He Believes His Wife Isn’t Contributing Enough As A Stay-At-Home Mom And Feels Taken Advantage Of
While being a stay-at-home parent definitely isn’t easy, being able to have this arrangement at all is viewed as a luxury by families across the country. Being able to sustain a household on one sole income definitely is not easy in today’s economy.
Nonetheless, countless parents try to make this arrangement work – valuing having a parent at home with their children as opposed to relying on outside childcare.
However, once parents actually decide to take the plunge, some realize that having a stay-at-home spouse isn’t what they initially expected.
This 44-year-old man is currently in this situation. He and his wife, who is also 44, have been together for 18 years. And since he works and makes a healthy income of $250,000 per year, his wife has been a stay-at-home parent to their two children – who are 16 and 12-years-old.
But he really doesn’t believe that his wife is contributing enough around the house, and it’s starting to bug him.
For some context, he doesn’t believe that he’s above household chores. Rather, he often carries much of the load around his home – completing laundry, cooking, and most of the outdoor work.
His children don’t do any chores around the house, though, and he believes they should definitely be contributing, too.
“I am the one yelling about the fact that they do not help, and she [his wife] always gives them a free pass. Oh, they are tired, oh this, oh that…,” he explained.
As for his wife herself, she is apparently “constantly” complaining about doing things like dishes or laundry. However, according to him, these chores never get done anyway.
BullRun – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual person
“And we always have stuff sitting out because I refuse to do it after I have already done stuff when she didn’t,” he said.
Their relationship has been pretty stagnant, too. His wife hates sleeping with him and mostly just spends her time taking naps or watching TV.
“Just today, I did three loads of laundry, and she has done nothing but rest in between me taking calls for work,” he revealed.
“I feel like I ask pretty little, and she takes a ton.”
So now, he really isn’t sure what to think and whether or not he should confront his wife. On the one hand, he feels like he’s being taken advantage of. But, on the other hand, he’s not sure if this is common and his wife’s behavior aligns with “the role of a stay-at-home mom.”
“I just figured she signed up for being at home, and complaining about laundry or dishes should just be part of the job. Shoot, roles reversed, I would love to do dishes all day instead of dealing with corporate children,” he vented.
Do you think that all schedules for stay-at-home parents are exactly the same? Despite that, does it seem like his wife is contributing enough or not? How do you suggest he handles this situation?
You can read the original post on Reddit here.
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