Thoughts on Housework
by Heather Koerner on 06/24/2008 at 12:15 PM
According to figures in a recent New York Times Magazine article, I do an average of 38 hours a week of housework and my husband does about 12 (the figures for a stay-at-home mom and a sole-earner husband).
Not surprising, considering "the home" is part of my job description. Though when I told my hubbie, he frowned, "I don't think I do 12 hours of work around here." But I informed him that they were including yard work in the mix. "Yeah, okay, that might be closer." And how I rarely touch a shower stall. "Hmm, maybe."
But what is a little surprising, or at least surprising to New York Magazine, is how the housework is divided when both couples have full-time paying jobs. Then, the woman does 26 hours of housework to the man's 14 hours -- a ratio of almost two-to one (and a ratio very similar to the ratio 90 years ago).
What's also surprising to Sampson Lee Blair, a professor of sociology quoted in the article, is the unity across classes: "Working class, middle class, upper class, it stays at two to one," Blair reports. Perhaps those nice, upper class girls are supposed to know better?
"And the most sadly comic data is from my own research," Blair adds, which show that in married couples "where she has a job and he doesn't, and where you would anticipate a complete reversal, even then you find the wife doing the majority of the housework."
That's a little bit frustrating for Blair: "When you look at this rationally, it is very difficult to understand why things are the way they are." The ratios on child care on even more lopsided.
So, in the article, they try to come up with "rational" explanations like "societal norms" and "contextual choices." But, still, there's that question that keeps popping up: Are women just anal or are men just lazy? As one of the moms in the article put it: "His level of alertness to mess is quite different than mine. I see dirt two or three days before he does."
Perhaps it's neither norms nor contexts, though. Perhaps it's just in us.
As Kathleen Parker writes on National Review: "[L]ittle truck is given to the obvious: Men and women are hard-wired differently. Of course, that sort of statement will get you run off of college campuses these days — ask Lawrence Summers — but common sense and experience often explain what science cannot."
On his blog, Al Mohler puts it this way:
Those who operate from a secular worldview informed by feminism must assume that this is just another representation of enduring cultural prejudice. Those operating from an evolutionary worldview will be tempted to suggest that this is evidence of the enduring power of ancient adaptations.
The Christian, operating out of a biblical worldview, must see this as an affirmation of the fact that men and women are assigned complementary, and not identical roles.
So why is it that a shoe left on the floor bugs me but not my husband? Societal norms? Why did I want to stay home to raise our kids? Contextual choices? After 13 years of marriage (yippee), I have come to a very scientific conclusion: that's a lot of hooey. If I was working 50 hours a week, a shoe would still bug me and I would still want to raise my kids. I'm very thankful that I don't have to do both.
1. Tom Neven said the following at 1:45 PM on Jun 24:
Don't forget one of the first questions men ask their wives shortly after the marriage: "What's a hamper?"
2. P&P said the following at 2:06 PM on Jun 24:
I once had a boyfriend call me Oscar, as in Oscar Madison from the old TV show, "The Odd Couple." I was not the most fastidious person, while he was incapable of not lining up the newspaper at a perfect right angle on the coffee table.
I think the ratio works in reverse for me.
3. Louise said the following at 2:06 PM on Jun 24:
I am like most men, I don't see dirt until days after other women do.
I don't know if this is the result of "hard-wiring" or cultural indoctrination.
I do however know what a hamper is, and I do put my hamper to good use but my ex-husband actually purchased it!
:)
4. Esther said the following at 2:09 PM on Jun 24:
Since college, I have lived alone, and with my brother for a couple of years. It was very plain to me that I was much more aware of and motivated by the need to have a clean home. What I do find odd, however, is that I was much more aware of disorderliness when I was living with him, than when I lived alone. Even the presence of one other person (who didn't care) was motivation for me to be more domestic. Of course, the real cleaning spree always happened right before the girls arrived for Bible study...
5. Marc said the following at 2:18 PM on Jun 24:
Tom (# 1):
That was brilliant!!!
I'm still chuckling.
6. Khalil said the following at 2:38 PM on Jun 24:
single male....I probably do 2 hours housework a week, tops. Oh well, that skews the stats.
7. Lynne said the following at 2:49 PM on Jun 24:
FOTF had a song/jingle about men, probably 15 years ago, that had the following lines:
(chanting)
Men, Men, Men, Men
Men, Men, Men, Men
Put our clothes in a drawer?!
What do you think the floor is for?
Men, MEn, Men, Wonderful Men
My husband called me to tell me about it because it was far more applicable to me, than him : )
But even with my House-cleaning Deficit Disorder (HDD), there a couple of things that I have a higher level of alertness to than my husband (none of these involve shoes on the floor, dust or piles):
1. where things are in the pantry (my husband actually unloads the dishwasher, so dishes arent' the issue)
2. Whether the clothes in the closet actually fit the kids
3. Whether homework gets done
I grew up the daughter of a stay at home mom, in a Christian home, in the deep South. I suppose missed the "social constructs" somehow!
8. DEH said the following at 2:52 PM on Jun 24:
Even though I do more housework than my husband (we chose to do it that way--he works, I don't), I think he's actually more attuned to the need for it than I am. The shoe 0n the floor bothers him more than it does me, and cleaning and picking up seem to come more easily to him than they do to me, so I don't know if it's valid to say that women are wired more for cleaning. I actually think it's probably more of a nurture thing than a nature thing: most families train girls to be cleaner and to do more housework than they do boys. However, my parents didn't put a high priority on teaching any of us kids those things; my husband's parents made sure all three of their kids could clean and pick up after themselves. Consequently, in adulthood, he's better at it than I am, and it comes easier to him than it does to me.
9. DannieA said the following at 3:17 PM on Jun 24:
I still think it's a bunch of hooey.
Men can learn to clean up after themselves and take pride in how they live...even if they need to be taught. My father is a good example.
He does all the outside work, plus washes dishes, vacuums and mops the floor while my mother cooks and does the laundry/ironing....I really don't get men who don't help around the house at all....but then I'm used to Cuban men....they do a lot for the house...more than just work.
10. Sarah22 said the following at 3:18 PM on Jun 24:
I do have to agree, I think in general there is a nature factor to it, but nurturing makes a big difference as well. My Mom is an admitted "clean freak" and all of her children are as well, even the guys...my twin brothers are 24 and sometimes put me to shame with their cleaning (which is pretty hard since I consider myself a highly skilled floor mopper!). They are very aware of dirt, etc. and cannot go to sleep with a sink full of dishes and neither can I. My Mom never let us go to bed with a messy room and I appreciate that very much now as an adult.
I personally find it sad when either sex cannot properly care for a living space as an adult (i.e. anyone at least college age, if not younger). My friend recently had a roommate who was just absolutely disgusting and really stressed my friend out because she not only cleaned everything but had to work twice as hard against all the messes the rommate made...the rommate on the other hand, left my friend "encouraging bible verses" almost daily but couldn't bring down her stack of 10 to 15 dirty plates (that belonged to my friend) from her room upstairs, not to mention she rarely paid her (very low) rent on time, if at all...I'm not saying she wasn't a Christian, but clearly her priorites were way off.
Anyway, that article was a bunch of junk! I believe in general that each sex is hard wired for different responsibilities (i.e. Adam caring for the Garden and Eve assisting him/caring for his needs). I look forward to having my own home someday and being responsible for keeping it clean, tidy, etc. for my hubbie to enjoy :)
11. Julia H said the following at 3:27 PM on Jun 24:
My husband argues that he is more efficient. I argue that he is lazy and oblivious to the mess around him.
I have given up on this battle. Unlike what they tell you in pre-marital counselling, you will probably argue more about who does the chores than anything else (including money) once you are married.
It is seriously embarassing when a man invites his friends over on Friday night and the house is a complete pigsty because we both work 40+ hours a week and he does almost no chores, leaving me to deal with all of the laundry, cooking, pet care, yard work and cleaning. I'm just too tired to get it all done and he doesn't seem to care. I find myself apologizing for my poor homemaking skills everytime the doorbell rings and I am so sick of it.
I'm sure this is all related to gender roles learned from fathers who also could nto be bothered to lift a finger around the house.
12. alex said the following at 4:19 PM on Jun 24:
Oh, please. Men don't clean up after themselves because they don't have to. We women will just kiss their booties and be their maids for them. I have a rule in my house - if you're over 5 years old, you clean up after yourself. That's what ADULTS do, unles they hire a maid. Ya hear?
13. brx said the following at 5:26 PM on Jun 24:
Trying to cut it up and spending lots of energy in an effort to 'make things equal' seems to miss the point. I don't think it's so much about hard-wiring but rather more about God's teaching and commands to work together and complement where applicable -- mutual submission -
"submit to one another"
I think the title of the next blog post says it well: "Just Serve"
grace & peace
14. Shannon said the following at 6:01 PM on Jun 24:
FYI: This was from the New York Times Magazine, an entirely different publication from New York Magazine. Always good to properly identify the thing you're snarking on.
And--Why the snark? Do we all really believe that in a family where both husband and wife have full time jobs, she really should be responsible for twice as much housework? Why shouldn't social scientists investigate and postulate various reasons. I thought the theory that even if the dad is a stay at home father, if the house is a wreck, the wife is seen as responsible to be a really interesting observation.
My fiance does a great job of cleaning his entire apartment, and I expect that those skills will be put to good use when we marry, and raise children, and work together to raise them.
15. H said the following at 7:41 PM on Jun 24:
I guess I'm somewhat troubled by the way that Rev. Mohler jumps to the conclusion that Christians must see this as evidence of different hardwiring in men and women. I'm not saying that men and women aren't different, but I'm not convinced by the evidence presented here that housework preferences are always tied to basic, universal differences between men and women.
Adam and Eve were both given the task of cultivating and caring for the garden, a role often seen as "feminine" in American culture. The woman of Proverbs 31 is a masterful household manager, but she also seems to be engaged in several business pursuits that might in some cultures be seen as masculine (buying fields, selling cloth to merchants).
Wendell Berry argues that American industrialism caused men to abandon the household as central concern and women then abandoned it as well - but he suggests that the care of the household (defined very broadly to include family relationships, physical maintenance, and more) should be a fundamental concern of both genders. While Berry isn't Scripture, I think he's generally a wise person, and it may be worth considering his viewpoint.
Also, I've been impressed by the positive example many faithful Christian men have set by serving their wives in the household. Watching men who follow Christ lay down their lives for their families by taking on responsibilities in the house can be a reminder of how Christ loves the church.
16. Vanessa said the following at 8:43 PM on Jun 24:
Funny, 90% of the single men I know are way more anal about the cleanliness of their homes than any of the women I know.
My mom is a stay-at-home and has been since I was in the 2nd grade. She actually does the majority of the chores, including yard work, because she likes to stay busy and my dad works up to 10 hours per day and has a 2 hour round trip commute to work. Dad does a LOT of dishes, mostly because it is his pet peeve and partly because my mom has fibromyalgia and standing to do the dishes (or any stationary standing task, like ironing, for example) is very painful for her physically.
My brother and I were taught how to keep a house, and former roommates' lack of domestic skills or ambition were frequently the cause of arguments. I look forward to the day I can be at least a "part-time" housewife and can have the energy to keep a house as clean as the one I grew up in. My apartment now is not an embarrassment at all, but if I know company is coming, I'll take a few minutes to run a vacuum cleaner, make sure the newspaper is not sprawled on the coffee table and that the dishes are stacked in the dishwasher instead of the sink (always rinsed well...I live in Florida where the state bug is the cockroach!).
Don't look in my laundry room though...I have found what works best for me is to get all the laundry done in one or two marathon days a month. If I do a single load here or there, I tend to forget it in the machine and it gets either mildewy or very wrinkly, requiring even more work. This is the result of 18 years worth of research on the subject.
17. Bonnie said the following at 8:55 PM on Jun 24:
I don't know if the whole ratio of chores-doing is hard-wired or trained. My dad is completely helpful around the house - he just does what needs to be done. My husband, however, is typical of this study, and I have more than once grumbled under my breath about how lazy he is. It's something I have just had to come to terms with, but it was difficult since I grew up with my dad's opposite habits. My husband was never trained by his parents to work around the house, so he never did growing up.
I think some of it may be hard-wired, but I think a lot of it is the fact that boys are not trained the way girls are. Less is expected of them in this department growing up. There is less stigma for a messy guy than a messy girl. Sort of like handwriting - why do women typically have better handwriting? Is it hard-wired? It may be a little, but good penmanship is emphasized to girls more than it is to boys, who are allowed to get away with sloppiness more because "boys will be boys."
In the past I think men did more in the chores department. Things were more equalized. But the feminist movement gave men the chance to be boys forever, without many of the responsibilities of fatherhood and family. And that includes chores. Men just aren't given high standards to reach anymore. Women don't expect as much as they should, and men don't give more than they have to.
Of course this is a generalization that the study proves - not everyone is like that!!
18. Mike Toreno said the following at 9:15 PM on Jun 24:
I don't think Kathleen Parker is someone you need to be citing as an authority on anything. Check this out, from last year, in a column she wrote around the end of March on rape in the military:
"Clearly, some of what is considered sexual harassment falls into the category of harmless sport -- the usual towel-snapping that is, in fact, a way to neutralize sex.
But more overt sexual aggression may be the product of something few will acknowledge, at least on the record: Resentment.
Off the record, in dozens of interviews over a period of years, male soldiers and officers have confided that many men resent women because they've been forced to pretend that women are equals, and men know they're not.
The lie breeds contempt, which leads to a simmering rage that sometimes finds expression in aggression toward those deemed responsible."
Parker has this viewpoint about how men and women are supposed to be, drawn from her own imagination and her need to cater to the xenophobes who look to her for support for their bigotry. The military's progress toward accepting and honoring the contributions of women flies in the face of her viewpoint, so she sees it as a justification for rape.
If you want to support a proposition that men and women are "hard-wired" a particular way, support it with evidence, not by appeals to authority - especially not so profoundly evil an authority.
19. Natasha said the following at 12:18 AM on Jun 25:
Well, I'd have to agree with several previous folks here and say that the whole "women are hardwired to do housework" thing is... hooey. Funnily enough, I'm writing this from my room, where approximately 7/8ths of the clothing I own is piled in various spots on the floor(For those who are disturbed by that- those are CLEAN clothes) and the housework is behind (depending on the job) a week to a month. Guess the social construct thing didn't catch on for me either...
I also strongly dislike (trying to avoid using the word "hate" here)cooking and I can't sew to save my life.
According to the tone of this article(and please correct me if I've misunderstood), I must be lacking some inborn God-given feminine gene. Or perhaps I've just been repressing my secret desire for a Swiffer... (Sorry, just had to put that in there- those commercials are sooooo annoying);)
I've just gotta shake my head here. Yes, I agree that men and women are not androgynous beings and have some inherent differences. But seriously, to say that doing housework is a special feminine characteristic?
Anybody who has had a male family member go through army or law enforcement training knows that this isn't the case. At boot camp, those fellows are perfectly well able to notice and do all kinds of housework related tasks- from shining their shoes to making the bed with really nice hospital corners to ironing their shirts. Lynne (#7) got it right when she suggested that it is "probably more of a nurture thing than a nature thing: most families train girls to be cleaner and to do more housework than they do boys".
It seems like too many 'conservative' Christians seem to confuse our North American cultural traditions with Scripture and think that anything that disagrees with them(the traditions) is anti-Christian or anti-biblical.
The quote from Al Mohler suggests that anyone who says that "this is just another representation of enduring cultural prejudice" is operating "from a secular worldview informed by feminism". My challenge to those who support his views is this:
Show me in God's Word where it says that women are designed to do housework. Personally, I can't think of a single verse that would support such a claim. The notable women in the Bible are described as ruling (Adam & Eve), leading armies (Deborah), prophesying (Anna), running their own business (Proverbs 31 woman), leading house churches (Priscilla & her husband Aquilla), participating in intelligence operations (Rahab), providing financial backing (several women who followed Jesus), being trained as disciples (Mary), or killing bad guys (Jael). And that is just what I can think of off the top of my head. It seems to me to be pretty odd that 'housework' would be so stringently defended as being a biblical gender difference.
So, please, let me know how you biblically justify this kind of claim. Mrs. Koerner, I'm totally not knocking your right to like housework and think you are hardwired for it. I just cannot agree that what applies to you must also apply to me and every other woman out there. :)
Natasha
"I hate housework. You make the beds, you wash the dishes and six months later you have to start all over again." -Joan Rivers
20. Farmer Pete said the following at 2:50 AM on Jun 25:
Oh for heaven's sake!
Of course blokes can learn to be tidy - the military and some other occupations have been demonstrating that for longer than any of us have been alive.
But that is not the *point* of the article. The *point* is that in the absence of additional incentive, men generally (and anecdotal evidence to the contrary does not disprove this) have a higher tolerance for untidiness.
In my case, as a bachelor living alone and engaged in highly physical work, home is my "rest space" ...... if I'm working, then I need to be outside doing more productive and profitable things than just looking after my own comfort. If there was someone else in the house, it would be different, but there isn't.
Peter
21. Kelly said the following at 6:04 AM on Jun 25:
I agree that men tend to notice mess/dirt only 3 days after women have noticed it. That's certainly what I observe in my sisters' marriages!
22. Emily said the following at 7:02 AM on Jun 25:
I also read the article in the Times, and thought it thought provoking. The stats seem to prove that women are more inclined towards cleanliness than men. I think this might be a good example of how men and women can compliment one another. However, I think it might be a very poor excuse for husbands to not help out because "they aren't hard-wired that way." We must be very careful to not use this excuse in other areas of our lives as Christians as well; "That's just how I am, I can't change," must always remain under the Holy Spirit's scrutiny.
Also, the Biblical passages used to interpret men and women's "roles" must be taken in its cultural context.
23. obewan said the following at 7:48 AM on Jun 25:
Maybe there is a lot to be said for living single in a condo. I keep a very clean house, and spend less than 19 hours a month. Cooking for one is easy. One ½ hour session can prepare 3 meals. Laundry can be done once a month, and I can watch TV when it happens. My shower stays clean for at least whole month with only one person using it. I am so independent now that I am used to doing all the housework, so getting a wife to do chores for me is not a motivation. If I ever do get married, I would have no trouble at all doing 50% of the chores. It would be nice to have someone to share the other 50%. I am most attracted to women with careers since I don’t see housework as that burdensome with all the modern conveniences like built in laundry and large microwave ovens.
24. Kate said the following at 7:58 AM on Jun 25:
I remember reading this article in the NY Times recently and found it very interesting and thought the numbers made a lot of sense based on what I've seen others doing and so on.
I don't think it's appropriate to reject the suggested explanations about learned behavior, and pratical problems with some of the ways households may be run. This is not necessarily "liberal college campus adgenda" For example, as one person already mentioned above, men doing more around their homes can be very culturally appropriate. It can also be practical. And I would argue, perhaps also Biblical.
Why shouldn't men spend quality time helping in the home with their wives, and with the children? Should they perhaps be spending more time with their kids than what appears to be the norm here? I think so anyway... how is a man supposed to play his Biblical role as a father if he only spends 12 hours a week or less with his kids?
Why does division in labor have to be a thing based on who is compelled to do what by their intolerance for messes or feelings on an individual basis? (how is that even Biblical?) Why couldn't a couple or a family prepare a meal together, or do the laundry together? It makes it take less time, and also gives an opportunity to squeeze more quality time into a busy schedule. I know I certainly enjoy preparing meals with my fiance more than I enjoy making them myself when he is busy doing something else (like reading things on the internet). It's kind of like Mary Poppins... housework doesn't have to be treacherous, isolated hard "work."
In the case of when the woman works outside the home and the man does not work, except in the case of illness, what else would he be doing all day? If a couple decides for some reason to have the woman work outside the home and the man not, I don't think it's appropriate for the woman to do most of the work at home too. It's an expectation for a superwoman, which is often very stressful and not quite attainable, which I cannot imagine would not have ill effects on the children. How is that Biblical leadership in the home? Obviously, such a man does not have the needs and capabilities of his wife and children in mind in that set up.
25. kaarina said the following at 8:51 AM on Jun 25:
I'd argue it's based on the skillsets that men and women are taught at home. I know more men who are fastidious about keeping things clean (including my own father, and two of my best male friends, but alas, not the boy I visit the most) than women. They all have in common that they are either obsessive-compulsive (a response to the chaos of their own childhood environments), or that their parents/early bosses stringently insisted on things being neat, orderly, clean. They derive satisfaction from cleanliness.
Not so with everyone. Alas, not even so with me. I'm so used to the clutter and the mess that I actually feel anxious without it.
26. Nicole Y said the following at 8:57 AM on Jun 25:
I've been married 3 years and we both work full time. I do most of the day-to-day upkeep like dishes, making the bed, putting clothes in the hamper and I also do most of the saturday morning housecleaning. But he is really good about doing things also. He does laundry, loads and unloads the dishwashwer, cooks meals and many other things. While I am still at work, he does other outside yardwork, or is busy working on our finances. I think we have a pretty good balance. However, there is still more of a *need* for me to have a clean house than for him. He is very disorganized and doesn't always pick up after himself. As soon as I walk into a room I can scan it over in .5 seconds and sigh at the papers piling up on the table, the blanket left unfolded on the couch, the cookie crumbs left on the counter......I don't think my husband even sees these things....ever. However, he is extremely picky about dishes being completely spotless after being washed, and his sock and underwear drawer has to be completely neat and organized with everyting folded in it's place. I wonder why he isn't that picky about his desk full of papers or the kitchen sink?
I don't know what to attribute these differences to, honestly. I can't explain my husbands "selective" neatness. I know many women who are sloppier than some men and vice versa. It could be a combination of our personality and upbringing. Whatever the reason, it isn't fair that women are doing most of the housework when they work full time also. I don't care if it's "how God made us" or not, if a couple decides that both individuals should work, then both need to work as a team to help each other out. If that means the woman needs to mow the grass and the man needs to fold laundry, so be it.
27. Lauren said the following at 1:06 PM on Jun 25:
I don't think that calling your husband lazy in private or on a public message board is really "doing him good and not evil all the days of her life."
With that being said, I say if the dirty house bothers you and doesn't bother your husband then you should clean it up for you! Having a clean space is your way of taking care of you!
Also single moms and single women all over the country somehow manage to work 40+ hours a week and keep a clean house. My mother was one of them and she was able to do it without complaining and still spend quality time with her child. Was the house Martha Stewart perfect? Of course not, but it was clean, it was livable, and we were able to have people come and visit.
I think the division of chores causes so much drama because people like to complain. In the time it takes to read a boundless article and comment on it I'm sure all the dishes could get done and hey you might even be able to start a load of laundry. I don't know...it just doesn't seem that serious to me.
That's just my $0.02.
28. trying to stay balanced said the following at 2:44 PM on Jun 25:
#19 Natasha -
That was a very good response to the post. Overall Mrs. Koerner and her colleagues there at fotf paint a very simplistic picture of this issue and come to think of it, most issues in our very complicated and fallen world.
Scriptures don't close it all up in a neat little box. On the contrary Scriptures open up all of life. Praise be.
Now, back to the ironing.
29. Heather Koerner said the following at 4:32 PM on Jun 25:
Shannon (#14),
Thanks for the catch! I've corrected the citation.
As for snark, I only see it in one place--the "nice, upper class girls" comment. Probably could have done without that, but it smacked so much to me of class bias.
And I agree that social scientists have every right to investigate and postulate various reasons. The point I wanted to make was the one very obvious reason they never even considered.
30. Heather Koerner said the following at 9:25 PM on Jun 25:
Natasha (#19),
Your comment made me smile as I remembered the nickname my roommates gave my ever-present pile of clothes (which, unlike yours, was not clean)--"the monster."
Let me clarify a few things.
First, I am certain you are not missing the God-given, feminine gene. :) You (and I) are female in every cell of our body. But why? Why did God make us female and not male? Is it just for variety (like hair color) or is there purpose to our difference?
I would argue that Scripture shows there is purpose. That I am designed to be a suitable helper. How is that to be worked out practically? The Word gives me some pretty concise summaries in Titus 2 and Ephesians 5 and 1 Timothy 5.
You list a few "notable" women. I'm concerned that your list only rewards those women who achieved outside the home. I certainly would be the last to say a woman's duties are exclusive to home (I write, here, right?). But, looking at the totality of Scripture, what are women of faith doing? Even your example of the Proverbs 31 woman--surely you're not saying that she wasn't primarily concerned with her home?
The point of the original magazine article was to answer: Why do women do so much more housework? Its conclusion seemed to be that women pressure themselves and need to just stop. In other words, we have simply been too ignorant to stop doing what we've been trained to do.
My suggestion is not that women are "hardwired to do housework" or that men are incapable or unwilling to do housework. My suggestion is that the article missed an explanation: That God created women with an intense, intimate concern with the home and family that is different than men's. How that concern plays itself out will be different in different women and households (and in different stages of life). But the concern is there, nonetheless.
31. L said the following at 8:44 AM on Jun 26:
There's less of a social stigma attached to males keeping a dirty house. We sort of expect bachelors to be slobs--but not single women! This carries over into marriage.
Also, from personal observation, mothers "mother" their sons for much longer than they do their daughters. My dad was famous for never packing his own suitcase or buying his own underwear--his mother did it for him until he got married, then my mother did it.
Now when the family went on a trip, my mother would pack both my and my brother's suitcases--up until about the age of eight for me. Then I was considered sufficiently competent to not forget my toothbrush. My brother's suitcase STILL gets packed by mom or at least double-checked, and he's 25. Result--neither Dad nor brother ever learned how to pack for themselves.
My boyfriend is (to my great annoyance) the same way. If I have to hear, "Honey, where's my toothbrush?" one more time...Grrrrr...
If I ever have sons, I'm going to teach them how to do housework and how to pack for themselves.
32. Louise said the following at 9:32 AM on Jun 26:
Re comment 31, when Roseanne Barr was doing stand-up she had a joke about males thinking the uterus was a tracking device.
Example:
"Honey, have you seen my shoes, have you seen my socks, where's my tie?"
:D
33. Kyra said the following at 11:21 AM on Jun 26:
I'm not married but I have friends who work full time and also seem to do all of the housework. When their husbands do anything they seem to expect a medal of honor for it.
I think about 80% is them not realizing what needs to be done, and the other 20% just waiting for the other person to do it. Which they always do because based on my informal observations, men can live in far greater amounts of filth than can women.
Seems to me the easiest solution would be to put a list on the fridge of what needs to be done each week (so everyone is on the same page) and divide the chores based on what you don't mind doing. Yes, these are the words of an unmarried woman, but I have had lots of experience with roommates and have noticed that whenever one specific person is not designated to perform one specific task, the task just gets tossed around like a hot potato.
I once read a magazine survey (in a father's day issue) stating that up to 87% of dads don't mind changing diapers. This was supposed to be a positive statistic. Wow, how nice! As a single mom I had to wonder...are the other 13% quadriplegic? I suppose if I had decided that diapers really "gross me out," my two year old son would still be wearing the same diaper he came home from the hospital in.
34. Corinne said the following at 11:43 AM on Jun 26:
My husband and I have been going through Proverbs 31, one verse a week, over a nice Friday night dinner (the discussion takes all of about 5 min). Not to instruct me, but just to increase our understanding of it. The commentary we're using keeps coming back to the point that the accomplished woman works diligently so that she can give to charity and free her husband up to study the Bible - in essence be the spiritual leader of the household. I was inspired (this was the case in our house before the study), I do 95% of the housework and child care...but he spends 2-3 hrs a day (while working full-time) studying the Bible. I don't mind the trade off.
35. Louise said the following at 1:06 PM on Jun 26:
Comment 34, do you work a full time job outside your home?
Far be it from me to instruct someone on how he or she should live, but if the answer to the above question is yes, how can you possibly be happy with such a lopsided arrangement?
I know it's none of my business, but please forgive me..I am honestly curious.
36. Julia H said the following at 1:25 PM on Jun 26:
Corinne,
That is a wonderful arrangement you have with your husband. Out of curiosity, would you mind sharing what your couple's devotion time is like? My hubby and I can't seem to be consistent on devotions together. Mostly, it is a priority thing I guess, but sometimes we sit there, crack opent he Bible and look at each other like, "now what?"
Lauren's admonishment (while hard to swallow at first) was definitely a wake up call for me - and it was appreciated. I had a talk with my hubby about the chores and realized that I was definitely being unfair to him. I've decided that I'm not going to nag or complain any more. I see that one of the ways I can show love to my husband is to cheerfully do the chores without worrying so much about whether it is "fair." A bonus was that he helped me with the dishes and came home with flowers the next day. Now I feel a bit like a spoiled princess - haha!
37. LG said the following at 2:05 PM on Jun 26:
Hmmm.... my husband is neurotic about doing the laundry, and he gets really annoyed with me when I do it. We both work full-time, with three kids. He also is a great cook, which is great because I HATE to cook!
38. Craig said the following at 2:30 PM on Jun 26:
Mike Toreno--what character assassination! Kathleen Parker isn't "evil"--she's dead-on right. Ever been in the military, Mike? Parker is simply asserting what is obvious to any fair-minded individual in the service: women aren't physically the equals of men, and the forced pretending mandated by the politically correct military brass can be infuriating, particularly when it impacts one's own career and ability to do one's job. I'm the PT Physical Training) officer at my command--one of my collateral duties is to run weekly exercise. I have to scale down everything to what the weakest women at the command can do, which results in an utter waste of time for all of the men. On PT tests, women uniformly do pushups that would be rejected out-of-hand for bad form (read: failing to do the exercise fully or appropriately, such as going down only several inches rather than to the ground on pushups) if a man did the same. But because no one dares to call them on this for fear of being accused of "harassment," a woman who does transparently fraudulent pushups gets the same score as a man who does them legitimately--or, as the woman's standards are set lower, actually gets a better score. You think this doesn't cause legitimate resentment over time, especially considering the impact of PT scores on promotion and advancement?
Kathleen Parker is a keen observer of the overreach of feminism. Any fair read of her overall material makes it clear she's not "justifying rape," as you so irresponsibly assert. She has legitimate points to make about the impact on men and women of treating adults in military situations as though sex differences do not exist.
An amazingly irresponsible and slanderous post from you.
39. skp said the following at 3:56 PM on Jun 26:
Here are my thoughts on "housework". I think there is a confusion on the definition of "housework". There are MANY jobs that are necessary to keep a house running- not just "housework" which in my opinion to most people means cleaning . Yes, there is cleaning But there is also laundry, grocery shopping, running errands, child care/helping the kids with homework/ running the kids to soccor practice etc, finances- paying bills and investments etc., and yard work. Oh- I forgot car maintenance. I'm sure you could think of more. At my house if I was to do an excellent job it would take me 6 hours a week to clean, grocery shopping takes about 2 hours a week, yard work about 3 hours a week, meal preparation and clean up takes about an hour and one half a day or 10 1/2 hours a week, finances about one hour a week, laundry (I do a load a day while I'm doing other things) say about 20 minutes a day or 2 and 1/2 hours a week. Child care depends on the age and is hard to judge but say in my case it's 2 hours a day. If I am responsible for the cleaning and laundry but my husband does the finances, car repair, yard work, half the cooking (and half the dishes), most of the grocery shopping, and we both split the child care. Am I doing ALL the "housework" because I am the one cleaning??? Actually if I did the math right I'm AHEAD!!!!
40. skp said the following at 6:40 PM on Jun 26:
Also,
I'm sure this is going to cause a LOT of response.... But if you are a stay at home mom doing 38 hours of "housework" a week and your husband is working a 40 hour a week job and doing 12 hours a week of housework, and IF I did my math right-I'd say YOU are way AHEAD. Of course that depends on your definition of housework.
41. Mrs. Smitho said the following at 6:57 AM on Jun 27:
I believe we are all "trained" differently growing up. If your parents are slobs, so will the children be...HOWEVER, after a certain point, everybody has the choice and option to be as clean or slobby as they want. I grew up cooking and cleaning from a very young age...not out of my parents wanting to teach me how to work, but out of their own laziness...but it wasn't until I had my own daughter that I became a clean freak.
My rule was always, "keep it clean enough to have a 5 min rule. If someone comes over, within 5 min it should look like I cleaned for days", and it worked, until I got married :)
My husband has never been around someone like me. His first wife, was by far the slobbiest person on Earth...the pictures are appalling!! He is a slob by environment who is learning how to not be a slob simply out of love and respect for me.
I came into this marriage knowing that we are different in the chore abilities...and most every day I have to say to myself, "Self, I just spent 3 hours vacuuming and mopping, and KNOW he will track in mud, so it is OK...I can do it again tomorrow."
I have learned to let some stuff go so I can spend more time with hubby when he gets home...and he has learned to wipe his feet and slap a rag on the counter so I won't have to :). Some days are better than others.
Note: my first marriage and I am 37 yrs old, married 7 months now :)
We have 2 children, one mine and one his, now just ours...mine knows how to do chores, his doesn’t (I get the pleasure of teaching him- 12 - this summer :) )
I tell the kids, "I am not your maid and I appreciate a clean house, there is no since in nasty...I signed on to be dad's maid and your teacher."
I pray they will be equipped when they are older to just know how. If they choose to, that is their choice...
But I did, eyes wide open, come into this knowing my role is to take care of, cherish, spoil :), and make my husbands life easier. It is my biblical duty! AND my pleasure!!
Before salvation I was one of those, “woman can do anything" girls...since salvation, reading and learning about roles and studying other Christian couples...I KNOW there are girls jobs and there are guys jobs...
It is the MOST unappreciated job...but since I know I do what I do for the Lord, it is very easy to keep a good attitude. And my husband is pretty good at telling me how much he appreciated what I do and how I am the best thing in his life (really helps!).
So, in general, I believe (and have proved!) we all make choices. Weather it be in chores, attitudes, anger management, how to love, etc....regardless what our environment was in childhood. We set our priorities and live by them. We spend time on those things we hold dearest and sometimes we need to just take a few and ponder if those choices are going towards God or away from Him. It is not easy changing our hardwiring, but it is possible....and the best way is to look at Jesus and let Him show you the wonderful things He has in store. The Bible is defiantly the "rule book" for life...in every way, including who, how, what does what in the house :)
Thank you Boundless for being...I have enjoyed your articles for a couple years now and there is some wonderful, Biblical truths you guys share, even if it is hard to hear for a lot of folks. Keep up the good work.
K. Smitho
42. Corinne said the following at 10:57 AM on Jun 27:
To comment 35 - No offense taken at all. I would love to be able to completely free my husband up, but...the passage is called "the accomplished woman" for a reason. I just started back to work, ~10 hrs a week. My mother in law did it with 9 kids, while homeschooling, so I figure I can handle it with one kid. And it helps that we rent an apartment, so there's no yardwork and cleaning takes me all of an hour.
But as to being happy with a lopsided arrangement - the tradeoff is that I work so that my husband can be the spiritual leader, and if he is more sanctified, I am more sanctified. I definitely want to become more holy, and this has been paying off. Plus, he doesn't study at the expense of the family. He understands that all his study is worthless if his family is falling apart around his ears. He works it out by sleeping less and studying while the baby and I sleep. That's definitely an important point. Personal piety is worth nothing if it is done to the detriment of others.
Ok, comment 36 (Julia): I didn't add in my first post that my husband and I are trying to run a Messianic household. So Friday night we celebrate Shabbat, and from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday the housework shuts down and we rest. The Friday night meal is a really good time to discuss the Bible, and it's a habit we want to get into with our kids anyways, once they're big enough to join us. Part of the Friday night liturgy is reading Proverbs 31 - not to instruct the wife, but to renew the mind of the husband to see his wife in that way. So, before dinner is served, my husband reads through a commentary on one verse. He reviews the points from last week, then we move on to the next week, and he tells me the comments on it and we talk about how that applies to the Bible in general and to specific situations. And then we move on to other topics, but since it's Shabbat we try to keep it spiritual in nature.
Also, we're reading through another book of the Bible one chapter a week. We read through it, read the comments, compare notes (he actually reads a Jewish commentary, while I have the Reformation Study Bible). It's very interesting how each commentary can lend different and complementary insights.
Hope that helps.
43. Jeremy said the following at 3:26 PM on Jun 27:
From the article --
"If you break out couples in which wives stay home and husbands are the sole earners, the number of hours goes up for women, to 38 hours of housework a week, and down a bit for men, to 12."
So, for a full-time worker with no overtime (which is increasingly rare these days), the average husband puts in 52 hours of work per week to the wife's 38. What do you want to bet this statistic will do nothing to shake the stereotype that stay-at-home wives do more work than their husbands?
44. Christina (in green) said the following at 5:01 PM on Jun 27:
Jeremy:
So, for a full-time worker with no overtime (which is increasingly rare these days)
Full-time with no overtime is 52 hours?
I think your numbers are off, though I betcha my boss would agree with you on it anyway.
Anyway, this is just housework. What about the watching of the kids? Or is that included?
45. Louise said the following at 9:05 PM on Jun 27:
Comment 44, I think comment 43 was referring to the basic forty hour work week at the job when referring to "full time work with no overtime".
The fifty two hours per week includes the twelve hours supposedly spent on housework/yardwork.
46. Ro said the following at 4:40 AM on Jun 28:
We are designed to be helpmates. So its hard for those of us that God does not want to allow to be helpmates; for us we have to focus on our careers instead. I pray to be made ready to be a wife, but I realize that God does not want this for me in my mid-20s or he would have made me ready.
Some women are really lucky - they get to partake in God's role and design of homemaker and mother. the rest of us feel a bit like men - only worried about our work and ministry and parents/siblings.
47. Christina (in green) said the following at 10:52 AM on Jul 1:
Louise (#45)
Thanks for the clarification :)
Its appreciated.