Feminist Advice Friday: If my husband works long hours, do I have to do everything else?

A reader writes…

I’ve been married to my husband for 7 years, together for 12. During the pandemic, I was laid off from my job for a year. I was finally able to return to work, but only part time and working from home. We have three children. The oldest is nine and the youngest is 6 months. I am the primary parent as well as the house hold manager. I cook, clean, and am fully available and present for our children. Although my mental and emotional health feels very strained at times, I consider myself fortunate to have the option of working part time and being home with our children. With that all said…I make a fraction of the income I used to. Enough to cover some groceries, gas, and maybe a bill or two. It’s not much, but it’s something.

My husband firmly believes that because he works 12 hour days, because he commutes for an hour each way, because he has the health insurance, etc. etc. etc., that I should absolutely shoulder most of all the responsibilities that come with children and our home. He believes that after a “long hard day at work” that he should be able to come home and relax.. This is heartbreaking for me for many reasons. More so that he really just doesn’t “get it”.

How do I phrase/tell him WHY he should help? I need consistency, support, and acknowledgment for the work I do at home. I truly struggle with this. I cannot seem to communicate to him, let alone get through to him WHY this is absolutely problematic and that it’s NOT FAIR.

In his eyes, “I get to stay home all day and hang with the kids.”

He told me that if I start working full time, only then would we split the responsibilities equally.

I know I’m no different that all the women that write to you. I know that my message is one of a million that you get. I even think I have an idea (based off of what I have read from your pieces) of what you’ll say.

I guess I just need to communicate this is in hopes you can help me feel less crazy for feeling like this and or maybe give me some advise on how to approach this.

If I give him an ultimatum, I’m scared for the unknown of being a single divorced mom who has to provide for our children. I don’t make enough money working full time to support our life on my own. I live in his hometown, his family lives here. It’s small and rural. Which just adds to my issue in ways I’m sure you can imagine.

Thank you so much for your time. Much appreciated. Wishing you wellness, take care. <3

My answer

Your predictions about what I am going to say are almost certainly right.

I get lots of letters like yours, from women who know that something has gone fundamentally wrong in their lives, but who also want to know if maybe the problem is them, if maybe they’re crazy, if maybe they actually deserve the shoddy treatment they’re getting.

They don’t.

You don’t.

I’m struck by the fact that you feel you have to convince your husband there is a problem. I can feel that you think if you could just use the right words, give the perfect example, he would see the light. He won’t.

I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.

But he’s not going to see the light.

He sees things as they are. That’s why he so strongly resists change. If he thought you had a better deal than him, then he would be gunning to get more of what you have and less of what he has. He is gaslighting you, just like millions of other men do with their wives. He is not dumb. He can see you working. He can see that he often does not have to do anything while you work.

He understands what you’re doing, and its value, perhaps even more than you do.

I think you know this, and that’s why you are asking about single motherhood and divorce.

I want to tell you a story.

My mom died last year, at 70 years old. She spent the first half of her life married to my father—a man she passionately loved. She wrote a column on motherhood that is strikingly similar to my own work. In it, she talks about how people demean stay-at-home mothers, how difficult household equity feels, and how deeply she loves her family in spite of it all. But in her own house, she was never quite able to get her marriage to match her values. She and my dad divorced, and she spent the rest of her life looking for the sort of passionate, equal, feminist relationship she knew she deserved. She never found it.

Her mother, my grandmother, married three times before she finally found a man she could tolerate living with. And even then, tolerate was a stretch. She pushed hard against the confines of patriarchal motherhood. They pushed back harder, keeping her in her place. When her middle baby died, a society that devalued babies and mothers conspired to force her to remain silent about her loss. She, too, died without ever getting real justice in her relationships with men, without anyone ever fully acknowledging the immense sacrifices she made for her family.

The two of them led to me. I am married to a man I love deeply, who shares the household burden equally, who supports me in my work and in my dreams. I have what they wanted. I have what every woman who cam before me deserved, and what so few got.

I think often of my mother and grandmother, of how fundamentally unfair it is that they died without ever getting the equitable love they craved and deserved.

Their gift to me is my happier, healthier, more balanced life. But that is also my gift to them. They pushed back where they could, gave me the energy and inclination to push where they couldn’t,

Sometimes we only get free over generations. Sometimes the best gift you can give your kids is a push to do slightly better than you did, so that their kids can do even better, and eventually your descendants can look back on you, their ancestor, and thank you for pushing the boulder up the hill, getting it rolling toward a progressively better future for everyone who came after.

I don’t know if divorce is the right answer for you.

I do know that in an ideal world, you would get away from this man, who is buying his freedom with your life. He wants you to suffer so he can live a little easier.

I also know that many women I have spoken to say that life is so much better after divorce. There is child support. He has to support the kids he made financially, whether he’s with you or not. And you may find that when you're not caring for a manbaby, you have more time for yourself. It may be worth it.

It might not be.

So what you have to do now is figure out how best to set your children up for a better future, where they are freer than you are to pursue lives that make them happy. How can you push back on the oppressive structures that have pushed you into this marriage? How can you show your kids a better way?

Push the boulder as hard as you can, even if you can’t move it all the way by yourself.

I publish #feministadvicefriday every Friday(ish) here and on Facebook. You can get early access to Feminist Advice Friday, as well as other content I don’t publish anywhere else, by subscribing for free to my Substack newsletter. You can submit your own question to zawn.villines@gmail.com, by messaging my Facebook page, or anonymously by using this site’s contact form.