This is so, so good.
I remembered the time that I asked him to watch the kids and I came back to find that he had traded them for remote control cars. When I shrilly demanded to know where the kids were he hid under a blanket and whispered, “Kids are hard.” I yelled that he was a bad parent, and that only a moron would trade the kids in for remote control cars. This is why I had never left him alone with the kids before. But now I realize that he was never going to learn to not trade the kids in for toys if I never trusted him enough to figure it out for himself. In this society that constantly tells men that women are better at not selling kids for toys, is it no wonder that my husband sold our kids for toys?
And then I thought about all of the times that I have messed up and he didn’t yell at me. What about the time he asked me to get the tires changed on the truck and I had them replaced with milk crates? Did he yell then? No, he just smiled and said, “Silly woman.”
From Ijeoma Oluo, who is wonderful and if you don’t already follow her writing you must, with “Another woman discovers she’s been abusing her husband” in Medium.
Me, on this topic:
Before we call a truce on The Chore War.
I saw the article that this was based on on FB. I prefer this version.
I think I’ve rarely commented on your site, bluemilk, but I read it all the time and love it. This post led me to go back and loads of your posts on this topic and now I’m so mad!
I’m 29 and don’t have (or want) kids, but my friends are starting to have them. It fills me with rage for them when I see their husbands calling out for help with changing a fucking nappy because it’s “a two-person job” as one 30-year old lawyer told his 6 month-pregnant wife when I was there lately!
I love my partner, but I don’t even want to move in together because it would drive me crazy. He knocked a plant over at my flat once and although he picked the pot up, he left the dirt on the living room floor. After two months (I’m stubborn and single and can do that) I cleaned it up (I know when I’m beaten). Perhaps there are men out there who care enough to do their share but I’ve never met one. I broke up with an otherwise fairly awesome dude after five years because I couldn’t make him understand that leaving me to scrub his shit off the toilet was killing my affection for him. Why men who behave like this can’t understand they’re grinding us down is beyond me.
A commenter called Amy (something?) said at hoydenabouttown that the horrible, sad truth was the men in our lives cared more about being served by us than being fair to us as their partners. That’s how it feels to me. Men who don’t share household work with you fairly ultimately care less about how you feel than about their own convenience. It’s horrible to face that.