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I raised 4 children, and a slob of a husband.
My kids all started washing dishes and loading the dishwasher when they were 5. By 6, they did their own laundry, and cleaned their rooms. Except my daughter. We had a weekly job chart, which my oldest son created, and everyone had to pick three items on the list and do them on Saturday morning. She was only 3, and the older boys would get the easier tasks, and she would get cleaning the toilets. I felt bad about it, but she told me one day she was glad she got toilets, because they were small like her, and she could do a good job on them.
As the kids got older, they just voluntarily cleaned up messes and after themselves. It was part of their training. I was always working, first part time, then full time, mostly to pay for their sports. So they were happy to help out.
Hubby came from a home with a perfectionist German housewife. He could not do any job well enough for his mother, and had a severe case of "learned helplessness." I've got him on the 4 year bed making apprenticeship program, working with him each week to change the sheets, and put the bed back together, and there are days I worry he might not graduate. I can't manage the king sized bed with my hands being so bad right now. So I have to supervise, but I sure wish I could do it myself.
The first 5 years I was sick, I had a housekeeper and it was wonderful! She quit, and I couldn't find anyone who wanted to come out to my house in the country to do the job. Sigh! I've tried to get one here, but no luck either. Hubby is in charge of cleaning, because he doesn't want to hire a housekeeper. I do what I can, but meals are the one thing that is beyond his ability, so I do that. Although sometimes he has to do all the cutting, like with a stir fry, because my joints dislocate with cutting.
So, away from me, and what I think is the right way to do things! (i.e., everyone pitching in and working, and especially teaching those kids how to be neat and clean!)
This 1950's TV scenario of the little wife who cleans the house and waits for her man to put on his slippers at the end of the day, is just a total scam! It didn't even happen in the '50's!
Divorce over housekeeping? Perhaps she should divorce this selfish, self-centred brat who never helps around the house. If kids are involved, you are on a road to disaster if they don't learn to clean up after themselves. Just like the father! My brother and my husband never had to clean house, my brother is the ultimate slob, with no wife to clean up after him, my husband, well, the apprenticeship program continues.
How nice it would have been for them to have learned when they were kids. My mother even said that to me one day - about what a mistake she made not forcing my brother to clean up after himself, and do chores, just like my kids could all do.
As for my kids growing up to be drug addicts?? Not so much! One is an electrical engineer, the second a chartered accountant married to a doctor, the third an insurance salesman and my daughter is a social worker, married to a doctor. Not one of them even experimented with drugs. Well, partly that had to do with being in elite sports, and not wanting to ruin their chances of making it in their sport. One was even offered anabolic steroids, but wouldn't take them, which might have made a difference in him making the NHL, but he declined them every time. Not so for others, I hope they don't get cancer!
I really do detest this whole complimentarian movement with its false "roles." Today, women work outside the home, they also are highly involved with the lives of their children. It is really laughable to me that a man thinks he should divorce because the wife is not doing her "role." Maybe it is time to show love and compassion, and pitch in so the house is clean? If not, well, the wife should dump him!
My kids all started washing dishes and loading the dishwasher when they were 5. By 6, they did their own laundry, and cleaned their rooms. Except my daughter. We had a weekly job chart, which my oldest son created, and everyone had to pick three items on the list and do them on Saturday morning. She was only 3, and the older boys would get the easier tasks, and she would get cleaning the toilets. I felt bad about it, but she told me one day she was glad she got toilets, because they were small like her, and she could do a good job on them.
As the kids got older, they just voluntarily cleaned up messes and after themselves. It was part of their training. I was always working, first part time, then full time, mostly to pay for their sports. So they were happy to help out.
Hubby came from a home with a perfectionist German housewife. He could not do any job well enough for his mother, and had a severe case of "learned helplessness." I've got him on the 4 year bed making apprenticeship program, working with him each week to change the sheets, and put the bed back together, and there are days I worry he might not graduate. I can't manage the king sized bed with my hands being so bad right now. So I have to supervise, but I sure wish I could do it myself.
The first 5 years I was sick, I had a housekeeper and it was wonderful! She quit, and I couldn't find anyone who wanted to come out to my house in the country to do the job. Sigh! I've tried to get one here, but no luck either. Hubby is in charge of cleaning, because he doesn't want to hire a housekeeper. I do what I can, but meals are the one thing that is beyond his ability, so I do that. Although sometimes he has to do all the cutting, like with a stir fry, because my joints dislocate with cutting.
So, away from me, and what I think is the right way to do things! (i.e., everyone pitching in and working, and especially teaching those kids how to be neat and clean!)
This 1950's TV scenario of the little wife who cleans the house and waits for her man to put on his slippers at the end of the day, is just a total scam! It didn't even happen in the '50's!
Divorce over housekeeping? Perhaps she should divorce this selfish, self-centred brat who never helps around the house. If kids are involved, you are on a road to disaster if they don't learn to clean up after themselves. Just like the father! My brother and my husband never had to clean house, my brother is the ultimate slob, with no wife to clean up after him, my husband, well, the apprenticeship program continues.
How nice it would have been for them to have learned when they were kids. My mother even said that to me one day - about what a mistake she made not forcing my brother to clean up after himself, and do chores, just like my kids could all do.
As for my kids growing up to be drug addicts?? Not so much! One is an electrical engineer, the second a chartered accountant married to a doctor, the third an insurance salesman and my daughter is a social worker, married to a doctor. Not one of them even experimented with drugs. Well, partly that had to do with being in elite sports, and not wanting to ruin their chances of making it in their sport. One was even offered anabolic steroids, but wouldn't take them, which might have made a difference in him making the NHL, but he declined them every time. Not so for others, I hope they don't get cancer!
I really do detest this whole complimentarian movement with its false "roles." Today, women work outside the home, they also are highly involved with the lives of their children. It is really laughable to me that a man thinks he should divorce because the wife is not doing her "role." Maybe it is time to show love and compassion, and pitch in so the house is clean? If not, well, the wife should dump him!
I hear what you're saying Angela...I really do. I work in construction so I'm constantly carrying heavy crap, up and down ladders and in the heat or in the cold. Coming home to messes I didn't make while the wife went to coffee lunch and bible study while the home life crumbles around you into chaos and filth is unacceptable. I did what I could but it was totally unfair to have to walk and trip over other people's clothes and garbage. she'd just go buy new clothes instead of wash the ones we already had. Oh....and let's get chickens and another dog to throw into the mix. She divorced me btw. I was in it for the long haul but spending lots of time in the only safe place I had.....my shop. And then to feel used on top of all of that...to have no say in anything. As a result of that experience I will probably never trust another woman enough to get romantically involved with one.
Oh...and the teenager trying to burn the house down, taking a hammer to the walls and a knife to the chairs and the 22 I begged the wife to let me put in my gun safe but she wouldn't allow it. And then finding spent 22 cartridges in the back yard next to the toilet cleaner bombs in our nice little residential neighborhood. Now tell me I didn't have grounds for divorced based on the safety of my own child.
That is not what I am talking about. Your wife sounds like an entitled, lazy person. If she was not working outside the home, at all, then maybe you both needed to evaluate the jobs, and what needed to be done, and by whom.
What I dislike is a wife working as much as the husband, but still being expected to do everything. Although there is no reason kids cannot help - to me, that is part of raising your children to be responsible adults.
I guess maybe it comes down to laziness. Is the stay at home person lazy? Are they just filling their time with fun things, and social encounters? Is the person who works expecting too much, or are they right to complain that jobs are not getting done?
And if both work, then a division of labour has to occur, and in families with children, it must include the children. My boys are all good at cleaning house, and even cooking. My CA son, his wife is on call all the time, and often works 12 hour days. So my son fills in as mom, cook and house cleaner. His goal is a wife making lots of money! And that he loves his wife. But his wife is an incredibly hard worker and awesome mom on the weekends and when she is home!
I'm sorry your wife turned out to be so entitled, Sirk! It doesn't matter the gender or age - if someone is entitled, that is a home wrecker for sure!
What I dislike is a wife working as much as the husband, but still being expected to do everything. Although there is no reason kids cannot help - to me, that is part of raising your children to be responsible adults.
I guess maybe it comes down to laziness. Is the stay at home person lazy? Are they just filling their time with fun things, and social encounters? Is the person who works expecting too much, or are they right to complain that jobs are not getting done?
And if both work, then a division of labour has to occur, and in families with children, it must include the children. My boys are all good at cleaning house, and even cooking. My CA son, his wife is on call all the time, and often works 12 hour days. So my son fills in as mom, cook and house cleaner. His goal is a wife making lots of money! And that he loves his wife. But his wife is an incredibly hard worker and awesome mom on the weekends and when she is home!
I'm sorry your wife turned out to be so entitled, Sirk! It doesn't matter the gender or age - if someone is entitled, that is a home wrecker for sure!
I wasn't coming at you and I hope I didn't come across that way. There was zero accountability. I literally caught he daughter pooping in boxes in the garage. There was so much unbelievable crap. They sabatoged my food and there was never any consequences dished out for any of it. Read my post above. They violated decency every single day.
C
Well at least my apartment is clean again. Thanks Sirk! You're inspiring. I am so used to have a man tell me I have to clean up or otherwise he barks, first my dad, then my ex and until 3 weeks ago my dad again who picked us up every saturday. But now he can't drive anymore, so it started to become sloppy. Lol when it's cleaned up I always put a picture on Facebook, so my ex can see it's clean and I didn't do it for nothing.
P
it really, really didn't. my mom, aunties, grandmothers even, all worked outside the home. and every one of their husbands pitched in. my husband and i had a division of labor, and bless him, i got to choose where the dividing line was. if i felt like bathing the kids, he'd do the dishes or vice versa. before the kids were old enough to clean we did it together and it went twice as fast so we could zip off to the park or whatever.
i stayed away from this thread because the idea's ludicrous. divorce over housekeeping? just how much have we cheapened marriage, anyway?
and what's next? i don't like your highlights so you're out?
the flavor of this salad dressing displeases me....adios?
you didn't fill my car with gas... you didn't laugh at my jokes... you were late to pick me up??
good grief.
(apologies, kaylagrl, for the rant lol! i know it's your thread, but not your idea)
i stayed away from this thread because the idea's ludicrous. divorce over housekeeping? just how much have we cheapened marriage, anyway?
and what's next? i don't like your highlights so you're out?
the flavor of this salad dressing displeases me....adios?
you didn't fill my car with gas... you didn't laugh at my jokes... you were late to pick me up??
good grief.
(apologies, kaylagrl, for the rant lol! i know it's your thread, but not your idea
)
K
it really, really didn't. my mom, aunties, grandmothers even, all worked outside the home. and every one of their husbands pitched in. my husband and i had a division of labor, and bless him, i got to choose where the dividing line was. if i felt like bathing the kids, he'd do the dishes or vice versa. before the kids were old enough to clean we did it together and it went twice as fast so we could zip off to the park or whatever.
i stayed away from this thread because the idea's ludicrous. divorce over housekeeping? just how much have we cheapened marriage, anyway?
and what's next? i don't like your highlights so you're out?
the flavor of this salad dressing displeases me....adios?
you didn't fill my car with gas... you didn't laugh at my jokes... you were late to pick me up??
good grief.
(apologies, kaylagrl, for the rant lol! i know it's your thread, but not your idea)
i stayed away from this thread because the idea's ludicrous. divorce over housekeeping? just how much have we cheapened marriage, anyway?
and what's next? i don't like your highlights so you're out?
the flavor of this salad dressing displeases me....adios?
you didn't fill my car with gas... you didn't laugh at my jokes... you were late to pick me up??
good grief.
(apologies, kaylagrl, for the rant lol! i know it's your thread, but not your idea
)
I'm honestly dumbfounded,I thought this thread would be over already! I think I hit everyones nerve. Wow. Who knew house keeping was such a volatile subject?!
C
ha! my accountant is my sister, and she functions in an advisory capacity only.
Last week a friend of mine offered to make business cards for me and I designed my monogram using photoshop and let me tell you....it's adorable
Anyways, as we were working on it a classmate of mine who is going to work as a tax accountant and will eventually open one of his own agencies and said he would offer me a job. Not quite sure if he is just being nice or what, but tax accounting is not really my thing lol
K
I can't stand that 50s husband attitude. That whole fantasy,it drives me nuts. My parents have that as does my sister. I warned my husband before we married "don't ever tell me I'm lazy if you want to live to see the next day"! But he's the total opposite of the other men in my family. He can do it all, he doesn't need me to do a thing for him but appreciates everything I do.I don't have kids,I dont work outside the home so keeping the house clean isn't an issue. If I dont get to something he does it. We have no "this is your job" roles in our house.If you see something needing done, do it. My father can boil eggs,pour a bowl of cereal and make toast. Thats pretty much it. My brother- in-law can do it but refuses because thats "womens work". He was furious with my sister once because she forgot to clean his work uniform. She actually came home the fight was so bad. I said to him later "Whats wrong with you,your arms broken? Why cant you put your own clothes through the wash?" smh These are issues couples should talk out before they marry but seldom do.