What Should I Do? - Beverly Hills,CA

I hear what you're saying Julie S but the house is messy and chaotic. None of the rooms are clean and the floors are disgusting. It's not me being picky or wanting things done my way. There is barely a clean space on the floor for my 6 mth old to play on. He will be crawling soon, so we can't leave things on the floor. I feel my husband is waiting for me to get sick of the mess and thinks I will clean it all up.

Get a maid and a nanny.
Once your school work is complete then you won't need the nanny.
But keep the maid.

Additional:
Simplify.
Use paper plates - clean up means throwing them into the trash.
If nagging isn't helping stop doing that.
Throw something into the washer in the morning and into the dryer at night.
Looks like it will be on your shoulders but you'll get your thesis done eventually.
What's he doing instead of housework and childcare?
Playing games? drinking? working? What?
Some helpmate your husband turned out to be.
It would be hard for me not to hold some resentment towards him.
Finish your thesis then figure out what you want to do.
It might or might not be with him.

hire a once a week house cleaner. Tell him that since it's too much for him, and for you, that the money will just have to be spent, and have him write the check, or pay that bill. Say thanks because it's too much strain on the both of you. Merry Maids or some firm like that, or hire a teenager to help with the kids and light housework while you're home. A maid or a nanny. It will be money well spent.

I can see my husband being like this... He's not a bad guy but just doesn't have the "team" mentality I'd like. Luckily these really hard times pass. You may just have to suck it up, hire someone a little, let stuff go and get through this time. Sounds like you've done everytihng else you can. I know it stinks and isn't fair. But with some men or people it just seems like it never will be and all the lists and charts don't work. You might try picking just one or two things he has to do and figure out the rest yourself and if you have to, nag for those one or two things but at least he will do those things. If it's only for 3 more months, you likely can afford a little help or maybe the action of hiring someone will be the kick in the pants he needs. Is he money conscious or a spender? I'm the organized one AND the one who worries about managing our money more than my husband so yours might be the same but maybe the money outflow will get him going. Otherwise, make the kids your priority and buy paper plates. Wash only yours and their clothes obviously. Really look at what HAS to be done and what you can live without for 3 months...

Hire someone to come in and do the deep cleaning. Take that completely out of the equation for him. It will let him know that you care for his time too and make the rest not such a big deal.

Just ask him to do the daily stuff. Do your best to always pick up after yourself and put things back after use so you aren't adding to that pile of daily stuff.

Stop trying to manage him. Give him a LIST of the things that need to be done, not a schedule. Only put appointments on the whiteboard. He knows when the babies get baths and meals and naps without it being on the whiteboard.

As long as the things on the list get taken care of, it doesn't need to be exactly the way you do it. I think one of the biggest mistakes women make with their husbands is trying to micromanage them. They're grown men, not kids. Step back and trust that he can do it, even if it's not "your way." When he does do something, don't nitpick about it not being "right." Is it done? Okay then. That's good enough.

ETA: Good NIGHT, what on EARTH is going on in your house that 2 hours would be required PER DAY to clean up? Our house is BIG, and tidying up at the end of the day might require 30-45 minutes. If everyone is cleaning up behind themselves, there shouldn't be messes that take longer to pick up. Clean as you go and make all of your lives easier.

Both my husband and I work, if he whined that I am not keeping the house as clean as he wants I would take him off at the knees. Same applies if the roles are reversed.

If he is keeping up on health code violations let it go. As you said it is only three more months. Lower YOUR expectations, it is only a little longer.

Per your what happened, I have a nice sized home and 30 minutes a day would be all it took to clean it. Laundry is always a weekend chore. It really does sound like you want too much. I am heading home in a few minutes and there is no way I am putting more than thirty minutes into that house.

You know, he could be doing the best he can. You say you normally do everything you are asking your hubby to do. It's like starting a new job, you can't be expected to come in and take over everything from day one and do it as well as the person before you who had been doing it for years.

I have learned that housework and the like is not as important as we think it is. The mess is not going anywhere - it will wait for you,. LOL! As long as the bills are paid, and the kids are happy, fed, and bathed, just try to forget about the rest. Once this time is over, you can keep your home as clean as you want, but for this very short period of time, focus on what's really important and try to let the rest go.

BTW, counseling because he's not stepping up the way YOU want him to? Sorry, but I just don't see it. Not everything is counseling-worthy and I say save your money, adjust your attitude and expectations and get through it.

I'd say just don't rescue him. If he's in charge of dinner then don't go fix it. Tell the kids to go find dad when they say their hungry. If it's his time to take out the trash let it sit there until it's gross. He'll find it's not fun to carry stinking trash to the trash can. If he's supposed to do the laundry let it go. When he needs clothes tell him they are in the laundry basket.

If you do these things for him you end up having all the work for yourself. Stop that!

He will only take his responsibilities serious when he learns what he's supposed to do.

I also suggest you go to the University and spend time doing your work there. To leave him alone with the kids where he MUST handle the job all by himself. If you're always there how is he supposed to man up?

Welcome to mamapedia, B.!!

Well, what would I do? I would hire a cleaning service. Then I would check into marriage counseling so you two can learn to communicate with each other...

Then I would make a list of things that MUST be done...and prioritize them...MAKE A SCHEDULE...He might be feeling just as overwhelmed as you are. So a TO DO list will help. But COMMUNICATION is key. Nagging is NOT going to work. It will only create tension and put you in his "mommy" role instead of his PARTNER role...

Yes. You deserve the time to work on your education.
Yes. You deserve rest/sleep.

You BOTH chose to have babies. You BOTH chose to work on your PhD's while having babies...and the timeline slipped...you NEED TO COMMUNICATE with each other...

Sounds like his style of communicating would affect all parts of your relationship. Surely he's been this way all along or you've never expected much from him and this has changed. His style is to agree and then shut down. This is a passive way of relating. I doubt you can get him to change in this short period of time.

Yes, you have the right to expect him to follow thru with his agreement. Is he likely to do it? No! You now have a choice to be right or to be happy. You cannot force him to change. You could accept that this is the way it is and change your expectations so you can be happier. Perhaps you can find someone else to help you. Perhaps a teen "mother's helper" To come wash dished and do laundry after school.
I tried to get my husband to help when we had both of our mothers, my teen daughter and his uncooperative son living with us. It was in counseling that I learned my choices. Eventually I was able to change my housekeeping standards. Eventually I left because he sabotaged my efforts to get help from others.

For you it might help to know this would be temporary. I suggest that if you stop expecting help from him you could find a way to organize you time differently. It is also possible that if you stopped expecting so much your husband will help on his terms.

Passive agressive is a way of handling anger. I suggest the two of you are in an angry spiral. The only way this can be changed is for both of you to change. Both need a clearer understanding of who they and their partner are and how what they need for better comunication. This takes time; months or years.

Please stop expecting him to do things he either doesn't want to do or just won't do. This is a recipe for more diappointment. Instead be wise. It doesn't cost much to drop your clothes off to be washed at a laundry mat. They will charge you by the pound. It saves time and effort. This is what we do. In the winter 2 weeks of laundry may be about 30 pounds which costs around $27.00 and is usually ready for pick up the same day if I drop it off in the morning.

Stop treating your husband like he is a child by writing things out for him. Just simply remove yourself from the home to do your writing. Leave him with the kids and it will be what it will be.

Also see if you can get hired help in your home for at least 1 day a week to clean. The cost may not be as high as you think it is. This person can come in and do your floors, wash the windows, clean the bathroom, clean the kitchen, or any other task you don't want to do or don't have time to do. Sometimes things aren't as expensive as we think they may be. I would figure out a way to get these things done. I wouldn't nag my husband about it either. I would possbily have 1 last conversation about stuff that needs to be done. I wouldn't stress about it any further. I would just call in the troops for an expense of at least an added $100.00 a month which would be well worth it.

Lastly you may consider hiring a teen or mother's helper to help with getting the kids to bed for the night. This would free up time as well. Get your help in there and lighten your load.

I finished my MBA with three very active kids and a husband who works two hours away. If either of us expected the other one to be the sole person taking care of the house/kids, nothing would ever get accomplished. I understand plans shited (same with me), but you have to make it work. It doesn't take long to sweep the floor or wipe the counter. Do your part too.

Or hire someone to do it.

If your home is small then it really shouldn't take that much effort to keep it clean. Do the dishes and laundry daily. Everything else can be done as needed.

Expecting your husband to do *everything* is unrealistic. Every home has a different division of labor.

In three months you'll be relieved. Until then, lower your expectations for yourself. Don't drive yourself crazy over this.

why on earth does it take 2 hours every day to tidy up? you both need to take a weekend and clean up the house from top to bottom. and then make a schedule that says things like monday dust, tuesday grocery shop, wed clean the bathrooms. those things don't need to be done every day. its hard when you want someone else to do the work but you want to micro manage it. if he is in charge of the cleaning then let him do it. you won't be able to shift it until you let go of it.

I don't think you're being unreasonable at all. You're obviously both bright and educated people who should be able to problem solve your way through this so...what's his problem? I use two strategies at work that might be helpful to you. One is "difficult interactions":

1. Choose whether or not this is a problem worth addressing. Seems pretty clear to me that it is.
2. Assess the facts - you know the facts as you see them...you agreed to a plan and timeline, you stuck to you plan to give him his time and space to finish his thesis, his thesis wasn't completed until X date, your timeline is now pushed back to Y date, and you now need him to cover for you at homo while you complete your school work, which is your job right now. See if there are any other facts that he would like to acknowledge. The goal is to agree to the facts.
3. Identify emotions. You identify yours ("I feel angry, tired, resentful, duped, taken advantage of, etc."). He identifies his (he may feel tired, afraid, depressed, resentful, inadequate, unprepared, like a failure, etc.).
4. Identify areas of agreement and a plan to solve the problem as well as a plan to remediate...you'll come back to the table and discuss how things are going every 3 days...you might need to remove some perceived obstacles for him to really take ownership, etc.

The other is DMAIC - it's a LEAN/Six Sigma normally applied to process improvement in work projects but can work at home too:

Define - define the problem, goal, resources and timeline
Measure - come up with a baseline to improve against, identify the current gap between where you are and where you need to be, and map out a current process flow. Try to no blame or over-state things here ("the current process is that I do everything and you do nothing" isn't a helpful starting point LOL)
Analyze - here you need to get to the root cause of the problem and find out how to eliminate it. Your husband's attitude and behavior seem like obvious root causes but there may be other issues there that are driving the attitude and behavior.
Improve - here is where you address the (or a) root cause and see how changing/fixing that helps the situation (or not)
Control - assuming you get improvement, here is where you put controls into place to "sustain the gain"

Not every interpersonal problem can be solved like a business problem but many can. I think in your case, you're both experiencing major life stressors with a small child, a newborn, and your very important school work. This is an emotional minefield for sure - if you can apply a more process-oriented approach like either one of the two above, you may be able to remove guilt, shame, blame and resentment from the interaction and get the results that you want and need.

Good luck to you...your expectations are 100% valid, you just really need to figure out what his problem is and solve it...together!

If you're doing the work, he has no reason to. Stop doing it. Use paper plates. Make crock pot dinners and sandwiches. STOP WASHING HIS CLOTHES - PERIOD. Do the minimum with the kids. Vacuum every other week. Clean toilets once a week. Forget the dusting. Your house doesn't need to be picked up. If he wants to live in a wreck of a house, LET HIM.

You are right to expect him to stand by his agreement. He isn't, but you are letting your anger at him keep you from finishing your schooling. Instead of doing that, DROP THE BALL in the house just like he is.

If you don't, then you're just enabling him. Why would you do that? You say you can't afford a cleaner. Well, if you paid for a cleaner anyway, then he would FEEL the pinch of the money going out for it when you CANCEL THE CABLE ON THE TV then maybe he'd get his a*% in gear and clean the house.

Stop talking about it and start letting him LIVE IT.

Your last sentence in your question spoke to my own experience. Very tough to deal with. I finally forced us to go to a counselor, so he was forced to stop avoiding and shutting down, and had to deal with things instead. Finally he is making the changes. But I had to push it to the brink.

I suggest a counselor, so that you don't have to be the nagging mother to your husband. It breeds a LOT of resentment and distaste.

Nip this in the bud, or if it's past the bud stage, nip in in the flower. But don't let it go on any longer.

Communication is key, sit down and talk about expectations of each other as it relates with schedules, work, study, child care, household chores.

Consider hiring someone to clean for you a couple of times a month or weekly. Consider hiring a teenager or someone to watch the kids while you and husband "team up" to do the housework together on an evening or weekend.

If you are looking at a temporary situation, it could be much healthier for all and socializing your children with a sitter is not the end of the world.

You will feel more refreshed and be able to accomplish more if you take some of the burden off of yourself.

Well, nagging hasn't worked. Yes, you SHOULD have your "time", but it's not happening & you are overwhelmed with babies, school work & house work. You just had a baby, your body is overwhelmed with those changes, too. You NEED some sleep! There is a reason sleep deprivation is used as a torture technique! New moms don't get enough sleep in the best of times & you are doing triple duty with your schedule.

Find a "Mother's Helper" to watch the kids a couple of hours during the DAY while you work on your thesis, so that you can get some sleep at night! Have her take them to the park or around the block so that they are out of the house. If you can afford it, a cleaner once a week to do the laundry, etc. for a couple of months would take some of the pressure off of you.

And check out the FLYLady.net web site. I heard of her a couple of years ago from Mamapedia & it has helped me cope. I am not great with "home management" & unlike the ladies who are shocked that your small house takes you so much time to tidy up--I TOTALLY get why that is! And with each kid, it was harder & harder to cope with the work of all their stuff & messes! Although I have always liked a tidy & orderly home, DOING it consistently wasn't my strong suit! And when I was sleep depraved & overwhelmed with deadlines, EVERYTHING went to H*ll in a hand basket!

Good Luck & remember--this too shall pass!

Hi there,

I'm sorry to hear your having this struggle.
Going off what you've written I thought of a few things that I hope are ok to speculate simply based on what you've written, obviously take it or leave it:

Firstly you are a very articulate writer so your thesis will be awesome!

Reading what you wrote is like stepping back from the whole thing and looking at a family system making a pattern in the way it functions so I'm commenting in that sense. It seems like before your husband was writing his thesis like 'the brave father role' forging ahead for the family,

- a nice masculine identity for him to feel healthy and motivated about-

while you were doing the more classically, (in the past at least ),mother role/identity stuff ( a nice feminine role for you to feel healthy and motivated about).

Now - looking at what you've written - it looks like you could be doing the brave forging ahead creative stuff as well as being the primary mother role/identity while he is perhaps going more to the young boy role?

So I wonder if he has been given the freedom and space to do his current role in a masculine way/ his way?

Does he have any other outlets or time for that side (masculine identity - whatever that means for him) in the way your living your lives?

Have you really let go of and surrendered the duties to him to do his way?

I wonder generally what would happen if he did feel completely free to do those tasks his way as his own man. Also does his having this problem enable you to still feel like the great mum you obviously are even though your spending time on other things as well as your babies? Is there a way you can both feel that you can have both?

Hope any of that helps! Best of luck!

Your life and expectations have to change.

"I want to know if I am being unreasonable to expect extra effort during a crisis time, especially when I would have been finished it if he hadn't taken extra time to do his." No you are NOT, but life is not fair.
Stop with the "He had his time, shouldn't I get mine???" yes, you should, but since that isn't happening you have to take action. If you dwell on this you will go crazy - eaten up with anger and resentment.

I would suggest;

1)look into going away for the last 3 months until you finish. Go alone, or take the baby, or both kids and go home to your mom, or find a room somewhere, a hotel, your parent's home, a retreat center. Put the blinders on and just get the thesis done. It doesn't have to be the worlds best, it just has to be done. I don't think you need to discuss this at length with your husband. Take care of yourself right now.

2)he dropped the ball big time - use this information for future life decisions.

3)I am a full time mom. I have 2 children with special needs. I pay a cleaning lady $10 an hour to come in and do the daily stuff. She comes in 2 hours a day, M - F. It costs me $200 a month. Hire one - this will be a job for life.

4)having children changes everything. This is motherhood. Either embrace it fully and stop after you get your PhD, or find someone in the nanny/housekeeper mode, who will be with you for life as you pursue your career, who will take your place. Your ideas of sharing home/ child care/ work are obviously NOT working with your husband.

Don't mean to be harsh, but use your past experiences with your husband to design your future with your children. It may mean giving up your life dreams and goals, but THIS IS MOTHERHOOD and your children shouldn't have to suffer because their parents can't work together. He won't help on the domestic side, so don't base future life plans on his helping out. Spend the money, or spend the time.

Wishing you all the best,
Mrs. Been there, done that

I would suggest finding out what his main temperament is and once you do use it to the advantage. There are certain ways to deal with certain "types"

Although this may help a great deal, still ya gotta know that you can't get a person to do what they don't want to do. So there is a kind of surrender involved here as hard as that can be. You may have to simply let a lot go while you're working on your phd and ignore him. Maybe you should threaten to get a maid and or babysitter and see what he says or how he responds.

It seems to me this is selfish of him but that's something he'll have to see for himself. Either he's vested in the well being of his children and wife or not.

Sending the best thoughts to you for your situation and getting thru your work and caring for your baby.

pull on family or friends ask them to help him out, doesn't sounds like he is very motivated with other things why would you expect him to be motivated in this? not being snarky just saying I think your expectations of him might be wrong.