I’ve been struggling to show up at martial arts lately. Part of the reason is that really I should be training for my next test, but when I think of how much I have to review and relearn (and learn for the first time!) I get totally overwhelmed and shut down, and if I’m not doing the hard work of preparing for my next test I’m just stuck on this plateau where I feel like I’m not making any real progress. The other main reason is that martial arts takes up a lot of time. With the bus ride both ways, its at least a 2.5 hour commitment, and if stay for sparring or a higher belt class it’s 3-3.5 hours. That’s a lot of time to be away from home even once a week, let alone twice. So when I’m trying to decide if I should go, I let the feelings about “fairness” in our marriage help me make the decision.
And man do I seem to have a lot of feelings about fairness in my marriage. I am ALWAYS mentally calculating how much time I’m asking for away from home, how frequently I’m asking my husband to cover a drop off or pick up that I usually do, where the tally stands on dishes, etc. This Saturday I left for martial arts at 10am, and wasn’t home until after 1pm, and then my husband took our son to get his flu shot (they both still needed it) and to get groceries at Trader Joe’s. This meant I got another two hours at home alone after I’d already been gone most of the morning. This really stressed me out, and instead of just parking my ass on the couch to watch some TV, I cleaned both the showers, and the rest of our bathroom too. I just felt like I needed to be doing something to make up for the fact that I got so much time to myself that day.
I can guarantee you my husband does not think like that.
So why do I? Is it just insidious patriarchal messaging, that I have readily assimilated for all these years, telling me that I NEED to show up in various ways at home and with my kids to be deemed WORTHY? Is it that I don’t think I deserve so much of my own time because I haven’t achieved certain goals (like a clean, clutter free home)? Is it just that I really appreciate all the ways my husband has stepped up since the pandemic and I don’t want to take him for granted? The latter would be the least problematic interpretation, but even if it were true, it would be tinged with sentiments from the first two.
It’s something I really need to work on. I do a lot for our family, and for years I did WAY more than my husband did. If there really were some kind of running tally I would be WAY ahead. And yet, when my husband gets up twice with our son on the weekends, I feel a lot of guilt, even though they play video games together, an activity that I do not participate in.
I did end up watching about 30 minutes of a show on Saturday, while I was folding the laundry. But I also mentioned to my husband (multiple times!) that I cleaned the showers (the upstairs shower was very much in need of a cleaning). I know my husband never mentions what he gets done when I am out with the kids, and I don’t expect him to! So I guess I just need to stop expecting myself to either.
Phew, that’s some serious guilt or something you’re contending with. You often write about how overwhelmed you are with work/cleaning/life. Personally, I think taking a few hours for yourself a couple times a week is the BEST thing you can do for your family to help you contend with that feeling of overwhelm! Give yourself an athletic and mental outlet without the guilt – especially when you seem to be laying those negative opinions on yourself. We can’t take good care of others without first taking good care of ourselves!
I am asking them! More and more! And they want to help, but getting them to a place where they can takes a while. My husband does SO MUCH more than ever before – he really is my partner in so many respects. But I internalize stuff, stuff that happened before and stuff that happens now. It’s a lot to unpack.
Patriarchal cultural training. As more people have understood equality in division of tasks in community/marital/partnership living, some adults have become more aware of inequalities and many women (due to patriarchal conditioning) are now worried that they are not ALWAYS carrying their share. In part because they used to carry far more of these tasks and they know the resentment and unhappiness is creates.
Best cure I can think of, and bet others have more, different ideas: talk to your partner and ask how they see it. Ask broadly, not starting from where your guilty worry is. Very carefully because it is about ensuring both are seeing the division of time and chores as equitable and appropriate ~ not dumping frustrations or trying to rationalize inequalities.
Patriarchal cultural training <- yes to that! They really do get us. What a mind f*ck.
I feel very similarly. Not sure if it’s guilt. Or if I don’t want to lose my self-conception as the one who does more. It’s complicated.
Oh my god yes to “or if I don’t want to lose my self-conception as the one who does more”. It is so complicated! Thank you for reminding me that this is DEFINITELY part of it for me. Thank you for making me feel less alone!
Its like we are leading the parallel lives. I relate to everything you said!!
Thank you for helping me to feel less alone.
I used to struggle with this. The thing that helped was talking about it with my husband enough that I finally, FINALLY learned to take him at his word if he said he didn’t mind doing X,Y or Z while I spent time on myself. As ‘Purple and Rose’ pointed out, as women we’ve been taught to take any resentment about our caretaking burdens and stuff it and bury it deep down inside, and just keep giving and giving (even when the well runs dry). When I was trying to do everything for everyone, I did carry around a load of resentment. I think we’re paranoid about creating that resentment in our spouses, and we’ve been told that our worth in marriage is measured by how easy we can make everyone else’s life.
Fortunately, my husband isn’t conditioned the same way. He is not at all lazy (that would be a different issue), but if he is tired or needs a break, he will say so. He has no compunctions about taking a Saturday nap when he needs it. Once I stopped trying to do everything and took my own naps and trusted him to share the load, my resentment went waaaay down, my gratitude went waaay up, and our relationship improved.
(We’ve also had to learn that he and I need different amounts of alone time, social time, sleep etc. So, ‘Equal’ doesn’t mean splitting everything 50.00 to 50.00, but rather making sure that we are each equally rested and nurtured. For example, you work with kids all day–you might need more weekend quiet time than everyone else in the house.)
Thank you for all of this. I definitely have talked to my husband about it and he tells me I need to chill out. We’re pretty good about checking in with each other, because we also have very different needs – he needs more alone time to recharge and I need more time with people to recharge. But sometimes I can tell he’s feeling overwhelmed and I internalize it, even if it has nothing to do with me. I definitely need to do my own work on it, and I appreciate knowing that others have worked through it and moved on!