"Wifework"

[jamaisjedors]

I would have liked to post this in cognitive dissonance but it's all a bit erm... muddled and off track there so I thought I'd start a new thread based on this comment from the thread:

"Sakura Wed 29-Sep-10 11:48:51

... Read "wifework" by Maushart and you'll find that a husband increases the workload for a woman."

DH is away for 2 days, and this evening I have SO much more time on my hands.

Is this true for everyone?

Is it just because there isn't someone else to talk to?

Surely the workload (2 DSs house, garden etc.) should have doubled?

Any thoughts ?

It is the person who cares the most though. With my dad he loves cooking so much and cant understand why anyone wouldnt want to do it but my mum hates it. He also has this weird thing with fluff. With the washing up my mum said she couldnt sleep if she knew there was a plate downstairs in the sink as it would worry her .

My husband is so anal about ironing we all went on a massive family holiday abroad and my parents were asking about the area and things to do and the hotel man said does anyone have any more questions and all my husband could say is 'how quickly am I going to be able to get hold of an ironing board?' I said we have been in this lovely country and this hotel for 10 minutes and thats the most important question you have you weirdo! He says he actually looks at people in the street who have unironed tops and it makes him annoyed.

My thing is monica geller style organising of things and moving things around and hoovering. I am like her though with that secret cupboard where she hides her stuff. Thats my kitchen drawers!

Everyone has some weird things they care about I have found! I think it is important to keep the place clean and tidy which we do but I am not going to get my knickers in a twist because there are 3 specks of fluff on the carpet like my dad or 2 pots in the sink like my mum. Lifes too short.

But what if one person didn't care enough about anything to do it.

Then dont marry them lol.

I'm following Germaine:

'The only way to escape this tyranny of housework is to abandon the house. You can live with nomads or hunter-gatherers, maybe, or become a nun with nothing but a cell to distract you from the day-long excitement of prayer. Or maybe you can make a vow that no more than an hour in any day may be spent on housework--and keep it.'

I havent read Germaine Greer but I think its weird how on the other thread when I said that labour saving devices save modern people time everyone said no as now we have to be even more tidy. That to me is completely bonkers. There is middle ground between living in completely disarray and it being show home standard.

The richer people get the more space they want, then they have to worry about tidying all that and the garden etc. Its ok if you have people to do it but why bother stressing yourself out. Some stay at home mums want to prove a point by doing it all day to prove they are not lazy but what is the point in that?

You know you are doing something important so why bother if someone says your not. I went on a course with my work the other day and the leader said 'you are the most important people there are as you build brains. That is how important the first 3 years of life as that is when the pathways and connections in the brain are made and your care and interaction are a massive part of that'. I like that idea and know my job working with kids and having 1 is the most important thing in the world. If I am not always pristinely tidy so what?

You arent going to look back and think I wish I had done more housework. Get rid of stuff, dont live in big places if its too hard to keep up with the cleaning and dont care too much about material things so you are clutter free.

That doesnt mean that if you have a lazy man he should do nothing but it also means that you both dont need to be doing 100s of hours of housework a week.

the amount of housework you do is irrelevant here. Many women I know have much lower standards than their pernickety husbands. So the image of the neurotic housewife is untrue and probably based on commercials for cleaning products [cue sunny telling me she personally knows lots of neurotic women]

WHat is relevant is how much of it each person in the marriage does. IS your marriage equal to your husband's marriage? Is he getting more out of the marriage deal than you?

yes wifework is unseen . THe comment from the force's wife was fascinating: that it's a known and recognized thing that life is easier when they're away.
I also feel I always have to be "on" when my DH is around, and that can sometimes be stressful.

the housework thing seems to be, for some people at least, an extension of the syndrome, I call babying the men it is ridiculous to go to the trouble of picking a partner if they are not going to be equal partners in all senses of the word, why would a woman choose to look after a man who displays all signs of childish behaviour?

also some of them seem to have these weird ideas of what 'mum' used to do for them and seem to expect that from wives, well as if, move on grow up

haven't got time to read this Have housework to do!

I understand that but if no one wants to listen to any suggestions and just says society pressures me so I am going to have to keep end up doing it you are never going to get anywhere.

Its like with my husband he did it all for me so I thought why should I have to learn and try to do it as he does it? I am obviously going to let him do it so I can sit around as its better for me, but since I have kids I have decided to do some things I didnt do before as my family persuaded me in to it in the end.

Before that if I tried anything he would say I will do that for you if you want. So I just went ok then and let him. My parents used to do exactly the same to me when I was growing up so I never had to learn to look after myself.

In the end my parents persauded me to give things a go If they hadnt I would have happily gone the rest of my life not doing it.

I do agree with you sunny that part of the problem is that lots of us do too much housework/want too much housework done and ought to learn to lighten up. I'm much more relaxed about the idea of an untidy home or a scratch dinner than my mum, and it helps.

I think the difficulty with saying you want to offer suggestions is that people like you (and me) don't live in a way that's appealing or realistic to most people on this thread. I don't have kids, I expect my place is smaller than anyone else's on here (so less hoovering, obviously!). You live in a way that suits you, but a lot of that is based on the very convenient food you eat.

I don't think it makes our experiences any less valid, but it's not realistic to expect others on the thread to find them helpful because as far as I can see, their situations are a bit different.

I also think practical suggestions don't really cover the whole problem for some people. They may do for you; it may have been obvious to you when you started living with your DH that you didn't want to do all the work so it was simple, you'd do 50:50 and make a pact not to be too fussy.

But you already had to have a particular attitude to get to that point (as did your DH). That attitude is a real struggle for people like my mum to understand, and it's a much harder problem to solve than just saying, 'mum, why don't you just let the hoovering slide this week'. She does; it doesn't solve the underlying problem.

I know the situations are a bit different but the biggest thing to make someone do it is to not enable them not to do it. If I was in a situation where someone said I am not doing it thats it I would have done stuff years ago.

I never had to though as people just said 'are you sure your alright with that? You might not be able to do it properly just let me do it'. Then when I did do anything people hovered around me and put me off. Then they tried to just nag me in to it but I knew they would still blatantly just do it so I made a half hearted attempt and let them take over.

Your husbands are fully aware that is what you are going to do. Just like I was aware that was what my family where going to do. Until people started saying come on give it a go and refusing to help me is when I started learning. Alright I am no Nigella Lawson but I cook chilli, spag bol, a variety of chicken and pasta dishes and I even made a roast. This has only started recently 18 months ago I refused to touch raw meat. It is an ongoing process but I am improving . I never would of though if people hadnt of been harder on me.

It is to do with upbringing and how much you do for your kids. They will expect that when they get married and doing what I am saying is the only way to change it. I know I am the person who did it!!

You see, I don't think everyone's husband is 'fully aware' of what their wives might do. That's the point, to me.

In order for you to change these patterns, you must already have come to the conclusion that it was unfair and/or stupid for the wife's work to be her silent responsibility. But how do you communicate that unfairness to someone who's still struggling with the idea? Sure, you can start with kids and bring them up well. But what about adult women and men? That's a real problem.

I know, for example, that my mum and dad will both say that when we were small, dad did about 40% of the housework. He worked from 8, came home around 6, 6.30, and did the laundry and washing up. He also did car stuff. It was accepted that putting on a few loads of washing, occasionally running the hoover round and washing up every night, was equivalent to what my mum did with three small children and a house to run.

The problem there isn't something you can solve by simply telling someone to relax their standards. The problem is that there was always the implication that my dad was a good man, 'helping' with a large proportion of the work, despite his full-time job.

Trying to get my parents to understand that their set up is incredibly unequal, is just not possible. I do exactly what you suggest, and try to get them to find labour-saving ways around it, but it doesn't change the fact that mum is swamped with all this work she can't stop feeling guilty about, and my dad - though he loves her - has absolutely no idea that he's being incredibly lazy.

Also I purposely acted crap so everyone would go 'aww dont worry love I will do it I know you find it difficult'. I had that my whole life and it is an extremely hard habit to break.

I literally used ti eat crispy pancakes and waffles everyday until my husband would cook for me. Then we would go through stages of him cooking every night for weeks then he would get bored and I would go back to the crispy pankcakes until I made him start up again.

It is partial lazyness and partial fear. I was genuinely scared of doing it and doing it wrong because peopel had made normal living things in to this massive big deal my whole life. My brother is younger than me but he is exactly the same and he is starting to try to do things now but it is incredibly hard and it doesnt do you any favours.

I used to cry because I had to iron in the military and because I had never done it I had no practice so was awful. Then I met my husband and he started doing it so I got out of it. Its the story of my life but I am trying

Sorry, I'm getting into personal examples here, but sunny, what I think is really draining is the widely held view that men on their own really can't cope with domestic stuff. I expect that's partly why single men say they feel bad!

My mum knows my DH can cook, clean, wash, iron, etc. She knows he cooks 3/4/5 nights a week. She knows I earn more than he does and she knows my career is currently on track to bring in more than he does. Yet, last night on the phone, when I mentioned I was very busy at the moment and spending a lot of time traveling, her automatic response was, 'And how is [DH] coping?'. She is still absolutely sure that the household and the relationship become unstable when I'm not there every night with a meal prepared.

Sunny, your upbringing sounds very strange.

'In order for you to change these patterns, you must already have come to the conclusion that it was unfair and/or stupid for the wife's work to be her silent responsibility. But how do you communicate that unfairness to someone who's still struggling with the idea? Sure, you can start with kids and bring them up well.'

I dont know what to suggest in that situation but I bet deep down he knows. I did but would kick off and go mad if anyone used to tell me otherwise.

I would start throwing things back in peoples faces and saying I am doing loads. I do x,y, z. Then because I shouted everyone would change their tune and start saying 'sorry no you do, you work really hard. We didnt mean it. You do a lot in your life more than lots of people'. Then because they would say that I would think 'yes I do actually. Why is everyone picking on me? I am really hard working already thats the end of it'.

That used to give me more time until it came up again. My husband never said anything but my parents did. The more they said the more annoyed I would get and it would make me worse.

Not strange so much wastingaway just spoilt. I loved it when I was younger as my friends had to do jobs such as the ironing for 50p whereas I never lifted a finger the whole time. Guarntee most of these men come from childhoods where their mums or dads did everything and they never had to. That is why they then expect it from their spouses.

It is learnt behaviour.

Spoilt is strange imo. You're not brought up if you can't function as an adult in the real world.

Was there any reason that they didn't teach you these things?

sunny, I think your family sound great.

But honestly, I've been through this with my dad (so has my little brother). He really doesn't get it. He doesn't 'know deep down' that he's not doing a lot. He does the paid work, my mum keeps house. These days, she also works around 30 hours - but his is the main job, so he doesn't see the problem.

I have tried to explain to him how hard some of this work is. He will admit that he think he'd have been bad at staying home with us children - but he thinks that is to do with his character, not to do with it being hard!

The problem is that so, so much of how my parents understand each other, and understand housework and gender roles, is based in a mire of subconscious, deeply rooted assumptions. You can tackle one when you see it (eg., 'no, dad, you do not work longer hours than mum if when you come in from work, she is still working!'). But you can't tackle them all.

I do agree that you're not an adult until you know how to be self-sufficient, but be fair - sunny does say she's trying and learning, and a lot of the things she refers to are in the past.

I only learned to change a tyre four years back; does that mean I should still beat myself up about being incompetent before that?