She’s Upset That Her Stay-At-Home Husband Won’t Do Chores Unless She Pays Him
This 32-year-old woman’s 29-year-old husband is a stay-at-home dad. They have two children together, a 3-year-old son and a 4-year-old daughter.
Every weekday morning at 7 a.m., she wakes up her husband and their kids before heading off to work an hour later.
She’s gone until 5 p.m., and when she returns home, she cares for their kids until tucking them into bed. On the weekends, she’s on her own with childcare as well.
As for her husband, when he’s off from caring for the kids, he’s in charge of caring for their home and completing all the chores.
“For the first two or three years of our oldest’s life, this was our arrangement,” she explained. “I’ve slowly had to take on more of the chores because they just aren’t being done.”
“Laundry is constantly everywhere. The walls are covered in crayon, and marker, and chocolate. The sink is always full of dishes.”
“He doesn’t bathe the kids unless one of them has a blowout or gets into something while I’m working. He has never put them both in the car and taken them anywhere – not once. They basically live on TV and tablets.”
She has tried to put their daughter in gymnastics or preschool part-time, but then it’s on her to find time in her work day to drive her daughter to everything.
She’s frustrated with having to spend all of her nights and weekends dealing with the kids, feeding them, bathing them, and then putting them to bed.
auremar – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual person
But then, last year, her husband requested that he be paid $100 every other week to have some “fun money,” and she said yes to giving this to him.
At the same time, she outlined her frustrations with her husband about how she does not believe he’s equally contributing.
She’s irritated that her husband also won’t take the kids outside during the day to play on their playground or bring them to museums.
Adding to her growing list of complaints, their bathrooms are always messy unless she takes it upon herself to clean them. She also is the only one mopping their floors or cleaning the walls after the kids have fun on them.
“I’m just frustrated that as a stay at home parent, he isn’t doing what I see as enough to justify having every evening and weekend completely to himself AND getting pocket money,” she said.
A week ago, she finally informed her husband that she is at the height of annoyance and can’t take it anymore.
He also never really talks to her unless he’s airing his complaints, which adds more fuel to the fire under their roof.
Additionally, she’s trying to purchase a home for them, so she pointed out to her husband she can no longer give him his spending money and will have to cancel any subscriptions they have to save further.
He didn’t take that well and replied that he’s not going to do chores around the house unless she bumps up his spending money to $200 every week.
“He wrote a note calling it a “campaign of noncooperation” until his “small comforts” are returned to him,” she continued.
“I really am starting to feel gaslit here. I’m a female breadwinner, and I feel like I’m doing everything I can to make this work for him. I know being a stay-at-home parent with no economic power is hard.”
“But now I’m looking for a second job, at the cost of even more time away from my kids, and knowing they’ll get substandard care from my husband. He’s a caring parent, and I believe he loves our kids, but he just isn’t doing enough. Am I in the wrong here? Should I just pay him and let some of my personal debts go in the interest of fairness?”
You can read the original post on Reddit here.
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