Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

I don't get mad at my DH when he forgets stuff from the grocery store because he can't find the stuff he wanted just as often as what I wanted. I don't have to teach him how to clean (he's better at most cleaning than I am), but when we were dating and I told him he was loading the dishwasher wrong it led to something like a 4 week standoff because he can't handle criticism at all. He had to break the dishwasher and have a technician come out and tell him exactly what I said he was doing wrong before he changed his ways. I don't think you can teach or train a grown man to be better at basic tasks, you have to choose to marry one that's not a screw-up to begin with (which, dishwasher incident notwithstanding, is what I did). This is why I have more sympathy for women who realize their DH's suck at childcare than cleaning - that one is at least partially unknowable before the fact.

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because my husband wouldn’t go back to the store, clean the bathroom again, or watch the kids. He’d do what he wanted and get pissed at me.

This. Not only that, but the next time one of those things needed to be done, he'd say "Well I can never do it to your demanding specifications, so why bother?" It would give him an easy out, which is what he's already looking for.

Any halfway decent parent knows that positive reinforcement is a much more effective way of getting your children to behave a certain way, and that criticism tends to make them more recalcitrant and combative.

Yep, I'm comparing my husband to a child. That's because when he was an actual child, his own parents failed to do any of this. They bought into toxic ideas about masculinity that "boys are just messy" or "girls are just naturally more helpful than boys." So my grown ass husband has had to relearn how the world works as an adult because his parents bought into dumb ideas about traditional gender roles. That sucks for both of us, frankly. I don't love having to praise my husband every time he does something normal and expected, like cleaning the shower. And he doesn't like that he is instinctively selfish and childish at times because his parents taught him the wrong stuff.

And before you say "Well, why didn't you marry a better man?" a few things. First, the vast majority of men are like this to some degree or another. My husband had actually figured some of this out on his own before I even met him, putting him light years ahead of other men I know. But two, toxic masculinity sneaks into all the crevices of a person's personality. You think you've sorted it out and then, boom, you have kids and discover a whole new batch of idiotic assumptions about gender. Sorry, but we all have to keep working on misogyny forever in the hopes that our kids will have a slightly easier time. At let we are working on it instead of eating it up and teaching it to our kids on purpose.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

Except this is the way lazy DH's "train" their wives to do everything. They do an intolerably bad job. When it comes to kids, sometimes they threaten their safety or wellbeing. So mom does it all.

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

Anonymous wrote:Guess what, other peoples relationships have different dynamics than yours

Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

You are the one being trained here, and you don't even see it.

This is so true of my situation. My DH acts like a complete asshole anytime he’s asked to do something. So guess wha? I don’t ask him anymore because it’s not even worth the fuss. Looks like I got trained.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, OP, you sound like his Mother. Your way of teaching your DH to clean the bathroom is how I teach my sons. My DH knows how to clean a bathroom better than I do by learning from his Mother. If your DH is not cleaning the bathroom to your standards, then you should be the one with that chore, or you should learn to accept the way he does it. I mean, you can tell him you don't think it's clean enough, and if he wants you to teach him, then go for it, but don't think it helps any relationship to treat your partner like a child.

I don't get mad at my DH when he forgets stuff from the grocery store because he can't find the stuff he wanted just as often as what I wanted. I don't have to teach him how to clean (he's better at most cleaning than I am), but when we were dating and I told him he was loading the dishwasher wrong it led to something like a 4 week standoff because he can't handle criticism at all. He had to break the dishwasher and have a technician come out and tell him exactly what I said he was doing wrong before he changed his ways. I don't think you can teach or train a grown man to be better at basic tasks, you have to choose to marry one that's not a screw-up to begin with (which, dishwasher incident notwithstanding, is what I did). This is why I have more sympathy for women who realize their DH's suck at childcare than cleaning - that one is at least partially unknowable before the fact.

Okay I'm intrigued. I gotta know what he was doing so wrong that it broke the dishwasher - just so I can be sure that I don't do it. I mean really, can you put dishes in the dishwasher in such a way that it could break it? Please, tell us, pp!

Honestly, he just refused to scrape his plates. And then, because I told him you have to scrape your dishes before you put them in the dishwasher, he turned it into a stupid standoff and put even more food into it. It was his condo so I just watched him be a jackass and bided my time. $250 later a technician is cleaning out his trap and explaining that you have to . . . wait for it . . . scrape food off dishes before putting them into the dishwasher.

And honestly my DH is not like the nightmares that get threads on this forum - this was a one-off. But the crazy overreaction to any perceived criticism makes me understand why other wives aren't standing near the bathroom saying 'SCRUB HARDER, DUMMY' like OP apparently wants them to. I wouldn't react well to that either.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because my husband wouldn’t go back to the store, clean the bathroom again, or watch the kids. He’d do what he wanted and get pissed at me.

This. Not only that, but the next time one of those things needed to be done, he'd say "Well I can never do it to your demanding specifications, so why bother?" It would give him an easy out, which is what he's already looking for.

Any halfway decent parent knows that positive reinforcement is a much more effective way of getting your children to behave a certain way, and that criticism tends to make them more recalcitrant and combative.

Yep, I'm comparing my husband to a child. That's because when he was an actual child, his own parents failed to do any of this. They bought into toxic ideas about masculinity that "boys are just messy" or "girls are just naturally more helpful than boys." So my grown ass husband has had to relearn how the world works as an adult because his parents bought into dumb ideas about traditional gender roles. That sucks for both of us, frankly. I don't love having to praise my husband every time he does something normal and expected, like cleaning the shower. And he doesn't like that he is instinctively selfish and childish at times because his parents taught him the wrong stuff.

And before you say "Well, why didn't you marry a better man?" a few things. First, the vast majority of men are like this to some degree or another. My husband had actually figured some of this out on his own before I even met him, putting him light years ahead of other men I know. But two, toxic masculinity sneaks into all the crevices of a person's personality. You think you've sorted it out and then, boom, you have kids and discover a whole new batch of idiotic assumptions about gender. Sorry, but we all have to keep working on misogyny forever in the hopes that our kids will have a slightly easier time. At let we are working on it instead of eating it up and teaching it to our kids on purpose.

I know that you need to tell yourself that, to make yourself feel better. It puts the responsibility on society as a whole, rather than you. It's not your fault you married an incompetent ass that you had to treat like a child.

But you should recognize that it's just a deflection - a polite lie you can tell yourself so you don't have to face the truth.

Just by the prevalence of these types of threads, it should be evident that husbands who contribute less than their fair share to the household work aren't rare. Even studies show that full time working women spend more time on childcare and chores that working men do. If you truly feel that household duties are shared equally in your family - great! But you must realize that that situation is less common.

Please google selection bias.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because my husband wouldn’t go back to the store, clean the bathroom again, or watch the kids. He’d do what he wanted and get pissed at me.

This. Not only that, but the next time one of those things needed to be done, he'd say "Well I can never do it to your demanding specifications, so why bother?" It would give him an easy out, which is what he's already looking for.

Any halfway decent parent knows that positive reinforcement is a much more effective way of getting your children to behave a certain way, and that criticism tends to make them more recalcitrant and combative.

Yep, I'm comparing my husband to a child. That's because when he was an actual child, his own parents failed to do any of this. They bought into toxic ideas about masculinity that "boys are just messy" or "girls are just naturally more helpful than boys." So my grown ass husband has had to relearn how the world works as an adult because his parents bought into dumb ideas about traditional gender roles. That sucks for both of us, frankly. I don't love having to praise my husband every time he does something normal and expected, like cleaning the shower. And he doesn't like that he is instinctively selfish and childish at times because his parents taught him the wrong stuff.

And before you say "Well, why didn't you marry a better man?" a few things. First, the vast majority of men are like this to some degree or another. My husband had actually figured some of this out on his own before I even met him, putting him light years ahead of other men I know. But two, toxic masculinity sneaks into all the crevices of a person's personality. You think you've sorted it out and then, boom, you have kids and discover a whole new batch of idiotic assumptions about gender. Sorry, but we all have to keep working on misogyny forever in the hopes that our kids will have a slightly easier time. At let we are working on it instead of eating it up and teaching it to our kids on purpose.

I know that you need to tell yourself that, to make yourself feel better. It puts the responsibility on society as a whole, rather than you. It's not your fault you married an incompetent ass that you had to treat like a child.

But you should recognize that it's just a deflection - a polite lie you can tell yourself so you don't have to face the truth.

Just by the prevalence of these types of threads, it should be evident that husbands who contribute less than their fair share to the household work aren't rare. Even studies show that full time working women spend more time on childcare and chores that working men do. If you truly feel that household duties are shared equally in your family - great! But you must realize that that situation is less common.