S/o outsourcing cleaning as a relationship fix

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My husband and I are both bad at cleaning and don't want to do it so we do have cleaners, but it does almost nothing to solve imbalance issues (because I wasn't an obsessive cleaner anyway and never had any intention of doing it myself). I think cleaning is the tip of the iceberg for most people, but it's one of the only things that can actually be outsourced. I can't outsource interacting with my kids' schools/camps/doctors/etc.

Yup. I'm actually good at cleaning and enjoy it. I sometimes get frustrated about the fact that I do most of the cleaning, but rarely -- I'm better at it and find it satisfying.

But what happens is that I'm busy doing all the family admin that I'm not good at and really loathe (forms, appointments, etc.) and then fall behind on the cleaning, plus I'm trying to get work done, plus the kids are always "Mom mom mom" all day. So it might come out as "I resent that I'm scrubbing the bathtub while you're watching YouTube videos. But it's not that I want him to scrub the tub, it's that I want him to do one of the 900 other things that need to be done while I'm scrubbing the tub.

The flip side, though, is that doing more cleaning or the low-hanging childcare work is usually the easiest thing for the non-primary parent to pitch in on. Asking my DH to make doctor's appointments is a whole production. I wind up having to teach him a bunch of stuff about how our doctor's office works (which he doesn't retain for some reason) and remind him 16 times and double check the date and make sure it gets in the calendar, etc. But he can do pick up or drop off, or wash the dishes, without my involvement. And that why that's the stuff that couples fight over, even though they really are not the crux of the problem at all.

💯💯💯

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think implied in this conversation, but not expressly stated, is the belief that somehow, the wife can force the husband to do more if only she insists more, using the right words and logic.

But the wife can’t do that. She cannot make him do anything, full stop. A cleaning service is accepting it as true (which it is).

A husband who genuinely loves his wife and respects her as a person would change his ways after being shown how impossible it is for her to do everything (be a working mom and a SAHM who does 90% of child and house related tasks).

Stopping looking at it this way saved my marriage.

Agreed. This is not how men think at ALL.

I just don’t get why many men just don’t think they should have to clean. They will let their wife do the majority of it, and if she complains they will hire a cleaning service so other women can do it.

DP. I'm a woman and I don't think I have to clean. What is the point of working hard at my actual job if I can't use some of that money to avoid something I loathe?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think implied in this conversation, but not expressly stated, is the belief that somehow, the wife can force the husband to do more if only she insists more, using the right words and logic.

But the wife can’t do that. She cannot make him do anything, full stop. A cleaning service is accepting it as true (which it is).

A husband who genuinely loves his wife and respects her as a person would change his ways after being shown how impossible it is for her to do everything (be a working mom and a SAHM who does 90% of child and house related tasks).

Stopping looking at it this way saved my marriage.

Agreed. This is not how men think at ALL.

I just don’t get why many men just don’t think they should have to clean. They will let their wife do the majority of it, and if she complains they will hire a cleaning service so other women can do it.

DP. I'm a woman and I don't think I have to clean. What is the point of working hard at my actual job if I can't use some of that money to avoid something I loathe?

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My feeling about it is this. I love my spouse and I love our life together. Outsourcing the cleaning does two things. It gets rid of conflict and it improves quality of life because neither of us likes to do it. Yes there are things to be done, but when the big stuff is out of the equation there is a lot less on your plate and it’s not as important to keep score.

I guess some people will divorce over cleaning of cleaning can be the straw that breaks the camels back. And I’m sure for some the cost of outsourcing is a deterrent. But living in conflict, therapy and divorce are so much more expensive.

I hope for you that you have your own wildly unreasonable immutable behavior that your household can just throw money at to keep the peace. It's only fair.

[Anonymous]

I've been married 24 years to a clutter slob. He can't wait to get out of bed after sex to clean up, but wouldn't think of wiping down a counter. I do absolutely nothing between our cleaners' visits. Why should I? The kids are grown and out of the house and spending time cleaning while he sits in his chair only leads to resentment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe if you did a little more sex he would feel more relaxed at the end of the day to do chores around the house.

He would get more sex if he realized that household work is not only mine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree, OP. And while everyone will disagree about exactly what has to be done outside of a regular cleaning person, to pretend the answer is “nothing” or “minimal” is still just missing the problem. Any.d then of course, when you point it out, you get the ole “oh you’re just harping, that’s unnecessary” line which just further denegrates the work that (mostly women) are doing.

We are not particularly clean people. We don’t touch the bathrooms or vacuum between professional cleanings. We don’t make our bed. But still - the kitchen has to be taken care of after dinner each night (clearing the table, putting away leftovers, loading and running the dishwasher, washing pots and pans). The dishwasher has to be unloaded. The trash needs to be taken out on trash day. The mail has to be gotten and dealt with at least occasionally. Even if you send out laundry, it has to be put back in drawers. Even if you order groceries for delivery, the order needs to be placed and the groceries put away. Someone has to cook dinner. The laundry service, house cleaners, and childcare needs to be managed, paid, and communicated with. Kid logistics need to be deal with (scheduling, buying clothes, school stuff, finding camps, managing extracurriculars, etc).

Unless you have the funds to pay for essentially a full time house manager and cook, there is work to be done, and if one person won’t hold up his half it’s totally unfair and unacceptable, IMHO.

Agree completely. But my husband absolutely won't do any of it, so it's that I do what has to be done and leave the rest undone, or divorce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree, OP. And while everyone will disagree about exactly what has to be done outside of a regular cleaning person, to pretend the answer is “nothing” or “minimal” is still just missing the problem. And then of course, when you point it out, you get the ole “oh you’re just harping, that’s unnecessary” line which just further denegrates the work that (mostly women) are doing.

We are not particularly clean people. We don’t touch the bathrooms or vacuum between professional cleanings. We don’t make our bed. But still - the kitchen has to be taken care of after dinner each night (clearing the table, putting away leftovers, loading and running the dishwasher, washing pots and pans). The dishwasher has to be unloaded. The trash needs to be taken out on trash day. The mail has to be gotten and dealt with at least occasionally. Even if you send out laundry, it has to be put back in drawers. Even if you order groceries for delivery, the order needs to be placed and the groceries put away. Someone has to cook dinner. The laundry service, house cleaners, and childcare needs to be managed, paid, and communicated with. Kid logistics need to be deal with (scheduling, buying clothes, school stuff, finding camps, managing extracurriculars, etc).

Unless you have the funds to pay for essentially a full time house manager and cook, there is work to be done, and if one person won’t hold up his half it’s totally unfair and unacceptable, IMHO.

But none of the people saying outsource are saying the DH should do nothing. They’re all saying, in essence, if there are 24 hours of housekeeping to be done, outsourcing 12 of it leaves 6 for each parent. I can sign up to six. My DH can sign up to six. He would never sign up for 12, and I would certainly not do 24 so he could slack off. But I also wouldn’t add another two hours per week by saying the beds need to be made every day...

PP here. If this is the case, then outsourcing is fine advice. And it probably would work for couples where (to stick with your examples) the wife is doing 15 hours of work, the husband is doing six, and the wife is frustrated both at the imbalance and that stuff is getting missed.

But that’s an example where the husband was already doing about a third of the work. It seems like for most of the situations we hear about on DCUM, the imbalance is much more extreme. 90/10, 80/20. And in those cases, even with outsourcing, the husband needs to step up and do his half. And I would strongly prioritize (and do, when I comment on those threads) a serious conversation with the husband, and marriage counseling if necessary, to get to a place where he understands and accepts that he has to do his half. If as part of that, a mutual decision is made to outsource some stuff, great. But I think what the OP is reacting to is responses to threads about husbands who do nothing or nearly nothing that just say “outsource it.” That is NOT going to solve the problem if the husband still thinks whatever’s left isn’t his problem.

I did 95, he did 5. We went to marriage counselling. She told him to step up. He did for 6 weeks. I decided to work towards acceptance that he's lazy and low energy. I spend whatever I want on whatever I want and leave a bunch of stuff undone. And have a whole boatload of resentment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only thing done daily in my house from your daily list is the dishes, and other than that, laundry (sent out) mail management and putting away groceries, our weekly cleaning service does it for $120/week.

And, I should think obviously, this does not mean we are “living in filth.”

You don’t make your bed every day? What about crumbs, dust, hair, and dirt brought in from the outside by shoes/clothes or a dog? If you’re living with kids or an animal, you need daily vacuuming and sweeping.

Sorry but I think that’s living in filth.

Reason #1000 why we have no pets. We each work more than 45 hours a week; no time for animals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Much of your list really doesn’t have to be done every day. Unmade beds are not a crime (are in fact more hygienic) groceries aren’t delivered daily, mail can sit on a shelf for a couple days without producing radioactivity, and perhaps my husband and I are outliers but our floors are not littered with pubes...

The point of outsourcing cleaning help and why I always suggest it has nothing to do with giving men an out on doing their half, it’s on making the whole smaller so both partners have less on their plate. We have finite time, we both work full time jobs, time with each other and our daughter is inherently of greater value than time scrubbing a toilet. It is also about avoiding sources of conflict. I have a daughter, and if she has no memories of her parents fighting over who takes out the trash, that’s a win in my book. I also consider it a win if she is raised without the Insane and deeply sexist idea that cleaning a house is a better use of her time than reading a book, taking a walk, connecting with her spouse and child/ren etc.

I was raised by someone who thought the house had to be ready for inspection at a moments notice. Every dish washed within ten minutes of a meal being finished. She used to vacuum on the way out the door to vacation. My dad begged her to have a daily maid and she refused. How many memories do you want your kids to have of you mopping vs. playing with them?

You are remembering her anxiety. My dad did all the cooking and cleaning. I remember that and all the fun we had with him. Clearly my brother remembers it too because he does the same for his family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only thing done daily in my house from your daily list is the dishes, and other than that, laundry (sent out) mail management and putting away groceries, our weekly cleaning service does it for $120/week.

And, I should think obviously, this does not mean we are “living in filth.”

You don’t make your bed every day? What about crumbs, dust, hair, and dirt brought in from the outside by shoes/clothes or a dog? If you’re living with kids or an animal, you need daily vacuuming and sweeping.

Sorry but I think that’s living in filth.

It’s scientifically more hygienic not to, unless you have serval hours to let it air which working people don’t. Also we are a shoes off household so all that dirt you’re vacuuming daily is on a mat by the door.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have cleaning people come on Mondays and Thursdays. We rinse off dishes and silverware and put them in the dishwasher and run/empty it. If something spills we clean it up. We're not messy people though so it's not as if there are crumbs on the floor after each meal.

I do one load of laundry a week, and so does DH. The cleaning people do all linens and the nanny does the kids' clothes. We would vacuum if we saw visible dirt but otherwise think twice a week is fine.

We generally have groceries delivered when the nanny is there, so that's how groceries are put away. Dh or I sort mail/pay bills once a week. But we autopay and streamline as much as we possibly can.

That's great but most of us aren't in a position to have a cleaning service come twice a month, let alone twice a week. So the house has dirt, and we have to manage dealing (or not) with it somehow.

But good for you for being in a position to have that much help. Your house must look beautiful!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have cleaning people come on Mondays and Thursdays. We rinse off dishes and silverware and put them in the dishwasher and run/empty it. If something spills we clean it up. We're not messy people though so it's not as if there are crumbs on the floor after each meal.

I do one load of laundry a week, and so does DH. The cleaning people do all linens and the nanny does the kids' clothes. We would vacuum if we saw visible dirt but otherwise think twice a week is fine.

We generally have groceries delivered when the nanny is there, so that's how groceries are put away. Dh or I sort mail/pay bills once a week. But we autopay and streamline as much as we possibly can.

That's great but most of us aren't in a position to have a cleaning service come twice a month, let alone twice a week. So the house has dirt, and we have to manage dealing (or not) with it somehow.

But good for you for being in a position to have that much help. Your house must look beautiful!

It’s cheaper than quitting your job or working part time to do it yourself, and much cheaper than getting divorced and maintaining two households!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have cleaning people come on Mondays and Thursdays. We rinse off dishes and silverware and put them in the dishwasher and run/empty it. If something spills we clean it up. We're not messy people though so it's not as if there are crumbs on the floor after each meal.

I do one load of laundry a week, and so does DH. The cleaning people do all linens and the nanny does the kids' clothes. We would vacuum if we saw visible dirt but otherwise think twice a week is fine.

We generally have groceries delivered when the nanny is there, so that's how groceries are put away. Dh or I sort mail/pay bills once a week. But we autopay and streamline as much as we possibly can.

That's great but most of us aren't in a position to have a cleaning service come twice a month, let alone twice a week. So the house has dirt, and we have to manage dealing (or not) with it somehow.

But good for you for being in a position to have that much help. Your house must look beautiful!

It’s cheaper than quitting your job or working part time to do it yourself, and much cheaper than getting divorced and maintaining two households!

... which is the kind of thing you say when you actually do have the money to get cleaners twice a week, which we don't. so, again, good for you!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think implied in this conversation, but not expressly stated, is the belief that somehow, the wife can force the husband to do more if only she insists more, using the right words and logic.

But the wife can’t do that. She cannot make him do anything, full stop. A cleaning service is accepting it as true (which it is).

A husband who genuinely loves his wife and respects her as a person would change his ways after being shown how impossible it is for her to do everything (be a working mom and a SAHM who does 90% of child and house related tasks).

Stopping looking at it this way saved my marriage.

Agreed. This is not how men think at ALL.

I just don’t get why many men just don’t think they should have to clean. They will let their wife do the majority of it, and if she complains they will hire a cleaning service so other women can do it.

DP. I'm a woman and I don't think I have to clean. What is the point of working hard at my actual job if I can't use some of that money to avoid something I loathe?

+1

+2

You are conflating a bunch of things, OP.

Yes this advice is annoying to people who can't afford a biweekly cleaner. But does that apply to you?

If you need this extreme level of cleanliness (cleaning a toilet that often etc) that's just on you.

Agree with other PPs that this makes the total amount of cleaning lower. The deep cleaning, mopping the floors instead of just vacuuming, dusting all over, etc. There are still daily tasks like wiping counters, dishes, laundry etc, and those should be split between spouses and older kids.

Basically this advice makes sense for a lot of couples. Hence it is frequently given!