To ask what made your partner "step up"?

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I am really hoping this doesn't turn into a man-bashing thread, but here goes...

I am wondering if any of you have experience of your partner (or indeed yourself) deciding to "step up". What prompted this decision? Was it successful, as in, did it result in long-term change? Was therapy involved and did it help?

Basically, like a large number of other women, after our first child arrived, I felt like I was doing the lion's share of all the domestic duties. My husband isn't a horribly selfish person, but since the birth most of the time he just doesn't put himself out to help out. For example, he will not forgo drinking his coffee quietly while it's still hot in order to change a dirty diaper, wipe sticky hands, bring down washing, etc. He has no compunction about leaving DC to whine and cry that he's hungry, because DH wants to finish watching an episode of his show before he deals with dinner. He leaves the dishes to do "in the morning", when having a cluttered and messy kitchen makes life harder in the mornings.

Before kids, there were just not so many of these time sensitive tasks and he doesn't seem to realise that this is life with small children - that a lot of our ability to do exactly what we want when we want is on hold until DC is more independent.

However. He really, truly believes he is being an equal partner. He wants to be an equal partner. He thinks he is doing the lion's share, and thinks my expectations are either being met or are unreasonable. By any measure, I am doing more, but he just doesn't accept this. To me, it really feels like he has the mindset of a young guy without responsibilities and just has a bit of "growing up" (for want of a better term) to do, than that he is a bad, selfish, waste of space human. I'm just not sure how long I can deal with the current situation and am looking for hope.

I hear a lot about ExPs who didn't step up, and I hear a lot about people who never felt they had to, but I don't think I've ever read a thread where people talk about successful personal growth in this way.

So I am wondering, were any of you in a similar situation? Did you have a partner who thought they were sharing the load (or did you yourself), until the scales fell from their eyes? What prompted that realisation, and did it stick?

And before it is brought up, we are both open to couples counselling, but we have not yet had a lot of success with it.

he already thinks he does more than me

Yeah. Right.

He would say that, wouldn't he?

He is gaslighting you. Letting you tie yourself in knots, trying to justify what cannot be justified.

NowDH was devastated when his first wife divorced him. He learned from his mistakes, which he was quite open about while we were dating. Still slips back sometimes but responds well to my asking the question: is it fair to ...

Not sure how this applies in your case

She does not.

She sounds like a woman with self respect, that knows her worth.

I think that’s the bit my DH was missing in his mind. Basically, if you want a housewife and SAHM, you’ve got to work to pay for it. But if you want to share the economic load and enjoy the lifestyle that comes from having two earners, then you’ve got to step up on the home front.

This is so true. Too many men people subscribe to 'selective equality' - and cherry pick which equality suits them, ignoring the rest.

I've never got passed how crap my ex dp was during the first year. One of many examples - We'd just moved into our first owned home a month before the baby was born I was 23 and he was 27. We needed a bookcase and dp took up woodwork and decided to build the mother of all bookcases, he spent all of his spare time building it, no nails or screws it had to be done with proper craftsmanship! I left him when my son was 4 after finding out he was on dating websites. He was the last to leave the house, he left the half finished bookcase behind in the shed. He used it to opt out of any parenting and in the end he didn't even care enough to take it with him. Just sums the whole sorry relationship up. We get along a lot better now, he's having a baby with his new partner and I do hope he will be a better partner.

if you want a housewife and SAHM, you’ve got to work to pay for it.

I don't like this argument, really, because it lets him think he has bought your time and has no responsibility for anything in the domestic sphere. It doesn't say anything about what happens at the weekend when he has two days off

Does he step up then, or do you, as SAHP, end up working as normal?

I prefer the 'equal leisure time' approach those even that is flawed. I much prefer working outside the home to domestic drudgery so we both work and have a cleaner, gardener etc

We went to couples counselling which really helped. At the time I was working 4 (long) days a week, planning our wedding (he did the playlist 🙄) as well as looking after our 2 young children and the resentment I was feeling over this was leading to huge arguments. I was massively overwhelmed. He was resentful of me never wanting to have sex/show affection/being angry all the time. The counsellor was able to help him make the connection between me feeling like the parent in the relationship and therefore not wanting intimacy because who wants to have sex with a man child?! We also went through a 'To Do' list on a Sunday of what needed doing over the following week and we divvied it up. By going through this every Sunday we could also see what hadn't been done the previous week and so there was no need for me to constantly nag him about jobs which i hated doing. I didn't want to be 'project managing' him and his list of things to do. Anyway things massively improved - he really upped his game in terms of just cracking on with things without me constantly needing to ask/tell him. Things aren't perfect, I still carry much more of the mental load but to be honest I'm happy being in charge of some of this stuff but we're definitely a lot happier than we were. Good luck!

No, you’re right, and I didn’t mean to suggest that SAHMs/housewives should be 24/7 skivvies.

The point I was making is that men can’t enjoy the benefits of being part of a two-income household while also enjoying the benefits of having a wife who stays at home running the household/providing childcare.

Very fair. In our case, my husband is a workaholic and I earn much less but end up doing most of the child/house stuff simply because I am around to do it. He makes payments every month into my personal savings/pension to compensate me to some extent for what I lose by not being able to progress my career to the same extent that he can, on the back of my unpaid labour and care for our children.

Not all of these men can be without a brain cell or two and surely some of them hold responsible jobs requiring a modicum of intelligence. So imo most of them must be capable of understanding the economic value of unpaid labour and domestic work. It is surely a fairly easy mental leap from grasping this concept to realising that they are exploiting their partners economically and financially if they don't either pull their weight or provide financial compensation for the disparity in labour.

In answer to your question, OP, though - how did I get my husband to pull his weight? Our problem is slightly different in that he isn't lazy, he's a workaholic who is always in the office. But he is also very conventional at heart and would do anything to avoid a broken relationship or living apart from his children. So that gave me quite a lot of leverage to make demands. While it is still not a 50/50 split in any sense and he couldn't even begin to tell you what is required to run the household/children, he mucks in as best he can when he's around, he takes the children out at the weekend to give me some time to myself and I send him a list of admin jobs at the beginning of each week to progress, which he works through during his commute. He also does his own laundry and cooking and cleans the kitchen after he gets back from work (usually when we're all asleep). But it took threatening divorce and meaning it to get to this point, and he still tends to get food for himself and ignore everyone else, which drives me mad. Our oldest DC has started to pull him up on this - "Daddy, I'm hungry... Daddy, I want this..." etc. He's better at meeting articulated needs than anticipating needs, so they get along fine now DC can say what they want or need.

The best example of men pulling their weight in my life are two women acting absolutely helpless. One does no housework. She is the one reading a book while her dh is running around frazzled. If they invite us for dinner he literally does every single thing. Meantime he looks adoring at her and laughs at all her jokes. Seems to have no issue with it. She just announces: l don't do housework!! And he laughs.
Other woman does housework but has a lot of very specific tasks she absolutely will not do. Her dh has to do these no matter if the roof falls in. He has an extremely busy job. He never complains or seems to see any problem with this.
Actually my mil was the same. She depended on fil to do everything and he waited on her with no resentment.
I wonder are we our own worst enemies running around doing everything and very soon are left too much to do.

'I guess maybe that's really what I'm asking. How do I communicate myself more clearly so that he gets what I'm dealing with? But I guess that's not something Mumsnet can answer.'

I can answer it but you won't like the answer...You have communicated it to him: he doesn't care.

I know you don't want to "bash him" so I'm choosing my words carefully but you won't change this type of man. Unless you get some sort of life limiting illness and he's forced to step up, he's not going to. You need to accept your lot, submit to the fact that you will always carry more of the burden of childrearing - if you accept it then your resentment will be temporarily dampened.

Or leave him.

Another poster said if you threatened to leave he sounds like the type who would cut his nose off and let you leave - and I agree. So I would only threaten if you are fully prepared to go through with it.

You've asked him multiple times and you've said he's just argued and discounted your feelings and contribution. He's not on your team. Instead of coming together to make things better for the family unit he's out for himself and to be "right". The only sliver of hope is that he's open to counselling as these types would usually baulk at the suggestion, so it's worth a shot for the sake of your children but the damage is already done IME. It's a betrayal when a partner acts this way, it's not something you forget and you'll probably never look at him the same again.

I hope one way or another things get easier for you OP, it's a frustrating, often soul destroying, position to be in 💐

he sounds really pedantic and childish-if getting up in the night is so easy why doesnt he do it all night

all this no it doesnt take this amount of time its this is really pathetic

You're not a breastfeeding mum are you? All the research on this says feeding on demand is completely biologically normal and night weaning isn't recommended at this age. Babies feed for comfort, pain relief, through transitions...all sorts.

Agree with this.

Also, sometimes I see women on this site that try to describe what their life was like after ditching the dick head ex… the word “peaceful” comes up a lot. And I’ve never understood it to just mean “the arguments stop” but… y’know. All the frazzle. I think they mean that all the unnecessary noise stops… even that little voice in your head that is saying “why am I the only one that ever empties the fucking dishwasher”

Just food for thought, OP.

Some time ago on a thread I read a woman saying that it had emerged during couple counselling that the reason her STBX had never stepped up on the domestic front during their long marriage was "because he didn't want to".

That still blows my mind. The effrontery and arrogance of the man. He simply opted out because he wanted to.

So often you see women asking what they can do to make men step up, like there's a special key or word or way of phrasing it that will unlock his understanding of how unfair it is.

The truth is there is no special key and all the successful examples upthread are ones where the women threatened to make their lives harder (by leaving) or completely withdrew their labour (by being ill, leaving).

So they know, they just don't care until the shit hits the fan, and sometimes not even then.

I think it depends on what sort of selfish the man is to begin with. They all seem to be intrinsically selfish in some way. Different types of selfish then become good or bad dads/husbands.

Our oldest DC has started to pull him up on this - "Daddy, I'm hungry... Daddy, I want this..." etc. He's better at meeting articulated needs than anticipating needs, so they get along fine now DC can say what they want or need.

I think this is it men don't as general rule anticipate but can respond to articulated needs hence the nagging dynamic

I think the nappy situation you describe would send me completely insane. He does it but only when you tell him to and after he's finished his drink/telly programme and then rows with you about how long it takes? Why does the fact that you're miserable not bother him? I've wasted a lot of time in the past asking men to step up and do their fair share until I realised that they were happy to see me do all the shit work and i will never go back there.

My DH has never been lazy or selfish but there was definitely a period of inequality in our relationship due to him having the stereotypical 'big important man job' with zero flexibility, combined with a hellish commute. He still pulled his weight when he was at home, but he was rarely at home and this caused some resentment. I worked fewer hours so the Mental Load inevitably fell to me. When lockdown happened and he was working from home all the time DH saw how much he had been missing. He also saw everything I'd been juggling. He liked being able to do his share of school drop offs and have tea with the DC instead of getting back when they were already in bed 5 nights a week. This prompted him to look for a job closer to home, still full time and a lot of responsibility, but no evenings or weekends. Now things are much more equal. Crucially though, he wanted to be around for the kids and to do his share. He wanted things to be more equal and recognised that something needed to change. I'm not sure how you can 'make' someone "step up" if they don't actually want to be an equally involved parent or if they're deluding themselves that they already are.

But doesn't their lack of anticipating needs come down to feeling that it's not their responsibility? It's "women's work" essentially - so they'll do their bit to "help" if they're told what to do, but they won't assume responsibility for the domain they feel is beneath them. There's no shiny short term incentives to drudge domestic work, so they'd rather leave it to someone else. Because they always have.

It's sexism not an innate defect, otherwise how do they miraculously succeed in jobs where forecasting and anticipating is essential?

I'm quoting @billy1966 's post because she's totally right, and she has spelt it out far better than I could.

"I guess maybe that's really what I'm asking. How do I communicate myself more clearly so that he gets what I'm dealing with?"
You HAVE communicated clearly. There are no magic words, he's heard what you have to say and he understands you perfectly. He just wants you to continue to be his skivvy.

"He is an arguer by nature (and upbringing) and would argue the sky was green if I happened to mention it was blue, whereas I am very argument avoidant."
He likes to argue. He will continue to argue that he does more than you, not because he believes he does, but because he likes to win arguments more than he likes you. Your happiness is less important to him than 'winning'.

"Whenever I try and raise it with him, he completely discounts how much I do."
Of course he does, it's a tactic he deploys to 'win' the argument. Remember, he cares more about arguing than he does about you.

He is, as billy has said, a dud. He always has been, but now it's really really impacting on you. It's exhausting you, it's draining you, and it's high time you asked yourself - 'should I put up with this forever, because he is NOT going to change?'. Because he really really won't change. "He is an arguer by nature (and upbringing)". Anything you could say (and probably already have said) to him is just the starting-point for him to metaphorically draw himself tall and start detailing all the ways you are wrong and he is right about absolutely everything. So - anything you say (and probably already have said) is just wasting your time and energies. I'm sorry. Stop believing there is any possible way that you could "communicate myself more clearly so that he gets what I'm dealing with". There isn't.

I'd tend to agree. I imagine most men anticipate fine what they need to do at work. Unfortunately many care more about what their bosses, co-workers and friends think of them than their partners and children.

I find this completely believable.

The only thing shocking is the honesty.

CBA is the favourite acronym for these lazy wasters, ........"can't be arsed".

It's who they are. Wasters as men, partners and fathers.

No one will ever be more important than them.

Way to go!! 🙌

Bit drastic, but like @JlL2013 upthread, I got cancer. He had to step up and he did. I'm now cancer free, but I'd say the workload split is 80/20, with him doing the 80 part. I don't feel guilty, I spent years doing 95% of the workload, he's catching up on what he missed.

Therapy and medication! Honestly, the change has been amazing I'm still in shock tbh.