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My wife (26F) and I (26M) work four days a week. She works 8-hour shifts, and I work 12-hour shifts. She can’t work anymore because we need to pick up our one-year-old daughter from daycare. I leave for work before they wake up and sometimes get home after our daughter has gone to bed.
This week, our daughter’s daycare provider was sick, so my wife took the week off to care for her. I worked an extra day to make up for her lost income, hoping things would be okay.
She seemed stressed, so I asked what was wrong. She said she’s struggling with balancing work, caring for our daughter, and keeping the house clean. I told her I couldn’t cut my hours because we needed the money.
She agreed but said the chores were piling up. I suggested that if she picked up after herself like putting used butter knives in the sink and rinsing bottles and cookware I’d do the dishes when I got home and even put them away. I didn’t want to search the house for things to wash.
She didn’t say much and went to comfort our daughter, who woke up early from her nap. She still seemed upset, so I talked to my coworker. He said I was being unreasonable for not listening to her. I think I was being fair. Am I the asshole?
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My wife and I both work four days a week—she has 8-hour shifts, and I have 12-hour ones. I leave before our one-year-old daughter wakes up and sometimes come home after she’s asleep.
This week, our daughter’s daycare provider was sick, so my wife stayed home to care for her. I worked an extra day to cover her lost income. She’s stressed about juggling work, childcare, and household chores.
I suggested she handle minor chores like putting dirty knives in the sink, and I’d take care of the dishes. She didn’t respond much and went to comfort our daughter, who woke up early. My coworker thinks I’m being unreasonable. Am I?
Let’s swiftly assess a handful of the top comments: AITA for Telling My Stressed Wife to Handle Light Chores While I Do the Dishes?
You’re not the asshole for “offering to help with the dishes” but YTA for telling her that “90% of the problems with messiness could be solved if she picked up after herself”. Like what were you thinking?
ETA: Your title was misleading. Either you did that on purpose in a weak attempt to garner sympathy, or you are actually that dense. I suspect it’s the former.
YTA. So your wife is overwhelmed and exhausted with a one year old and you say it would all be okay if she just picked up after herself. Are you kidding me?
YTA
You completely invalidated her feelings by not even offering a “yeah, it’s a lot.”
You used this as an opportunity to correct her and admonish her instead of offering her support. You also made your help contingent on her doing more. What seems like a small thing to you isn’t to her. She’s probably literally got her hands full with your daughter and you’re telling her how to better clean up after herself than offering to shoulder the burden as you should have.
You reap the benefits of her flexible schedule without acknowledging that just because it’s easier for her to take off work doesn’t mean she’s not taking on the more challenging task by staying home with your daughter for a week.
What chores do you do? If she’s getting your daughter up and putting her to bed because your schedule necessitates it you should be finding ways to offset that WITHOUT her needing to tell you she’s overwhelmed. I’m astonished that, when she communicated her feelings you still couldn’t step up to the plate.
Do better.
YTA. Wow…got creative with that tile, didn’t ya? She is overwhelmed with everything. You only offered to help with one thing.
You will help with dishes…but only on your terms. It’s like you chose the one chore that would allow you to also tear her even further down.
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