In my home, I am definitely in charge of the housekeeping. I do the cooking, cleaning, washing and the ironing not to mention the rest of the chores around the home that go unmissed. I even create the weekly food shopping list in our home and I pay all of the monthly bills making sure we run super smooth and never miss a payment.
At the start of the day
I get up on a morning nice and early and then the magic begins “I like to think of it like this because it makes the hard work seem a little easier”. I pretty much orchestrate everyone’s movements, ensuring my husband and kids all get out of the house on time with all the correct pieces of equipment they need to get them through their days.
My husband helps, but he works full-time and to be honest quite lengthy hours, whilst I am a stay at home mum making sure the kids are well looked after and learn the best values I am able to teach them. Although I do not enjoy every household task, I do completely understand and expect that the heaviest load of the household jobs would fall on to me.
Gender Patterns
I read an article entitled Housekeeping in the UK.The article included a survey which was conducted in the UK, I was truly shocked by the findings. The article shows evidence that most UK families appear to follow traditional gender patterns when it comes to housekeeping. I do follow tradition and I suppose gender patterns too, but I thought I was the minority not part of the majority as the survey has quite clearly corrected me on.
My Traditional Values
My mother is a very traditional woman and I am so proud of her and all she has achieved throughout her life. The thing that always sticks out to me is that she stayed at home and really looked after my sisters and myself. I suppose I would refer to my mother as a stay at home mum, but I also hear both of my parents referring to my mother “The mighty head of the household” as a Housewife.
My mother and father are what I would class as old school and it was their generation and the ones before who created the gender patterns we have today in our homes. I am very proud of how my parents complement each other in the home and how they have stuck together with their traditional values throughout their 41 years of marriage. Maybe Gender patterns in the home are the way forward to keeping a happy and relaxed marriage for all of those years.
One opinion I have recently formed is that being a stay at home mum feels harder than having to go to work all day, it’s certainly harder than any of my previous job roles.
I have asked my mother about household gender patterns, although I put it to her a little simpler than that. She swears by the fact she and also many of her friends have always run their homes. She believes women are often more accepting of household chores and men just seem to get on with the tougher jobs that many women probably hate. My father is a joiner by trade, but when he arrives home, he almost instantly starts to get on with the jobs that he feels he exceeds at. I must say though my mother does have to ask him over and over again sometimes, which is also a chore in itself.
My mother and I are very similar; we have said on many occasions that we take care of the laundry, shopping, house cleaning because they are jobs we are good at. My husband and father on the other hand exceed at other tasks such as doing repairs, taking out the rubbish and since my husband passed his driving test, I have pretty much become a back seat driver because he loves driving far more than I ever have. I mentioned earlier that I create the shopping list, but my husband seems to be the one who does a lot of the shopping these days.
My husband also maintains and cleans the car, although to be fair he is the one that makes the car a mess. He also does the heavier jobs and keeps on top of our garden throughout the year.
It’s our Dynamic’s
This is the dynamics in our home, I seem to be keeping up the tradition a little old fashioned some of you may say, but I enjoy being the caretaker of my family. Well, most of the time anyway. Please do not get me wrong there are plenty of times when I wish the rest of the household helped more often and It is sometimes mind numbing and completely exhausting doing all the housework.
Your Thoughts
This is just me saying that the article I read on Gender pattern actually makes me feel a little better because I now know I am not alone and there are many others who follow the same traditional gender patterns as me and my family do.
Thank you for reading, I would love to hear your comments.
Yup I’m a SAHM ATM and I do all the housework around the house. My other half works full time and he is the same does the repairs, decorating etc when it needs doing. I do sometimes wish that every now and again he would just do the washing up or run the Hoover around though just to give me a break once in a while.
Tina Holmes! I knew their were more like myself out there. It is frustrating sometimes when you need a little break and there is no one around to help. When my husband is at home, he does help me with certain things but cooking and washing go way over his head. I hope your husband gives you a little break soon! Thanks for commenting Rachel X
Since I am home full time I handle all of the cleaning. Hubby does help sometimes and the kids do have their chores but it’s mostly on me. I’m fine with it though (most of the times) LOL.
I would truly love to do all that you do! I actually feel that women are better at running a household than men – well it is certainly that way in my house but as much as I try to do everything at home I cannot fit it all in around my job and running my business. We therefore all chip in with the chores in my house, my husband takes the children to school most days and prepares tea for them at night. I do most of the household tasks and manage the running of the house from the background – leaving to do lists, what’s for tea and how to cook it etc. At the weekend we all work together to get all the cleaning done and that includes the 4 year old helping where she can.
So although we as definitely not a traditional family in that I am a stay at home mum I am still the one responsible for managing the tasks to help our household run as smooth as possible!!
I do all the housework and my partner rarely helps me but I find that it’s better this way 🙂
I do all of the housework in our house. To be honest I like it that way because if my otherhalf did it it would never rach my standards,lol,thats what excuse he uses too!
I hate housework, I do tend to do little bits as I can’t tolerate doing loads in one go. My husband is a bit OCD so he tends to do it all- luckily!!