Reply to Extreme resentment over mental load

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You can be free of the resentment whenever you choose to put it down.

I am the superior parent. Without my spouse, the kids would be okay. They have me. Without me, the kids are FOOKED. I win. I take pride in it. I don't sit and stew about how their other parent could never. I pat myself on the back because I can, and I did. If you're better with the mental load, GOOD FOR YOU.

[b]Nobody can take advantage of your mental labor without your consent. [/b]You either need to restructure your household or reframe your mentality. The latter is always within your control.[/quote]

I have a friend currently going through what OP is describing and I find this statement you made really interesting. I'm at a loss as to how to help her because my husband is an equal partner so while I hear what she is telling me, I am struggling with understanding it but mostly I am struggling with how to help her (for now I just listen and extend sympathy and I don't think I can solve their problems but I have directed her to books or other resources that people have suggested).

So if you don't mind, would you tell me more about what you said? She works full-time in a demanding medical profession where she is out of the house and on her feet dealing with a lot of trauma at work. On top of that, she handles everything for the two kids because he just won't read the emails from the school about picture day, etc., and her youngest is too little to remember things like that on his own. The mental labor she talks about is being the one to keep track of and do everything, so how can she feel as though her husband isn't taking advantage of the fact that she keeps everything in place?[/quote]

I’m not that poster, but this is a deeper relationship thing.  It really isn’t just about getting him to understand.  He understands.

It’s like when you are sitting down to dinner and your mom asks if she can have some ketchup, and you respond by getting up and getting some ketchup. But if your child asks if she can have some ketchup, you respond by saying “yes” and maybe telling them where to get it.  They are both asking the same question, and you know that they both want the same thing, for you to get the ketchup, but your mom has more power than you and your child has less power, so the response is different.

Your friend’s husband isn’t an idiot.  He knows that Christmas presents need to be purchased and food needs to be prepared.  Creating this dynamic where she is responsible for asking him to do it is about establishing power structures.  It’s not that he doesn’t understand what’s being asked of him.

I don’t know what the way is to get out of it.  I mean, if you are the child in the situation I described and you ask for the ketchup…How do you get your mom to go get the ketchup, at least some of the time?  
There is nothing you can do in the moment.  You have to change the entire dynamic of the relationship.  [/quote]

Use the example of a woman who does the shopping for presents because she assumes her man won't and she doesn't disappoint the kids. She might be surprised to find he also doesn't want to disappoint the kids, but she's not willing to risk the kids' disappointment. He knows that, he knows she won't let them go without, and so he does nothing, knowing she's got it covered.

[b]Drop it once, and you'll see just how quickly he learns how to shop for presents. Same with cooking dinner, shopping for groceries, etc.[/b] If you're doing those things because your spouse isn't reliable, your spouse isn't doing those things because you are. Either learn to get your satisfaction from being reliable/responsible/the one who gets it done, or stop doing it. If your spouse truly can't pick up the slack, well, you can buy presents, make dinner, etc. as a single parent without the dead weight.[/quote]

I’m a woman married to a woman, so it’s not a gender thing in my household, but my wife will either not eat or order delivery if I don’t manage all food prep. I tried this and she simultaneously lost 15 pounds and our food spending tripled. We didn’t have money in the budget to DoorDash every day, but my wife didn’t care. [/quote]

Assuming your wife is a functional adult, remove the budget access and try again. Has she seriously never cooked for herself? This is an essential life skill, and she should learn. What if you die tomorrow? She needs to understand how to feed herself and budget her money for her own safety. Stop enabling her BS.[/quote]

She joined the military at 18 and was either fed there or got take out 99% of the time. Her living expenses were extremely low at most of her duty stations, plus the dining options were cheap and terrible, so she never worried about money.

I ask her what she would do if I wasn’t around, and she says “starve.” I don’t even think she’s really lying. She’d bankrupt herself on DoorDash and still probably wouldn’t eat enough. [/quote]

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