Just stopping doing stuff like washing clothes.

[mostlyaslattern]

Ok. I have name changed because DH knows my user name and I love him to bits but want to get stuff off my chest.

Basically I am a bit of a slattern as is my DH, certainly compared to a lot of people I know. I don't clean and tidy every day and prefer to have a big clean up at the weekends. However I do seem to be the only one doing washing, hanging washing out, putting clothes away, cleaning the bathroom, changing the bedding - that kind of thing - while DH sits about relaxing. I also cook 5 times out of 7. He washes up the dishes but quite often I end up doing them as he leaves them so long.

We both work full time and have a baby on the way (our first) which is going to mean a lot of change. Up to now I have been fairly happy to do all the general clothes washing stuff though in recent months I have stopped doing his ironing as I barely do any for myself and found myself on most sundays preparing a full sunday dinner and then ironing his stuff while it was cooking and somewhere along the line I thought 'WTF am I doing?' and decided to leave him to it. He now irons a shirt for himself in the morning so has proven that he will do it if I stop. All his other clothes make it from the floor to the washing machine to the line and into his drawers without him lifting a finger - I do all that - WTF for I don't know.

I have recently been trying to talk to my DH about how all this stuff (clothes washing, cooking etc) will still need to be done when I have a very small baby and will be breastfeeding or sleeping all the time. I don't think he understands that I am asking him to please pull his finger out even when I say outright 'please pull your finger out' and to start to pepare himself for this change. He suggested I write a kind of wife swap manual for him to use when the baby is here, I am more keen for him to just start doing his share now!

So.... would it be wrong of me to just stop doing all the stuff I do so that he runs out of shirts/t-shirts, trousers, socks, pants etc? Do I really even need to ask? I am a sucker aren't I, but it's just become part of my routine and at the moment I don't resent it, though I know I will when the baby is here.

The thing is I don't think I could live with all the stuff building up, despite being such a Slattern, plus I would feel pretty mean picking things of his out of the washing basket and not putting them in with my stuff. Maybe I should tell him I am going to do it first?

I suspect playing it like a game of chess won't work.
Just try and have it out with him. He shouldn't need an effing manual FFS he's a grown man. But if that's what it takes - then write him a list of jobs.

The best way to do it would be to get a separate washing basket for you and another for baby's laundry.

You do yours, he does his, you both do baby's.

For what it's worth, I don't do my husband's washing and never have.

Talk to him first, otherwise you look petty. I totally understand where you're coming from, I've had a live-in lazy-ass boyfriend before and it wasn't fun, but I do think you should give talking to him a go first. If you have to resort to strike action, at least you've tried to be reasonable first :).

The thing with men is they slip much easier into a relaxed routine than us ladies do. They don't seem to always consciously make the connection between something needing to get done and it actually getting done when someone else is doing it for them. In their world, it just happens (cleaning fairies? ). This doesn't excuse the fact that some do fuck all, but some aren't specifically lazy, they are just blinded to it. Okay, shit way of putting that, but hopefully you know what I mean!

I you have to resort to the manual (which you shouldn't have to do, but it's an option) it's infinitely better than having nothing done in the days and weeks after your bring your LO home. Try all else first though, you don't want him doing fuck all without a manual for the rest of your lives after all!

Good luck and congratulations on your impending arrival!

Buy a dishwasher. Seriously.

Then he will never load it/empty it!

My DH does his own clothes and I'm a SAHM. I agree with branchingout that getting separate laundry baskets is the way to go. DH did try the feeble-male approach at first, he would do things like load the machine but not close the door properly and not notice that it didn't start washing. I just pretended not to notice the problems and he learned because if he didn't he wouldn't have anything to wear. I always do the DCs' laundry and most of the household laundry.

For the bedding, if I'm short of time, I'll just strip and replace my duvet and pillows and the bottom sheet and he can do his duvet and pillows when he's ready for bed. (We have always used two single duvets because we need different togs.) If I don't want to wash bedding or towels then I put them in his laundry basket.

When you're short of time (and you will be with a new baby) just do the things that make a difference to you, if he urgently needs clean clothes/dinner/shopping then he will sort it out himself.

but a dishwasher is a useful cupboard for your dirty washing up and therefore invaluable. I long for one.

First have it out with him. Make a list of the jobs and take it in turns to pick on. Include stuff like mowing lawn/supermarket shop/bins/bill paying. Explain that these jobs do not earn brownie points: they are what it takes to keep a house above the dysentry line.

Then if he doesn't man up and do his share, do what branchingout says and get more laundry baskets

solve this problem and you will make a bloody fortune

all I can say is stick to your guns - a lot depends on your grunge tolerance level. you will always crack before he does.

All this talk of separate washing baskets or just replacing your own bedding when your husband's bed is RIGHT THERE NEXT TO YOURS is so bleak and depressing. :(

More or less bleak and depressing than doing all the housework while your DH sits on the sofa?

Because I have to tell you that I chirped no end when I stopped picking his dirty laundry up from whatever corner it had been kicked to and washing it. He has very depressing pants IME.

thank you for not calling me a walkover and being rude. I had to go out so just read these replies.

Dishwasher not an option as we have too small a kitchen and to be fair to him the Washing up isn't such a massive problem, it does eventually get done.

I have just emptied out the two washing baskets and made one for him and one for me. I thik perhaps I will tell him that's what I am doing and let him know that I won't be doing his stuff anymore so that he can get used to doing it himself, depressing as it is.

For the bedding change I think I might strip the bed then leave the new bedding on the end of the bed until he gets the hint.

"More or less bleak and depressing than doing all the housework while your DH sits on the sofa?"

But he does work and pay all the bills, doesn't he? Would you think it was fair if he paid only the bills that related to him and the DC?

brn, I'm not having a go at you! I don't want you to think I'm being horribly rude. I just feel it sounds really sad. I think of you on your wedding day promising to love one another, and now there he is with his bedding left on the end of his bed... :(

Personally I think as soon as you start playing games and doing stuff on a tit for tat basis , you loose any kind of ability to resolve it like adults.

There should be very few issues that are not resolveable by the two of you sitting down and talking about it. If things can't be sorted out without resorting to point scoring and pettiness it is not desperately healthy.
Talk to him and find a way of dealing with these things that feels fair to both of you

But they BOTH work full time! How come the OP ends up doing more around the house? I'm sorry but I agree with her - he DOES need to pull his finger out or the resentment will build. I think a manual is a good idea. My DH has a tendancy towards just sitting there, but I think it's because he just doens't SEE what needs doing. A proper weekly list of chores that could be ticked off would be a good idea.

I think this would be a horrible thing to do!

Better to do some sort of written rota and put it on the fridge so that he knows what needs to be done and he can tick it when it is done!

So you can say that you will do the washing and putting it out and folding it but he needs to do the ironing and washing up every night.

Meal plan so that you both know what you are having each night and first one home starts dinner.

Dont separate things or he might start doing the same and it will get 'icky'!!

Erm. Beautiful - We both work full time and earn roughly the same as eachother. We split all the bills and mortgage equally.

Over time I have taken charge of the housework to the point where he has only used the hoover a few times.

As for me leaving the bedding on the end of the bed, in his world the bedding gets folded and put away by a housework fairy who then takes it out and puts it on the bed. Obviously that fairy is me.

Op works full time too, and presumably will be getting mat pay (at least for a bit). When I was on mat leave I had to gently remind Dh at times that I was at home all day, but I had not chosen to become a housewife for 9 months - I was looking after our child; a full time job in itself.

Why don't you just split the chores? In our house, I do washing and upstairs and DH does cooking and downstairs. Doe work, although he's a lot bloody slower so quite often I'll chip in with downstairs.

Now I'm back in work my rule is that we keep geneally tidy during teh week but then do an hour at the weekend and whatever doesn't get done then - tough.

Or you could do what my sister recently did when her dp ignored the chore list she made - go on strike! He got the message on teh third day of having no sandwiches for lunch, although the fact she gets up earlier to make his sadwiches at all makes me really depressed - especially as she earns more than him!

And - a rota, I have tried that and it didn't work. firstly because I don't have set days for doing things, I tend to get it all done at the weekend, and secondly because last time DH ignored it.

Getting him to do the ironing wouldn't work either as we both only iron what we personally need that day if it needs ironing.

He is always the first one home as he goes to work an hour before me, I don't think it would be fair for him to cook every day and tbh the cooking thing is the least of my worries.

Mostlyaslattern, I know you work fulltime, I was talking to Bran.

Seriously.
Is this so difficult. Sit down and talk to him.
You are both adults, you are about to have a baby.
So you say
'we are about to have a baby. We love each other. I know you don't want me knackered and resentful because I am doing everything and I know that I don't want to be writing lists like this is fucking student digs.
What do you want to handle and what shall I do so that it is fair , we can love the baby and still have time for each other?'

He may enjoy the shopping and dusting for all you know.
Talk about it and work something out

I work! I'm a SAHM to two children and I'm not particularly good at it so it's a huge effort for me. I hate housework and skivvying after others. When I stopped doing his laundry we had one DC and we both worked outside the home, and frankly being at work is a piece of piss compared to being at home.

DH is a workaholic who lives for and loves his work. It's not at all about paying bills for him, and even if it was I don't think bringing money into the family absolves the earner from pulling their own weight. I wish I could work and he could stay home, but he has admitted he could never do it. He can't even stop working when we go away on holiday.

As it happens your trade-off (money for housework) is nonsense in our case anyway, as I have much more money than he does. Or I would have more than him if I didn't consider all our finances to be joint.

I did promise to love him in our wedding vows, and I do. I don't remember a vow about following around behind him sorting out all the chaos he leaves in his wake.

It's not sad for him to do his own laundry, it's just laundry, and it's his.

pagwatch's idea is much better!

I shouldn't even be on this thread as my H left me last year so what do I know about marriage! but I'll tell you what I've found since he left:

Housework isn't hard or even particularly time-consuming. Laundry, for example, takes under 30 minutes: 2 to load machine, 5 to unload machine, 10 to put away. Cooking, shopping, straightening-up -- none of these things is a big deal at all. You could live in an immaculate house by doing less than 3 hours of housework every day.

It's only resentment that makes housework feel like a big deal. I remember feeling SO hard done by doing the laundry whilst H watched TV. Now I breeze through it without thinking. (It helps that I have only my stuff and 2 DC's worth of clothes to do, though. Hmm...)

The times I miss having a bloke around the place is when I have to: do all the shopping then unpack it, carry it all into the house and unload it; work and pay all the bills on top of running the house; do heavy stuff (like gardening, getting stuff out of the loft, moving furniture, pack the car for holidays; decorate alone; help me plan the future (pensions, savings, etc); do all the driving by myself.

Before you go on laundry-strike, please sit down and make a mental list of everything your DH does do to help your lives. You might as well, as he will have this list in the top of his brain when you raise the subject. If after scrutiny you feel you are STILL doing way more than 50%, then chat to him. Just don't take for granted the things he is doing because you're focussing only on what you're putting in.

And now I will you happily married types to continue this chat! I do hope you can sort it out.

Thanks Pagwatch - I know you speak sense. Possibly the lasst time I spoke to him about it (earlier today) I went about it the wrong way as it was then he mentioned doing the manual al la wife swap.

To be honest beautiful the list of things he does is not that great and possibly that's my fault. He washes up if I cook, he tidies up our small backyard and sometimes he runs us a bath. All other house duties do seem to fall to me. I know that I do way more than 50% of everything to do with the house.