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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

in not making Dh's packed lunch for him every day?

105 replies

pedilia · 16/04/2008 22:18

He will do it and doesn't ask me to but makes little comments that suggests he thinks I should be doing it, as in 'everyones wife at work makes them a packed lunch'

OP posts:
Lazycow · 17/04/2008 13:57

Well dh makes my lunch sometimes (though certainly not every day) and I pretty much never make his so I think I'm not the best person to ask

In my (sort of )defence we both work (me 4 days a week in an office 9-5.30pm ) and he full time but 1-2 days a week of that are from home.

Also I have quite big issues around food so he tends to make me lunch sometimes as he knows I will just eat junk otherwise and then moan about the weight I'm putting on!

Original poster
pedilia · 17/04/2008 14:08

Good seems like I'm in the clear then

OP posts:
sleepycat · 17/04/2008 14:12

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

beaniesteve · 17/04/2008 14:14

Depends on your reasons for sometimes doing it, sometimes not.

If you don't do it to make some kind of point then I am guessing he's getting teh point. If you don't do it because of time then can't blame you.

If you have to make them in the morning for your children it does seem a bit strange to me that you don't do them for you husband.

Miggsie · 17/04/2008 14:16

..so everyone has a packed lunch making wife where your DH works...so there are no women working where your DH does then???!!!!

I wonder why?!!!

And is it REALLY a talking point as to who makes their packed lunch for them? Do they feel all superior if they have a skivvy at home devoted neverendingly to producing packed lunches for their masculine ego? What a bunch of sexist twerps.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:25

I don't think it's necessarily about sexism - it's about what roles, and boundaries, you have agreed for yourselves. Here's what we did.

pre-children - DW WOH and me WAH (with a bit of WOH). I made her lunch. When I started WOH more, me made each other's. People found this amusing but it was the only way they'd get done.

mat leave - DW at home (obv) and me mostly WOH - she made my lunch. I didn't expect it but it was nice.

Post-mat-leave: both WOH - back to doing each other's again.

More recently - me WAH (mainly) and her WOH - we take it in turns to do the children's and sort our own out. I used to do hers, but to be honest she has stopped having sandwiches and started having weird organic yoghurt and fruit type stuff which she is quite happy to sort out herself.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:26

sorry - pre-children should say WE made each other's

DrNortherner · 17/04/2008 14:29

Make him do his own. Asif they all caht about who made their lunch anyway

Saying that, dh reckons most of teh guys he works with get woken up every morning with a BJ from ther wives.......

duchesse · 17/04/2008 14:31

What is he- 13? Of course you shouldn't have to make his packed fecking lunch! If you don't want to get confrontational about it, say you will make them, and then put horrible things in them. Eventually he'll get the idea and start to make his own again without moaning. The idle arse man.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:32

I think you're all being really horrible.

PrimulaVeris · 17/04/2008 14:32

If my DH asked me to make his lunch (I make my own and dc's every morning) I'm sorry, but he would rapidly be an ex-DH

I contribute quite enough to the Gross Domestic Product as it is

Miggsie · 17/04/2008 14:34

My DH has a canteen at his work...suggest that, and get them to ask for one only staffed by women who look like their wives.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:34

Do you never make your husbands a cup of tea? Do they never make you one?

amidaiwish · 17/04/2008 14:35

well on the point of whether you make him a packed lunch or not, i would say it really depends on which of you has the most time in the morning/evening whenever they are being made. If you are busting yourself seeing to the children, goats etc.. then no, you do not have time. But if he is seeing to the children and rushing himself and you are making some anyway then why not do it? i don't see the big deal.

However, i would object to the claim/statement "everyone else's wife makes it" as if it is your duty. that is insulting and demeaning. it smacks of "you are the little wife at home so make your hard working husband some food to take with him on his hard day at the office".

btw every man in our dept ate their packed lunch well before 10am and then came to the canteen with us. i was sworn to secrecy when i met them.

Libra1975 · 17/04/2008 14:36

I used to work in a place where this 26yr old still lived with his parents, now whilst I find that strange I admit in the current climate finding somewhere to live isn't easy HOWEVER his MOTHER used to still make his packed lunch.......

Both DH and I work full-time, I never take in a packed lunch but I sometimes make my DH one depending on what type of mood I am and if we actually have any food in the house. I love doing it but he doesn't expect it all and always says thank you, if either of those things changed then I would probably stop. I will probably start doing it more when I am on ML, it's just one of those little things that couples do for each other I think (and each couple has different things!)

However I will never, ever iron his (or the childrens come to think of it) clothes.

DrNortherner · 17/04/2008 14:36

I make my dh a cup of tea when he gets home from work - as soon as I have put a ribbon in my hair and put on a clean apron.

oiFoiF · 17/04/2008 14:36

dh has a 42 yr old who lives with his parents working for him...

amidaiwish · 17/04/2008 14:36

canteen for lunch and sworn to secrecy when i met their wives that should be. are you keeping up?!

Triggles · 17/04/2008 14:37

I'm not sure I understand what the big deal is with this. My DH has asked me to put together a lunch for him on occasion when he is running late for work while he gets showered and dressed. Key word I suppose is "asked" as opposed to ordered. I've done the same - asked him to put mine together when I was running late. No big deal.

Many are making it like a point of honour that they don't just simply do it to be nice. Personally, I like doing nice things for DH. He does the same for me. Why is it such a sticking point?

seeker · 17/04/2008 14:38

Being a SAHM is a full-time role. You are not his personal servant. I repeat - he is an adult and can therefore make his own lunch. I am being a SAHM for a year with my LO and have firmly told DP that this is to look after the children, not him. He doesn't need looking after."

So does this mean that you don't expect him to do Any child care or housework at all in the evenings and weekends?

PrimulaVeris · 17/04/2008 14:38

UD - well, making cups of tea could be start of the slippery slope of expectation to morning BJ's by the sounds of it

Though I reckon I make him more cups than he makes me ... actually that's given me an idea. The Primula household Tea chart. Performance related pay and all that.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:39

My point is that it's not some subservient surrendered wife thing, it's just a little kindness like making cups of tea and the numerous other things people do for each other in marriage. And I say that having been on both sides of the work fence.

amidaiwish · 17/04/2008 14:40

i'm with you unquietdad.

duchesse · 17/04/2008 14:40

UQD- the point is not about not doing something for our partners (of course I make tea etc for my husband, and the occasional packed lunch), but about the expectation being that it is expected because one is the woman, and therefore in the the "caring" role yadda yadda yadda. That way lies ongoing gender discrimination... As Ormirian said, if my husband requested that I make his packed lunch as a matter of course (rather than due to particular circumstances), he'd be removing his lunch box from somewhere painful.

UnquietDad · 17/04/2008 14:43

We all have things that are expected, though, don't we? (When the fuse blows in the cellar, who's more likely to go and sort it out?)

If you both work, obviously it's more complicated, but I bet numerous people have an arrangement like the one Triggle mentions above.

It's about being nice FGS. Sometimes I think you all secretly hate your husbands.

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