Why is it always left upto me???

[spudcounter]

..to do the finances, negotiate with the builder without giving away our life's savings, organise the holiday, do the packing for the family, deal with insurance, car stuff, kids' health concerns and school, clean up, deal with plumber, electrician, plasterer, wash and iron clothes, organise our social life (we wouldn't have one otherwise), 'maintain' our relationship, and do the f*ing DIY!..it's really getting me down..do other people's dhs take a reasonable share of things that need doing??

No.

But we are always fighting over who does more and who is tiredest.

[yawns]

No - am feeling the same as you recently. The most dp does is phone the garage about his own cars mot service - thats it!

I know he works but once he is home he des nothing about the house in terms of maintenance, upkeep or 'paperwork'. Does everything for his clients and nowt for us!

Am feeling quite AAAAARRRRGGGHHH about it myself!

Start with unimportant things and start to get bad at doing them. Scorch a few of his shirts with the iron, or accidentally wash his favourite white top with your red socks. Forget to put the bin out a few times, or only cook things he dislikes. MAKE him take over some things, and DON'T do things for him like sorting out his finances or making phonecalls it would be a lot easier for him to make.

He probably lets you do all those things because you're so efficient, and he's forgotten the sense of accomplishment he gets from doing DIY etc. If he moans, tell him you have too much to cope with and you need to do x,y and z and those are now HIS duties, you simply don't have the time.

because you are a woman. and if you do these things they will be done properly.

blokes are rubbish .

it would take you twice as long to rectify the fallout if you let him do any of these things so consider it a time saving exercise !

My DH has a long commute and works long hours in a stressful job. Fine - but I work full time too and have finally got fed up with doing everything. I have stopped doing his ironing (and that of 18 year old DS), have stopped remembering his mother's birthday and told him he had better sort out his car insurance as the renewal letter was in. He forgot! - and was driving around all last week uninsured . . . MY fault, of course - but I think that the message is beginning to get through now.

Its a fine line between asking for them to help and seeming to be nagging and inevitably ends in a row so I have just accepted I will have to do it and occasionally the resentment builds up!

because you are a woman and therefore better at everything ?

I know how frustrating it is, and I wish I knew the answer.

My DH doesn't sound as bad as yours as he deals with workmen (mind you, he knows plumbers, builders etc anyway through his job), all his own car stuff and odd bits of housework, though it can take prompting. I do virtually all cleaning, cooking, shopping, finances, holiday arrangements etc etc. We both work full time (no DC yet) and make an equal financial contribution. I leave the house 1-2 hours before him & get in about 2 hours earlier - the time I am out and he's here, he's asleep; the time I get in and he's still out, I'm cleaning, washing, cooking etc. He does work Saturdays though, which is why I ended up being responsible for so much, but I am beginning to feel like he should do more stuff for 'us'.

We will have to have a re-think if when we have DC and there is more work to do.

What I have found works is to give him jobs that are his responsibility, eg cleaning up dinner stuff, rubbish, car washing, and always thank him for doing them. OK they are sometimes not done as often or as well as I would like, but at least they are done!

I can't really blame him if he doesn't leap up and offer to clean the bathroom or whatever when he has got used to me doing it.

It'll be hard to change his habits, especially if things have been like this for a while, so i think you should start small, one or two jobs at a time.

Good luck, and if you find something that works, let me know!

You forgot about organising the babysitter! Why is that always my job? Even had to arrange it for MY birthday.

My DH will organise the car stuff but only because I can't drive so have no idea what they are talking about. I am having driving lessons at the moment so as soon as I pass that will be another job dumped on me.

He is a chef so does work long and unsociable hours. But he is in charge of quite a few restaurants/cafes and is very organised at work. But at home is a messy and lazy.

He is a lost cause. We have been together 15 years so I don't think he will change now.

You're not alone.

I work three days a week, and hubby works five. Whilst I accept that as I work less I should do more around the home (for example, it is easier for me to do the shopping on my day off than it is for him to fit it in after work). We have our chores split up, and he rarely does his without nagging. As a result, my 'rooms' are tidy, his are messy, my chores are done, his are never fully complete, we only ever socialise with my friends and family, and his time off is his time, whereas my time off is my opportunity to look after the kids! He has his 'jobs' but everything else kind of defaults to me because he just assumes I will do them.

In short, men can be lazy blighters who seem to get away with as little as possible (a generalisation I know, but is definitely what appears to be the case from threads like these!). I've never managed to change my hubby, so just accept that's the way it is - saves on rows. It is a bit lame though!

DH and I aren't actually speaking to each other at the moment for this very reason. We've had numerous arguments about it in the past and now I don't know what I'm supposed to say to him.

Dh goes to work and comes home and thats it. I asked him a while ago if he would mind washing the dishes every night seeing as I cook, which he does but under duress. He only washes the dishes and doesn't dry them and put them away. I work in the evenings and they are still on the draining board when I get home.

I do his finances, I do mine, I even had to remind him about his car tax, which was due at the end of last month, I reminded him on the 7th of this month because he still hadn't done it. Even then he just wrote a cheque and I had to go to the Post Office for him. I work, I do the housework, I take the kids to school and pick them up, I sort out our finances. I basically do the thinking for the whole family but sometimes I would just like not to have to think IYSWIM?

Things have now come to a head because earlier in the week DD was going on a school trip which would require her to have waterproofs and wellies etc. I was talking to DH about this the night before as I had had to buy her some waterproof trousers. In the morning I couldn't find Wellies in the normal place and DD thought that they might be in DH's car, so I had to drop DC's at school and drive to dh's work to have a look in his car, meanwhile trying to contact him on mobile phone with no luck. Wellies weren't in his car and I couldn't find him at his workplace. Drove home to have another look in the house and then in the garage. Managed to get hold of DH and he told me he had put DC's wellies in the boot of my car a couple of weeks ago!! (I hadn't noticed because they were in a carrier bag). So I drove for miles for nothing.

When I asked him why he hadn't mentioned it the night before when talking about it, he replied "because I just didn't think". To me this was just the final nail in the coffin, he doesn't ever think about anything. I feel like I'm so alone, like I'm looking after 3 children not 2. I do everything for DC's and DH but what does anyone ever do for me? I wish I could just go to work and come home and not think about anything else. Life would be so simple.
I also raised the issue of not being able to get hold of him at work if I need to (not the first time I've needed to)and his reply to that was "I'm not a fucking telephone answering service".

Sorry to have hijacked this thread for a moment. I feel better for getting this of my chest and having this little rant!!

cuddle for fizzy...

Thanks MrsM

Worse than I didn't think is you could've asked. Why is it we have to ask them, but they never have to ask us we just do!!!! We see it we do it, that simple, so why is this such a huge problem to them.

Causes lots of arguments as there is no point if you have to ask them each time you want them to do something, even if you want them to appreciate you, by buying a bunch of flowers - maybe!!!

I don't think we should accept that is just the way men are as not all men are like that so it is possible to break the chain.

I'm just fed up with arguing about it all the time. He thinks I'm being totally unreasonable/insane/irrational about it and can't see (or maybe doesn't care) why it upsets me so much.

It bugs me so much that he'll tell me a conversation he's had at work, word for word, but if I ask him to do me a favour he doesn't remember me having said any such thing! Maybe he's just not interested in anything I've got to say anymore.

I think a little appreciation from our men once in a while would go a long way, but then I guess they just don't think about it!!

oh I know this one,

I study/work p/t and care for DS p/t.
I organise holidays including packing for everything except DH clothes
I do the washing and alot of the general cleaning and tidying (espeically the boring stuff)
I put bins/recycling out and take them in
I manage finance
I drop his dry cleaning off and pick it up
I do his expenses and other HR type stuff
I check his work reports
I plan and manage all parties/family visits etc
I buy presents and cards for all friends and family
I organise everything to do with DS (who has SN apts on top of normal kid stuff)
I ALWAYS organise babysitter - including on my birthday or valentines day etc
I cook (to an extent I'm not good at cooking and he hates what I cook)
I get up in the night to DS
I get DS ready for nursery/days out etc even when DH is at home
I do shopping

and its not worth leaving it, I did this and ended up with an overflowing fly ridden stinky bin cos despite me being away it hadn't occured to him to put the bin out!

My DH sounds quite good compared to some of yours - he puts the bins out once a week, stacks the dishwasher every night, organises his own car stuff and deals with our finances. I am grateful, honestly I am.

However, I do understand the feeling that some of you have that you are never able to share the responsibility for anything. Things that are glaringly obvious that need doing but he doesn't ever do unless asked. No good getting cross about it because if I didn't ask he didn't know it needs doing, did he?.

He never does the organising of holidays, repairmen, baby sitters, days out, visits to relatives or family birthdays. If I don't think of it, it won't get done and then he'll ask why we don't go out/go on holiday/forgot his mum's birthday.

The thing about his time off being his time off also ran a bell. He does very little that he doesn't want to do and if he does he expects loads of thanks and praise. We women are just supposed to get on with it. I am a SAHM so even on holiday I end up doing the same old things but in a different place but he expects to put his feet up and have a nice time. Chance would be a fine thing.

I just wish sometimes I got some time off from thinking and planning.

oh well at least I'm not alone....one of the low points was sitting in a tax accountant's office breastfeeding our (!) 6 week old baby sorting out HIS tax affairs!

Got builders in at the moment and it was me who had to say to them could they leave the hen line on the roof so yours truly (not dh)could clamber up to paint the wall.(we would never be able to do it if they didn't as it would be too precarious). So, in between packing holiday stuff, childcare, organising finances, etc etc, I'm now going to be perched on the roof this weekend painting a bloody wall!

DH and I now haven't spoken to each other since Thursday. He's sleeping on the sofa.....

No. DP will automatically not do these things and I will automatically do them. I arranged for the council to come and pick up some junk the other ay; I asked DP to remember to put it out - he forgot and we missed it. You could say I forgot too, but the fact is if I don't do all the remembering, things don't happen. I sometimes give him jobs to do - "You are doing the car tax, here is the form, the office is at blah blah, go NOW before you forget!" and that way I offload a bit of it, but I have to remember to do that IYSWIM. It annoys me that the buck stops with me, but it does. Left to his own devices, he'd just wait for the red bills to mount up.

One thing I do to feel better about it is ask him to do jobs he can do and likes - he's good with anything technical, computer and electrical stuff, and gardening. So I never do those, to make it more fair.

fizzy i am in the same situation as you - not currently talking to dh for exactly the same reasons (even down to the not being able to get hold of him at work - I have to send him an email because I know that he would NEVER not check his blackberry - God forbid he may miss a work email )

Someone will come on here soon and say that these men behave like this because we let them. Well fine, but I don't know how to stop it. If I don't do the jobs, no-one does and we get bailiffs at the door (failure to pay a speeding fine), or ccjs (failure to pay tax) or cheques bounce or dcs don't get lunches, clean clothes etc.

I work 4 days a week, have 5 children under 9 and still do everything home/family related on top of my job. I can't get through to dh that it isn't tolerable and am starting to think that the only way forward is to get him to leave

sorry spudcounter, I'm not help, and have used your thread as a vehicle for ranting! If you find a solution, you should market it - you would be a very wealthy woman

Pollyanna-yes I would love to know how to stop it too. DH and I have had numerous rows about this in the past and nothing has ever been resolved. We can't keep covering the same ground for the rest of our lives but I really do not know how we are ever going to resolve this.

To top this off everything I say to DH he takes the wrong way, which really doesn't help when trying to talk things through rationally.

It's serious this time, with us not talking and him sleeping on the sofa. He wrote me a letter on Thurs evening, which I found screwed up into a ball on our bed. Said some very nasty things about me, totally uncalled for, but this is what it's like. I may say to him "DH it really annoys me when......" and he will come back with something not very nice and personal about me.

HELP!!!

I can tell you from experience that if you stop doing it they don't start.In my case I am at home a lot because of health and I have had a home based job for years so I can do a lot of this stuff but my bug bear is that even if i do do it because I am here I want him to at least know what is going on and be part of it.This year he has even told me to book any holiday he doesn't mind where we go is quite happy just to drive to gatwick on august 9th and see where he ends up!¬

I think a lot of assumptions are made on both sides. People need to talk about who has which jobs and stick to them. If this means drawing up a list, then draw up a list. Saying "I shouldn't need to do that" will not change anything.

It is unreasonable to assume that someone who has a long-hours, demanding job will also do a great deal of the house stuff. And I think it is also unreasonable to keep pestering someone at work. It can make them look unprofessional - remember what they are there for.

Having said that I cannot understand why people do their DHs' family's birthday cards and presents for them. That really is arse-wiping of the most condescending kind. If they forget, leave it, for gawd's sake. Their problem. Not yours.