I’m Done With the Household Duty Disparity
My husband went away and left me a list of jobs
My husband has gone away for four nights with some friends. He’s packed a heck of a lot of beer and some fishing rods, so, I think he’ll be extremely drunk and starving as I’ve never, ever seen him catch a fish before. He’s spending his time on a houseboat in a stunning location off the east coast of Australia. I’m only slightly (a lot) jealous.
Anyways, he left the house before 6am this morning and when I got out of bed, I saw that he had written me a note outlining the jobs I needed to do whilst he was away. What a thoughtful soul.
It wasn’t a long list; however, it was fairly detailed. I am to feed the fish twice a day, one of these feedings should be at precisely 5pm and I also need to give our budgies some fresh water and seed. See below instructions.
I’m feeling a little under pressure with these responsibilities. They are significant and time-consuming tasks and I’m not quite sure that I’m up to the challenge. Can I keep these animals alive for four whole days without his help?
Well, he’s been gone for a little over 12 hours and so far, I can report that all fish are still alive and they received their evening meal at 5:02pm. The budgies, however, are a different story.
At about 3pm this afternoon my daughter was playing basketball in our backyard with a friend. She ran into the house and yelled, “Mom, mom, the budgie cage is open and there are no budgies inside.” I thought she was tricking me, but on inspection, she was right. The budgie cage was open and there were no budgies. We don’t clip our budgie’s wings, so I knew they had spread their wings and flown far away. They weren’t homing pigeons and were a little dumb, so there’s no way they’d be making their way back home.
I was all prepared to counsel the children and help them work through their grief, but the kids were totally fine saying things like, “At least the budgies are free now,” “They’ve probably found their long-lost family,” and “They are high up in the trees enjoying the breeze.” Phew, I managed to dodge a bullet there and was glad I didn’t have to deal with crying kids for the rest of the afternoon and evening.
I know my husband won’t be so cool with our lost family members. Therefore, to be a considerate wife, I’ll wait for him to get home before breaking the budgie news.
So, I haven’t been able to successfully complete the task list from my husband. But this did get me thinking.
I occasionally travel interstate for work. Before leaving I ensure the house is full of food. I pre-prepare and label school lunchbox food, do extra loads of washing so everyone has clean clothes, and have some ready-to-heat meals in the freezer. The list I leave my husband is very long, as in, it extends over a couple of pages.
It will have a heap of reminders on it. Which day is library bag day, when the trash goes out, don’t forget our daughter’s violin on Thursday, medication lists, homework reminders, child one is to wear her sports uniform on Wednesday, child two on Fridays, there will be a note to water my eight dying pot plants, etc, etc. I list any appointments the kids have and leave a kind request asking him to do some washing while I’m away (otherwise I come back to full washing baskets).
My point is, when I go away a stack of tasks are added to my husband’s job list. When my husband goes away, two jobs are added to my jobs list.
Just. Two. Jobs.
Feed the fish and the budgies. Granted, I failed at the budgie babysitting, but when I go away his job list goes up exponentially. Despite us both working full time, the mental load of running a household and child-rearing still sits with me.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not bitter or angry about it, it is what it is, however the common unequal distribution of duties within the household is a little annoying.
I read an article recently identifying that women do on average 61% of household tasks, which includes the home-schooling responsibilities associated with COVID-19, whilst men do just 39%. This is despite more men working from home during the pandemic. Whilst women were already doing most of the unpaid household and caring work, this increased significantly during COVID.
I find it quite amusing that fathers with young children, who in the past were reported to be the least stressed group, had a large increase in mental distress during COVID lock-downs. This was equated to them previously not having to deal with, nor understand the competing priorities of work and care.
Men who worked out of the home and were forced to work from home suddenly started to get an idea of the juggle that goes on each and every day for working mothers. A part of me is happy that the pandemic has helped to shine a light on the work-life imbalance that working mothers juggle each and every day.
No wonder working moms are mentally distressed. Or perhaps that’s just me?
I personally have been working from home, full time in paid employment for about six years. I have also been a stay-at-home mom this entire time — meaning that I’ve negotiated household, caring, and work responsibilities for quite a while. When the children go to bed, I’m often back on my computer catching up on the work I’ve missed during the day, whilst my husband can relax as he’s been able to commit a solid eight hours straight to work without interruption.
I know I’m fortunate to be able to work from home and I’m not necessarily complaining. I think seeing the job list my husband left for me this morning just brought to light how ridiculously and unevenly skewed home duties are, and in my case, the woman gets the raw end of the deal.
Whilst I may have failed to successfully manage my husband’s two jobs whilst he’s been holidaying, with his budgies having gone awol, I think I do still need to reassess how I can hand over some more of the mental load to my husband. My aim is that when I’m away next, the list I leave him is shorter, and when he goes traveling again, his list to me is longer.
Changing the household duty disparity starts now. Wish me luck!
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