I do 99.9% of a job and my wife will complain about the 0.1%.

[victorino]

I want to vent off a little, I guess. But I am also genuinely interested to find out if this is normal behaviour. Are all wives like mine, or am I especially “lucky”.

So here we go. Here’s what happened this morning. I got up, and then prepared breakfast for the kids, changed the baby, made his bottle and fed him. Then got the kids up to the bathroom, got them washed and changed into their school uniforms. Made a coffee for the wife, brought it to her in bed. Made packed lunch. Took kids to school.

Here’s what I did not do: brush my son’s hair (I forgot).

"Did you brush John’s hair", she asked. I said no, but I brushed his teeth. Big scolding / argument ensued because it is apparently essential that I brush his hair every morning before school. Nevermind all the other things I did correctly and on time…

Is this normal, to be so demanding/ungrateful/rude for something so trivial?

So you... parented your own children as you should and forgot to brush your kids hair?

She doesn't owe you a massive thank you for being a dad and kids hair needs brushing.

Not that big of a deal but stop imagining she should be grateful that you patented.

So you... parented your own children as you should and forgot to brush your kids hair?

She doesn't owe you a massive thank you for being a dad and kids hair needs brushing.

Not that big of a deal but stop imagining she should be grateful that you patented.

Here's a wild idea. Talk to your wife about an equitable split of household gruntwork, rather than starting a self-pitying post on the internet about it

Tonnes of women come onto MN and do exactly this. None of them are mocked and told to do what you have suggested.

They are given advice and support and encouraged to either talk to their husband, or simply go on strike.

No one calls the woman posting here "self pitying"

Oh dear. You should have posted in the guise of a woman. Everyone would then have been falling over themselves to tell you your husband was a controlling cunt and you should LTB.

MillyDilly

Absoloutley.

Come on, if it was a woman saying it and her husband made a big deal about not brushing the kids hair, it would be a totally different story.

The posts on here are an absolute joke. If a woman was posting about this, what would your responses be?

I agree with you OP. I don't think you were trying to play superdad. I think you were doing your job and forgot one little thing and then your wife had a tantrum about it. I'd tell her to fuck off and get out of bed and do it herself if it bothers her so much.

My Dh does shitloads but if that was important to me, Im afraid I’d mention it too!

Hair brushing:

Not essential. Saying it 1,000 times does not change the fact that it is mostly vanity.

It is also in no way a safeguarding ‘red flag’. If you think it is, you have misunderstood your safeguarding course. The whole purpose is to build a picture. A happy, clean, well fed engaged child with unkempt hair is just that. Children can choose unkempt hair and it is a perfectly valid choice (assuming clean). Again, show me the safeguarding guideline which suggests unkempt hair is any kind of a ‘red flag’,

People really twist the truth for their own ends on here.

I think you are doing more that your fair share. I couldn't stay inbed drinking my coffee knowing my husband was rushing around and getting the kids ready for school whilst trying to get himself sorted and to work on time as I would feel guilty. That's just me personally. I think your wife is being a little selfish, she could at least get up and do the packed lunches then maybe you would have 5 mins extra and wouldn't forget to brush your child hair

Oh dear. You should have posted in the guise of a woman

I agree.

Why is your wife in bed? Is she not well or does she usually just issue you with a list of jobs to be done to her satisfaction from her bed?

Having now read your update it sounds very odd - why are you doing all of the childcare, working full time and she's a SAHM? Not sure I believe you tbh

Well, based on your update, then I think you've got much bigger problems than the fact that she's annoyed about the hair brushing. I'm sorry OP.

DH was a SAHD and is still the children's primary carer. I work full time. But I still do a great deal and believe that's how it should be. However, if DH was having a lie in every day while I was rushing around getting the kids ready, then clocking off the moment I walked through the door - it's very unlikely our relationship would survive. I'm assuming she's still doing a lot of the "wifework" like sorting uniforms, liaising with school, organising after school stuff etc but if you're also doing this, then the problem is even bigger. Do you get a lie in on the weekend?

I don't necessarily agree that these things are a case of leaving part of a job that a woman needs to pick up later. Often it's a difference in priorities or ways of doing things and one partner (in this case the woman) deciding that her preference is correct and acting like a martyr because she's doing something that she wants to be done but her partner doesn't care about.

For example, DH doesn't load the dishwasher as effectively as me. So I often end up moving stuff around so I can fit more in before putting it on. Or he puts it on but it could have contained far more than he's put in there. It's a difference in approach. I'm not going to start nagging him about it or insisting that he does it my way (even though it's better). He's loaded the dishwasher in the way he thought most appropriate. Nor am I going to start acting like a martyr because I've looked at it and chosen to reorganise things. That was my decision, not 'him leaving the last bit of a job for me to do'.

Here the wife cares about the hair being brushed, but the husband didn't think it needed doing (or he's have noticed and done it). But she's acted like she's in charge and her way is the only way. And told her husband off.

And I agree with PP that unbrushed (but otherwise clean) hair just does not matter. It's not a safeguarding concern, unless it's triangulated with loads of other stuff. Primary teachers see kids with scruffy hair, trousers with holes in the knees, jumpers with toothpaste or breakfast down the front and so on all the time. It's fairly standard stuff in kids. I doubt their teachers are making safeguarding reports on that basis.

Mumsnet - by parents for parents. Unless you happen to be a dad.

I got told off by nursery for leaving my dd's hair unbrushed once. Long time ago but I have not forgotten the shame.

Yeah she should probably have been nicer. We should all be nicer to each other at the moment, nothing is easy. Don't get us all to slag her off. It isn't going to make you feel better about anything, quite the reverse I should think.

Having now read your update it sounds very odd - why are you doing all of the childcare, working full time and she's a SAHM? Not sure I believe you tbh

A (female) friend divorced her husband because this was basically exactly their situation. She worked and he was supposedly the SAHD. But her H did nothing expect pick up their DC from school. Like OP, she got up, sorted kids and dropped them at school on her way to work. Once she returned home in evenings, she went back to doing everything. Plus, DC at home in afternoons were not helped with their homework, played with etc but simply sat on their iPads.

So it is believable.

I regularly forget to brush DS’ hair, mainly because it sticks up whether I do or don’t.

The rest of him is clean, ironed, polished and well kempt.

Having now read your update it sounds very odd - why are you doing all of the childcare, working full time and she's a SAHM? Not sure I believe you tbh

Yes something isn't adding up here.

Very little detail on what the wife is doing and why.

And every parent whether working or not usually has a bus and/or school or wrap around care deadline which usually means that most people mums and dads have the routine nailed so they aren't missing deadline at work or meetings or whatsver. To post as someone who says they do it every day but then post that they have been late for work/missed meetings or whatever that doesn't quite make sense to me.

Start from the beginning . Now long has this been going on. Whats the matter with your wife.

@JizzPigeon22

Sounds like you’re doing way more than 50%. Does she have health issues?

No health issues at all. And the baby sleeps all night and has been for almost a year. My wife fell asleep on the sofa watching Netflix and she joined me in bed at silly o'clock. That's why she was tired this morning. My mum keeps telling me I do too much at home, and she may be right but every couple have their own dynamics, right? I don't mind doing it, as long as it does not interfere with my work commitments.

Have some of the more recent posters not read the update? The wife is a sahm. The husband works full time and does the majority of morning and evening kid duty and has missed work calls and meetings in order to facilitate this. I’m a sahm and the whole point of me doing that is so that dh can get on with his job!

@victorino unless there is a further update about your wife’s ill health or 5 non school aged children also at home to come then there is something not right here at all. All the things you describe are things a sahm would generally do, dh does these sometimes if he can but certainly never at the expense of his job!

You certainly shouldn't expect gratitude but hell, I do most of the getting ready for school stuff and there are definitely days when hair hasn't been brushed or I've forgotten to wipe a bit of mud off shoes or put a letter in a bag or whatever. It shouldn't result in a row.

Your wife sounds like a lazy ungrateful sod..iv a little boy and would hold my hands up that many a time when rushing about in morning to get him ready and myself ready for work iv forgot to brush his hair and end up running my fingers through it..think with boys if they have shorter hair you can get away with doing this..strangely i was always a stickler for brushing my daughters hair religiously...sounds like balance is way off in your household. If your wife has decided to be a SAHM she should get off her ass and be one...and before im linched i would say exactly the same if it was other way about!

@victorino

First I would like to thank you all for your replies. All feedback is good feedback, even (especially) the ones that don’t agree with me. Some of your replies made me laugh and cheered me up.

I feel I need to add a bit of context because of some of the replies I received. Yes I do the morning routine and school drop-off almost every day. And yes I work full time and I am the only one working - my wife is stay-at-home mum. I also do all the baths in the evening and the dinners almost every evening. My wife does all the laundry, the shopping and the cleaning. And yes, I have sometimes missed meetings, deadlines or conference calls because of my obligations at home, and I’m very lucky to have understanding/forgiving employer & customers. I guess my frustration comes from the fact that I get stressed having to juggle work commitments and home life, especially since lockdown. Sometimes I feel like my contribution is not recognised, and/or I’m doing more than my fair share. What do you think?

Wow, I was a stay at home mother for a long time and there is no way I would have expected my full time working DH to do all that. Unless your DW washes your clothes by hand, I don’t see how strenuous it can be to fill a washing machine, empty it, hang the clothes and put them away 😂 If I worked FT and my DH was at home, there is no way in hell I’d be doing the list of jobs you are doing.

Very unfair of her. If you were regularly forgetting bits and pieces of the "getting ready" process, I can see how it would be VERY irritating for her to have to keep checking. But it sounds like it's a one-off.

In any case, she shouldn't be scolding you. The most DH or I would do over forgetting to brush DS's hair would be to have a laugh over the probable state of it. Even something more serious like forgetting to put his lunch in, we'd just fix it, not shout about it.