What is the "mental load"

[Noideamatey]

As a single parent for many years, I just don't understand the hoo ha around the "mental load" that's just remembering stuff and being a functioning adult right?

It seems to be a thing that posh women complain about. Presumably because from an evolutionary standpoint, they used to have maids and housekeepers to do these things. The working class amongst us remember our mums doing the same to just crack on 👍

I'm not trying to be snide. I'm really not, I just see it a lot and struggle to understand. Hence the post

Like I say I'm a single mum and have been for a very long time. I work full time in a low paid job and have a college aged child with SEN and a younger NT teen. To me, organising life/appointments/dinner is just part of adult life and I don't see it as extra work

I genuinely hope the husbands of most respondents are wealthy and generous, great lovers and excellent at DIY; otherwise they sound entirely pointless ☹️.

Yes it's just doing all the everyday stuff that needs going but if you're in a partnership is unfair if one person is carrying it, which is usually the woman.

Rubbish. The reality is that most households now have 2 working parents. That hasn’t always been the case. Also, with a move towards equality, women chow do high paying, more stressful job roles.
This all means that there is more of a dialogue around equitable division of labour at home.

You are not more mentally equipped - no one is saying they are not capable of doing it. The opposite in fact, because they are saying they do do it. They are complaining that they should not have to because there is another adult in the household. Do you disagree with that? If you weren’t a single parent would you be fine with your partner taking on none of it, just because you were technically capable of doing it?

Yes but bow imagine you have another supposedly functional adult living with you and not only do they dump ALL of their shit on you, on top of everything , they make you responsible for it so it’s your fault if something goes wrong, same for the kids, they put a spanner in the works by “forgetting “ things or doing them badly, springing things at the last minute at you etc. Nevermind the frustration that it should be BOTH of you juggling all the plates…

Does this make sense?

There have been umpteen other faux naïve threads asking the exact same question. If you don't think there's enough involved in 'remembering stuff' and 'being an adult' to place a significant load on your mind (especially if you also work full time) then I guess either you have a surprisingly simple life or you're just superior to other people. Either way, well done.

OP can you address what people are saying about wrangling everything when you have a partner who ought to be splitting things but are actually adding to the tasks. I'm an SP too and fearsomely capable and on top of things, but I absolutely get what the phrase means.

@Noideamatey - in case no one else has suggested this, here's a link to a good explanation of the mental load: https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/

Single people do it without thinking, but when you're in a partnership, it's supposed to be easier

Housework, remembering appointments, presents, birthdays, what's for tea/dinner/breakfast, bills, remembering to cancel the free trial subscription before money goes out, car insurance for two or more vehicles - all mental load for two not one

Then read my earlier comment and you’ll understand how it differs from being a single parent…feels like you’re picking and choosing what to come back to.

Question for you, OP: do you feel an undercurrent of resentment when you hear about women in relationships talking about the mental load? Like ‘hey, I’m here in the trenches every day…it’s no different to what I do but at least you get some help.’ Or do you feel superior, like ‘no idea what these women complain about, I do all this and it’s just life?’

Either way, you’ve asked the question, you’ve had some cracking answers that address why it’s a whole different set of challenges to being a single parent. Not necessarily harder but a grind nonetheless. If you refuse to actually take on board what people are showing you and instead cling to either of the above, then it’s kinda sad. But your choice.

As others have pointed it out : yes many of the mental load tasks are just 'life' : but nowadays most women work, and equal hours to their partners. Yet..... It's women who pick up all those "mental load" jobs let's face it. Generally speaking. It's a lot for one person to juggle.

Plus life is pathetically complicated now. You go to work, endless computer based tick box mandatory training every year to cover arses. So many forms and 'updates' and endless arse covering exercises that just didn't exist before.

Children's school. This app for this , that app for that. This workshop, that parent cafe. This online questionnaire, that autism awareness session. It's all so sterile and tick box.

Teachers no longer care really about their bright or middling students etc. it's all risk management of SEND and meeting targets. Pressure pressure pressure.

We live in a very sterilised computerised "ticky box" world now. So "tasks" a plenty. And you might get a "wellbeing" referral at work if you're burnt out and can't manage all the tasks. Or a tick box meeting with the teacher to "explore the problem" if you can't access all these apps. The threat is real.

None of the above has happened to me. But I can see that the pressure to do tasks is immense. Or you may get a sterile "referral" to cover someone's arse.

Bring back the old days when people weren't robots.

Yes I've gone off on a tangent!

You are spectacularly missing the point OP.

It’s just a concept though? The mental load - it’s a definition. If you google it you get:

Mental load refers to the invisible cognitive and emotional labor required to plan, organize, and manage household and family responsibilities, such as anticipating needs, scheduling events, and making decisions. It encompasses both the mental process of organizing and the emotional work of caring for family members. This "thinking work" is often unrecognized, unbounded, and disproportionately borne by women, leading to stress, burnout, and relationship strain.

I think you are pretending you don’t understand to make out that you are superior to women who complain about this. You have a mental load - we all do regardless of our circumstances. Some adults complain that it isn’t fairly shared in couples - you are a single parent so you don’t experience that frustration.

Totally agree with you OP

So do women, depressingly. I've seen any number of posts on MN claiming there's no such thing as life admin.

And what if you were doing all that plus the same for a useless DH and his elderly relations? Yes looking after yourself and your dependent children to an extent is normal adulting. But doing the same thing for another adult who should be relieving your burden not adding to it is very draining.

If I had a partner I wouldn't expect them to take on anything to do with my life/kids and also wouldn't suddenly become responsible for theirs

It often happens between siblings for elder care too. In my family it all fell to my mother - arranging the home help, making accompanying my grandmother to appointments, sorting out nurses and then picking a home when the time came. Her bother and sister left it all to her. Back then there wasn’t the terminology for the mental load she was burdened with but it was huge!

I am sure OP would have scoffed at her too and claimed she is just better than most people and wouldn’t have found this exhausting and unfair😊

I'm a single parent now but I haven't forgotten how much of my headspace was taken up by resenting a partner who wasn't pulling his weight.

Aw OP - in the concept of sharing the mental load the partner would be the children’s father 🤦‍♀️

Im clearly not as capable and great as OP.

I'm a single parent and it's a lot.

I work FT in a demanding job and all of my spare time is taken up taking the kids to activities - often multiple trips out per evening for various things. Trying to plan and cook healthy home made meals that fit around my evenings of chauffeuring. Sorting school bags and uniform for the next day.

I'm also: planning out the school holiday activities and child care, keeping up with the various apps and whatsapp groups for the kids clubs, sorting out any house repairs, boiler servicing, car mot, mowing the lawn GP and dentist appointments, school events.

On top if it all my DC's dad seems to hoard their stuff at his house and can't find it when asked so I end up buying multiple of everything. He doesn't respond to a direct question - needs to check everything with his wife but then doesn't do that so I have to ask a simple question (like will you be taking DC to football on saturday?) over and over again. So despite being separated from him for 8 years he's still creating work for me.

For me, its not about the actual tasks - for all that those tasks will be more in some families than others and some days your head feels full to bursting. Its the attitude behind it - that my time and energy are less important than the other persons. Because that is what underpins the mental load. In a relationship I expect equality and that means not having to do more than my fair share.

Maybe some people dont mind. Or circumstances lead to it. But in general any relationship where one person feels they are better than the other somehow is not one I want to be in.