Hi, my boyfriend and I have been living together for almost 2 years now. He lived here on his own before I moved in and every time that I would be over here before moving in, it was clean.
I remember him before I moved in telling me like “oh I’ll call you after I do laundry”….. We’re sending me photos of the dinners that he would make himself.
When I moved in, it was due to some family issues and I lost my job. So for the first four months of us living together, I was looking for a job and going to interviews and since he was the one working, I felt like it was only fair that I clean the house. I made sure that he had clean clothes dinner when he came home. Because I wasn’t able to provide, and he had provided me a home and was taken care of me.
But once I got a job that changed. The only bill we split is rent. He covers utilities and I cover groceries. And then any other individual bills we pay ourself such as our phones and cars we pay on our own. I started to work 40 hours a week and so I no longer had the time or energy to be taking care of all the household chores and meals. But it’s still all fell on me.
I love cooking, but it started to feel like more of a chore than a passion. I started to slowly just stop cleaning everything on top of working just to see if he would start to clean up. I would leave dishes in the sink for a week and eventually they’d start to smell so bad that I’d have to do them myself.
Don’t get me wrong he always thanks me for doing the laundry, for cooking meals, and just compliments me and tells me how grateful he is for me. I didn’t really know how to bring this conversation to light at first because it kind of just baffled me that he stopped cleaning altogether once I moved in.
At some point, I ended up having a bit of a mental breakdown and crying to him about how I’m tired and I can’t do it ALL that I need help with cleaning the house and that I’m tired of cooking. He was very understanding towards it and told me basically that he had no idea and thought that I enjoyed cooking and that he’ll start making sure that he cleans up.
For a few weeks, it was fine, but I didn’t notice that he would just ask me what I want cleaned and I’d have to tell him what I want done he wouldn’t just do it. Which again doesn’t make any sense to me because before I lived here, he lived here on his own and he cleaned up just fine and knew what needed to be clean. I feel like it’s obvious look around “oh the dirty clothes back to get as full let me do the laundry”, “ oh the sink is full of dishes. Let me do those”, sweep, take out the trash, scrub the toilet or the tub!! All the things you used to do??
At some point, I just got annoyed that I’m having to tell a grown man and it made me always just feel bad. It made me feel like I was forcing him to do something. He obviously didn’t want to do while I’m having to do stuff that I also don’t wanna do, but it’s just part of life! Every Saturday I work, but he’s off on weekends and I would text him in the morning a little list “do the dishes and take out trash please” and he would do it and let me know when it was done, and he just almost gave off the same energy as a kid doing chores and looking for their allowance, which I just didn’t like!!
Again, I’ve tried to do things like just stop cleaning up as much and see what he chooses to do, but I just can’t deal with how long the mess will sit. I think if I stop sweeping there would be piles of dog hair and dust. Laundry would never get done. The kitchen would be a disaster, even if I stopped cooking completely, which I kind of have. I probably cooked dinner twice a week now and then we eat fast food the rest of the week.
Any advice on what I can really do? He’s not a bad boyfriend. He takes me on dates, he tells me I’m pretty all the time, I’d say we’re still in the honeymoon phase. We don’t really argue. We communicate well and I have brought up this cleaning problem multiple times and it’s the one thing that I’ve communicated to him that has not been resolved in someway or compromised anything else I’ve ever brought to his attention that I have an issue with he’s fixed and I haven’t had much of an issue with afterwards!!
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Get a cleaning lady
Clean
You need to sit down and very clearly tell him that household responsibilities need to be at least somewhat evenly split. He’s gotten comfortable with you doing it all and won’t change unless you lay it out for him. No “do X please”- be straight up about it.
get a cleaning MAN. make sure you are home when he comes, so you can show him all the places where your bf is failing!
Im sorry
He’s not going to change.
Congrats on your elevationto the status of bangmaid, though. Stop living with him, end of story. Move elsewhere.
I think you should try to sit him down and remind him of the fact that he used to clean. That you’re not asking him to do anything he hasn’t been able to do when he was alone so instead of a list tell him to look around like he used to and figure it out. If that doesn’t work sit down together and assign chores evenly and those will be each of your jobs all the time
I have dealt with this before. You told him, he continues to show his laziness and lack of responsibility and respect so leave him. Do not waste your time or energy on him. It will never get better and settling for this will change you for the worse. Leave
if you have expressed countless times that he’s upsetting you when he doesn’t help, and he still hasn’t changed, then he most likely is not going to change. you need to decide if you want to put up with that for years to come or just leave him.
Show him this post
Have you told him all of this? I ironically just saw something today about the “mental load”. (I’ll link it below).
I definitely understand and empathize what you’re dealing with. My fiancée does housework, but for the first few years we lived together, I was pretty convinced he thought the only housework that existed was laundry, vacuuming, and dishes. 🤦🏼♀️ I was so frustrated that I was spending almost all my days off cleaning the bathroom, deep cleaning the living room/bedroom, changing sheets, and all the other stuff that goes into keeping a house clean. I eventually told him exactly what I was frustrated about. It didn’t really change much because I was still doing most of the housework unless I specifically asked.
Tell him you expect a PARTNER around the house. Not an employee. You’re not the manager of the house. You’re his PARTNER. You’re not his mother. You are his PARTNER. This isn’t fully his fault, as many men are raised in a way that makes this feel normal, but it is his responsibility to break out of that routine so that you aren’t unnecessarily burdened. You’re right. You shouldn’t have to tell him what needs done every single time. I’ve seen it put as “if you had to ask your manager every single time so you knew what needed to be done at your job instead of just… doing your job, you’d be fired.” He should put that ability to use at home the same way he did when he lived alone. Yes, having two people to do the housework can help split up that burden, but it doesn’t mean he gets to dump it all. Read the comic I linked. Show it to him. If you all communicate well and care about each other, you should be able to see forward progress that lasts.
https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/
If you have to repeat yourself or raise your voice, it’s bc your partner is not listening
You said anything else you’ve ever brought up, he has fixed and it’s never been an issue again. Which means that he doesn’t want to fix this issue.
Every single day, he makes the decision that these chores are your responsibility. At the very least, you will have to delegate tasks to him.
You have told him repeatedly how you feel, and the issue remains unchanged. This is your life now, unless you leave.
He knows what needs doing. He just thinks it’s your responsibility and doesn’t care that you are overwhelmed.
He. Doesn’t. Care.
You can’t make him change but you can leave someone who respects you so little
You say he’s not a bad boyfriend, but he actually is. If he was a good boyfriend, he wouldn’t be okay with you doing everything.
What you can do is tell him you’re sick of being his mommy. And if he doesn’t pick up half the load, immediately, you’re out of there.
Be careful… don’t want to marry him and have kids.. then you’ll really be stuck doing it all by yourself
Also I think utilities are cheaper than groceries. Just for the record.
Just read the title, if he can’t pay for a cleaner to pick up for where is lacking… There is always the option to leave. Good luck to you.
Have you tried a chore chart? Make a list of what has to be done & together write down either your or his name by the chore along with when or how often it has to be done.
Marry him. That will change his habits for sure. 👍🏻
It sounds like he’s found a manipulative way of keeping the responsibility on you. He’s gonna do what you specifically tell him to do which, in his mind, frees him of all the other responsibilities (as he’s assuming you’re still gonna do it).
I’d sit him down and adamantly tell him he needs to pick things up so that you guys both have an equitable share of the cleaning responsibilities. It’s not gonna be perfect, but it shouldn’t rest solely on any one person’s shoulders. Tell him exactly like you told here that, in having to tell him what to do rather than him knowing as a person that also lives in the household, you feel like his mom and not like his partner.
Get a new man
In my experience, you need to be extremely clear. Sit down and divide the chores evenly based on who likes doing what. Indicate how often it needs to be done. If he still fails to do his half, you are with one of the men in this world who expects you to care for him like mother while also working full time and being his girlfriend. Unless that sounds good to you, run.
Would you be willing to spend five minutes a month on a chore chart?
I’m not saying this is definitely the problem, but if he got in the habit of deferring to you about what housework needs doing, a piece of paper that says “Do the dishes on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday” takes a lot less time than asking every day.
This is soooo oh sooooo incredibly common. Many men do this type of thing ALL the time. Weaponized incompetence. Some men will actually delay something for as long as they can bc they know their partner will just take care of it and then state “oh I was going to do that tomorrow”. Bullshit.
Now you have to decide – are you ok with him constantly pawning the load onto you or do you need someone who can contribute without being micromanaged like a toddler? Think long and hard, think 10 years down the road when you are married with kids..
Frankly I do 70% of the cleaning, house management, and cooking and I’m not over the moon about it, but it’s infinity better than a lot of my friends who are married who carry 90% of the load.
I will tell you this, it gets worse after marriage.
So either nip it in the bud now, start looking for your own place to move out and force him to step up and clean his own pigsty or just accept that this is life.
If he wants a mommy, he came move back in with his actually mommy.
He’s pretending that he needs to be told what to do. You know this because he was doing it before you moved in.
I have a few ideas for you which are pretty non-confrontational. The first one is to continue with the text messages. When he replies that he’s done what you asked, send him more chores. And repeat.
The other, better option is to just get a whiteboard and write everything that needs doing on it. Then everyone knows what needs to be done.
I bet he was only cleaning the day before you came over or he hired someone to clean his house for him. He’s never gonna change.
He’s happy to have all the work done for him. The fact that he’s asking what you want done is telling. He’s decided that you are in charge of housekeeping and he is “helping you” when he does a chore.
He won’t change. You can’t fix him. It will get much worse if you have children with him.
Start working on your exit plan, start saving as much money as you can and in the meantime stop cooking and cleaning for him. You have been his live in maid and it needs to end.