How can we fairly share household chores without rows or resentment?

[GentleDog]

Please help me work this out with my husband! It's a common problem, I think, really rather boring but I am not making any headway. How will he commit to take on some of the household labour and execute it?
He works 4 days, I'm 4.5 days with school holidays off. I do the dusting, hoovering, mopping, laundry, the bathroom, the food shop every week. I do the vast majority of the cooking. I also look after the finances, house admin, book holidays. I do the less regular cleaning jobs, e.g. filters, vents, descaling etc in the school holidays. He loads the dishwasher when I've cooked and will usually wipe down the worktops and hob. I usually empty the disgusting sink strainer thing and wipe round the sink. If I ask him to put some laundry in the tumble dryer he will do so, but invariably he will not think to get it back out. I might hang out a load of washing in the morning, he wouldn't think to bring it in when dry. He seems to think the kitchen bins need only to be emptied the night before the binmen come; the rest of the week he squishes everything down. Then the kitchen stinks so I also take the bins out to the garage and struggle to empty them as they've been compressed so much.
At the start of this year our cleaner retired. We agreed that he would clean the bathroom and upstairs on his non working day. I would sort the rest. I think he's cleaned the bathroom maybe three times since then. If I ask him about it he gets defensive. I tried to explain last weekend that I'm feeling anxious about returning to work after the school holidays as there'll be so much less time for me to do all the things I've done over the summer. His response was that the food shopping doesn't have to be done in person, I could get a delivery. This irritated me beyond belief! I feel resentful, frustrated, put upon, uncared for and taken for granted. I just do not know how to share this load. We have been together donkeys years and this is nothing new, however it feels exacerbated this year since the cleaner left and he dropped a day of work.

I dj t know what to tell you op, I have no idea how to get things equal without having to ask/ nag/ hint, which is as exhausting as doing it! Maybe a ‘so how are we going to do this- will we take turns doing the sheets, bathrooms, clothes, sweeping, mopping’ and list them all so he knows the shopping is nothing!!!

My friend did an excel spreadsheet showing everything she and her DH had done that week. included the time it took and asked him to add as necessary.

Then asked how they could even things up by moving things from her column to his!

Can you get another cleaner? Also yes to doing the food shop on line! What about listing ALL the chores so he can see them then you both agree to who does what. If he’s not pulling his weight tho, I would get another cleaner and down tools! You can’t make a grown man do what he doesn’t want to do but that doesn’t mean you should do it all either.

Get this book and do exactly what it says! (Hope the fancy link works)

Agree with getting another cleaner. A food delivery is so much easier and time efficient too.

Is he this incompetent in everyday life, or just in terms of housework? I can’t believe he can hold down a job if he can’t work out that clothes need washing and drying.

As he’s acting like a child, I think you’ll have to treat him like one. Write down the jobs you think need doing, get him to do the same and both agree how long they take (if he thinks it is a lot less, then get him to carry out a timed trial). Then take it in turns to pick a job ensuring both of you have jobs that add up to the same time. I would seriously consider getting a new cleaner though. We have one once a week and don’t really do any cleaning apart from that.

Read Eva Rodskys fair play and buy him a copy of This is how your marriage ends by Mathew Fray .

I suspect you may want to leave after Fair Play .

He knows things need washing as much as he knows the floors need sweeping/hoovering/mopping but he knows I'll do it. He wouldn't dream of taking the laundry basket down and putting a load on. I'm resistant to getting another cleaner due to the cost and because I feel that between us there's no reason we can't do it.

I'm resistant to getting another cleaner due to the cost. I think we should be able to manage it ourselves with the time we have. Food shopping is also more expensive when delivered. I go to Lidl and cannot get it down to that price anywhere else.

Food shopping - great idea - that’s your job now. Here’s the last three receipts from my last big shop so you can see what I normally buy and what I normally spend

There is The Organised Mum method- https://theorganisedmethod.com/

Bear with me, you can jointly set up a rota of what needs done and how often and then divide the rota between the two of you. So if he is cleaning upstairs bathroom it’s not when he feels like it and skipping the hair trap. It’s on a set schedule. It’s also a standard based on normal hygiene so he can’t be like your standards are OCD germphobic too high.

For the food shopping, deliveries are a god send! I would have said, great how about you do it? It’s still a task off your plate. You could start keeping a pad and pen where you write down anything you finish or notice looks low and then do a meal plan each week.

Food shopping is also more expensive when delivered.

I use Ocado smart pass and it works out cheaper than the petrol to go back and forth. Also the food waste is much lower as I don’t impulse buy or get tempted like when I’m in a physical shop. I get what’s on the list and that’s it. Finally, if you get something and then days later find its gone off early, it is super easy to get a refund from Ocado for it. With any shop I’d have to go to with say a £7 packet of chicken that’s gone off three days early - I’d not do it. I couldn’t stomach it, I just bin it. Now I photo it, the use by date, I ask for a refund and a day later it’s approved and 5days later the money is in my account.

So, in short, I think I save money getting my food shop delivered.

I would suggest sitting down together and working it all out when its not an imminent argument over something specific not done. Then try and put the past behind you (even though you will likely have to grit your teeth) and work out a the list of jobs that needs to be done daily, weekly and sporadically.

Then agree together what accomplishing that job looks like to both of you when its finished, so cleaning the kitchen involves cleaning the strainer....but does that happen in the daily quick clean or the weekly deep clean and also in terms of how often and when it happens. So food shopping happens on a Sunday so that you have food to cook for the work week etc

Then write it all down, listed by job with tasks, its finished criteria and timings and the person who owns it.

Try really hard to group jobs together with one person that impact each other, so the food shopper cooks the day after the shopping should have been done, so being late or sloppy impacts the person doing the job, not the other person

Then devise a split of jobs that plays to each person's skill set and preferences. And not wanting to do any jobs does not get factored into preferences but hating ironing does!! and that balances it between you both.

The lastly agree on a process for handling what happens if life throws a curveball and someone really cant do a job - actually sick, travelling on business etc. How the person who owns the job needs to ask for help and how it will balance back and by when if possible

So in short treat it like a business planning session with SMART goals..specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time bound.

It works 😊

Does he come from a family home where his mother did everything and his father sat on his arse? I've had 2 partners from this set up and they're frigging useless. My now partner comes from a family home where mum & dad both did houseworky jobs the same as my parents did and it's so much better & far easier.

I second fair play. Or as a PO suggested, you list our your chores, frequency and time taken. Work out annual time, divide to get weekly time. He does the same, then compare lists. Then transfer from your list to his to even it up. Tell him he has to take full ownership and accountability for whatever's on his list. You won't be reminding him or even thinking about what's on his list, you will be trusting him to step up and be an adult about it.

He doesnt want to do his share
Men are not incompetent, they dont have special eyes that dont see dirt, they just dont want to do it
He would rather you exhaust yourself than him doing his fair share
Thats how much he really cares about you

Personally they never change and Im getting my ducks in a row

Are there things that he does, that you’re not seeing? I’m a bit blind to my some of my husband’s priorities - I’ve no idea how to reset the WiFi, I didn’t notice the tap in the bathroom even dripped and I wouldn’t think to mow the lawn until the cat went missing.

We split chores by who cares about what so I don’t expect him to ever plump a cushion, and I don’t clean the wheelie bins.

We don’t share or take turns. I do all the cooking but he doesn’t get to complain about it unless he wants to take it on. I don’t deal with insurance or utility bills - I don’t have to remember dates, know which provider we’re with, or check the oil tank. But if he makes a mistake I don’t get on his case because I don’t want to take over.

We have relatively strict rules about what belongs where and return things to their correct rooms. But we don’t bother about each other’s stuff beyond that because it’s not out in the way.

I prefer not to share jobs where mistakes affect each other - it’s just easier, imo, if the person who does the shopping, also cooks, because I would lose my mind over missing ingredients. But I don’t mind if he doesn’t fold my socks or hangs the laundry differently, If you can work out what drives you mad, build your system around that principle. It’s not the same for everybody.

This part is very unmumsnetty but it works - I give him a lot of appreciation for anything I want him to do. Takes seconds and gets jobs done. He’s pretty appreciative too and I like that.

Get a new cleaner. And hes right about the food shop

You do both have to let go of having things done your way. If he wants to get the food delivered and do the cooking, then fine (though you then face having to put up with what he cooks), but he doesn’t get to tell you to get the food delivered if you carry on doing it. But I get entirely how infuriating it is to be told ‘oh just fix it this way’ when he’s never bloody done it.

I’m living in clover now because we have a cleaner and then after that dp literally does 80% of all the remaining house work of every type - the only things I do more of are cooking and ironing, but he wouldn’t care if I didn’t iron his things, he’s more than capable of doing it, and he does a good 40% of the cooking still. There isn’t any reason why men can’t do this except when they don’t give a shit.

I’m afraid I think a cleaner is cheaper than divorce.

Agree. Yes, you can try Fair Play and make more lists and tell him exactly what to do (thus adding even further to your mental labour) but a large proportion of men who don't pull their weight at home do so because they feel entitled to female labour. They pretend not to understand when you complain because it serves them for mummy bang-maid to do everything. It's weaponised incompetence that gives them free time at the expense of their wife's time, energy, mental work, and exhaustion.

Zawn Villines writes about this a lot

https://zawn.substack.com/p/why-household-labor-inequity-is-abuse

https://zawn.substack.com/p/if-he-wanted-to-he-would-the-real

https://zawn.substack.com/p/its-time-to-stop-lying-about-household

get another cleaner. Apparently my DH can’t “see” everything that needs doing. It will not occur to him. As I am home more than him, I notice things more and the bin gets full on “ my watch” so I end up emptying it more than him.
instead of nagging him, I now just spend his money to outsource as much as I can. The only help I need now is someone to meal prep for me and once I get round to getting more organised, may outsource that as well

Def stop doing his washing, buying the foods he likes etc, things he needs.

If he can't be bothered to do it for you or the family, then why do it for him?

Are there any things that he does but you don’t?

My DH is a lazy arse with housework. He does work more hours than me and do the after school pick up as I'm at work so there is some balance. He does bins, dishwasher etc.
I allocated him the ironing as well, that's one of those jobs that's very binary, it's either done or it isn't. If the dc don't have uniform I just stand and look at him in bewlidement, I don't problem solve for him etc, it's worked, he cracks on with it.
We also have a robot vacuum that goes round every day, a fortnightly cleaner and online food shop.