How can I get DH to take on a bigger share of the workload? (Sorry it's long!)

[WoIsMe]

My DH and I split the housework (cooking, cleaning, emptying bins, gardening etc.) pretty evenly between us but I do the rest of the household workload (dentist appointments, birthday parties, school activities, buying clothes for the kids, paying bills etc.) We have four DCs and it is a huge burden that I'm finding difficult, time-consuming and depressing.

Some time ago I told DH that I was going to stop buying birthday and Christmas cards and presents for his family members (parents, siblings, nephews and nieces) and he would have to start doing it again himself. He has managed this pretty well although a couple of presents have arrived a day or two after the birthday.

More recently I asked DH to take over the meal planning and food shopping. He drives past two supermarkets on his commute so it's easy for him to stop for something if we've run out, whereas I work from home so would have to make a special trip out since there isn't a shop within walking distance. I have been doing the bulk of the food shopping for years so I expected that it would take him a while to get to grips with it. However several months later our kids have been begging me to take over the shopping again because they're fed up of running out of biscuits, crisps, yogurts, fruit, bread etc.

I also asked DH to take over ordering and collecting one DC's prescription medicine. He only gets a 30-day supply and it's critical that he doesn't run out plus it's a class B medication so it takes up to a week to get a new supply. I write the number of days of remaining medicine on the calendar with a reminder at ten days to order more but DH keeps leaving it to the last minute. I spent a large portion of the last two days driving between hospital, GP and chemists trying to get an urgent prescription and find a chemist that had the medicine in stock.

So now I'm feeling that I need to take over the food shopping and ordering medication again because DH can't commit to doing it properly. When I look at all the other myriad tasks that I have to do I feel completely overwhelmed by it all. I feel that for every task I complete there are two more that aren't being done. I'm also finding it very difficult to put enough work hours in because of the sheer burden of it all.

My worry is that DH seems so incompetent with these types of tasks because they're just not that important to him. With the family birthdays then he's managing to do it because he gets thanks and attention from people. Whereas if one of the DCs won't eat breakfast because his preferred food has run out then it doesn't matter to DH. I really want to be able to pass some of the household tasks on to DH but it isn't worth it if he won't do them properly. We have had lots of issues in the past with unpaid bills and fines so eventually I ended up taking over most of these tasks. At the moment DH has a parking charge that he keeps forgetting to pay - it's already doubled and it's only going to increase the longer he leaves it.

Has anyone been in a similar situation and managed to persuade their partner to take on a bigger share of the workload... and do it properly?

Well it depends. Do you both work the same amount of hours each week?

Show him this, if he's seeing you as his manager, then he needs to step up.
english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/

A bit off topic but one way I have managed to get my daughter’s medicine on time is to use an online pharmacy. It’s free, takes 2 secs to order on an app and comes in the post. That might take one thing off your list?

Learned helplessness. It's a thing. If he does someting badly, you will take over.

What do you get out of this relationship now?.

AF has it. Your H's mother most likely taught him such and you as his wife have perpetuated that state. If he does something badly you always take over.

He seems incompetent with such tasks purely and simply because he sees those as your job and those tasks are not that important to him. Bet you he is not half as incompetent when he is at work either because that is more important to him.

Leave the parking charge to him and do not enable him by further paying any fines or late charges he clocks up. Let him fully feel the consequences of such inaction.

Taco if you're talking about paid employment then he works full time and I work part time. But I don't think that's relevant, I'm not asking him to take on half of these types of tasks, just to step up a bit. I asked him to take over three aspects: organising presents for his family; meal planning and food shopping; and ordering the prescription. What I wanted to happen was for him to take over these tasks and perform them adequately. If I'm still having to go food shopping and run around at the last minute to get the prescription he forgot to order then I may as well just do it myself in the first place and save myself the stress.

Thanks for the link Blank. I have seen that cartoon before but I don't think he would respond well to it. He would just say, "Well I prepare the food when we have guests" and "I do get the shopping" and "Well I got the prescription okay last month". He wouldn't see it as relevant to him.

Buscake unfortunately it's a grade B medication (Ritalin for ADHD) so there are extra safeguards: the prescription request must be made in writing, it takes an extra two days to get the prescription, and the chemist doesn't keep the medication in stock so they have to order it in.

I don't think it's learned helplessness AnyFucker I think he's just crap and disorganised. He manages to hold down his job perfectly well and buy his family presents because it's important to him. But he doesn't put in the effort to these other areas because he just doesn't see it as important. He was upset that I had to run around after the prescription and made an effort to make it up to me.

Attilla he's fine in other areas of managing the household. He'll happily cook, clean, wash up, wash clothes, bath the kids, all the physical side of things. It's the organisational / calendar / paperwork stuff that he can't seem to manage. I have been enabling him by taking on the wifework side of things such as managing the childrens' clothes, organising birthday parties, making sure shoes are the right size, etc. But as I said to Taco I'm not expecting him to completely take over, I just want him to pull his weight on this side of things. If he gets a court order over it or gets the debt collectors on him again then my credit rating gets damaged as well which has been a problem several times in the past when applying for loans or mortgages.

"If he gets a court order over it or gets the debt collectors on him again then my credit rating gets damaged as well which has been a problem several times in the past when applying for loans or mortgages"

This would not be a problem if you separated from him. You have basically continued what his mother taught him and it is learned helplessness. He does things badly and or deliberately forgets so that you pick up that mental load.

What you want as well i.e. for him to pull his own weight will not ever happen. Your assertion as well that he is simply crap and not well organised does not cut it. He is not like this at work because such overt incompetence would not be tolerated. Also his work and the approval of work colleagues is important to him. That is far more important to him than making sure his child has enough medication.

So what he does is the equivalent of carving the turkey on Christmas Day, isn't it? He gets all the applause and all the credit, while the wife, who's shopped for everyone, bought all the food and prepared every bloody thing gets none of the credit. Sod that.

I would take over the medication simply because it's so important it's remembered. Is there a pharmacy that delivers?

Regarding the food, could you do an online order? I wouldn't want to be physically shopping for six people every week. I think the responsibility for top up shops should be his.

Why don't your children tell their dad when they are running low of stuff?

He hasn't learned this from his mum Attilla, I would say his childhood was pretty neglected as his mum has a long-term depressive illness. I really don't think he's doing things deliberately badly to get out of them. He is a disorganised person by nature, you should see him trying to get out the front door in the morning - he's always coming back for something he's forgotten. I am by nature a very organised and meticulous person so it makes sense for me to be responsible for things such as dentist appointments. There are plenty of things that I'm not great at and as a result get left up to DH, for example fixing the kids' bikes, some gardening tasks, DIY stuff, dealing with dead things the cats bring in. But I would say the difference is that these tasks are not causing a significant burden to DH although I did nearly call him home from work to deal with a live frog in the kitchen last week!

Hollow it's not like that, he definitely pulls his weight in terms of housework. It's the financial, appointments, endless school emails side of things that I'm doing most of the work. I used to get food deliveries once or twice a week but DH has been writing a list at home then going out to the supermarket at the weekend. I suppose it's the forward-planning side of online shopping that he hasn't go the hang of. When he goes shopping there are always things that are needed that day so he can't wait a couple of days for a delivery.

They tell me Goose and I tell them to tell their dad! We have a tear-off notepad on the fridge that we write things on when they run out but I don't think DH has been on top of it as I was.

You already split most of the regular household chores evenly ("cooking, cleaning, emptying bins, gardening, etc") but you still want him to take on food shopping and meal planning even though he works full-time and you only part-time?

That wouldn't fly with me. There's no way dentist appointments and clothes shopping takes up enough of your time that you have less free time than him.

Unfortunately it sounds like it's his personality and habits and that isn't something that can change overnight - I realise you aren't expecting it.

Unless you are planning to leave him over this then I think you might need to change the way somethings are done so that they aggravate you less.

As you are the more organised person the important things are going to have to be your jobs.
Will you feel better about it if you take on more of the mental load and in turn he does more of the physical load?

Could you meal plan together as a couple and write a list, you can then make sure things don't get left off or quantities are correct, then he goes off and does the actual shop on his own.

Can you remind him to do things in a more immediate way.
Eg 'honey can you go now and pay that fine please as we can't afford it to keep going up?'

I know you've said your getting the kids to remind them but you need to tell them Dad is in charge of that now so they should always go to them if it's a problem.
Then just keep reminding him, 'did you realise dc didn't eat breakfast because you didn't get enough xyz?'

You might become a big nag for a while but it might sink in his brain that you aren't going to let him get away with not doing it.
The same way it would be at work which he clearly knows and gets on with.

I think that you both need to sit down and work on what can be done and when. It strikes me that he is "needs done now, will do it now" type as opposed to this is needed later so will get it done now type.

Can you get more tasks of the do now nature to him so you get time to do the forward planning? Are you as good at that as you think if you work part time and he works full time? List all the jobs that need done and allocate on ability/time available as opposed to you just saying what he should be doing next.

You already split most of the regular household chores evenly ("cooking, cleaning, emptying bins, gardening, etc") but you still want him to take on food shopping and meal planning even though he works full-time and you only part-time?That wouldn't fly with me. There's no way dentist appointments and clothes shopping takes up enough of your time that you have less free time than him.

This, sorry.

As an aside, food shop online. Either of you. Shared family calendar on phone with medication reminders etc.

Hont did you miss the part where I said and it is a huge burden that I'm finding difficult, time-consuming and depressing? We have four children, all at different schools, and I get about twelve emails a week to deal with just for school. I deal with all their outside interests: Scouts, music lessons, sports, etc. I organise all their birthday presents and parties, plus replying to invitations and buying presents for parties they attend. I pay all the bills for the household, arrange insurance, MOTs, car servicing, doctors / dentist / paediatrician / audiology /opticians / vet (not for the kids obvs) appointments. I make sure their clothes, school uniform and shoes fit and arrange replacements when necessary. I take the kids to the library when their books are due. I sort out their back accounts and savings. God there’s just so much to do! So my DH works 15 hours a week more than me, most of that time is filled with the school run and supervising homework. If I could stop doing all this shit and work for 15 hours extra a week I would jump at the chance. All I’m asking is how I can delegate a few of the things that are on my plate to my DH and be able to rely on him to do them. I can’t be the first person on Mumsnet that has found herself in this position.

Thanks for the tips Handsfull and Scottish some great suggestions there. Hellena a shared calendar might work as he’s totally addicted to his phone. We have a physical calendar at home but he doesn’t use it as much as me and the kids. Can you suggest an app for a shared calendar? I tried Wunderlist for a while but it didn’t really work for us.

Sorry but I don't think the household stuff should even be split equally when he works more than you. All the tasks you list are small when you look at them by themselves but I see how it could be stressful; but these don't seem that bad imo because it's not like you're doing them all on the same day. I have anxiety so if I had to do a lot of these I would be quite worried. Have you had any anxiety in the past?

Sorry I didn't see where you wrote that y Oh didn't want things to be split completely equally. However from what you've posted it does seem like he's pulling his weight for someone that works full time.

I would either accept the shopping situation or do an online shop together. We do that and it works well. if you are organised I'd keep the medicine as your job. Maybe find some jobs he is better at or need less organising. My Dh is great at being a taxi for the kids for instance.

And yes it is tiring thinking and sorting out everything.

Shop on line. Physically going to the supermarket is such a waste of time. Once you have done the first couple of shops it gets easier because you have your regular purchases saved. Do you have a decent sized freezer and a slow cooker? These are the two appliances that I found most useful when I was at your stage of family life.

We had a large family diary that lived in the kitchen next to the phone. A4 size, everything was written in there.
DH and I checked it every evening and both made to do lists for the next day.
Prescriptions should be easier to deal with these days - I can email both my pharmacist and my GP to organise repeats. Most pharmacists will deliver locally.
Deal with post daily and put reminders in the diary/on the list.
But I agree, your DH should deal with things like his own parking fines himself.

Just reading your last post OP I don't think you are being unreasonable. That is an awful lot of mental load and practical work. A lot more than the 15 hours difference in paid work IMO.

You do realise all parents that work full time do all that as well? I'd not want an equal split of chores with a partner who worked two full days less than me.

Most of those jobs are one offs like mot etc, checking clothes fit is a second job and birthday parties take a call to book and maybe twenty minutes to write invites.

He doesn't sound horrible (it's not a LTB situation), however he does sound careless but only when stuff doesn't impact directly on him

Since you are the "organised" one, try arranging allocated tasks so that if he stuffs it up he is the only one who "suffers". It would be interesting to see how "disorganised" he is then

Taco but it isn't split equally if I'm unable to keep up with everything that needs to be done. Like I said before, I don't expect him to do a significant amount more, just reliably take on a few tasks to enable me to get on top of everything else. He works in a lab so he has downtime while waiting for tests to finish when he can phone up to order a prescription or add some things to an online order.

We do have a large freezer, a slow cooker and an instant pot Endoftheline so the cooking isn't so much of an issue. I have suggested that DH do the shopping online but I think he prefers pottering around the supermarket. He always seems to get there at the right time for reduced stuff and I think he likes getting the bargains.

I haven't read the full thread but am I the only one who thinks you should actually be doing more?

You work part time and it sounds like he actually does his fair share, albeit maybe badly, but even so! Not everyone is good at everything.

There's household stuff I'm absolutely shite at but it doesn't mean I do it on purpose just to pass the book.

Do an online shop.

I have down time in my role but I couldn't just start making personal phone calls at work?