To think that “mental load” is just another way to moan about normal adult life?

[ByNimbleCrow]

Everyone has responsibilities. Why do women act like keeping track of household tasks is some unique burden?

Considering my family and my friends’ families I think there is a mix between the woman taking on the mental load and it being split 50:50.

Where the woman takes on the lion’s share or all of the mental load, I would say the relationship is pretty awful and they would be better off divorcing. Where there is a fairer split, I think the families work better all round and the partnership is happy.

Right now I’m cleaning bathrooms whilst DP vacs up and mops downstairs. He does meal planning (I add bits but he does most of it) and usually I’d do the supermarket run.

The DC’s admin is done between us but I take the lead with play dates etc. He mostly cooks and I do the washing.

We have a very fair split so when sometimes I think of things to help him out (get him a Mother’s Day card for his mum) it’s no biggie. He was sending flowers anyway but I bought cards from him and DC which he appreciated.

If DP didn’t share ALL the load we wouldn’t be together.

The question to ask is, why do people stay in a relationship which isn’t fair and equitable - especially if it makes them unhappy?

Was your DH not at home after work or the weekend to do weaning?

I am a single parent and was previously in an unequal relationship. I can testify that the feeling of the mental load comes specifically from having a fully capable, mess-making but bone idle, adult in the house, who adds to the burden rather than sharing it. I now feel free of the mental load - I just crack on with my adult responsibilities and share them with my children when appropriate.

I can't get to grips with the crossword this morning so I need a good laugh!

This is exactly it. Not many people have difficulty with their own mental load it’s when you’re required to do it for other adults for no reason other than that you are expected to.

To take a random example. I used to have a job where roughly once every six weeks I would have to work on Sunday (in the office). My ex husband (who was a former chef and an excellent cook) would call me while I was working and interrupt conference calls to ask me what was in the fridge and what we needed for dinner. When he could walk over and look.

It’s the arrogance and entitlement of not bothering to apply your brain to something because you are confident someone else will pick up the slack. And not caring what other responsibilities that person has.

I think this captures the point. 'mental load' described the invisible work of thinking, planning, monitoring and there is usually a huge shift towards women once children arrive.

And expecting women to come up with a list of what needs doing is a large part of the burden.

Why can't men put thor minds to it and work out what needs attending to rather than asking women to figure it out.

Because it is a burden that generally falls on only one of the adults on the house despite them both having responsibilities.

I’ve never in my life heard that expression other than on MN so yes it does seem like a made up term to moan about daily life

Exactly. What kind of communication does a man need to know the dishes need done or the school uniforms need ironed? The infantilisation of men is so fucking tiresome.

No. Long hours and often working away. Even when he was back for mealtimes, I would have usually already done the batch cooking so it's irrelevant anyway.

Again, nitpicking small parts of comments is less useful than engaging with the overall point.

Yesterday my son had a football game. On Friday i washed his kit, dried overnight on a radiator, packed his bag, checked the location, match times, team mates and route. On Saturday i gave ds lunch well before the game so that he had time to digest. Made him a packed lunch, avoiding the allergens mentioned in the WhatsApp group.

His dad came to pick him up. To take him to the game. I tried to give him all the instruction about: timings, address, what colour shirt to wear for what, reminding to feed ds between games, what was in the bag, dont forget the water. He didn't even listen. Mucked around with son whilst i talked.

Yeah..but isn't he such a good dad taking his son to football! Bless him!

Presuming it’s a couple living together, the total admin workload isn’t double the admin workload for a single person. You have the same number of bins and bin days. You have the same number of rent/mortgage, gas/electric, water, internet and council tax bills. You don’t need to go grocery shopping twice as much.

I’m going to say it’s probably something you can’t understand fully until you have children OP.

Household tasks & personal admin is one thing, but I never really understood the “mental load” before I became a parent because it was all just either my own things or my own houses things, it wasn’t a huge task and none of it particularly took up any headspace for me.

But once you have children it’s a whole other level and it does make it all the more daunting. Suddenly there’s another person and someone needs to keep track of their milestones, make sure they’re hitting them & if not figuring out how you can help them to get there, keep track of what they’re eating, making sure they always have something they can eat, keeping track of their clothes & shoe size then making sure they always have things to wear in the correct size, a whole other person’s doctors and dentist appointments, nursery/school admin, figuring out who’s going to do drop off, pick up, evening meal, bedtime, breakfast, they’re unwell, who is staying off work? Is it me? How am I going to arrange that with my employer, when will I catch that work up?

It really does become a mental load to carry and unlike when it’s just you and a partner you can’t just drop the rope because that most impacts the tiny human you are trying so hard to take care of.

This! Like many things, the mental load is a very valid concept and clearly a lot of women are in relationships where their partner isn't pulling their weight. And also having to do all these tasks is tedious. Which I'm definitely going to moan about. But also some people have jumped on the concept to make out like they are some particular sort of victim. Happens in a million other areas too!

Clearly some women manage to resist this though. Just because society or your family say/expect you should do XYZ because that’s what women do, doesn’t mean you have to unquestioningly obey that. Where is the critical thinking and questioning of the status quo? Socialisation is absolutely a factor but nobody is so brainwashed they can’t resist it.

Clearly judging by the amount of these types of posts on MN communication seems to have died out years ago.

@takealettermsjones - it wasn't intended to be a "gotcha" - I just genuinely can't imagine choosing to marry a man who can't be trusted to feed his own children a safe and appropriate diet.

There are so many women on here who seem to have tied themselves to men who can't be trusted to run a bath, let alone run a household, and it just baffles me. A lot of the comments blame society, but we're all part of society and we don't have to tolerate behaviour that we find unacceptable just because it appears to be accepted on a wider scale.

I mean, you say your DH had no clue about feeding because you were on maternity leave and he wasn't - but surely he could have taken over in the evenings, or before work, or at weekends? Being on maternity leave (or a SAHM) doesn't have to mean that you automatically default into doing all of of the feeding (using your example).

I think for many families, it's easier to fall into "default roles" when one parent is home, and then when the mum goes back to work, it's hard to re-adjust expectations, which is why it's so vital to have everything split from day one, even if it seems counter-productive at the time.

The problem with that is that then the kids suffer when noone takes them to their activity or buys them shoes.

Don't get me wrong I agree with you - but some men WON'T step up, and then what do you do?

I completely agree. But clearly a lot of women struggle to do this, don’t they, so it’s important to raise the issue and discuss why. Without denying the existence of a mental load - which doesn’t help anyone.

Of course it's gendered. Look how many women are judged, or not liked on here, because birthday cards, presents, flowers, meals booked etc aren't done. It's always the SIL/DILs fault, never the BIL/Son. Women of my generation were considered responsible for the family's admin and a lot of MILs on here, still expect that. Some people on here must live in vacuums, because in RL, mothers are judged more than fathers.
I do think it's slowly changing, though, I see a equal number Dads and granddads at inspire days, pick ups, hobbies, as women carers. The unequal devision of labour can creep in during ML. It's a big decision to end your relationship over something that you will certainly be fully responsible for, as a single parent. So women get on with it. As said, if it's part of being an adult, then men would also have done it, going back decades, as they did gardening etc.

Sure, if you over complicate something then I guess it would seem burdensome.

We just had a shopping list for stuff that had run out

I did a quick scan to see what else would be needed

Never meal planned in my life (probably should have done). Just cooked what I felt like/what there was time for/what was available

Took the kids to the supermarket as there were no deliveries then

One in trolley, one walking

You just did it. Never gave it a second's thought

And sometimes my husband would do it at the weekend if I hadn't had time

(Admittedly I didn't work then. But - no deliveries)

Exactly.

Just because society expects X, doesn't mean you have to do X.

Maybe DH and I are exceptions, but we were both raised in households where our fathers did an equal share of the grunt work. My dad often took me to get my hair cut, or to buy shoes. He did the school runs, took me to do the food shop and taught me how to bake. FIL worked full-time, did all the cooking and his share of all the cleaning. He's now widowed and does everything without any kind of issue.

Yes, societal pressures are real, but they'll never change so long as people just blindly follow them. Change starts at home.

Gosh yes why would the extremely consistent gender imbalance in this relationship issue make it a gendered issue.
its been exacerbated by the increase in both parents working and work taking over more time. I’ve spent half the weekend working and 70% of it taking my dc to various sports plus some finance stuff. If dh hadnt done dinners and the shop and 3 loads of washing I’d not have slept. Which would tip anyone over the edge of coping.

That fine, if it's Christmas cards etc. Leaving your child to be devastated Christmas, Birthdays, School/hobby events, or to not have new school uniform etc isn't as easy.