Yesterday I was out of the house from 7 AM-8 PM for work and a couple errands and when I got home he asked about dinner. I looked in the fridge, which was basically empty, and suggested that he could have gone to the grocery store sometime during the week. He sheepishly agreed and went

Cook and shop only for yourself. Mention that if he wants meals together he'll have to shop and do his share to prepare. Better yet, eat out --- meaning you eat out before you come home. See if that starts resonating with him.

Anonymous wrote:you are wrong because you substituted a child in place of the marriage partner. What I specifically said was that YOU as a marriage partner have no right to the other partners labor. That is 100% true. even in the event of a child the marriage PARTNER is not entitled to any labor including diaper changing. One parent may choose to provide the CHILD labor but again the other PARENT is not entitled to it.

Logic. Think about it.

There is literally nothing logical (or ethical) about what you wrote.

Anonymous wrote:You do not have a right to his labor either physical or mental. Just because you are married does not mean he is required to do anything. You have expectations that he "should" be doing certain things. Those expectations are wrong. One marriage partner should not expect the other partner to perform any sort of unwanted activity. This include any activity from unwanted sex to unwanted cleaning to unwanted diaper changing or unwanted shopping or unwanted cooking.

When you realize this fact and adjust to it you will be much more happy in your marriage.

Lol!!! what is unwanted diaper changing? And do you think women actually *want* to do all those tasks? if you don’t “want” to do your fair share, then live alone.

you are wrong because you substituted a child in place of the marriage partner. What I specifically said was that YOU as a marriage partner have no right to the other partners labor. That is 100% true. even in the event of a child the marriage PARTNER is not entitled to any labor including diaper changing. One parent may choose to provide the CHILD labor but again the other PARENT is not entitled to it.

Logic. Think about it.

Anonymous wrote:You do not have a right to his labor either physical or mental. Just because you are married does not mean he is required to do anything. You have expectations that he "should" be doing certain things. Those expectations are wrong. One marriage partner should not expect the other partner to perform any sort of unwanted activity. This include any activity from unwanted sex to unwanted cleaning to unwanted diaper changing or unwanted shopping or unwanted cooking.

When you realize this fact and adjust to it you will be much more happy in your marriage.

I disagree if you have kids. As a parent, your kids have a right to your labor...diapers, cooking/feeding, basic cleanliness...otherwise it’s neglect

You do not have a right to his labor either physical or mental. Just because you are married does not mean he is required to do anything. You have expectations that he "should" be doing certain things. Those expectations are wrong. One marriage partner should not expect the other partner to perform any sort of unwanted activity. This include any activity from unwanted sex to unwanted cleaning to unwanted diaper changing or unwanted shopping or unwanted cooking.

When you realize this fact and adjust to it you will be much more happy in your marriage.

We just pay someone to do the domestic chores...shopping/cooking, errands. DH understands the value of these tasks because now they cost him $$.

He needs to have consistent and obvious chores and responsibilities such as preparing dinner on specific days, trash pickup, etc. If it's not completed, do nothing and wait for him to react. He doesn't sound like the kind of guy who takes initiative so it needs to be directed.

If you don’t want to divorce, just accept that he sucks in this regard.

I would make a list of everything that has to be done and put it in a google calendar. Even little things for the house. This helps stay organized anyways. Put recurring things like groceries and oil changes, signing up for camp, Making dinner, loading and unloading the dishwasher, Cleaning gutters, etc.

You’re still doing more work but at least he does some of it and he can see all that goes into the household.

During the shutdown he’s in charge of all errands - AND dinner. Do not spend your weekends doing this stuff - that’s ridiculous.

I’m generally not a fan of bean counting chores, but I am adamant that both spouses need to have similar amounts of leisure time. Stand up for yourself.

Anonymous wrote:op, I think is your problem you don't know how to communicate with a man. From your description, you treat him like your employee, but the men wants to be treated like a man. Your mode of communication would be perfect for lesbian relation.
You have a few choices here.
- you learn how to communicate with your husband the way that he will be gladly doing all chores (yes, you can train the man like you train the dog)
- you will continue living like this, doing all mental load and become very resentful.

I honestly don't believe a grown up men can change himself.

What's your suggestion for man training?

op, I think is your problem you don't know how to communicate with a man. From your description, you treat him like your employee, but the men wants to be treated like a man. Your mode of communication would be perfect for lesbian relation.
You have a few choices here.
- you learn how to communicate with your husband the way that he will be gladly doing all chores (yes, you can train the man like you train the dog)
- you will continue living like this, doing all mental load and become very resentful.

I honestly don't believe a grown up men can change himself.

Have a weekly marriage meeting. Stephen Covey talks about it in his book 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families. But there are tons of blog articles on how to have a marriage meeting. We have a marriage meeting on Saturday nights. We have a sitter, and we go out. The first hour of our date night we get some drinks, bring planners, and talk about tasks that need to be done the upcoming week. I still do the bulk of everything, but at least DH knows what I am doing, and I know what he is doing, and we share the "mental load."
Also, that mental load isn't that bad if you have everything written in a to do list for yourself and pull it out when you have time, rather than trying to run through everything you need to do over and over again.

Make a weekly routine with specific tasks for each person. This constant uncertainty and negotiation is exhausting.

Tell him specifically what you expect during the furlough. Dinner cooked by him every night, for example.

And do NOT have children with a lazy and disorganized man.

My suggestion: do NOT have kids with this man until he shapes up.

He's never going to be the domestic partner you deserve, but with marriage counseling and a good chore chart, you may at least be able to get a more fair division of labor. But you're going to have to stand up for yourself.

Before this goes downhill I should say I love DH, we have a great relationship, and he is a good person.

That being said...the two of us both work full-time, and I have a considerably more demanding job. I am a very forward-looking, get-things-done person, while he is more laid back and reactive (as opposed to proactive). As such, by default I have always been the person who initiates errands, necessary home repairs, pays bills, etc. He's happy to do these things if I ask, but if I don't (and don't do them myself) they will not get done. He grew up with a horrible example - FIL is a POS who prides himself on never having changed a diaper, not cooking, not cleaning, etc. and MIL to this day does everything in his parents' household even though she works full-time.

All of this is usually a minor inconvenience which I'm able to ignore, but during the shutdown (he is a fed) it has really come to a head and is very frustrating. DH has been home for a couple weeks and spends his time playing games and surfing the internet, which I don't have a problem with - until I get home and he asks me what's for dinner. Yesterday I was out of the house from 7 AM-8 PM for work and a couple errands and when I got home he asked about dinner. I looked in the fridge, which was basically empty, and suggested that he could have gone to the grocery store sometime during the week. He sheepishly agreed and went. This is just one example - we have a huge list of errands to accomplish today, which could have been easily avoided had he taken *one* hour out of every day not working this week to do something for the house.

Does anyone have any suggestions? It really comes down to him totally lacking initiative and I worry that it's unchangeable because it's all he knew growing up and just seems to be his personality.