Is our relationship fair? Am I missing something?

[frozennile]

Hi everyone, looking for some opinions as I'm struggling to see the wood for the trees.

My (M40) wife (F41) have a 4 year-old daughter and a dog. We both work from home, me full-time and she has Fridays off with the kid.

We split the household chores as follows:

Me: Cooking / dishes / kitchen cleaning and tidying up, laundry, nursery drop-off and pick-up, bins, bathtime, all overnight get-ups (since she stopped breastfeeding), 3/4 of the dog walks (2 per day), finance management, ordering groceries, car stuff, house and garden DIY, one-off major physical jobs, about half the nursery and school admin.

Wife: Bedtime stories, ordering clothes, anything dog related eg vet stuff, buying things online for the house and for the kid, birthday presents for other children, watching the kid while I cook (we only allow an hour of TV every other night max) or run on a Sunday morning, swim and dance class bookings, other half of the nursery admin

She also tells me she does 'all the cognitive load stuff'.

She goes to a gym class on Monday nights, yoga on Tuesday nights, and dog agility training on Sunday late morning.

We have a cleaner once a week.

I believe we split the childcare evenly in terms of solo time with child.

My question is really - what am I missing here? I feel like I'm doing really quite a lot and I'm always on my feet. In addition I'm responsible for about 3/5 of the household income so need to keep on top of my work (I run my own business). Do I just not understand the cognitive load thing? When I ask her about it she gets very defensive ('oh you're accusing me of not pulling my weight again') and it's hard to have a sensible discussion.

I'm basically concerned I'm being a stupid man and not understanding something.

It is a problem we have that we are both quite focused on what's fair rather than looking at how the other one is feeling. Typically I am usually fine and have a lot of energy, whereas my wife is usually under the weather, stressed or tired. I don't know how to solve this other than talk to her about how she feels (we talk about her work problems a lot) and take on more to help her. But I would rather she didn't have these continuous challenges. I'm not going to pile more on her just to prove a point, but I am getting frustrated at the lack of expectation meeting reality (would be nice to have a hot meal made for me at the end of the day maybe once a week and a bit of appreciation in some form...yes that but other ways as well...)

You could try getting the Fair play cards, it’s. Pack of cards with all kinds of different tasks written on and you can go through it together to agree who does which and does the balance seem right.

Maybe a better way to open the conversation might be to say with your daughter starting school in September (I assume?) obviously the plans for the days and division of jobs will need to change, so let’s see where we are now and how we’ll handle things from September.

I mean if she’s off work on Fridays then when your daughter is in school presumably she can get most of the housework done in that time?

I think it can be hard to compare task lists (although in your case it's pretty clear she is doing very little) so I think of it as "does one of us have more free time than the other?"

In this case, I would consider it totally unreasonable for my OH to be lying on the sofa while I am doing bath time such that I had to come downstairs after bath time and do more jobs. If my OH is doing jobs (and there are more jobs to do) I do jobs as well. If we get to a point where we both think all the jobs that need doing that day are done, we both sit down (often that doesn't happen though).

Unfortunately I think you are right that some people are less capable at coping than others. Some people seem to get overwhelmed from very little whereas others can take on a lot and seem ok. I think the only thing you can do is have a chat with her in a calm and considered way when she is not stressed and see if she can understand your point of view.

Another option would be to just stop doing stuff and when she comes down and you've not cleaned the kitchen, just tell her you are too tired.

This is how we operate but equally neither of us takes the piss so it works ok.

This is not a "who is doing what" issue.

This is a communication issue.

She is your wife, so assuming someone you have known for a good length of time. No-one here can tell you who is doing what wrong. But the one person who can, you don't seem to be connecting with to get to the route of this.

You need to have a proper discussion. And listen to each other. As otherwise this is just going to cause resentment.

I did try this - those cards ascribe a lot of value to cognitive load tasks (arranging vaccinations is considered the same as doing all the laundry for example, and other kids birthdays is equal to middle-of-the-night getups). So her pile came out higher - which she used to show me that I'm not pulling my weight.

Which is kind of why I'm asking the question - am I missing something about these tasks that are difficult and if I did them I would mess them up or not do them properly?

If she has a day off my wife usually relaxes, has a nap, maybe takes the dog on a long walk etc. She doesn't do housework. If I take the kid to my mum's on a Sunday I will come home to the house left as it was and will need to make dinner.

Is it possible she could be anemic, B12, or vitamin D deficient?

Pregnancy, childbirth and periods can really deplete iron levels. Even mild deficiency can cause crushing fatigue and (I notice in myself) irritability towards the end of the day and low emotional resilience.

You can avoid all this nonsense. A pack of cards for who does what. Really?

You need to get to the route of this by talking. And if you can't, work out why. That is the issue here.

Although your posts seem very AI, so this might be somewhere to start...

I think you’re doing most of the heavy lifting here. You are doing chores that have to be done every day - dishes, cleaning, tidying up, bins, bath time, cooking etc . Your wife’s responsibilities are mainly occasional - ordering things for house and child, birthday presents, vet stuff, how long does that actually take? Not long I would think. The daily grind of keeping a home needs to be more evenly shared. Why doesn’t she cook or clean ? Could you do alternate weeks or have set days where she does these things?

a divisive, shocking reply

From what you have said, you are doing way more than her.
Ordering things online is not some arduous task. Especially as a lot of people enjoy browsing and shopping.

I would be unhappy if I were you, from what you have said here she is taking the piss out of your good nature. She doesn't want to talk about it because she doesn't want it to change.

(Of course, we don't have a full picture!)

I didn’t realise that about the Fair Play cards, that does seem insane.

Would it work to compare leisure time? You should both have the same amount of time to relax/pursue hobbies - at the moment it seems like she has more.

ha I read back my original post and it does sound AI if you're suspicious of AI (which i definitely am myself). defo not an AI though!

Another saintly husband asking the good women of mumsnet to confirm that his wife is useless.

Ordering clothes online and organising presents for a friend's birthday party isn't every day tasks though is it??? Your wife adds these things to her list of tasks she does, but they are something you do occasionally, not daily! Laundry, loading/unloading the dishwasher, cleaning etc are daily (or at least very frequent) tasks.

You appear to be carrying the daily load, whilst your wife has a list of infrequent tasks, with may be an odd daily task thrown in!

She isn't pulling her weight. You need a non-confrontational conversation with her.

I was coming back to say this. She might even be suffering from depression if she's always tired or has lost her zest for life. Encourage your wife to go to the GP to discuss her low energy.

Yes you would surely be far busier than she is on the average day. Sorry I'm not sure how you address this if you've already tried and she's getting defensive. she perhaps thinks the chores she does are less visible but you do seem to have the work that is more physical and possibly this consumes more time.

Do you have similar expectations for tidying and laundry? I mean you aren't getting the place excessively, unnecessarily clean? Can you let asome things slide on certain busier days ?

I really think if you aren't making progress in getting her to see how you feel then you should consider a change, so perhaps she cooks on certain days - early week days maybe? Why dont you do bath times on some days and she doesn't them the other days? It seems like a really rigid system you've got going. I'm sure me and my hubby shared the kid- based work between ourselves, you need some variety if nothing else.

Raise it at a good time when your child is asleep and just say you're feeling unhappy with the current plan and you want to talk it through with her. Best wishes

It seems unfair that she has all the surfing jobs so maybe offer to swap some of your jobs for hers? Also one person doing all the cooking is just impractical

I would also echo that if that she is that tired she should see the doctor. She doesn’t sound well but I don’t think resting all the time is going to help.

In mental load here eg yesterday i had to have son’s homework signed, sign a permission slip for a school tour, remember another son needed to bring in recycling for school, pay a bill, book swimming for next term.

If that was all I’d had to do I would have said fine, as it was I had to convince two children they needed to shower and remind one to brush teeth, put clothes on line and walk dog before bringing them to school and then going to work, coming home taking clothes in, sweeping, taking dog out again, checking ds had done homework, putting a wash on, loading dishwasher, putting clothes suddenly needed for today into tumble dryer, changing sheets on one bed as cat had been in it and son has eczema that gets aggrevates by cat hair. Then collected eldest and put everyone to bed. Dh is away for two weeks with work so everything is on me. Mental load not much mostly, mental load plus everything else a lot. Op while your wife does do an amount, without cleaning/ cooking etc etc etc everything else doesn’t seem to be split fairly (unless you’re a neat freak looking for above and beyond daily!!!)

She's taking the piss and then playing the victim.

Deeply unattractive in a partner

I think you should tell her you think you need marriage counselling because you can’t otherwise talk about this.

She will probably quickly back down at which point you should lock in a month of switching tasks.

Or she will double down in which case you should bring up the subject of divorce.

You definitely need to swap for a week or a month. It sounds mine you are doing way more, and as you say, being in charge of kids vaccines is not the same as doing laundry every day.

The other thing to think about is splitting the chores so you have equal downtime. That would be fair. Gym classes are included in that downtime for me but dog agility isn’t.

You don't seem to give any weight to the whole day a week your wife spends with your daughter ("the kid") and surely the Saturday morning at dog obedience counts to match your dog walks?

How many night wakings do you have to deal with for a 4 year old?

Lots of people who work 4 days a week end up being expected to do the same amount of work they were doing in five, so maybe that's one of the reasons she's so knackered. As others say, maybe she should get checked out by a GP.

I think you need to properly talk to each other, without resentment creeping in and without being so transactional - do you ever go out together as just a couple? Sometimes it's easy to forget what you actually like about each other when you are caught up in the drudgery of life.