AIBU to hate the term mental load?

[YeahIsaidit]

I cringe every time I read it, people lamenting that they can't cope with the mental load, partners aren't taking on an equal share of the mental load, argh! They're chores, household tasks, jobs. Mental load makes it sound like you're suffering from some kind of mental health issue rather than being dragged down by housework, stop it.

YABU. DH is retired and on a smallish pension. DC do not contribute anywhere near what they cost and almost nothing to cleaning the house. I work FT, but the housework doesn’t get done while I’m at work and the shopping is expected to be my responsibility, as well as the cooking, and the corralling of DC to do basic tasks. I’m also the oldest in the house. My mental load is crazy - and unfair. Why should I have to take charge of everything that needs doing when I’m the one doing all of the providing?

Hahaha yes! Very succinctly put.

I agree. I think op is being deliberately obtuse.

Anyone can see that a couple of mundane tasks = not hard to organise or do

An endless stream of mundane tasks = oppressive

@YeahIsaidit I don't think the term mental load is discussed on here with the word "sharing" in front of it.

You are a single parent so yes, you sort everything out. That's fine.

But in relationships where there are two parents, and one has the task of thinking about/doing everything because the other is a lazy shit that's different. Not only is someone having to carry the mental load of their own life (which we all need to do as you have alluded to) they are having to carry someone else's.

How else would you describe this if not mental load?

Id never heard the term until I came on here but its so accurate. Its not just a bit of admin but the relentless grind of being responsible for everything.
It completely grinds me down at times.

YABU
Overdoing it physically can have a toll, and the same applies mentally (or emotionally).

MistressOfTheDarkSide you write beautifully and should write more as really enjoyed reading your well thought out post and sorry for your loss. Do you write for a living, you should write short stories as you do it so well. Same age as yourself and am staying single.

Mental load isn't the act of who does what around the house. It's about where the default responsibility lies.

There are some things in our house that I don't think about. The fairies take care of those areas of our home as far as I'm concerned. Other parts of our home DH doesn't have to think about. I'm the fairy that keeps those areas running. If I need DH to do something in 'my' areas then I'll tell him and vice versa but we carry different mental loads.

The reason it comes up on Mumsnet is because too many women seem to fall into being the default adult, default parent, default housekeeper because it doesn't register to their partner that he might need to make sure the children have their dentist appointment booked, or to check the book bag for a newsletter, or to buy a birthday card for their sibling's birthday next week. They expect their wives to do all the mental responsibility and then delegate them tasks

HaHa at Bev's post, gave me a good laugh !!!!

Just to add aswell dh is not lazy at all but has very basic IT skills so everything falls to me. I can sort of handle this but he then relentlessly asks the same questions. ie what time do we fly? What time do we land over and over ( we have just been on holiday). I started saying this is the last time i am going to answer so write it down if you genuinely can’t remember.
I found one of my best responses to repetitive inane questions on here & use it a lot - if only you had a computer in the palm of your hand that tell you everything you need to know!

I think it's quite an apt description personally, it's not chores, it's the organisation and responsibility behind everything, I think it would only really come up as a problem in couples though IMO.

You have all the mental load of your household OP, but the reason you don't feel the need to complain about it on the internet is because you don't have anyone to share it with even if you wanted to, to you it's just normal life. When I lived on my own it wouldn't have even crossed my mind to refer to it that way either, it's just adulting.

As soon as you bring a partner into the household, you're supposed to be 'sharing' that ML equally by default, you shouldn't have to 'adult' a partner of equal standing in your relationship the same way you do a child, and that imbalance is what causes a lot of problems in relationships, hence complaints on mumsnet! It's not really a hard concept to grasp.

One person in a couple SHOULDN'T have to think of everything for their household, one single person SHOULD have to think of everything for their household.

Mental load is definitely a thing. I listened to my mother rant about it growing up (not using that same term) and now it's me in my family carrying the mental load. And that's not to say we have unloving dimwit husbands. It's just the way the penny has dropped and trying to undo it almost feels like more work.

Why are you carrying the load for DHs if they can't remember that they need to put socks in the wash, looks like they won't be wearing any socks huh.

"I couldn't decide which child would be regularly let down by DH so I took on both" is it perhaps this attitude that's making all these men "lazy", being fed up with being told over and over that they're doing things wrong so they just don't bother? If I was regularly nagged and told I was doing everything wrong/badly I wouldn't bother either. I refuse to believe that half of the population are that scatterbrained, inept, lazy and wouldn't function if they didn't have a woman doing everything for them. Sure, there are lazy useless people everywhere but that isn't limited to the half of the population that has a dick.

As far as mothers being the default parent I don't think it's "the patriarchy" causing this but more what happens right after birth, particularly with maternity leave and having months/years at home with baby, it's through that that kids naturally defer to their mum when needing something but that doesn't mean mum can't say oh dad will do that etc or ask dad to change nappies, do the bath etc etc. It's often the case that mums work PT when kids are young so are more likely to be around for the parents days, school plays etc etc. Would it be better if you got 4 weeks (up until recently 2) to bond with baby and then back to work while dad stayed home? Switch things up a bit.

I did start this being annoyed by the phrase and a lot of the comments here have cemented it, ideal world yep household jobs are shared but God pick your battles, moaning about who remembers to buy washing up liquid or make sure sports kits are ready, buying in laws presents (why, don't do this, DH parents, DH gift buying, if he doesn't it's him that'll look the arsehole, not you, you're taking this on needlessly, lighten your load) and all the other dopey petty shite that's being moaned about, give over its being an adult with kids and pets, grow up. If you want your partner to do more, tell them, stop taking responsibility for THEIR STUFF, you'll see that they can indeed work the washing machine and make appointments. Making a martyr of yourself and then going online to complain so 100s can justify your whining is making women look worse than any of this perceived misogyny that YOU ARE CHOOSING TO PUT UP WITH!

Thank you for the supportive comments on my post - much appreciated as my own “mental load”, while caused by widowhood, a failing business and various other cumulative issues has me at a breaking point I’ve never experienced before despite weathering many storms, and I can totally empathise with anyone whose circumstances can be described by this useful shorthand phrase. It conveys a cumulative effect of having to always consider many things due to the feeling of default responsibility. Constant brain activity is exhausting so expressing solidarity is the least we can do sometimes.

@BOOTS52PollyPrissyPants Thank you for your kind and encouraging words. Funnily enough you’re the second person in a week who has encouraged me to take up the pen again. It means a great deal to be encouraged at the moment x

If you don't like the term "mental load", you don't have to use it though? It clearly doesn't apply to you and your life, which is brilliant, but why the annoyance at people who it does apply to? That's what I don't get. Unless you're just here to wind up other women who are finding life difficult?

I definitely felt the 'mental load' when my DCs were little. I remember DH and I booking a "break" away when DS was 7 months old. Fucking self catering.

DH did all the research, booked it, loaded up the car, and drove us there. He genuinely felt like he'd done his bit. DH did his own packing, a small holdall with a couple of pairs of pants and socks, a spare pair of trousers, and two t-shirts. Job done.

I did my own packing, which was fine. And I also did the packing and organising for our newly weaned 7 month old.
We're all mums on here, I don't need to elaborate on how much packing and organising it took to get the baby 'holiday ready'.
I'd stopped BFing at 4 months, so we needed the full shebang of sterilising equipment. I made sure we had a full tub of his regular formula, and six bottles with the correct size of teats.
DC was going to be swimming in the pool, so I went to get the swim nappies
I bought a travel cot to take with us, and packed the bedding from his own cot at home so it would feel familiar.
I packed a baby case with nappies, wipes, Metanium, nappy bags, teddies, sleeping bags, Calpol.
I did all the prep for weaning food - I was looking at baby weaning recipes, I went shopping for the ingredients, cooked it, pureed it (as we did back in those days), I portioned it into little tubs, and packed it all into a cool bag.
We arrived at our accommodation and DS was hungry. I warmed his food, put him in his high chair, put a bib round his neck, and handed DH the bowl of food.
DH fed him, and thought he'd done his share.

That's what's called the "mental load".

Everyone does life admin. As a single parent and carer I do it for myself, two teenagers one with SEN, and an adult with dementia. On top of FT work. Shit yes it's a mental load. It's not just the time spent on the admin, it's the time spent on anticipating, remembering, reminding, chasing up, evaluating, and planning four schedules so they dovetail. It's largely invisible work but I'm surprised you don't see it, OP.

OP you are being deliberately obtuse and reductive.

It has been explained over and over that it’s a cumulative phenomenon and the examples you use are often “the straw that breaks the camels back”.

Once again you talk of picking one’s battles, making poor choices, and martyrdom.

“Why can’t a woman be more like a man?” seems to be your subtext. Well, of course we can. But we will be vilified by men and women alike.

A father dissatisfied with his wife can walk away, largely unfettered and find another domestic set up that suits him. As long as he pays his dues, and rocks up to play Disney Dad when necessary, society judges very little. But if a woman does that, out come the daggers.

It’s a dangerous game to play, blindly expecting, watching and waiting for a man, who for whatever reason doesn’t meet his child’s needs, to figure out he needs to step up. A mother who stands by and refuses to step in and make sure those needs are met adequately and in a timely fashion could end up being considered complicit in neglect later down the line.

Raising children is another paradox of modern times, both competitively fetishised and trivialised.

All humans wish to be loved, valued and validated. The complexities of modern society pit us all against each other on so many levels. For all our increased knowledge we’re regressing at an alarming rate.

Ah, thanks OP, we didn't realise all we had to do was say something and stop washing socks.

Thank goodness you've enlightened us.

The term just acknowledges this stuff is work - domestic labour. That usually gets ignored. And is different in quantity and quality to the basic life admin that every grown-up does for themselves.

Doesn't imply moaning or not being able to cope. And yes, many of us chose it. Just as we chose our paid employment and often acknowledge how knackering it is.

But the real purpose of having a dedicated phrase is not to pathologise normal life - it's a feminist act of naming the unpaid female labour (including mental and emotional labour) on which our society depends.

Why do you tolerate that? Seriously.

as the expression goes, no one can take advantage of you without your consent.

Sounds awfully like just giving up and being a victim to me.

Who cares if you're vilified and by whom exactly? Noone is suggesting being a man but having standards based on mutual respect and not wavering from the bare minimum expectations.

I'd rather be single with kids than to look after a adult baby that lacks mutual respect. That's progress to me. Being a doormat and moaning about it is as far away from being a feminist as I can possibly imagine.

I sometimes wonder when the tipping point will come and if it ever arrives for some women.

If you don’t understand what something means there is a thing called google. Maybe ask a child to help you if it’s a bit tricky.

While you are looking mental load up, have a look at what it is likely to cost you when you get divorced. Because I have a feeling that is where your life is heading.

I love this thread! I don't get the mental load problem either.

There was a thread last week where a woman said she had colleagues with a mental load that had to spend their lunch break picking out an anniversary present for their SIL as their H would not bother.

WTF!

This is making work for yourself.

Don't bother!

There’s no real mental load of being a single parent of a teenager, ds can look after his own needs or let me know what he needs. The mental load was there when they were younger, when I had 2 younger children needing lifts, equipment, packed lunches etc in different directions at the same time, as well as working ft, making sure the dog was let out for a wee and taken for a walk, the shopping was done, the house was cleaned, we all had clean clothes in the right sizes… It was there as a single parent and when xh was around, whether xh did his share or not (although you can probably guess that he didn’t by the fact that we’re divorced).
Great work on getting your dc to understand the value of putting their washing in the basket in 10 seconds by only telling them once, it took me years of repeating the same message over again with mine.

I did Google, it's all the same tripe that was spouted here, project managers of the household only women do this bla bla bla. If you're all married to inept men who can't see dirty dishes, organise an appointment or work out that you need to buy more loo roll when it's running low I feel sorry for you. You don't have to put up with it though. Step back a bit, it doesn't mean you're complicit in neglect ffs. You really think these fathers are just going to let their kids run around in ill fitting, dirty clothes and have no idea who to call or when should they need a doctor or dentist? Why did you marry someone so shite?

I have mentioned a couple of times that I'm a single parent so no need to worry about my pending divorce. Some of you might want to look into it though lose the useless sacks of shit who are incapable of running a household