On being an equal partner whatever that means to you and yours
I am constantly being told how lucky I am that my partner does all the:
- Shopping and inventory supply planning for the household – soap, toilet paper, household dishes and equipment, towels, bedding, furniture, shelving.. I mean EVERYTHING. Including reviewing flyers DAILY for sales on things we need, and price matches. He actually plans when to buy things like sugar in bulk, and through his efforts we save at least $10,000 a year.
- Planning and shopping for Little Bun’s clothing — his next sizes in winter gear, boots, shoes, socks, clothing, I do not buy or handle any of this planning
- Cooking — all of it. I make some meals here and there as I crave them (vegan sauced noodles), but he cooks 100%. Bakes too. He also cooks all of our birthday meals, even his own.
- Car stuff — the maintenance, buying of fluids, and only until recently, the car appointments (I do my own now.)
- Errand running — buying not just household stuff but milk, groceries (makes sense, he cooks) and planning for sugar, flour, salt, pasta, and stocking up. I just tell him what I want, he finds it in the store.
… and a bunch of other things but mostly that.
I do the rest —
I project manage his career.*Update: He’s retired now, but I used to* …. I do a lot of work in hunting down and finding him contracts because I have an extensive network and am very nice. People message me, or I hear of things and pass along intel to him. His last 2 contracts have been because of me, and he has made $$$$$$. I’ve been managing his career in a sense, by bringing them to him on a platter and then he takes over for negotiations and landing the job.- All the cleaning (but he does the heavy stuff like the bathroom shower, the oven and the grill), vacuuming all of the radiators, moving the appliances and vacuuming underneath there once a year
- I am pretty much 90% Little Bun caretaker, for all his needs – emotional, etc… and this is getting slightly better, but I will have to say angrily sometimes: GO AND SEE WHAT HE WANTS. I cannot be the ONLY ONE HERE parenting him.
- I also do mine and Little Bun’s laundry, and all the laundry except his clothes (bleached his shirt once, he has never let me touch his clothes again.)
- He will floss and supervise brushing at night
but I do all the baths, we jointly do the hair cutting, I do his nails. He now does showers with Little Bun instead of me. - I do all the education (soon to be piano lessons) which is why he now reads very well and does math easily, and my partner has now started doing nighttime classes with Little Bun as well, so we are both doing the education bit, though I will say I am more 75% and he is 25% supplementary.
- I handle ALL the online shopping and returns. If you don’t think this is a part time job, you are WRONG. It is so time consuming. He gives me what he wants me to buy, I buy it, track it, return it if need be, and get on customer service to handle anything that comes up which by the way takes a lot of time.
And through all of this, I hear:
Wow! He is SO GOOD, he is such a keeper!
(I am too, we are both amazing. Why do you think he is doing all this?)
That’s amazing. He does EVERYTHING!!!
(Uh no. We share the workload, as we should).
I’m just surprised when people expect him to be a second child, so to speak.
For him to be “useless” and sit around doing nothing and complaining.
He’s my equal
I wouldn’t expect or want anything less. What for? Might as well be better of alone in that case than having to care for another “child”.
And if I’m bringing in half the money, half the retirement and making sure I cover my end of the money side by being a full-time contractor then where the hell does he think I’d ever find the time to ALSO do his half of the household chores??
I’ll be damned if I’m going to be the House Elf AND the one bringing home half the bacon for him to cook on pasta.
He is equally as lucky to have someone like me in the corner ready to back him up if anything happens, including taking on financial reins if need be.
I can also run a household AND the money including investing as well, so I’m not incompetent, we just chose / fell into these roles and the work is equally distributed.
He and I are both working together to a shared goal of saving money in little ways, being productive and crushing it in the workplace while supporting each other and Little Bun.
Isn’t that what we should all have?
8 Comments
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Sherry of Save. Spend. Splurge.
As long as the equality is fair in your relationship – who cares? And you’re an admitted control freak, which means you have to have it a certain way, whereas mine is more of a control freak than I am HAHA…..
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Livingalmostlarge
Maybe I would feel lessened if I wasn’t given an equal choice in his career. His career choice affects our lives. So he didn’t say i’m going to do this. He asked and said I said no that was it. It was more than a fair vote. Probably the bigger vote because he was uncertain. Either I decided to gamble or he’d step away from the table. It’s a big deal. And I don’t know many partners working or otherwise who have that kind of say. I do feel blessed.
DH once had a boss and he won a nobel prize. In a recent interview, he’s potentially up for a second nobel prize, he said the more influential thing that occurred when he was in grad school was meeting his wife. Without his wife he would not have won the nobel prize. Literally he said it more than 1 interview about himself. He always told this story about how he met her at a party and stole her from another guy. He went up to her and said I’m going to do 2 things in life, marry you and win a nobel prize. He did both. Apparently he just knew. She didn’t work outside the home yet he said meeting her was transformational. So I think the partner you pick sometimes influences you more than you know.
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Sherry of Save. Spend. Splurge.
The main thing about partnerships is that partners recognize you need and respect each others’ opinions.
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Rachel C
1000% agree. A lot of people tell me how “lucky” I am because my partner does the grocery shopping (I despise it). But I still make the grocery list and cook most of the meals. He cooks about 2 meals a week but often needs a bit of input from me. We do our laundry separately because his job is dirty and smelly. I do send him to do a lot of errands, just because his days off are in the middle of the week when it’s much more convenient to run minor errands. It’s def not as much of a split as you and your partner but I find it funny how many comments I get about it, as though its odd to expect your PARTNER to help out and do things for you.
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Sherry of Save. Spend. Splurge.
Yes I think the bar for men is ridiculously low.. that is why they’re all surprised he has a say or an action in anything.
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SSS Fan
Hear, hear! I’m glad you spelled out what each of you does. From a lot of your posts, especially Weeks of Money, it seemed like your partner was not pulling his weight around the house. I kept thinking, “Where does this guy get off, thinking he deserves a hot, significantly younger woman in the prime of life, who makes a ton of money, pays for half of everything, and plays nanny all day to THEIR child?” This blog makes it clear it’s closer to 50/50. I still think you carry the greater burden at home because tending to Little Bun’s mental, emotional, physical, and educational needs is extraordinarily time-intensive. A lot of the stuff your partner does is probably soothing to a frugal, precise, and ambitious introvert. Taking care of a very, very demanding child is clearly not relaxing. But, you know, different strokes for different folks.
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Sherry of Save. Spend. Splurge.
HAHHAAHHAHAHAHAH. I love you. That is all. (I also do remind him of that daily)
Okay, there is more I want to say – I definitely carry more of the burden in terms of Little Bun’s total needs. I am definitely his Go-To Parent, and what he does, is take care of the stuff I do not have to or want to do like making sure food is ready, he preps his breakfasts in the morning, takes him to the bathroom, showers with him, brushes his teeth.. we have increased some of the tasks of care for him, that have changed since writing this blog post.
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I do 90% and he does 10%. But then again I’m a control freak so maybe that’s why. It works for us since i tell DH what to do. Only thing I don’t? Is work sort of. He took the leap and did a startup this year. He sat and we together decided to do it. He couldn’t do it without my buy in and he told his coworkers that. The CEO in particular was amazed i was willing and interested in him doing it and gave him the push. Without my support and that means i do 100% everything else he wouldn’t be doing this with 2 kids at home during covid. I also gave my blessing and buy in financially. he was making serious bank and took a severe paycut. We’re talking this year probably close to 7 figures for a lot less now. Most partners would not be so amendable to that sort of lifestyle jerk, not hitting “savings” goals and just taking the risk. I said we’re fine, do it, we’ll manage, and I’ll pick up all slack with the kids. I did a lot before but at least he tried. Now he’s a lot more consumed and i even uber him the 1 mile to work if it’s raining. I literally will pick up him and drive him somewhere (he’s also not really able to drive anymore that much). But all this? I picked our house because I needed it to be specifically located when he stopped driving he could get to work easily no matter what job he had. I picked our cars now because I am the one driving and I’ll probably pick the next car and decide how it all works. I take of everything and i mean everything. I do all the finances, pay all the bills, do all the investments, sign every paper for the kids, I take care of his LTCI to avoid the tax where we live, I do our taxes, I do the mortgage refi, I do the home maintenance, talk to all contractors, vets, shop, cook, laundry, clean, return and pick up anything and everything. But I think I’m an abnormal control freak. So he lets me do everything.