To think some parents use “mental load” as a way of avoiding accountability?

[PlainGreyReader]

I know the mental load is real but sometimes it feels like people use it as a get out of jail card for not doing practical stuff. AIBU?

I have always got examples on the go for this. From the last few days:

The child my kid is going to forest school with is stuck in Canada. I am looking into booking another ticket and getting a different friend on board. Communicating with Canada-stuck mum, other mums and forest school.
Auditing two sets of school uniform and filling in the gaps through online shopping in time for the new term.
Trying to track down two secondhand car seats for our second car ahead if going fulltime and office based from September. Using Facebook recycle parents page.
Arranging a time to show my friend how to administer an epi pen for when she has my boy next week.
Working out how the fucking after school app works so I can see which day they have asigned to us and how we can pay.
Rearranging swim times so that my daughter can attend Rainbows.
Arranging and attending a playdate with a child in my daughter's class, trying to make a stronger connection as both are struggling with other classmates.

This is a typical week. It's definitely a load.

@VaseofViolets

The burden of cooking, shopping and making decisions is huge? Don’t be silly, that’s just life, it’s not huge. It isn’t anything… it’s just doing what needs to be done. How do you manage when you have actual problems to deal with

You’re missing the point. Its not that these individual tasks on their own are huge.

Its the cumulative effect of being the one who is on the hook for the decision making all the time. It leaves you feeling frustrated and resentful that the other partner delegates it all.

Particularly when, as a majority of women are these days, you are also working outside the home. So you doing two jobs and he’s doing maybe one and a quarter.

It just diminishes the respect you have for him.

No, not a bibliography and footnotes; what we need is a really concrete example of what you're talking about (which also perhaps includes a nice precise definition of what you think "mental load" actually means . . . . .)

My Ex used to tell anyone who’d listen that “I drop the DC to nursery (it was only once a week, but he’d conveniently leave that bit out).

I would be the one to:
-get the DC up, showered and dressed
-give DC breakfast
-pack DC bags for school
-pack DC bags for after school activities
-remember whether it was red/blue/green/mufti day and prepare or give DC money accordingly

Sometimes I even strapped DC into the car, and all he had to do was literally just drive them to the nursery door.

When I’d ask him to prepare the DC as they needed, he’d complain that it was all too much for him, so I’d have to do it, or it wouldn’t get done, or they’d be late waiting.

There seem to be lots of men out there who have no idea how much wifework goes into every single house or DC task, so I’d say it’s a very accurate description.

My DH put my toddler down for a nap earlier today so thinks that’s job done; he didn’t think about noting the time to make sure they don’t sleep too long, or what they’re going to have for dinner, or making them a drink for when they wake up. He thinks that this stuff doesn’t really matter but it really does if we don’t want a grumpy, hungry toddler who won’t go to bed because they’ve napped too long!

I have never seen anything like you describe.

to me, the mental load is a shorthand way to encapsulate the unseen work of running a household - who notices when the toothpaste has run out? Who thinks “I’d better put a wash on so the PE kits are dry by Wednesday?”. If it’s always the same half of the couple who remembers when the MOT is due, which day the dog is going to the groomers, thinks about what dinners to have this week, while the other adult in the house just says “do we not have any toothpaste?” or “oh the kids don’t have clean PE kit”, that is clearly an imbalance. It’s not that the mental load itself is unbearable - it’s that the mental load is invisible and the non-load-bearing partner can happily believe they are pulling their weight by following instructions.

that’s how I have always seen mental load used. I have never heard or seen anyone saying, oh, I am too tired to do the dishes because I am exhausted from the mental load, in order to get out of that chore.

if anything I find it is the partner not carrying the mental load who claims exhaustion from paid work as an excuse not to do any housework or parenting!

I don't recall anybody using that phrase in real life. Mind you I've got a horrible feeling it might pop out of my mouth this week now that it's on my mind.. I might see if I can use it as a way of getting out of doing admin type chores at work.. we all had to do training on mental health in the workplace recently so maybe i can at least get some longer deadlines for the boring cruddy stuff
.

Can you give an actual example though?

Admin is a lot of work! DH might take DS to a birthday party for example but I'll have recieved the invite, checked the diary, bought the present, wrapped the present, got DS to sign the card etc. So my 2 hours off (also whilst I'm looking after DD anyway) probably took getting towards an hour of prep when you add it all up in 15 mins here and there. There's hundreds of instances like this each month!

@queenmeadhbh

Who thinks “I’d better put a wash on so the PE kits are dry by Wednesday?”. If it’s always the same half of the couple who remembers when the MOT is due, which day the dog is going to the groomers, thinks about what dinners to have this week, while the other adult in the house just says “do we not have any toothpaste?” or “oh the kids don’t have clean PE kit”, that is clearly an imbalance. It’s not that the mental load itself is unbearable - it’s that the mental load is invisible and the non-load-bearing partner can happily believe they are pulling their weight by following instructions.

👏👏👏

Exactly. The questions are the real giveaway here. It's the defaulting to the assumption that someone else will do it/think about it and the lack of ownership of the situation.

In the nearly four years between my daughter being born and me leaving my husband (her father), almost every sentence which came out of his mouth began with the phrase: "You need to..." or "Why hasn't [xx] happened", in relation to the care of our daughter or the upkeep of the home.

It was this constant imbalance: on the one hand he had perfect awareness that [X] needed to happen, but was never prepared to have any agency for [X]. Everything had to be done by me. That was marginally more justifiable (albeit annoying) when I was on maternity leave. But it continued when I went back to work and never stopped.

You find yourself in a more or less constant state of apologising: "I haven't got to X because I've been busy with Y," and then resent the fact you are apologising for not doing [X] when he could perfectly well have done it himself. It just sucks the life out of any relationship.

DH and I have had a massive row about this this week in relation to redecorating a child's bedroom. He "doesn't really care about stuff like that", which is easy to say when you're 100% confident that you won't end up living in a value-depreciating shithole with kids who aren't happy to have their mates round, with no clean clothes or food in the fridge because someone else will do it.

It encapsulated everything I find so hard about being the mother. As a couple we have come an awfully long way since having kids - he is genuinely a good person, a lovely husband and father and - patronising though it is - much "better" at the day-to-day stuff than most blokes I know.

The one saving grace is that he shares everything financially with me, including paying into a pension while I was a SAHM etc, so I do feel that it's all one shared pot of resources - labour, skills, time and money.

As usual 3rd post nails it.

I take it you mean a way of avoiding responsibility. The mental load is about the responsibility and / or the feeling of responsibility for thinking, planning, organising, doing, remembering etc falling upon one within a couple or family.

But your DH has a two hour child’s party to deal with instead. I’d rather have the admin!

I think that is the least concerning/most optimistic explanation for the influx of provocative and bun fight inducing threads!

Yes and no
I for sure do it sometimes. I think of stuff I don’t want to do that needs doing - like picking up rotten pears from the lawn - and get/ask DH to do it. He’s quite energetic and cheerful and happy to muck in when told what to do. He does take the initiative sometimes but fairly often that actually knocks a plan I had out of whack - I.e he’ll put a white wash on but I was waiting until Thursday because I am wearing a top then that will need to go in etc. I quite often tell him (lovingly) to stop interfering.

But yes, he’s given a lot of the shit jobs in return for not having to think about things

He does deal with a lot of other stuff I never even think about like boring DIY like anything soffit based, and he has control of the Big Spreadsheet which details all the finances

A lot of the mental load is make-work as well though, especially Christmas. Lots of complaints on here about how DH doesn’t care about the cake/making a pudding/paper chains/Santa visit etc. If men were left to organise Christmas then yes it would be far less pretty and expensive and probably just last the two days but the kids would love it just as much.

I do wonder how a really equitable sharing of the mental load would work. I like being the one knowing everything. A ship can only have one captain. You can’t BOTH be thinking about everything, it’s doubling the work and leading to potential clashes as you both buy PE trainers/book them into recorder lessons/order school dinners/renew the pet insurance etc. Yes, devolve areas but one person has to have overview?

If men were left to organise Christmas then yes it would be far less pretty and expensive and probably just last the two days but the kids would love it just as much

I think this kind of sentiment is very true.i fully believe in mental load, and I also believe that women bear the brunt of it. But I also believe women are more prone to feel like things need to be more complicated than they are.

I see my female friends tie themselves up in knots about the number of activities/clubs/enrichment their kids have and drive themselves mad trying to make everything perfect all the time. But actually, things can be "good enough" most of the time and that's, well, good enough. I think society places so much more pressure on women for them to make their family life picture perfect in every way, and as a result we create mental load that needn't exist. But equally, is that women's fault, or is it just the patriarchy in action again - probably more the latter.

Everyone has varying levels of capability. I have never ever struggled with mental load because I am a very quick decision maker and also move quickly. My parents were the same as are my siblings.

I had no idea how laborious some people can make situations till I met DH family and lived in close quarters. His Mother is incapable of doing anything at speed and always has been and is a massive faffer, he is far better than her but still much slower than anyone in my family.

I worked FT in a demanding job when my children were small so was organised. How on earth can buying a birthday present and card for a small child be a huge mental load?

I just have a cupboard with cards for every type of event, gift bags and a few gifts in and buy them when on offer. My children are adults now so I do not buy for children much but have already picked up a gift for a neighbours child for Christmas when doing my regular shop.

Was going to read the whole thread, but... mental load was too great 😉

Do some people? Probably. But I would say for most it's probably genuine. We both work full time (in professional busy jobs) and have 2 kids. There are, what feels, like 100s of plates spinning all the time. Sometimes I forget something - a credit card bill, or yet another PTA dress up day, or sometimes something more important.

Have you ever heard about decision fatigue OP? You brain can't distinguish between an important decision (like whether we ought to agree something in a £25m negotiation or what to have for dinner). It gets tired of making decisions and every single decision gets hard to make. That's it for me, sometimes at the end of a long week where I've been full on at work, and at home, and make 100s of decisions and my brain has held hundreds of things it needs to remember then it just can't hold any more. And I fuck something up.

But yeah, I'm just making it up 🙄

Sorry i’m still not sure what you’re talking about.

Mental load contributes to exhaustion. It’s not ‘an excuse’. People still get things done as they need to be done. But people have the right to sometimes say no to reasonable things because they are knackered.

PPs have nailed it. It can be commonly a case of both parents working, while one parent also ends up with most of the mental load of what needs to be done around the house and also booking in things for the kids, not just activities but things like medical appointments, haircuts etc.

A ship can only have one captain. You can’t BOTH be thinking about everything, it’s doubling the work and leading to potential clashes as you both buy PE trainers/book them into recorder lessons/order school dinners/renew the pet insurance etc. Yes, devolve areas but one person has to have overview?

The problem with having "one captain" as you say is that this "captain" usually ends up not only the captain but the lieutenant and the midshipman and the chef, cook and bottle washer too. The person who is in charge of the "thinking" also has to do the directing and most of the doing.

It may possibly work in a traditional setup with a breadwinner man and a SAHM woman (or vice versa). But nowadays in more than half of families both partners work, at least some of the time.

So you have a very lopsided situation where someone who is already working full time is also project managing all the domestic stuff plus executing on most of it as well.

It's the equivalent of doing three quarters of all the productive work in a household while the other person is doing one quarter.

I would also add we, as people, don't all have the same capabilities. I am an unorganised person naturally. I have to work really hard to stay organised. Someone who is naturally very organised might think "well why don't you just plan your meals 10 weeks in advance like I do, or keep your house perfectly tidy so you don't lose stuff, or keep all your paperwork in colour coded folders so you don't miss a bill". All those things are easy for someone who is naturally that way inclined. For people who are not it can feel a huge effort and add massively to the effort your brain needs to exert.

Some people with high emotional intelligence might wonder why you can't imagine why this is a struggle for some people and conclude it must be a lie.

Is it not simply a phrase though?

Is there really a difference between saying “I’m drained by my mental load, can you do some house tasks darling husband?”
And
”I’m drained and have been busy, can you do some house tasks darling husband?”

It’s almost essential now to have two incomes to afford a family household.
If you don’t thrash out expectations between yourselves that if you want children and a house/lifestyle of two incomes, that most/all tasks are divided up, then it’s largely expected that traditional pink jobs remain pink.

If you don’t sort this out before you get pregnant then more fool you. We did this 18 years ago, it’s not a new thing.

Better to have the discussion before.

You’re still using mental capacity though to pick up gifts and remember birthdays. I can hand on heart say my DH would never think of doing this!