Division of labor in a relationship - my rant

A

againstthegrain

Senior Member
Location
Sun Valley, ID
My wife and me married in our late 20's, early 30's. She was a young businesswoman fully capable of taking her of herself in every respect. Me a couple years older building a successful business in my 2nd career. 2 hard working, strong willed folks that pretty much know what we want, and worked ourselves very hard to achieve our goals.

Typically we worked for a common goal, but separately. We have divided our efforts along the usual lines. For example anything w a moving part(could be a mouse trap or a car), I'm responsible to buy, maintain, and fix. She keeps up our relationships w family, saves the money, pays the bills, and cleans. This works really well for us, usually.

My wife was a business warrior, btwn the hours, commute, and travel she broke her azz. My produce business was typically concluded fairly early in the day so every day I would pick up kid from day care and be there when she got off the school bus. Getting out of work earlier than most left me time to shop and cook dinner. And now 30+ years later I'm still the primary dinner cook and I'm sick of it.

Btwn shopping, deciding what to have, and the cooking I'm at the point where I'm really frustrated, especially on days where sleep is lacking or I've exhausted myself from my activities. Please give me an idea of what to cook, maybe pitch in and do some prep, even just making a salad would give just a little incentive to do the rest. And I've told her this many times and it's "ok" for a couple days, then she'll ask if I need help when dinners almost done, and then doesn't ask at all.

I know some couples older than us where the principal cook(wives, mostly) hates cooking, and I don't want to end up like that. And I don't want this to continue to be a sore spot in our marriage. I truly enjoy cooking most of the time, but I dislike prepared food, eating out, and take away is even worse so some of it's on me(and we have a truly limited and poor selection of both.) I thought I had her "broke in right" ;) but I never imagined that cooking dinner night after night was going to be this big an issue.

I don't know what to do next, other than to suck it up, and keep trying. Thanks for reading my rant. What say you?
 

Who does the dishes and cleanup after cooking. Is that just you. If it’s her, you could suggest she cook the meal and you’ll clean.

If you still end up being the only cook, make a menu plan for a week or two. I find it really helps me. Too bad I don’t practice what I preach. I’m going to go back to this. It takes the pressure off of planning something at the last minute.
 
I too am done with cooking ... we cannot eat out much as he has strict sodium restrictions.. i would appreciate even a meal or 2 he cook he was a chef for a short time in early career he knows how to ......
If they do not help cook do not say things like i do not care because i will test that theory ...... help with menu/ shopping and cleanup
he recently after a rant does much more clean up but i just do not want to cook
Rant over hope it is ok i took part in your rant thread.
 

She does the dishes while I take care of the leftovers, and wipe down the counter and cooktop. If I've had one of those dinners where I use multiple pans I'll wash some of those. I load the dirty cooking dishes up until the point I need to put the dinner out and she isn't out there more than 5 mins or so longer than me.

Since I do 95% of the shopping usually in 1 big trip per week the usual ingredients are there to make a variety of dishes. We have well stocked cupboards. In the old days I did the European model of shopping virtually every day at the monger, butcher, and/or grocery store.

I'm not wanting to completely ditch the job of cooking dinner cause I do enjoy or at least tolerate it most of the time.
 
I don’t have a bit of advice for you. Just wanted you to know I deeply understand and share your frustration.
My frustration is compounded by having my 89 year old mother living with my husband and me. She is very limited in what she is willing to eat.

When I was younger it never occurred to me that as an old women most of my thought processes would be devoted to what can I fix for the next meal.

I’ve tried all the suggestions ,such as preparing a weeks worth of meals ahead, and that doesn’t work for us - for a multitude of reasons I won’t bore you with.
 
againstthegrain said:
My wife and me married in our late 20's, early 30's. She was a young businesswoman fully capable of taking her of herself in every respect. Me a couple years older building a successful business in my 2nd career. 2 hard working, strong willed folks that pretty much know what we want, and worked ourselves very hard to achieve our goals.

Typically we worked for a common goal, but separately. We have divided our efforts along the usual lines. For example anything w a moving part(could be a mouse trap or a car), I'm responsible to buy, maintain, and fix. She keeps up our relationships w family, saves the money, pays the bills, and cleans. This works really well for us, usually.

My wife was a business warrior, btwn the hours, commute, and travel she broke her azz. My produce business was typically concluded fairly early in the day so every day I would pick up kid from day care and be there when she got off the school bus. Getting out of work earlier than most left me time to shop and cook dinner. And now 30+ years later I'm still the primary dinner cook and I'm sick of it.

Btwn shopping, deciding what to have, and the cooking I'm at the point where I'm really frustrated, especially on days where sleep is lacking or I've exhausted myself from my activities. Please give me an idea of what to cook, maybe pitch in and do some prep, even just making a salad would give just a little incentive to do the rest. And I've told her this many times and it's "ok" for a couple days, then she'll ask if I need help when dinners almost done, and then doesn't ask at all.

I know some couples older than us where the principal cook(wives, mostly) hates cooking, and I don't want to end up like that. And I don't want this to continue to be a sore spot in our marriage. I truly enjoy cooking most of the time, but I dislike prepared food, eating out, and take away is even worse so some of it's on me(and we have a truly limited and poor selection of both.) I thought I had her "broke in right" ;) but I never imagined that cooking dinner night after night was going to be this big an issue.

I don't know what to do next, other than to suck it up, and keep trying. Thanks for reading my rant. What say you?
Click to expand...
I say have a conversation with her.
Voice your concerns and come to an agreement.
If that doesn't work, find out why she is not receptive. There may be more to this than just preparing meals.
 
MountainRa said:
I don’t have a bit of advice for you. Just wanted you to know I deeply understand and share your frustration.
My frustration is compounded by having my 89 year old mother living with my husband and me. She is very limited in what she is willing to eat.

When I was younger it never occurred to me that as an old women most of my thought processes would be devoted to what can I fix for the next meal.

I’ve tried all the suggestions ,such as preparing a weeks worth of meals ahead, and that doesn’t work for us - for a multitude of reasons I won’t bore you with.
Click to expand...
Although I wasn't the principle care provider I know the strain of feeding the elderly w limited appetites as my father starved to death on a 7 month home hospice. I made homemade soup 2-3x/week as it was one of the few things he enjoyed eating.
 
Pinky said:
How about giving yourself a break from cooking .. and take your wife out for dinner, once or twice a week, at a nice restaurant?
Click to expand...
We live in a resort community that's packed about 8 months out of the year so it's not that easy to say we're going be able to find a seat open, before 9pm. In the winter after a day outdoors skiing, getting in the car when it's pitch black and freezing cold (<10F) sometimes is not a lot of fun. And it's Idaho, the restaurant food pretty much sucks anyway. We have done fine dining in NYC and other cities for the past 30 years so we "may" be somewhat picky.

Here's what led to our latest blowup. Friday roast chicken was in the oven and it was almost done. I didn't feel like making the rest of the dinner so I shut the oven off and we went out. It's slack so no problem with crowds.

Friday night, poor sleep so Saturday had the untouched left over roast chicken, home made mac n cheese, and asparagus. She knew I was shot. Saturday night more poor sleep, I was awake a 3:30 am Sunday morning so Sunday dinner this comes to a head, again. She offers to get pizza, which I shouldn't be eating(white flour.)

But here's what take out pizza entails at our house. It's ordered half-baked so we finish it at home. So while she's out picking it up I fire up the gas grill, and lay the pizza stone on to heat through. Back inside I chop and saute` veggies for the pie....red pepper, onions, mush, or whatever and then I make a salad. After the pizza arrives I top and cook the pizza. Is that really a night off?
 
Costco 90 miles, but we have other roast chickens we could buy locally. We often have breakfast for dinner, huevos rancheros, is a favorite. Soups don't fly for dinner although I like it.

Perhaps going back to the farm days when the big meal was at noon!

Any way she's making dinner tonight, I'm sure I'll love it. I'm going to make sure she eats it before I do though for obvious reasons. :sneaky:
 
hollydolly said:
As you don't want to give up cooking altogether, can't you agree to swap at weekends or midweek. Tues through Thursday she cooks.. and you clean... or weekends swap roles...
Click to expand...
Ahhhh we kinda try things like that, but it would seem that she would end up doing more of things she doesn't want to do - cook, and forcing to people to do things is disagreeable to me. I'm just wanting a occasional break when I'm not up to it. Perhaps more than the actual physical effort I need relief from the deciding, and having to provide the motivation every night.
 
againstthegrain said:
Ahhhh we kinda try things like that, but it would seem that she would end up doing more of things she doesn't want to do - cook, and forcing to people to do things is disagreeable to me. I'm just wanting a occasional break when I'm not up to it. Perhaps more than the actual physical effort I need relief from the deciding, and having to provide the motivation every night.
Click to expand...
ok...simple then... tell her you'll continue to cook, if she'll come up with the Menu's for the week...
 
againstthegrain said:
My wife and me married in our late 20's, early 30's. She was a young businesswoman fully capable of taking her of herself in every respect. Me a couple years older building a successful business in my 2nd career. 2 hard working, strong willed folks that pretty much know what we want, and worked ourselves very hard to achieve our goals.

Typically we worked for a common goal, but separately. We have divided our efforts along the usual lines. For example anything w a moving part(could be a mouse trap or a car), I'm responsible to buy, maintain, and fix. She keeps up our relationships w family, saves the money, pays the bills, and cleans. This works really well for us, usually.

My wife was a business warrior, btwn the hours, commute, and travel she broke her azz. My produce business was typically concluded fairly early in the day so every day I would pick up kid from day care and be there when she got off the school bus. Getting out of work earlier than most left me time to shop and cook dinner. And now 30+ years later I'm still the primary dinner cook and I'm sick of it.

Btwn shopping, deciding what to have, and the cooking I'm at the point where I'm really frustrated, especially on days where sleep is lacking or I've exhausted myself from my activities. Please give me an idea of what to cook, maybe pitch in and do some prep, even just making a salad would give just a little incentive to do the rest. And I've told her this many times and it's "ok" for a couple days, then she'll ask if I need help when dinners almost done, and then doesn't ask at all.

I know some couples older than us where the principal cook(wives, mostly) hates cooking, and I don't want to end up like that. And I don't want this to continue to be a sore spot in our marriage. I truly enjoy cooking most of the time, but I dislike prepared food, eating out, and take away is even worse so some of it's on me(and we have a truly limited and poor selection of both.) I thought I had her "broke in right" ;) but I never imagined that cooking dinner night after night was going to be this big an issue.

I don't know what to do next, other than to suck it up, and keep trying. Thanks for reading my rant. What say you?
Click to expand...
I'm in the same boat, I do all the outside work, 98% of the indoor work, virtually all of the shopping and cooking. We've been together 20+ years, I don't expect her to change. But as the grocery shopper and cook I get to steer the meals in a healthier direction.
 
MountainRa said:
I don’t have a bit of advice for you. Just wanted you to know I deeply understand and share your frustration.
My frustration is compounded by having my 89 year old mother living with my husband and me. She is very limited in what she is willing to eat.

When I was younger it never occurred to me that as an old women most of my thought processes would be devoted to what can I fix for the next meal.

I’ve tried all the suggestions ,such as preparing a weeks worth of meals ahead, and that doesn’t work for us - for a multitude of reasons I won’t bore you with.
Click to expand...
:) My heart breaks for you. Can you give your mom three choices for dinner? If she can't or won't choose, pick one yourself. And POOF! Problem solved.
 
Nathan said:
I'm in the same boat, I do all the outside work, 98% of the indoor work, virtually all of the shopping and cooking. We've been together 20+ years, I don't expect her to change. But as the grocery shopper and cook I get to steer the meals in a healthier direction.
Click to expand...
She does the vast majority of the work in the yard that we don't pay for. Gardening is her main thing and she shovels the front steps.....250" of snow last winter. (I do the driveway and patio w blower.)

And it sounds like I better shut up and start cooking dinner right now!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top