My fiance and I have recently been arguing about household chores recently. She thinks she has to do most of the housework, and I think I do my fair share. We even had to create a chore chart, and have started using that.

She's a neat freak and I'm a slacker, by personality.

Anyone else run into serious issues about the division of labor around the house? How did you deal with it?

1/18/2011 1:34:28 PM

No, but your marriage is going to suck

1/18/2011 1:40:45 PM

LOL

Do you do the yardwork? Because that definitely should be weighted more than the in-house chores.

1/18/2011 1:44:56 PM

http://www.chorewars.com/

1/18/2011 1:47:09 PM

my wife complains that I don't do the dishes or vacuum/clean enough.
I tell her to stop using so many plates and bowls for one meal.

In all seriousness though, I am the slacker personality and she is the over-achiever in our relationship.
She wants everything perfect and has the "company at any time" mentality, and I have the "looks like someone lives here, and not a magazine ad" mentality.
I do not have the giant pig sty and nothing ever clean "lived in" mentality.

What has worked for us so far is this:
If she asks me to do it, I do it.
If she doesn't ask, I most likely won't.
I occasionally take initiative and do chores, and then get rewarded. It is all about the 'game'.

1/18/2011 1:48:53 PM

^^^Why do you think that instantly qualifies us for a sucky marriage?

The rest is good...we just have very different styles, history, standards, etc. with regards to housework.

No yardwork, we live in an apt.

1/18/2011 1:49:42 PM

Cleaning the house is almost making me want to propose to my girlfriend. I fucking hate cleaning the house....and she loves cleaning.

I do all the yardwork and other "man shit"....and she can clean the house. Sounds good to me.

We also do a great job of splitting the cooking/cleaning dishes. When we cook, I prep food and do little shit, and she cooks everything else (unless we're grilling, then that falls under "man shit"). Then I clean the dishes when we're done. Which isn't a big deal to me because I'm very picky about a clean kitchen and usually clean everything as we go.

1/18/2011 1:49:46 PM

My wife is also a neat freak.

So I just asked her straight up what she just had to do to be satisfied with its level of cleanliness - the only thing was bathrooms. So that's 100% her. She accidentally washed some chap stick in with my clothes a while ago so I offered to always do the laundry on the weekends. Once we split up two big things like that, we just take naturally turns doing everything else. She usually cooks, I usually do dishes, I take out the trash, she usually vacuums... it all evens out.

I don't understand how you can have so many arguments about it. Don't you both run down the list of chores you do? It's either 50/50 or it's not and one of you needs to do more. If you're actually 50/50 and she refuses to admit it, just go all out every now and then and clean the whole house to show her that you're actually trying.

1/18/2011 1:53:24 PM

Quote :

"In all seriousness though, I am the slacker personality and she is the over-achiever in our relationship. She wants everything perfect and has the "company at any time" mentality, and I have the "looks like someone lives here, and not a magazine ad" mentality. I do not have the giant pig sty and nothing ever clean "lived in" mentality."

The slacker and over-achiever roles are the exact same in my marriage

As far as the state of the house goes, we tend to keep it 80% towards the "company at any time" state. Basically we like to keep it so that with ~30 minutes heads up we can clean the place up nice without having to just throw things in our room and the closet. We both definitely feel more relaxed when the house is really clean and uncluttered but at the same time we don't feel pressured to put everything away and clean every dish the minute we are done using it. Kind of a compromise.

For chores, she tends to do the dishes, laundry, cook and clean the kitchen type chores and I almost always take care of the outside chores, recycling, garbage and do more of the painting/handyman type stuff (though she is an awesome helper with that stuff ). We both work so we do try and be at least somewhat even with the chores, although she does slightly more if you are comparing actual time spent probably.

1/18/2011 2:00:30 PM

We have so many arguments about it because, before this week, we didn't have any sort of list or anything.

I'd be home, watching tv or something, and she'd bring up how awful the place looked and get annoyed that I hadn't cleaned and I'd get annoyed that she was nagging. She'd feel like I didn't do my share that day/week/whatever and I'd feel like I had.

We're trying a chore chart now, and was wondering if anyone else had any ideas, similar stories, etc. that might help.

1/18/2011 2:04:08 PM

^^we are very similar. Except, we both do our own laundry.

1/18/2011 2:06:11 PM

The key to a successful marriage is finding a common ground on the definition of "clean"

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 2:06 PM. Reason : .]

1/18/2011 2:06:17 PM

A chore chart seems a bit excessive to me but whatever avoids arguments, I guess.

Just stop being a slob

1/18/2011 2:06:23 PM

Girlfriend cleans the house, I help out where I can. I do the cooking and she does the dishes. She does laundry. I do manly crap like take out the garbage.

When she wants some help she asks and I oblige. I also do little things like picking up my towel, putting clothes in the hamper...the things that would get on your nerves if you had to clean after someone. Its also not a cut and dry "you do dishes, I cook". I'll do dishes so I'm not slacking all the time.

1/18/2011 2:09:51 PM

My girlfriend lives in my house but is currently unemployed. I therefore do no chores. She does everything. It's pretty nice having my own live-in lady servant.

1/18/2011 2:10:37 PM

Just ask her what she expects out of you and then tell her if you'll be willing/able to do what she expects.

I guess the written form of that is your chore chart.

1/18/2011 2:11:34 PM

^^I had that for like a week. It was pretty nice. My unit even packed my lunch a few times!

Then she got a job

1/18/2011 2:34:13 PM

Quote :

"my wife complains that I don't do the dishes or vacuum/clean enough. I tell her to stop using so many plates and bowls for one meal. In all seriousness though, I am the slacker personality and she is the over-achiever in our relationship. She wants everything perfect and has the "company at any time" mentality, and I have the "looks like someone lives here, and not a magazine ad" mentality. I do not have the giant pig sty and nothing ever clean "lived in" mentality. What has worked for us so far is this: If she asks me to do it, I do it. If she doesn't ask, I most likely won't. I occasionally take initiative and do chores, and then get rewarded. It is all about the 'game'."

hahahaha the bf and I had this exact conversation last night, except our roles are reversed. He said I've helped him realize he doesnt need to be so anal but it bugs him if I leave a couch pillow astray. We've reached a middle ground basically.

1/18/2011 2:43:05 PM

I do the laundry and load the dishes bc I'm OCD about how a dishwasher should be properly loaded, and he unloads the dishwasher and takes out the trash. He doesn't unload the dishwasher fast enough for my liking, so I created a sign to display when they are clean as a signal "yo! Put the dishes away!" but it only works 40% of the time

I have morning dog walk duty, he has evening

I dust, vacuum & clean the toilets & shower; he also vacuums & mops when I ask...and collectively we'll divide up who does what for a more thorough clean.

I say we both have the same definition of clean, I just wish he would not leave his socks and shoes on the floor, hang his coat up, and put his trash in the trash can or recycling.

I'm fine with how much he does unasked and asked...it's the little messes that annoy me the most.

Right now we're in complete disarray mode working on the house in prep for selling, so I'm trying to ignore most of it

1/18/2011 2:48:00 PM

Quote :

"In all seriousness though, I am the slacker personality and she is the over-achiever in our relationship. She wants everything perfect and has the "company at any time" mentality, and I have the "looks like someone lives here, and not a magazine ad" mentality. I do not have the giant pig sty and nothing ever clean "lived in" mentality. What has worked for us so far is this: If she asks me to do it, I do it. If she doesn't ask, I most likely won't. I occasionally take initiative and do chores, and then get rewarded. It is all about the 'game'."

pretty much the same with my wife and me...i actually do most of the cooking (and subsequent kitchen cleaning), most of the dog care (walking, bathing, feeding, etc), and ALL of the yardwork...she does the vacuuming, organizing, and general picking-up (because i am an admittedly messy person)

she gets frustrated with my messiness sometimes and i get frustrated with her inability to turn off lights and propensity for using boatloads of dishes, but it rarely turns into an argument...i think we both believe the other does their fair share

1/18/2011 2:59:18 PM

slackerb

Tell your bitch to get back in the kitchen and do the dishes....


The good ole days

1/18/2011 4:40:50 PM

hire a maid

1/18/2011 4:44:37 PM

I have a farm with cattle(beef/dairy crosses),pigs, chickens and turkeys (all organic) 3 little kids and a DH that works away from the farm sometimes several days at a time. We have different adaptaions that we have made to our sitution.

Firstly I don't have to milk a cow every day - probley about a week out of a month as only once a day(right after a cow has given birth and after we wean the calf sometimes). I do have to feed and bed the animals twice a day though and that takes anywheres from 15min to over an hour depending on how many, what time of year ect

Our kids get up early so the short version of chores is done in the morning, from march to november they come out to the barn with me and play out there - there is an empty pen that they can play with there bikes, trikes and push toys in that when they are to young to help I put them in it. Once they are about 2.5 or 3 they can help or at very least know enough to stay safe and wander the barn.

In the wintertime when the temp can be -25 then I try to go out a little later after Dh is up - or I split the chore into 2, 10 minute sesions and leave the kids with a video and a snack for the time it takes.

Before everyone jumps on me - we have a video baby monitior in the barn - so I can see and hear what they are doing at all times and can run from barn to house in about 30 seconds.
For the bigger chores that the kids arn't going to be happy while I'm doing them I try and save them for Wed and do them while the kids spend the day in daycare.

The evening chore take longer so I do them after the kids are in bed in the winter (in summer sometimes they are still up and they help me or play in the sandbox). In the winter I do any milking in the evening because I have more time and the kids arn't going to scare the cow (and get me kicked). In the summer I do the milking in the maternaty pasture near the house and the kids stand and watch.

If for some reason I can't get the stuff done on my own and DH isn't around I give one of our neighbours a call and one of them comes over and watches the kids for me.

As far as getting a goat - can you get one that still has 1 kid on her - then the kid will take care of some of the milking and you would only have to milk once a day - BUT you may need two goats depending on how much milk you need.

Just my experiences and thoughts...

1/18/2011 4:44:38 PM

My roommate and I made a list of all the shit that needs to be done, from taking out the trash to cleaning the bathrooms etc etc, along with an agreed frequency of said activity.

Then we did a chore draft.

It was a fun 2 hours.

Then I went back to being a slacker.

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 4:50 PM. Reason : .]

1/18/2011 4:49:55 PM

Quote :

"We have so many arguments about it because, before this week, we didn't have any sort of list or anything. I'd be home, watching tv or something, and she'd bring up how awful the place looked and get annoyed that I hadn't cleaned and I'd get annoyed that she was nagging. She'd feel like I didn't do my share that day/week/whatever and I'd feel like I had."

This sounds like me and my bf. I do most (if not all) of the cleaning, the laundry, take care of the animals (though he does take care of the dog during the week except for at night), grocery shopping, and taking out the trash. I have mentioned multiple times how help would be appreciated and he says all I need to do is ask but when I ask it never gets done so I've given up on it.

A lot of it has to do with our different definitions of "clean" and how I lived alone for 6 years before we moved in together. It definitely took some adjusting on my part in terms of not getting so wound up if something was out of place. Now I just split the chores myself: I clean the downstairs on Saturday's and do the grocery shopping and Sunday's I clean the upstairs and do the laundry.

1/18/2011 4:53:25 PM

^Sounds like someone "knows their role" now. Your bf should be given a pat on the back.

1/18/2011 5:26:36 PM

I don't mind things being messy and my gf hates it, and as such, arguments are spawned. It's probably the only thing we argue about but it happens all too frequently. We have a theoretical division of labor--she usually cooks, I'm responsible for cleaning the kitchen, she takes care of the bathrooms, I vacuum, we split laundry and living room/common area tidying. However I'm bad about leaving things until it's too late at night or I have something else to do, it doesn't get done, and eventually the messiness grows.

Basically if I'd stop being so lazy the situation would rectify itself. You'd think I'd have this figured out by now.

1/18/2011 5:44:58 PM

Quote :

"SHe's a neat freak and I'm a slacker, by personality."

yup this is cody and me.
we fight about it.

sometime it escalates out of control. but usually we both realize how dumb it is.


we've met in the middle though, but completely unintentionally.
he's quit being so anal retentive and i'm cleaning up after myself more

it just kinda happened.

1/18/2011 5:52:09 PM

for reasons listed in this thread, i don't know if i could ever live with someone. i've been single for the last 10 years, lived alone for the past 6, and might have 2 visitors/year. needless to say, i'm kind of set in my ways at this point. i'm don't keep my place a pig sty, but its not going to make the cover of good housekeeping either.

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 6:41 PM. Reason : .]

1/18/2011 6:37:54 PM

Quote :

"^Sounds like someone "knows their role" now. Your bf should be given a pat on the back."

Lol. I think my boyfriend got lucky and got a neat freak who would rather clean than wait for him to help.

1/18/2011 6:46:28 PM

Can you clean my place, Cassie?

1/18/2011 7:01:05 PM

Sure but I'd probably charge a fee

1/18/2011 7:08:52 PM

Skeeeeeeeeeeeee

1/18/2011 7:09:35 PM

What we have here is a failure to communicate. You know what you both got into when you got engaged/married. If she's doing more cleaning than you, then cook more or do more housework. If she's being unreasonable, get used to it, she's a woman.

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 8:00 PM. Reason : ]

1/18/2011 7:55:17 PM

who makes more money?

1/18/2011 7:58:36 PM

^ahahah my mom has that same mentality

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 9:13 PM. Reason : s]

1/18/2011 9:13:09 PM

i do most of the work here, but i think it's one-sided bc i owned this house & lived here alone for 3 years before we got married. our 2nd wedding anniversary is june 6. we're both slackers, but i'm neater than he is from an overall/big picture perspective. he likes to organize shelves or drawers.

i do all of the yardwork that doesn't involve a chainsaw (so mowing, seeding, fertilizing, trimming, edging, weeding, raking, etc), sometimes he blows off the driveway though. i do the dishes, vacuuming, dusting, litterbox, general picking things up off the floor, bathrooms, painting, trash, etc. i've replaced a toilet by myself before too. and built a small screened porch. i'm the daughter of an architect & was taught how to do most anything around the house. if i don't know, i'll learn.

we cook together most of the time, if we cook. we really need to cook more. we both hate doing dishes so that's a big deterrent there. we try to use a few dishes, bowls, pots as possible. we share the laundry, but sometimes he folds more bc he's a little more particular about how his clothes are folded. i iron everything.

chris & i lived together in apartments in college, but after living together in this house for couple of years, we really need to find a way to divy up the chores. with the additional stuff to clean up since there's more than 1 person here now, i have a little trouble keeping up sometimes. we were just talking about making a chore chart or something a couple of days ago. i think part of the problem is that i expect that he knows what needs to be done but he actually doesn't.

i LOVE it when the house is picked up & vacuumed, and it's almost never guest-ready. with people like in-laws or new people, i fall back to my mom's neurotic EVERYSINGLEDAMNTHINGMUSTBESPOTLESS mindset though.

i'm the breadwinner

[Edited on January 18, 2011 at 9:29 PM. Reason : ]

1/18/2011 9:24:26 PM

I dont mind cleaning a little more if I get to work less.

The only thing I HATE doing is laundry, I don't mind cleaning anything else about the house but I hate laundry.

1/18/2011 9:25:27 PM

Quote :

"How did you deal with it?"

broke up

1/18/2011 10:11:45 PM

as far as cleaning goes - we hired a maid - stopped tons of fights because she cared about it and i didn't

1/18/2011 10:37:27 PM

We split it up as follows (we also have 2 roommates I'm supremely good at nagging):

him: cooks 99% of meals, auxiliary dog care, buys groceries I dictate, builds stuff I need (like a breakfast table, garden beds). He also brings home most of the money and handles utility wrangling (like gathering checks, mailing them, asking for my share, etc.).

me: maybe like 80% of dog care, all chicken care, cleaning the kitchen/washing dishes, 1/2 time the bathroom, vacuuming, sweeping, etc. Sometimes I'll do his laundry to get it out of my way. (Although since I'm in nursing school and work, it's winter, and the weather's been sucking, I've been letting some less necessary crap slide like vacuuming).

I'm also anal retentive about the front yard, and handle the garden beds, mowing with the push mower, etc. My one dumb roommate decided to do me a 'favor' and turn over all the garden beds while I was away for Xmas- forgetting we would have to go in and dig up all 24 inches and rehab the beds with compost for spring anyway . Sometimes I get the trash/recycling.

other roommates: usually trash/recycling, bathroom, turning compost, cleaning gutters or cleaning out the fridge- pretty much any chores I'm loathe to do, or don't have time for.

1/19/2011 12:01:33 AM

Seriously--

Stop keeping score.

If shit needs to be done, fucking do it and forget about who did what when or more often or less often or whatever. Man up or Woman up, and do the dishes even if you did them the last 5 times. Seriously, you waste more time bitching about it and fighting with your significant other than if you just do it.

you are grown ass people now. ack like it.

[Edited on January 19, 2011 at 1:03 AM. Reason : .]

1/19/2011 1:03:15 AM

Obviously, but doesn't it bug you a little that you're doing the dishes for the fifth time in a row? If not, you're not human

1/19/2011 1:28:37 AM

I currently have a similar situation with housemates right now. I have my tolerance for squalor, and they have theirs. If it reaches my threshold I will clean things, it just reaches their threshold first. And so, like MaximaDrvr, I will do chores when asked to do so, but I'm just not going to see the need otherwise. (Presumably unlike MaximaDrvr, my roommates do not "reward" me for any efforts I take on my own)

I have been on the other side of the equation, too, living with a girlfriend who was filthy beyond all measure and thought I should do all chores, whether or not I asked her to do otherwise. This was not an acceptable situation and contributed in part to my fleeing that godforsaken city.

1/19/2011 2:03:16 AM

Quote :

"If shit needs to be done, fucking do it and forget about who did what when or more often or less often or whatever. Man up or Woman up, and do the dishes even if you did them the last 5 times. Seriously, you waste more time bitching about it and fighting with your significant other than if you just do it. "

That's nice and all when it gets close to evening out in the long run...but sounds like there are a lot of situations here where the other person just doesn't really do anything. People are different. Sometimes you gotta make lists.

1/19/2011 8:10:53 AM

Quote :

"I have a farm with cattle(beef/dairy crosses),pigs, chickens and turkeys (all organic) 3 little kids and a DH that works away from the farm sometimes several days at a time. We have different adaptaions that we have made to our sitution."

You sure spend a lot of time on TWW do be such a productive farmer.

1/19/2011 8:13:48 AM

Quote :

"She thinks she has to do most of the housework, and I think I do my fair share. We even had to create a chore chart, and have started using that. She's a neat freak and I'm a slacker, by personality."

I'd say my wife and I are similar to this but I wouldn't go so far as to say that she is a neat freak. I am definitely a slacker though and, truth be told, if you were actually doing your fair share you would have thought you had been doing more than your far share. It's how us slackers think.

Like most of the others ITT we pretty much have set chores although we didn't get to the point of making a list. For the most part I think we pretty much do a good job of keeping stuff clean though. We have found that it's easier to keep an already clean kitchen/room clean than to let it get out of hand and then deal with it so if one of us has an opportunity (like she has to work late or I'm watching/playing a game) then the other won't hesitate to do a task they normally don't do. She still does waaay more than I do but the tricks are to go out of your way once in a while to go above and beyond and to notice/compliment/voice appreciation for the things she does.

If that doesn't work: http://www.digtriad.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=156829

1/19/2011 8:22:02 AM

a chore chart? break it off while you still can

1/19/2011 9:18:13 PM

Since I care more about a clean house than my boyfriend, I usually take the responsibility to do most of the cleaning. I do expect him to pick up after himself and I, also, expect him to do the dishes if I cook. Other than that, I'm fine with doing everything else. It's not that hard. But it helps that he does whatever I ask of him too.

1/19/2011 9:33:11 PM

...he's cleaning the kitchen

1/19/2011 10:31:29 PM