Straw poll - who handles all life admin in your house

[Lifeadmin22]

Just been having quite a terse disagreement with my husband about division of labour in our house.

I think I do far more than him and he seems to think this is absolutely fine/normal.

We have 3 children - an 8 year old and 5 year old twins. I went down to 3 days after the twins as we couldn’t afford full time childcare for them. I’ve changed my hours to school hours to accommodate drop offs and pick ups - of which I do them all. And then sort the kids when they get home, do their dinner etc. He gets home from the office and does help with books/bedtime.

I organise all doctors appointments, school admin, arranging holiday care, booking clubs, birthday parties, days out, our holidays.

To be fair to him, he does his share of ferrying them round, getting up in the morning, doing their breakfast while I get their uniform prepped and lunches made.

BUT basically I feel he sits back and waits to be told what to do and I’ve had enough of it. Like I’m his line manager dishing out tasks and telling him where he needs to be that day. Or he’ll happily come on a family day out but I need to think about where to go, book the tickets etc first.

He says he works full time and that no other dads do any admin so I should be grateful he does a lot more than most.

Im also resentful as I have a demanding job that I start at 9.30 and finish at 2.30 and have no lunch break as I’m so busy. He seems to think I’ve got the good end of the deal when actually I’m cramming a full time job into school hours and then have the children to manage the instant I’m finished. I don’t even have time for a lunch break! I do all the clearing up the minute I’m back from the school run and put a wash on and then have to be logged in working. He gets to swan off to the office, chat to colleagues and have plenty of hot coffees I’m sure!

AIBU to boot him out and change the locks!

It had always been me, but actually, everything going digital has enabled/forced me to make DH sort his own stuff out as I'm not able to access it.
I still have occasion to point out to him that he needs to deal with stuff, save stuff in emails to his One Drive or print stuff out so that I could access info if anything happened to him. How on Earth he's held down his job at senior management level for so long, when he doesn't even seem to think about this stuff, is beyond me!

Well, me, but he doesn't live with me. However I also seem to do a sizeable amount of his house's admin as well...

I have a disability so DH does all the physical tasks (plus we have a cleaner weekly) and I do all the Admin tasks. We have a baby on the way and plan to split mornings/evenings as fairly as possible. You have to find what works for you. Not him using what everyone else is doing as an excuse to do less.

Admin is shared in our house.

I do pretty much everything relating to DC (school, sports/activities, birthday parties, play dates, medical, clothes, toys, etc.)

DH does pretty much everything else (house, bills, cars, garden, tradesmen, legal issues, finances, insurance, dealing with MIL).

We plan holidays together.

Me,.all life admin falls to me. DH told me rather tersely last night that we need to stop waiting and get a prescription steroid for our son's eczema - yesterday was his day off with DS so when I asked why he didn't book a GP appointment for yesterday he looked blank!

I do more of the day to day stuff. I sort mortgage, insurance, bills, school stuff and hobbies. DH deals with the cars, MOTs, services. He's a tradesman so sorts bit and bobs around the house. We both book holidays and arrange days out together.

We both work full-time, I work from home so I do most of the school runs. If DH finishes earlier he'll do the school run. I put a washing on in the morning and DH will hang it up when he gets home. I do most of the cooking because I enjoy cooking but if I can't be arsed or have something on he'll do the dinner. Our teenager is in charge of the dishwasher and cleaning the kitchen at night. DH does all baths and bedtimes. He's supposed to clean the kids bathroom since he's in there more than me but I still have to remind him to do it because apparently empty toilet roll tubes, toothpaste everywhere and towels all over the floor isn't enough of a clue for him.

I'm like you in the sense that I do feel like the house project manager and although DH does some things without being asked he does need to be prompted sometimes. I've brought this up with him and explained the "mental load", it's a work in progress. This seems to be quite common from what I read on MN. It's weird how women don't need to be told that the hall needs a hoover or the windows need cleaned but men do. 🙄

It sounds like your DH only values paid work. He thinks he's doing more because he gets paid for his work. He doesn't see all the unpaid hours you do as actual work.

This was one of many reasons I left my, now ex, husband.

I did have some karma tho, about 6 months after we separated he crashed his car. He rang me in a rage, as it wasn't MOT'd so his insurance wouldn't pay out the full amount. The insurance had run out 2 months after we separated. He raged at me because I hadn't 'reminded' him it needed its MOT. Oh how I laughed

Husband does cars, insurance and utilities. I do school/kids activities admin and pets, we do finances jointly and share the ferrying around.

I’ve already said multiple times that it’s 3 days spread over 5. It’s supposed to be a few hours less on a Friday but inevitably isn’t. sorry if that wasn’t clear.

Even it is, I would have to spend that time cleaning as we don’t have enough spare cash for a cleaner at the moment.

The stickler probably is that I would just like to be appreciated. I feel that he only has himself to worry about but my mental load is absolutely overflowing and it goes totally unnoticed.

Personally I have found rather than saying "you don't do enough" (which will start an argument), saying "I'm buckling under the mental load right now, can you take responsibility for bedtimes/ school admin/ XYZ because I can't manage thinking about it". If you go in appreciating what he DOES do (which is a lot more than some men!) I'm sure he will want to help you out. Alternatively, you could offer to further reduce working hours?

Me.

I was getting there with trying to make things more equal. It took YEARS and i made SOME progress with my very willing but disorganised DH.

DH has now retrained and is out on sites literally all day, 5 days a week, and I WFH 3 days a week (and 2 in the office) so I have the time to sort it all now and DH absolutely doesn't.

Nevermind, at least he's working hard.

Me. I'm good at it, dh isn't.

Stop working extra and not being paid for it op. that will give you some time back in the evenings at least

i would write out all the tasks that need doing and start splitting them

but I also always get confused by all this life admin people have. We pay everything by direct debit, so most things just need reviewing yearly.

I have a weekly shop delivered each week which I check through and update the day before

what is this admin you’re doing each day/ week?

@anonhop this is probably the best way to do it but I feel so bloody resentful that it’s on me again to have to sweet talk him into doing a fairer split of the mental load.

And “help me out” rankles with me as it shouldn’t just be my responsibility as it’s his house and kids as well!

I would actually love to quit work as frankly I can’t do both things properly - failing on all fronts but we can’t afford for me to drop any lower. We have a big mortgage as had to renovations on our house for our son with a disability. (Guess who organised everything to do with that too …..!!!!)

I thinknit is normal, but that doesn't mean it's OK.

We are pretty even in our house but I think that's mainly because we don't have kids, so a lot less admin full stop and more obvious who is responsible for what.

I do think it works better to have designated things. So I do all the hoovering, DH does all the washing. I have my systems/timings on when I do mine, he has his. But the onus for each persons chore being done lies with them.

So for e.g., could you assign parties to DH? So he does all replies, ferrying kids there/back, and presents. If he forgets the present, he has to apologise to DC and so on - so his mistakes will come back on him. Maybe not a good example, but something like that?

Edit to add: I fucking hate "other men are worse" as an argument. As if we should be greatful that a man isn't being quite as totally shit as it's possible to be!!

We have 3 dc school age. Both work ft in stressful jobs. I do around 70% I'd say. He does the financial stuff and car stuff and now the kids are a bit older I also give him specific chunks of stuff I'd normally do, like Christmas and birthdays I'll say you're in charge of getting x child's gifts. I used to also be the one to make sure he knew when his sister's kids' birthdays were etc but I stopped that about 5 years ago because he doesn't even know when my sisters kids birthdays are. No one seems to have fallen out over the fact. I did somehow become responsible for getting his dad's online shopping during covid which then became permanent which I then passed over to him swiftly once I had a word with myself.

We have about one argument per month about the whole thing.

My life admin includes:

Checking finances - ensuring all DD’s are paid and reviewed annually, transfer money into savings, making manual payments (gardener, window cleaner, cleaner, annual freeholder fee - we don’t know how much these things are in advance so they have to be paid manually), ensure we have a budget for any upcoming costs (including getting quotes etc), ensure we stick to the budget

Bookings - days out (tickets, restaurants, parking etc), holidays/weekend away, medical appointments, beauty appointments, DIY/Repairs/Maintenance of the house/appliances, Car repairs

Shopping - Do a meal plan and order the correct items, replace household items (cleaning products, light bulbs, batteries, water filters, kitchen stuff, bedding, towels, new appliances) sort new car, buy clothing and toiletries etc

Organisation - clear out cupboards, sell items we no longer want/need, put shopping away, sort parcels and decide if keeping/arrange returns

Child - We have a baby on the way and I’ve already planned what we need to buy, what needs to be set up or prepared before baby arrives, booked us on ante natal classes
and a first aid course. I don’t doubt I will be responsible for arranging everything to do with the child - post partum admin (register birth, get passport, register GP, book medical appointments, sort childcare, sort education, buying what they need, organising their items etc

DH is good with cleaning and doing the physical chores and he actually hates mess/dirt and does a better job of cleaning than any cleaner we’ve ever had but he just doesn’t see how things get organised and the mental load of it, he buys his own clothes and that’s it. We have a scan at the hospital tomorrow he doesn’t even know what its hospital it is/how far away it is/what time we need to leave/what they will be checking for etc just clueless, whereas I’ve been worrying for weeks, he’s more concerned about the football league table atm!!

Same bullshit on my house, OP. I get enraged regularly.

Same bullshit in my workplace with the women doing all the work, planning, strategy...

Instead of comparing you & DH's different workloads, might it be more constructive to compare your different amounts of leisure time?

Tot up how much free time you each get, and show it to him in a calm way, with a view to making the situation objectively more fair.

I do everything you've listed as well. I work FT just like DH so it grinds my gears. But he's forgetful and doesn't take the time to do things properly so 99% of the time I'm better off doing it. I'm a control freak and the thought of him taking any control over the household finances has me in a cold sweat so there's no way I would let him do anything involving money.
That said he does most of the morning routine with the kids, cooks and ferries DS around to all his football things so it's not like he does nothing. I'm just tired of everyone looking to me to make every decision.

Fairly evenly split - Dh does stuff like utilities, opening bank accounts, keeping an eye on passport and insurance expiry dates and sorting them out, Mot bookings, taking bins out, arranging chimney sweep etc
He is way more organised and focused with this stuff. We sit down for an hour at the end of each month to go over finances for the following month, but it's Dh who does the actual grunt work.

I do dealing with tradesmen, organising holidays and everything that surrounds them (boarding pets, cancelling deliveries etc), diarising social stuff, ensuring family receive birthday and Christmas cards/presents (tbh it's mostly my family anyway).

We each do our own work related stuff, tax, pensions, but do discuss.

Housework evenly split. DH is much more thorough with cleaning kitchen and bathroom but wouldn't think to do door frames/skirting/light fittings.

After years of wrangling, me lowering my stamdards a lot and periodic arguments we had a system that kind of worked but when our DD reached primary age it became evident she had SEN and all the admin for that has fallen on me (which is very very common). People without SEN or disability in the family don't realise it exponentially increases admin. 18 months of work here including 2 tribunals just to get the stage that we may be within sight of the EHCP.

Anyway, I have no magic solution but:

• When you have a choice of the way to do things, set them up the way that's least trouble or most benefit for you.
• Things that inconvenience only your husband if not done, don't do.
• Your needs matter: you need lunch, a break, a bit of time away from the kids - make those happen.
• Look out for things he can take on in their entirety. DD plays football. I don't get involved at all apart from occasionally watching.
• Consider working more hours and using some of the extra money to outsource. Part time works for me but our set up is different and the civil service is a reasonable employer from what I hear.
• Harden your heart a little.
• Don't accept "you're lucky I do anything at all." What?! DH does more than most other dads we know. Luckily, as he's not an arse, his reaction is: "I know it's not OK that Other Dad is clueless! I saw you rolling your eyes!" I also prioritise time around the (one!) family we know with a good division of labour.

Your wellbeing matters as much as your husband's.

@Phineyj the admin for a child with a disability is off the charts and the sheer number of appointments 🤯

Our child has an echp but the process was an absolute nightmare and guess who had the job of dealing with every single element of it!!

Really hope you manage to get yours sorted - was a huge weight off when it finally got agreed. Also had to go to tribunal (although they capitulated before we got there in our case) so feel your pain x

Yes totally this. I even get “what should they wear today” when he’s getting them ready 🤯🤯🤯 You know where their clothes are - just choose something!!

He takes two kids to football and clubs but I book them on, pay the invoices and handle the admin of it!

Writing all this down I feel like the biggest mug going!

And it’s so deeply unsexy having to be someone’s mum

You're not a mug. It just takes a while to notice the structural sexism in society. I didn't really till DC.

But those clubs can hand right over to DH at next renewal point yes?!