“Unfair Amount Of Duties”: Wife’s New Job Puts Strain On The Household
Maintaining a household, taking care of kids, and managing a career all at once is more work than the vast majority of the population can handle. It can be a test of any marriage when partners need to renegotiate who does what. Miscommunication, resentment, stress, and misguided expectations are just some of the pitfalls people might encounter.
A man turned to the internet for advice when his wife’s new job ended up overwhelming him with housework and childcare. The comments quickly spiraled into a debate on gender norms, housekeeping standards, and how to communicate in a marriage.
Working out responsibilities in a married household require diplomacy and tact
Image credits: jm_video (not the actual photo)
So one man needed some advice when he realized his wife’s new job was creating a lot of work for him
Image credits: YuriArcursPeopleimages (not the actual photo)
Image credits: jm_video (not the actual photo)
OP debated some readers in the comments
Overall, few really sided with the husband
Others thought he made some valid points
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"She was able to keep up with a few things around the house". Mate, now you know what those "few things" are.
So maybe it's his turn to find a WFH job so that he can keep up with "a few things" around the house? It was fine while it was her, obviously it was quite a list if he's in over his head now.
Battle of the sexes stuff aside for a minute, I've worked from home for 20 years. Anyone who says it isn't easier to keep up on household chores as a partner who works from home is crazy. A ten minute 'pee' break is enough time to throw the laundry on. Another one is enough time to move it to the dryer. A lunch break is enough time to eat lunch and prep dinner etc. If I count the 30-45 minutes a day I can spend on those little chores AND the 2 hours of commuting I can save, over a work week that's 12.5 extra hours to devote to household chores. Again boy/girl aside, loss of that much capacity is going to sting. OTOH, one very important piece of information seems to be missing - What is OP's job? Can it be made flexible? Can he quit?
I don't know why you got downvoted. Ny husband does small things around the house when he is working from home. It's really different, because the time in commute is 1.5h/day and he is more stressed. Also I can leave the kids with him and go out (I'm a SAHM, but I also need time alone sometimes), they can sleep, play or watch a movie while he's working. When he was changing jobs he was specifically looking for WHM at least 3 days a week. Yes, for the 1 hour commute time one person can get 30 minutes for oneself and also cook a dinner.
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Why are women so often expected to live our lives and also prop up a man? It happens at home, at work, everywhere. We aren't here just to make your life easier at the expense of our own time and energy...the only two resources money can't buy and you can never get back once lost. Yes, of course, not all men, not all women...but it's a systemic negative against all women when men blame us for not fixing them or sacrificing ourselves so they can feel like a man. Pull your weight if you aren't, and stop assigning us a role to make your life easier.
What does any of what you’ve said have to do with the post? This was an equal partnership that now has shifted to being not equal. 🤷🏽♀️
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was willing to give him benefit of doubt until his edit. So "bohoo, that's why we men never speak up because this is what happens when we do" is the new get-out-of-jail-card for writing / saying b******t? Hey everybody, no one is allowed to criticise a man because he 'finally dared to speak up'. OP was happy to have his wife do most of the household duties, now they're on him and he's complaining. Sounds as if he's jealous of her getting a better job plus not willing to give up his household servatnt.
Well I can understand adjustment is hard, and he might be experiencing a greater workload than usual, but it's hard to have sympathy because literally every working mother has been doing this since the beginning of time. I've done everything this man is complaining that he has to do, for about 30 years, because my kids are all 10 years apart (not my plan. Life just happened that way) and I have had a young child to care for, consistently, for 3 decades. (Ages 29, 19, and 9) This should be used to reflect how much women are expected to do without complaining.
Does it make it right then? Did you not complain or wish for it to be easier? Did you never sigh to friends that you're so tired, stressed, wished you could just sleep in for one day etc... Why isn't he allowed to do so as well?
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I suspect he’s doing the same amount that she used to be doing and boy, he misses his servant. Most of these things are solvable if he wasn’t weaponizing his incompetence. For example, giving the kids a cracker if they are too hungry to wait an extra 20 minutes for dinner.
He's not TA for his feelings but definitely for TA for the way he phrased it. Part of communication is remembering how things will be received. "I hate your new job" is going to put anyone on the defensive side because it feels like an attack. "I feel overwhelmed" is more accurate. Her saying they need more time to adjust isn't necessarily wrong but is likely incomplete. If she loves this job and wants to make it work the whole family can come together to fix the situation but attitude is vital. If he's determined that the job is the problem, then it's unlikely that he will be happy with any solution.
So when she was WFH and carrying the bulk of the housework, that's fine, but now she's working longer hours than you, so you have to take on more responsibility at home, and she's an "Absent" mother. Maybe you can WFH a few days a week, and pick up more of the work around the house, so it's back up to standard? Don't see this job as a permanent thing - it's a way to advance her career. Discuss it with her from that perspective, and ask what she wants her next step to be - it could be a move to a company where the commute is lower, or there's more WFH. If you actually communicate and listen, instead of complaining and criticising, you'll probrably find that she's not happy with her current work life balance either, and is making plans to deal with that, without setting her career back by leaving a job within the first few months.
Bro, sorry but when someone suddenly has to go back out for work, other people have to pick up the slack. That's just how it is. Also, depending on how old the kids are, maybe have them help out a little. Maybe they can load the dishwasher after dinner or pick up the living room or something. Little stuff. Even younger kids LOVE to help
I’m coming at this from the perspective of a two mom household, and I FEEL this dad’s struggle and frustration! One’s genitalia has nothing to do with how a household is run and maintained. The kids are suffering, and it really seems like everything is suffering as a result. #TeamDad
I feel Shelli has the most practical view here, especially since I was the WFH / SAHM dad during the pandemic for 18 months. A household split between two partners can still take up all the available time both have, and shifting that all to one is not sustainable long term. You don't get to 'make time', you end up compromising other areas to steal time from. At some point, there is a price to pay for this. I hope that he either learns new tricks to manage his time, or she does, because this sounds like it won't end very well in the long term.
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I think what's missing here is her perspective on what their share of these responsibilities were before the job change. The answer to AITA is different depending on how things were before. If the wife was doing everything that he is doing now and they've just switched, then YTA. In that case, his saying "I don't want our lives to change this much" is just him not wanting to do what his wife was doing. And that's fine, but that's what he needs to communicate. He seems very manipulative in this case. However, if the responsibilities were shared before and she was able to do some things when she was WFH, but not everything, then I think NAH. I don't think in any case that she's doing anything wrong. I do think 10 weeks is not a long time for things to change. You go through different seasons in life and 10 weeks isn't really even a full season. You need longer to figure out how this will all look long-term. He might need to hustle for a bit to keep it all together for the moment.
Meh. This one is scripted far too well and reads as if it was written by a guy trying to "prove" that women are sexist because a man can't get the same level of sympathy as a woman.
Assuming these posts are here to trick us into being sympathetic, is a zero sum game. Truth is stranger than fiction, so it is more likely to be fake if you ARE seeing what you expect to see. Take it at face value, and try not to read things into it, too much stress for any of us to deal with, IMHO.
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The real question i did not see addressed is : is the pay gap enough to compensate for the 10h/w of commute. It is one parent one full day in her car every week on top of her 8-5. It is more than a work day. If it does not allow for hiring someone for cleaning the house at least, or picking the kids after school, then the math isn´t mathing. And as a household, you indeed both lost lin life quality.
It's funny (?) how it's usually the woman's day that gets audited for its contribution to the well-being of all, not the gent's. Her *happiness* seldom factors in when men complain about the math, while their own does.
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10 weeks is not long at all to adjust to a new job, let alone a whole new routine for a household. My current job took MONTHS of me adjusting. As far as the partner w/ a long commute, I can understand the frustration. It's just me and my husband at home but when his commute was an hour, it was rough; he was gone way into the evening due to late hours and dinner was always made by myself (I always wanted him to have food to come home to). I can't imagine doing it all plus with multiple kids. That being said, she never told him she would be dedicated to being a WFH person. That happened b/c of the pandemic and it was by luck she kept it for as long as she did. What if her previous job had required her to be back in full time?
YTA this man hasn't even realise that this was exactly what his wife was doing when she was WFH. He needs to thank his wife for all the hard work she did running a household whilst also working and then come up with some plans to make life easier. Like people suggested meal prep at weekends getting a slow cooker. Getting the kids to prep their own stuff for the next day. Once she is more used to her new job and commute she won't need to decompress and will hopefully be able to eat with the family.
NTA. If OP was a woman and wife a husband, this would anyway be the major vote, those gender standards are ridiculous. From what I understand, OP is overwhelmed with having to do the household and take care of the kids all of his own as wife works - a topic that, in reverse, had been quite prominent on BP. And so far, when it was a female writer saying her husband in such a post, people agreed that such a husband is a workaholic and needs to step a bit back for family time. Same goes here, with reversed genders. But what's even more prevalent from what I see here is the kids. All they will remember when they are older is that their mother was never home to spend time with them.
The issue is that when she was doing it all he was happy with the status quo. He didn't find it a problem that he expected his wife to do all those things for years. He didn't think that it was overwhelming for HER to work full time and manage the house. He says "she was able to keep up with things around the house" is rubbish - she was juggling full time work and the house and the kids. Its just that NOW the tables are turned. And suddenly this division of labour is overwhelming and unfair? That is the problem here.
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Yo who tf suggested cereal for dinner is ok 💀. That's not how you're supposed to feed your kids, what on earth.
Cereal does hit different at night tho 💀 jokes aside yeah not a good dinner option
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I find it strange that he had neglected to tell us a single thing about his job. What hours does he work, how long is his commute, how much does he earn?
If she's gone before anyone is up, doesn't get back until 6pm, and is in bed by 9pm, she is only present 3 hours a day, 40 minutes of which she spends decompressing (20 min) and then eating alone (20 min).
I feel you and I’m a woman. When my husband and I both worked full time and had two kids, there were so many days I felt life wasn’t worth living. We chose some radical changes, which probably won’t work in your situation. Time won’t change your adjustment to this. You all will need to compromise something to have a better life style.
People saying it's sexism: it doesn't say what else he did before, it's perfectly possible he had to do all the work for entertainment. It doesn't specify, and for all we know he was already doing his fair share. Also to those mentioning career advancement: it specifically stated she dissent make any more money
It's not just about money for career advancement though. Women usually take time off when the babies are born and statistics indicate that it takes them between 3 and 5 years to re-coup the lost wages and lost promotion oppertunities depending on how much time they took off. This is even longer if they returned to work part time for the first few years as many women do. Also take into account the wage gap noting that most women are still working 70c in the dollar and then ADD on top of that the retirement fund lost during maternity leave. Her oldest child is 10 which means her career has taken a back seat for 10 years while his has presumably flourished without consequence. How many promotions and pay rises has he received in that 10 years? How many has she? Perhaps it's time she had a turn?
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"She was able to keep up with a few things around the house". Mate, now you know what those "few things" are.
So maybe it's his turn to find a WFH job so that he can keep up with "a few things" around the house? It was fine while it was her, obviously it was quite a list if he's in over his head now.
Battle of the sexes stuff aside for a minute, I've worked from home for 20 years. Anyone who says it isn't easier to keep up on household chores as a partner who works from home is crazy. A ten minute 'pee' break is enough time to throw the laundry on. Another one is enough time to move it to the dryer. A lunch break is enough time to eat lunch and prep dinner etc. If I count the 30-45 minutes a day I can spend on those little chores AND the 2 hours of commuting I can save, over a work week that's 12.5 extra hours to devote to household chores. Again boy/girl aside, loss of that much capacity is going to sting. OTOH, one very important piece of information seems to be missing - What is OP's job? Can it be made flexible? Can he quit?
I don't know why you got downvoted. Ny husband does small things around the house when he is working from home. It's really different, because the time in commute is 1.5h/day and he is more stressed. Also I can leave the kids with him and go out (I'm a SAHM, but I also need time alone sometimes), they can sleep, play or watch a movie while he's working. When he was changing jobs he was specifically looking for WHM at least 3 days a week. Yes, for the 1 hour commute time one person can get 30 minutes for oneself and also cook a dinner.
Load More Replies... Why are women so often expected to live our lives and also prop up a man? It happens at home, at work, everywhere. We aren't here just to make your life easier at the expense of our own time and energy...the only two resources money can't buy and you can never get back once lost. Yes, of course, not all men, not all women...but it's a systemic negative against all women when men blame us for not fixing them or sacrificing ourselves so they can feel like a man. Pull your weight if you aren't, and stop assigning us a role to make your life easier.
What does any of what you’ve said have to do with the post? This was an equal partnership that now has shifted to being not equal. 🤷🏽♀️
Load More Replies... was willing to give him benefit of doubt until his edit. So "bohoo, that's why we men never speak up because this is what happens when we do" is the new get-out-of-jail-card for writing / saying b******t? Hey everybody, no one is allowed to criticise a man because he 'finally dared to speak up'. OP was happy to have his wife do most of the household duties, now they're on him and he's complaining. Sounds as if he's jealous of her getting a better job plus not willing to give up his household servatnt.
Well I can understand adjustment is hard, and he might be experiencing a greater workload than usual, but it's hard to have sympathy because literally every working mother has been doing this since the beginning of time. I've done everything this man is complaining that he has to do, for about 30 years, because my kids are all 10 years apart (not my plan. Life just happened that way) and I have had a young child to care for, consistently, for 3 decades. (Ages 29, 19, and 9) This should be used to reflect how much women are expected to do without complaining.
Does it make it right then? Did you not complain or wish for it to be easier? Did you never sigh to friends that you're so tired, stressed, wished you could just sleep in for one day etc... Why isn't he allowed to do so as well?
Load More Replies... I suspect he’s doing the same amount that she used to be doing and boy, he misses his servant. Most of these things are solvable if he wasn’t weaponizing his incompetence. For example, giving the kids a cracker if they are too hungry to wait an extra 20 minutes for dinner.
He's not TA for his feelings but definitely for TA for the way he phrased it. Part of communication is remembering how things will be received. "I hate your new job" is going to put anyone on the defensive side because it feels like an attack. "I feel overwhelmed" is more accurate. Her saying they need more time to adjust isn't necessarily wrong but is likely incomplete. If she loves this job and wants to make it work the whole family can come together to fix the situation but attitude is vital. If he's determined that the job is the problem, then it's unlikely that he will be happy with any solution.
So when she was WFH and carrying the bulk of the housework, that's fine, but now she's working longer hours than you, so you have to take on more responsibility at home, and she's an "Absent" mother. Maybe you can WFH a few days a week, and pick up more of the work around the house, so it's back up to standard? Don't see this job as a permanent thing - it's a way to advance her career. Discuss it with her from that perspective, and ask what she wants her next step to be - it could be a move to a company where the commute is lower, or there's more WFH. If you actually communicate and listen, instead of complaining and criticising, you'll probrably find that she's not happy with her current work life balance either, and is making plans to deal with that, without setting her career back by leaving a job within the first few months.
Bro, sorry but when someone suddenly has to go back out for work, other people have to pick up the slack. That's just how it is. Also, depending on how old the kids are, maybe have them help out a little. Maybe they can load the dishwasher after dinner or pick up the living room or something. Little stuff. Even younger kids LOVE to help
I’m coming at this from the perspective of a two mom household, and I FEEL this dad’s struggle and frustration! One’s genitalia has nothing to do with how a household is run and maintained. The kids are suffering, and it really seems like everything is suffering as a result. #TeamDad
I feel Shelli has the most practical view here, especially since I was the WFH / SAHM dad during the pandemic for 18 months. A household split between two partners can still take up all the available time both have, and shifting that all to one is not sustainable long term. You don't get to 'make time', you end up compromising other areas to steal time from. At some point, there is a price to pay for this. I hope that he either learns new tricks to manage his time, or she does, because this sounds like it won't end very well in the long term.
Load More Replies... I think what's missing here is her perspective on what their share of these responsibilities were before the job change. The answer to AITA is different depending on how things were before. If the wife was doing everything that he is doing now and they've just switched, then YTA. In that case, his saying "I don't want our lives to change this much" is just him not wanting to do what his wife was doing. And that's fine, but that's what he needs to communicate. He seems very manipulative in this case. However, if the responsibilities were shared before and she was able to do some things when she was WFH, but not everything, then I think NAH. I don't think in any case that she's doing anything wrong. I do think 10 weeks is not a long time for things to change. You go through different seasons in life and 10 weeks isn't really even a full season. You need longer to figure out how this will all look long-term. He might need to hustle for a bit to keep it all together for the moment.
Meh. This one is scripted far too well and reads as if it was written by a guy trying to "prove" that women are sexist because a man can't get the same level of sympathy as a woman.
Assuming these posts are here to trick us into being sympathetic, is a zero sum game. Truth is stranger than fiction, so it is more likely to be fake if you ARE seeing what you expect to see. Take it at face value, and try not to read things into it, too much stress for any of us to deal with, IMHO.
Load More Replies... The real question i did not see addressed is : is the pay gap enough to compensate for the 10h/w of commute. It is one parent one full day in her car every week on top of her 8-5. It is more than a work day. If it does not allow for hiring someone for cleaning the house at least, or picking the kids after school, then the math isn´t mathing. And as a household, you indeed both lost lin life quality.
It's funny (?) how it's usually the woman's day that gets audited for its contribution to the well-being of all, not the gent's. Her *happiness* seldom factors in when men complain about the math, while their own does.
Load More Replies... 10 weeks is not long at all to adjust to a new job, let alone a whole new routine for a household. My current job took MONTHS of me adjusting. As far as the partner w/ a long commute, I can understand the frustration. It's just me and my husband at home but when his commute was an hour, it was rough; he was gone way into the evening due to late hours and dinner was always made by myself (I always wanted him to have food to come home to). I can't imagine doing it all plus with multiple kids. That being said, she never told him she would be dedicated to being a WFH person. That happened b/c of the pandemic and it was by luck she kept it for as long as she did. What if her previous job had required her to be back in full time?
YTA this man hasn't even realise that this was exactly what his wife was doing when she was WFH. He needs to thank his wife for all the hard work she did running a household whilst also working and then come up with some plans to make life easier. Like people suggested meal prep at weekends getting a slow cooker. Getting the kids to prep their own stuff for the next day. Once she is more used to her new job and commute she won't need to decompress and will hopefully be able to eat with the family.
NTA. If OP was a woman and wife a husband, this would anyway be the major vote, those gender standards are ridiculous. From what I understand, OP is overwhelmed with having to do the household and take care of the kids all of his own as wife works - a topic that, in reverse, had been quite prominent on BP. And so far, when it was a female writer saying her husband in such a post, people agreed that such a husband is a workaholic and needs to step a bit back for family time. Same goes here, with reversed genders. But what's even more prevalent from what I see here is the kids. All they will remember when they are older is that their mother was never home to spend time with them.
The issue is that when she was doing it all he was happy with the status quo. He didn't find it a problem that he expected his wife to do all those things for years. He didn't think that it was overwhelming for HER to work full time and manage the house. He says "she was able to keep up with things around the house" is rubbish - she was juggling full time work and the house and the kids. Its just that NOW the tables are turned. And suddenly this division of labour is overwhelming and unfair? That is the problem here.
Load More Replies... Yo who tf suggested cereal for dinner is ok 💀. That's not how you're supposed to feed your kids, what on earth.
Cereal does hit different at night tho 💀 jokes aside yeah not a good dinner option
Load More Replies... I find it strange that he had neglected to tell us a single thing about his job. What hours does he work, how long is his commute, how much does he earn?
If she's gone before anyone is up, doesn't get back until 6pm, and is in bed by 9pm, she is only present 3 hours a day, 40 minutes of which she spends decompressing (20 min) and then eating alone (20 min).
I feel you and I’m a woman. When my husband and I both worked full time and had two kids, there were so many days I felt life wasn’t worth living. We chose some radical changes, which probably won’t work in your situation. Time won’t change your adjustment to this. You all will need to compromise something to have a better life style.
People saying it's sexism: it doesn't say what else he did before, it's perfectly possible he had to do all the work for entertainment. It doesn't specify, and for all we know he was already doing his fair share. Also to those mentioning career advancement: it specifically stated she dissent make any more money
It's not just about money for career advancement though. Women usually take time off when the babies are born and statistics indicate that it takes them between 3 and 5 years to re-coup the lost wages and lost promotion oppertunities depending on how much time they took off. This is even longer if they returned to work part time for the first few years as many women do. Also take into account the wage gap noting that most women are still working 70c in the dollar and then ADD on top of that the retirement fund lost during maternity leave. Her oldest child is 10 which means her career has taken a back seat for 10 years while his has presumably flourished without consequence. How many promotions and pay rises has he received in that 10 years? How many has she? Perhaps it's time she had a turn?
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