"Same amount of free time" theory RE household jobs except...

[flipperdoda]

...can this become unfair in itself?

Genuinely curious to see people's views. The relationships has since broken up for a multitude of reasons but I'm doing a lot of reflecting about what was/wasn't reasonable.

Context: moved in with partner. I was working a 9-5 job. I always knew I didn't want to work long hours - I value my free time, hobbies, socialising and downtime etc. So part of my reasoning for taking the job was it being a 9-5 job where they were flexible and valued people not just workers.

Partner working long, difficult/impossible to predict hours - an average week would be out of our home maybe 8-7 Mon - Sat and half a day Sunday too if it were a heavy week. They were self-defined but it's not like they could then just choose to work 2 hours a day.

I understood that more of the cleaning, food shopping etc fell to me - but the argument was pretty much that I had the free time to do it therefore I should do almost all/all of it because of this. When I said that I didn't think that was fair and I'd specifically chosen a job to enable me to have a good amount of free time etc I was told that I could leave them and I'd still end up doing the same amount of cleaning/cooking etc so it was up to me.

They couldn't quite see the backwards logic as to in that case they'd have it all to do too!

As I say, it's over now so doesn't 'matter' other than me trying to learn my boundaries and acceptable behaviours going forwards. I genuinely don't know where to sit on this.

Yes: people should both have free time. But in this case, where the hours are so drastically different due to career choices, where does it even out? I had all of Saturday therefore could get all the jobs done and they didn't lose free time? Or unfair of me to have to spend my Saturdays cleaning when I chose a job with balance on purpose?

Give me your opinions, please!

I think it depends on who got the benefit of the person working long hours. If it meant the household had a better income (significantly) and it was agreed it was worth the time commitment then the person working less contributes by taking the chores - because having to fit it all into a Sunday pm is harsh. If the long working partner kept the extra earning or it was done for job satisfaction then they still need to contribute.

You chose your lifestyle and know your priorities. I don’t see why you should then pick up more of the crap

You'll sigh reading this - and I sigh at myself, writing it - but we didn't really discuss it beforehand!! They kind of just announced after a few weeks of living together that I needed to do more.

I earned approx twice as much as them but our finances were kept relatively separate. We were in a weird situation where rent and bills didn't apply - but did live independently i.e. weren't living with parents or anything.

It was job satisfaction/the career choice. Honestly, I'm sure they'd say they had no choice with that career, whereas I'd say okay but you chose the career knowing about this!

Truly not sure what's reasonable as I'm clearly very biased

I'm in a very similar situation, so interested to read opinions. I didn't choose to go part time so I could spend all my time doing housework!

You were two people who'd made your own independent career choices but happened to be co-habiting. That's quite different from two people who have committed to each long term, become a family - and are making choices jointly about everything.

The equal leisure time idea is more relevant when both partners have decided that one will work long hours, the other short, for mutually beneficial reasons - financial and childcare usually.

Pay for a cleaner.

If I worked longer hours I’d expect to either pay for a cleaner or my partner to help more if we lived together.

I think if you didn't have children and were both out at work most of the day, then there wasn't that much housework to do anyway. So splitting it in half would have been the reasonable thing to do. You'd still both have had leisure time.

The rest would have been down to personal choice, kindness and give and take. Not expectation.

Wow, if this was me I'd be glad that the relationship had ended.

I work long hours in a job with a long commute and I'm the bigger earner in our house. I'm also a very houseproud person who weirdly enjoys cooking, homemaking, entertaining, a little bit OCD and not ashamed of that.

But, my partner who on the flip side enjoys watching sport and generally sitting always texts me to ask what needs doing, what he can pick up from the shops and we take it in turns to make breakfast, cups of tea, help out with entertaining and clearing up etc.

I'd never dream of digging him out over his share of the housework or mine. It just doesn't occur to me to do that.

I think if I'd ever argued or even debated with someone who "did it last" or "does the most" I'd end the partnership for fear of someone trying to score points or knock them off me. It's just not how I want to think of someone I love

The equal leisure time idea is more relevant when both partners have decided that one will work long hours, the other short, for mutually beneficial reasons - financial and childcare usually.

This seems to make sense, although what if the situation was the same (hours wise, no children) ten years later... you'd surely be your own family unit by then.

there wasn't that much housework to do anyway.

This is probably also true I think I struggled with the assumption and any discussion I tried to raise about it being shot down as me being ridiculous. But that's clearly bad and almost a different issue - I'm interested to see what people think is a fair split full stop!

Wow, if this was me I'd be glad that the relationship had ended.

I'm not sure whether you mean from my perspective or theirs - but to be honest I think that's a fair enough comment either way. I certainly didn't like who I turned into and your comment about points scoring is spot on, it did turn a bit like that. Like I said, it's finished for multiple reasons and this did contribute towards it (more both of our attitudes/way of (not) communicating about it, but still).

Equally if I couldn't raise concerns about one person doing something more (if it was genuinely unequal) that would be an issue for me!

Frederick, glad my thread could be of use to someone else (maybe!)

It's a difficult position, isn't it. I used to be totally torn between feeling utterly selfish and ridiculous - and thinking "but that's not why I set my life up like this!". I found it really really difficult to work out what I thought was reasonable and used to get turned around in discussions/arguments due to that

I was told that I could leave them and I'd still end up doing the same amount of cleaning/cooking etc so it was up to me.

err - NO!. One person doesn't create the same work as two BUT more importantly. Without you he has to do it all himself, so, anything you picked up which made life easier for him, he will now have to do himself.

Worst case scenario 0 you still do it all , although far less
He, from only having to a bit, now has to pick up the whole thing.

Well escaped. he's a twat!

Assuming you didn’t share any money at all and went halves on everything, I’d say you have a point. But assuming you did share money (and also assuming that your partner earnt more than you), you’re being unreasonable. I’ve been that person working long hours and coming home to a partner who’d done fuck all at home and still expected me to pay for stuff. It was monumentally shit.

We don't have kids so it is different, but we do most chores together. We have a few separate chores that we also do when the other is at work. I work longer hours and I have horses so I am out a lot more than he is. He also does a lot of diy which benefits me massively but is part hobby and part chore and is treated as such. I am in a job that can require long hours at times and I get paid a lot more which he massively benefits from and when I am in a full on period at work he will do more chores or more diy. The really long hours are not all the time and we wouldn't last long if they were.

We have never sat down and talked about it we just both see what needs doing and neither one of us would sit around while the other is doing chores.

I think it would be different if we had kids as it is more full on and I suspect that to carve out down time you need to act as a tag team, so one would be having downtime when the other is doing child care.

Without kids it is more about both being up and doing chores and not leaving it to the other. With kids (from someone that doesn't have them) it is more about survival and then both getting equal downtime is a good way to do it. However if one or both don't get enough downtime it quickly spirals into competitive tiredness and resentment.

Sonata, the OP said she actually earnt more. Why would you automatically assume he earns more? Weird...
OP He is a dick who wants a mother rather than a partner. Glad you're not in that situation anymore!

Hecateh it certainly wasn't his finest moment, although I'm sure I had (have!) moments of acting like a twat in day to day life too but yes that was my logic too.

Mummyto I'm pretty sure Sonata was just giving a few different examples rather than actually making those assumptions about me.

The really long hours are not all the time and we wouldn't last long if they were.

This is probably the vital difference between your scenario and what was mine. I get the idea of doing chores mostly at the same time, but if there's very few hours you're both around for that loops back to the exact argument they'd raise to me - surely the free time you do have as a couple should be spent doing something nice, if that time is so limited. Except then it results in one personal taking on all the heavy lifting the rest of the time.

I think it pretty much just comes down to the fact that relationships are very difficult maintain in the face of so many work hours. Possible, of course, but one person tends to have to suffer for it. In many relationships that suffering may be seen as minimal and worthwhile to keep the relationship, whereas in mine it wasn't which is probably where lots of the arguments really stemmed from but I didn't see that for a while.

Interesting to hear people's thoughts!

Pretty much seems like it's "if you don't bring the money to the table that your longer working partner does, you equal it out by spending the time doing housework". Gets more complicated when a partner is working longer for less money!

I found, in my relationship where I was at home more and therefore undertook to do more of the housework - there was no incentive for my DH to be tidy or clean anything up for himself. The justification was always 'well, you're home, you can do it,' which is fine for the bigger things, but shouldn't mean that the partner never has to do anything, as they so often assume. Picking up your own dirty pants, putting them in the laundry basket, helping to plan meals, loading the dishwasher (or unloading it)...surely if you make half the mess, you clean up your own part of it!

My XH would totally refuse to do a hand's turn in the house, to the extent of leaving rubbish where it fell, peeling off dirty clothes and leaving them where they fell, leaving plates on the floor...to me, this didn't so much imply a sharing of housework, but a total lack of respect for me.

In your situation, I wouldn’t expect to do most of the chores.

You’re earning more, so he wasn’t subsidising you or the household.

You hadn’t agreed together that he’d do long hours for a while as an investment in your future together.

You chose a different lifestyle, it’s ridiculous that your leisure time should go on doing his share of chores.

Also sounds like he’s a manipulative person who managed to confuse / browbeat you, so you’re definitely best out of it.

Yeah, I think the 'how much money' earned thing is a red herring, used to justify lower-earning women doing more housework, by lazy men and put-upon women.

Obviously, the solution would have been to have a baby and for him, as the lower-earning partner, to become a SAHD and do ALL the housework, (while you continued to enjoy your hobbies, as a perk of being 'the breadwinner').

Joking, obviously, in terms of you and him, since he's an ex but, in general terms, so very normal.

In terms of your actual relationship, it sounds like a case where you'd have been better off living apart and dating, since he mostly wanted to use you as his housekeeper.

Yeah I think in situations where there's a significant imbalance in working hours, and probably also in finances too, you're probably better keeping your own separate homes when you don't have any shared commitments like children or property.

Yeah don't think I could deal with someone working 6 12 hour days a week. If I was going to live with someone, I'd actually want to be able to see them.

My exH ended up being a lodger. I almost always came home to a dirty house and no meal while he'd slept in and played video games all day.
He still isn't working and we've been divorced awhile so made the right decision.
I can't see living with anyone again or married again. I'm just over cleaning up after someone else and them being resentful about money like I should apologise for doing well.

I don’t tend to think of sharing the load in terms of free time - in our case, honestly neither of us has much free time! But if you’re a partnership, whoever is home carries the load 100%. When you’re both home, you share it equally.

My dh technically makes more than me but I work longer more awkward hours. He is technically home more, so he does more of the day to day childcare, all of the cooking those days, school runs, homework, cleaning, etc when I’m at work. I do what I can when I can - ordering food or household admin on the train or down time at work. When we’re both home, everything is shared. I get less free time because I have less free time in general (I wouldn’t see my dh or dc if I took my ‘free time’ to do anything else). But this is fine because we’ve talked about it and we accept it’s what we need to do for me to have the career I want and everyone’s needs to be met. But no one is ever just sitting around while the other one does everything because it’s their ‘free time’.

We had a similar scenario, where we both earned the same with equal earning trajectory, but his work involved travel about 2 weeks every month (international so in one lump). It would all be short notice too, not planned ahead. He'd never check with me before agreeing to trips.

So I'd end up working full-time and doing 100% of household stuff when he was away. Plus even when he was back he'd say "I can't arrange that (say boiler service), I don't know if I'll be there that week." Or he'd forget he wasn't in a hotel and the dishes needed doing. So I'd end up doing 100% of it all the time. Which got tedious. I got burned out and dropped my hours. So I have time for the household stuff, but little earnings and career.

Just a cautionary tale.

This is a tricky one. I do see your point of view, in fact I think you're right in theory.

But in reality, surely you want to spend some / most of your time off together? I think I'd rather do a bit more for the sake of having quality time together when both of you were not working.

Also, from his point of you, I can see how you might appear lazy.... even though you have 'chosen' to be lazy (which I do think is a valid choice), but still v irritating for him if you're sitting around doing nothing while he's supposed to get home late and then clean on top of that.

Tricky. I can see why this was an issue between you!