AIBU to think that even the good ones are a bit shit?

[Dontasksillyquestions]

Are there any men out there who actually do 50/50 when it comes to childcare, housework, and the mental load?

My husband is a good guy - he’s respectful, spends time with us, helps with cleaning, is great with the kids, and provides for the family. But when it comes to the mental load, it's mostly on me. I handle the kids' appointments, school stuff, making sure they have clean clothes, and I do all the cooking, grocery shopping, and laundry.

He’s not great at DIY and needs constant reminding to do anything. If something breaks, I fix it or it stays broken. I also deal with all the tradesmen and house stuff. He handles the car and the dog.

On paper he’s a good partner, but lately, I’ve been thinking life would be simpler without him - smaller house, no dog, fewer chores. It’s so frustrating having to constantly remind him to do things. I don’t want to be his manager; he should just get things done. And when he complains about how tough life is and how we never get time to ourselves, it really gets to me. He doesn’t have as much time for his hobby as he used to, but I don’t have any time for myself at all. I always prioritise his free time and well-being because he complains.

If our marriage ended for any reason (just to be clear, I’m not thinking of separating, it’s all hypothetical), I wouldn’t be with another man. At this point, even the “good” ones seem pretty useless. My friends’ husbands are the same - generally nice, helpful guys, but still not really 50/50 partners. Then there are the absolutely vile men you read about on here - the cocklodgers, gaslighters and cheaters.

AIBU to think that they’re all a bit shit actually? 😄

Mine does absolutely loads. And especially while I've been pregnant has done way more than me

I think I dropped on as my DH is nothing like the useless men described on here.

He manages to do more than his fair share with the kids despite working multiple jobs. He does the majority of the cooking, all the shit household jobs (such as cleaning bathrooms/kitchen, sorting out the bins, cleaning out the cat tray and guinea hutch etc), while also doing a huge amount of DIY. He’s just fully rewired the house and is now building me the porch I asked for.

He’s also responsible for organising and paying for the kids clubs, wrap around childcare and activities so doesn’t leave ‘life admin’ to me. He does all hospital stays & appointments for the kids. He never gets a minute to himself but never ever complains.

He doesn’t think he does anything special, he thinks it’s just his fair share as a parent (I personally think he does way more than me but he doesn’t agree).

Of course there are a few things that niggle, he can sometimes be a bit grumpy but that’s because he works very long hours in several jobs. We’ve never argued in the 8yrs we’ve been together because he’s the most reasonable person I’ve ever met. I probably should show him more appreciation 🤭

Same here - my family says I am extraordinarily lucky to have found someone to pick up the load. I used to do it all as a single parent but it burned me out. I think it’s good for our daughters to see a good example of what a husband can be!

i do contribute…but I am definitely not carrying the load…

Yes. You've summed it up perfectly. After a lifetime of struggling with this, and watching other women struggle, I've concluded men are useful only for three things:

1. an additional income (not as a breadwinner, just sharing the cost of the house and having kids)

2. a companion in life

3. another adult for the children to talk to and interact with.

Trying to achieve anything else is like rolling water up a hill every day. It requires a lot of aggression or manipulation, and they just revert back to zero as soon as they can.

It's frustrating, infuriating, even. And there are the minority of men who are legends and do a lot. But they aren't the norm.

I'm just grateful that dh has a decent salary now, and he's nice to get along with. I love him to bits. But any idea of equal shares went out the window when the kids were small.

Sadly my daughters remember the arguments that preceeded that acceptance as traumatic. I nearly left a few times because I just couldn't cope with it all.

The compromise I came to was in my career, so I reduced to 3 days a week to make it work. I've had a good life, it would have been so luch harder without him, as I've seen others forced to do.

But I don't wonder why women have fewer children these days. Sadly with needing to earn a salary, that's the upper limit for most.

Gosh this is sad

I've been with DH for 19 years, everything's split fairly equally. He doesn't drive, so I take the kids to activities and do a lot of food shops, but he will take the kids on the bus or walk and does a food shop down the road. Housework is split, taking the bits we like the most (I hate cooking so he does most of that). Did the same with night feeds too, he did 3 nights a week when he was off work the next day. I guess I thought this would be normal in a modern relationship - I don't think I'd put up with someone who didn't do their fair share.

Haha - full disclosure then!

DS is autistic and struggled at his lovely, leafy primary school. There was a long period in which I visited other schools, juggled medical reports and haggled with the LA over his school place (because mental load, obviously). All of this effort was dutifully reported to DH, who nodded and looked concerned. Happily, the school place was agreed and we both took DS out for pizza to celebrate. Then DS broke up for Summer hols and gave cards and gifts to his teachers (obviously sourced, purchased and wrapped by me).

Two weeks into the Autumn term, I get a call whilst in Germany on business to say that DH has dropped off DS at the leafy primary. Obviously they called me first, without even trying DH 🙄but it transpired that his phone was off anyway. I called DM wailing, and she drove to the previous school immediately and deposited bewildered DS at the correct school.

Not sure whether it's a generational thing (we are late 40's) or a post-children thing. I definitely did not notice DH's unequal contribution pre-DC, but he has definitely not picked up his share of the additional work. (Tbf I have only been irate about it since peri-menopause gave me general rage at the world!) I am pleased to hear that younger women may have better experiences with men who have raised their game. It's not that long since I worked with a senior barrister who unironically referred to his DW as "home clerk" when distinguishing her from the actual clerks in his chambers!

This speaks volumes about you, not him.

Maybe learn to read the lines not just between them then.

It's so depressing when you're married to one of these men. Doesn't pull his weight, does jobs half-heartedly, says he'll improve when challenged about it, but it never lasts.

He thinks he's done well if he gets the kids fed, but doesn't think to clear and wipe the table, sort the leftovers, stack and run the dishwasher, clean up the hob after the rice boiled over... And then wonders why I get frustrated, because he's fed the kids, hasn't he?!?

It's not enough to divorce over, but it's so demoralising to always be the one everything falls to.

And I know I should have seen the red flags and not married him. I should have made him pull his weight right from the start.

But it was only really when the kids came along that the workload in the house increased exponentially and by then I was on maternity leave and then part-time, so it was ok (I thought) taking on most of the load.

And now it's engrained and despite me trying to get him to take on more he will not do it.

I will not have the kids detrimented because of his failings, so I do pick up the slack where they are concerned, but I've consciously stepped back from anything that only affects him.

I’d say my husband is pretty good at 50:50. I probably do more kids admin - paying nursery, booking things, sorting presents. But he does all the DIY as well as 50:50 cleaning, washing, ironing, shopping, cooking/washing up. Childcare is fairly evenly split too although I probably do slightly more drop offs/pick ups due to being my way to work and maybe a bit more solo parenting at weekends but he does more solo evenings in the week so it evens out.

Yes, we both feel we have a ‘good one’! Well I hope he feels like that about me, I certainly do about him. We split things equally and play to our strengths. No resentment, no stress, I had to say I think we have a pretty sweet life!

We made a conscious decision about things though. We made sure we were in a good financial position before we had children so we could both take leave (we met later and had children later than the average). Yes, we were a bit worse off in the short run, but we believed it would pay off in the long run, and it has. It’s the same for my friends, we all seem to have ‘good ones’ (male and female), so I didn’t think it was that rare but I think this forum is a bit skewed as most people don’t come on to say how wonderful their life and family are as people would think they were boasting!

We only have a 2 year old, so there isn’t a huge amount of life admin and mental load to worry about yet, but so far my husband definitely does 50/50. And when my child was breastfeeding and therefore I had to do more over night, he made up for it by doing more early mornings and cooking. Hate to say “I’m so lucky” because this should be the norm but I see other friends and family and feel so grateful for him

LOOK!
See what I did there? I baby sat for you while you did the housework....erm <look of confusion> where is my medal?

The clever women get rid of wasters like this.
They plan carefully and they get rid.
Life is too short.

I think the mistake people here are making is equating 50/50 with sharing all tasks 50/50 when in reality we have different qualities different abilities. I handled scheduling, organising etc because I’m good at that, it is also a large amount of my job so I’m assuming they think I’m good too, whereas my exh was good at diy, gardening and hard graft type cleaning eg scrubbing the bathroom or shampooing the carpets, cleaning stains on furniture which never really occurred to me, I was more whip round with the vacuum and squeeze bleach into the toilets having sprayed surfaces liberally with disinfectant, superficial cleaning.

my current dh doesn’t do diy but organises contractors, he is does the lions share of housework as he’s now retired, I cook, he can’t cook (or rather I don’t like his efforts and whilst he tries, I can do far better in half the time)

Nail on the head. Better to not get involved in the first place rather than having to get rid. Weed out the wasters before you get too deep.

Yes. I have one. Took me a bloody long time to find him though 😂. Caveat is we don’t have children together though. I do have a stepson and we are both very involved with him on our time preferring to see it as family time together (other than when he takes him to football training as they need bonding time) but we share all of the manual labour, I do the mental load, but DH works longer hours 2 nights during the week when we don’t have SS so that makes sense.