# Does your wife not clean because she knows you will do it?



## dwalt78 (Oct 17, 2011)

I am not a clean freak or have any neatness diseases. All I like is to have a tidy organized house. It is our home and you would think you would want your home to look nice and be proud of it but I she does not care. I am the only one that keeps up with the house. My wife thinks that if she puts away dishes in the dishwasher that means the house is clean. Laundry will pile up, papers will pile up, dust will pile up and well everything else. I feel I do way more than my share and I feel like she takes advantage of it. If I mention to her that I need more help around the house she goes to the extreme of things. Fine, I won't do my cafe mom or I won't go to my therapists. I say to her calm down I just need help. All I am asking is if she can maybe do the dusting or clean the carpet or the laundry room. Yet, she never does. Last night when we were talking she said if it was not for me then I would not do anything that the house would be a mess but I try to do a little bit just to make you happy. What, we purchased a nice house and you don't care to do anything with it. It is so difficult, I mean I have organized her closet for her from A-Z and guess what it looks like a junk yard again. I stack wood 30 face cords of it, then I cleaned the laundry room then I put away clothes I do the finances because she says that stresses her out. I just can't take it and I don't know what to do anymore. I dust the house, I get up on the roof and clean gutters, I mow the lawn, I make the nice dinners, I rake the leaves, I clean the basement and the garage, I change the oil of our cars. I just do it all and I am going to explode.


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## turnera (Jan 22, 2010)

She goes to the extreme because it works.

Stop letting it work. When she throws a fit, just smile, pat her on the shoulder, and say 'I knew you'd understand' and walk away.

And you can't make her care about the house. Some people do, some people don't. What you CAN do is decide what things you can live without getting done, and sit her down and tell her that you expect her to do those things, because you're going to do the other things. If she does them, great; if not, you can live with it. It will reduce your stress level.


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## cwm33 (Oct 18, 2011)

Sounds to me like she's taking advantage of your good nature.


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## COGypsy (Aug 12, 2010)

Now admittedly, my husband _does_ have more than a touch of OCD, which led to a great deal of our division of labor early on. However, over all I would have to say that yes--I don't clean because he will.

Turnera has it spot on--


> And you can't make her care about the house. Some people do, some people don't.


I'm just not a house person. You could buy me the Taj Majal and it means no more or less to me than a condo somewhere. I don't care about paint and wall stuff and all I really want from furniture is for it to be comfy. I'm not much of a homebody...why stay home when you could be doing something productive, is usually my point of view. 

Therefore, I do pretty much the bare minimum when I'm there and pretty much what I care most about. I cook, put away laundry and do one of the bathrooms. I guess if you count giving the keys and a check to the concierge desk at work, I do change my own oil though! 

My husband takes on the brunt of the rest. I pitch in when needed, but overall I've made it very clear that it's just not my talent or my interest and if he wants or needs me to do more, I'm happy to pay someone to come in. It is more than worth it to me to pay Merry Maids.

Maybe that's what you should propose. If she doesn't wish to contribute by doing x, y and/or z....then she is welcome to use some of her cafe mom/ therapy/ other money to bring in someone to take care of those basics once or twice a month. Let her decide how she wants to get it done....


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## ladybird (Jun 16, 2010)

I hate cleaning, but i do it anyway... I am a stay at home mom and really have nothing better to do during the day then clean it. With a toddler running around it never stays clean for long... toys everywhere. Granted my house isn't immaculate or anything, but it is clean.

I do everything around the house with no help so i know how you feel.

She does this because she knows you will do it. Does she work?


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## Thewife (Sep 3, 2007)

Hi, You said your wife had depression on another thread. Did she become like this after the depression? Is it possible for you to encourage her to come up with a chart for household chores? You can do together and let her choose 30% of the work that she likes to do for a start and then slowly increase it, I know this will sound childish but it worked for us. she need to get into the mood of cleaning or doing something productive to beat that depression. sitting at home doing nothing is only going to make it worst. Don't let this go on its not good for both of you. If she agrees you need to follow up and ensure that its done regularly and make it into a routine. Tell her that if she wants to get better she must work with you and that you are doing this to pull her out of this depression.


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## Cherry (Sep 23, 2009)

COGypsy said:


> I'm not much of a homebody...why stay home when you could be doing something productive, is usually my point of view.


I am the total opposite, but I think a lot of it has to do with we have no extra income, well we do to an extent, but I'm always saying to my H that I'd rather buy something nice for the house rather than blow it on meals or drinks out. Maybe not a healthy approach because I do know we need to get out once in a blue moon. But I love my house and I just love being there. 

As for cleaning, I recognize sometimes that because I know my H will do something, I just don't do it. But then usually within a half hour or so, I'll wind up doing it myself because I feel guilty for feeling that way. We have a nice division of household responsibilities going on... It certainly hasn't always been that way, only in the last year or so (Dec will be our 5 yr anniversary).


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## COGypsy (Aug 12, 2010)

Cherry said:


> I am the total opposite, but I think a lot of it has to do with we have no extra income, well we do to an extent, but I'm always saying to my H that I'd rather buy something nice for the house rather than blow it on meals or drinks out. Maybe not a healthy approach because I do know we need to get out once in a blue moon. But I love my house and I just love being there.
> 
> As for cleaning, I recognize sometimes that because I know my H will do something, I just don't do it. But then usually within a half hour or so, I'll wind up doing it myself because I feel guilty for feeling that way. We have a nice division of household responsibilities going on... It certainly hasn't always been that way, only in the last year or so (Dec will be our 5 yr anniversary).


My husband is a lot more of a homebody too--he's the one that's always puttering or fixing something up or getting some new doo-dad. It's a total role reversal on that front! Which is really funny since he's this totally conservative, former Marine, ex-bodybuilder, car-fixing/racing/clubbing, hunting, shooting, cigar-chomping tough guy! 

It took us a while to figure out the balance too. The first year was pretty hard with him going back over whatever I would try to pitch in and do, so that it would be done the "right" way. That's a big part of why I don't do more. It wasn't ever worth my time to do it if it was just going to be done again because I didn't get the lines in the carpet "right". 

And while I do enjoy spending time with my friends and going out for dinner or drinks, I also really love my work (most days, lol!) and the volunteering I do. My parents have had some health issues lately, so I've been going back and forth to their house to help out from time to time. We don't have kids, so I don't have that responsibility and can devote my time to these other interests. My husband and I are both pretty independent, so it works out for us pretty well


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## FirstYearDown (Sep 15, 2011)

My mother had *four *children and our house was always spotless. She also worked full time. 

I suppose that is why I don't understand when people use one child, as an excuse for a dirty house. I had to stop going to this single mom's home because it was unsanitary and smelled like dog pee. Not healthy for her child to be in that environment. 

Then again, Mommie Dearest also has severe OCD and would beat the crap out of us if we did not keep the place clean, as soon as we were old enough to help.

We both keep our place clean.


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## Jamison (Feb 10, 2011)

You had stated your wife had depression in another thread and was on meds. It could be coming from that. 

I would say get into some counseling for yourself and learn more about depression and how to deal with a loved one that is suffering from it. You also said how do you deal with and how do you keep it from making you crazy and not leaving. All the more reason to educate yourself more on the issue.


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## turnera (Jan 22, 2010)

I was watching Clean House New York, where the house is filled to the brim with junk and dirt, and the wife said that she was an only child and raised with a nanny AND a maid. She simply never had a single thought her whole life to what it takes to keep a house going.

My DH is the same way. His mom lived in his house when I moved in, and stayed there another four years. When she left, the house fell apart. Little did I know, but she was doing what she always did - following around behind him cleaning in his wake. I married a slob!


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## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

No. She doesn't clean because she's a slob.


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## dwalt78 (Oct 17, 2011)

Thanks you all for the posts. I have taken what was said and gathered some of what was said and I will try to put it to use. Good feed back on here.


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## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

Now now, don't get all judge-y we call them 'Disorganized-Americans'. In my house a good rule of thumb is if you need to look more than 10 minutes for something, buy a new one. It's gone, man, it's gone.


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## SadieBrown (Mar 16, 2011)

Runs like Dog said:


> Now now, don't get all judge-y we call them 'Disorganized-Americans'. In my house a good rule of thumb is if you need to look more than 10 minutes for something, buy a new one. It's gone, man, it's gone.



:lol::lol: That's to funny. 


Now to just offer a different point of view on husband's who do all the house work. 

My ex told everyone he did more than I did. I didn't see it that way. He was so anal retentive he could have been a case study. Add that to his tendency to greatly exaggerate and you have a man who thinks he did everything. 

For example, I always loaded the dish washer and ran it late at night. If a dish was used after I turned on the dishwasher I would wash it briefly under the tap and put it in the dish drainer. Many times I would be woke up in the morning with my husband shoving dishes into the cabinets from the dishwasher and proclaiming loudly how tied he was of doing all the dishes and me leaving dishes out for him to take care of. 

Also he could never clean just one mess, if our daughter got cookies crumbs in the floor he couldn't just sweep up those crumbs. He had to sweep and sometimes even mop the entire floor, didn't matter if it didn't need it. And he made sure everyone knew what he 'had to do'. 

I'm not saying this is what the OP is doing - I'm just throwing it out there as 'the other side of the story'.


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## ren (Aug 1, 2011)

dwalt78 said:


> Last night when we were talking she said if it was not for me then I would not do anything that the house would be a mess but I try to do a little bit just to make you happy.


I'm confused, are you saying she claims the house would be a mess if it wasn't for her? 
Have you tried just stopping? You could write a letter to her explaining how you feel like you do a disproportionate amount of the cleaning and she doesn't appreciate it so you quit to prove a point. When she finally notices the mess piling up don't say anything, just get out the letter and show it to her.
Or alternately, you could start keeping a tally of who does what and confront her with that. Or you could try something like chorewars.com to turn cleaning into a game.


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## turnera (Jan 22, 2010)

I once asked my husband - on the advice of my therapist, helping me through a LOT of disgruntlement with my husband - to take just ONE task off my plate, since we both worked full time yet I was the only one cleaning, cooking, doing laundry, doing dishes, raising child...he refused; said he never knew when he'd be home and couldn't pin down an ability to handle a chore.

I sat on that and stewed for a few days, and finally just stopped doing his laundry. Kept doing everything else, just not his clothes. After he finally exhausted all his clean clothes, and he blew up at me for not 'providing' his clean clothes, I just shrugged and said 'You told me you couldn't handle even one task to help me with the burden. Since we both work full time and I still do everything except mow the lawn, and you refused to help, I decided I had to remove something myself, and the one thing that least impacted me was your clothes. So I stopped doing them.'

*crickets*

Couldn't argue with that, could he?

Later that day, he fixed something that had been broken for a few months. And I washed a load of his clothes.


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## DoYouWoo (Jul 19, 2011)

The problem, fellow americans, is the "Alternate Definitions Of Clean" (ADOC - copyright Me 2011) - what I think looks clean, looks still-dirty or half-assed-cleaned to my wife. Some people are ok with a certain level of clean, some aren't. Now, I indulge my wife in certain things, doing it her way to her clean standards, cos it's a little thing and it keeps her happy - but other things I just need to say "If you want it done that way, you do it that way - I don't see the need". So I guess Dwalt, if you want the house cleaned to a standard beyond what your wife feels is necessary, you go ahead and do it!


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## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

She's got laundry covered though. To the extreme. 3 people live at home now. I swear it's 4 or 5 loads of laundry a day. I just don't see where it's all coming from. Maybe she's washing clean things as well. In any case we typically go through a new washing machine or drier every 2-3 years. They just wear out from around the clock use. I've never been able to figure it out and what's doubly odd is that most of the time, I only get to wear new things once or twice before they mysteriously disappear forever.


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## Ten_year_hubby (Jun 24, 2010)

dwalt78 said:


> I am not a clean freak or have any neatness diseases. All I like is to have a tidy organized house. It is our home and you would think you would want your home to look nice and be proud of it but I she does not care. I am the only one that keeps up with the house. My wife thinks that if she puts away dishes in the dishwasher that means the house is clean. Laundry will pile up, papers will pile up, dust will pile up and well everything else. I feel I do way more than my share and I feel like she takes advantage of it. If I mention to her that I need more help around the house she goes to the extreme of things. Fine, I won't do my cafe mom or I won't go to my therapists. I say to her calm down I just need help. All I am asking is if she can maybe do the dusting or clean the carpet or the laundry room. Yet, she never does. Last night when we were talking she said if it was not for me then I would not do anything that the house would be a mess but I try to do a little bit just to make you happy. What, we purchased a nice house and you don't care to do anything with it. It is so difficult, I mean I have organized her closet for her from A-Z and guess what it looks like a junk yard again. I stack wood 30 face cords of it, then I cleaned the laundry room then I put away clothes I do the finances because she says that stresses her out. I just can't take it and I don't know what to do anymore. I dust the house, I get up on the roof and clean gutters, I mow the lawn, I make the nice dinners, I rake the leaves, I clean the basement and the garage, I change the oil of our cars. I just do it all and I am going to explode.


Dwalt,

It sounds to me like you live nicely and you are a very capable and generous person. I'm on board with everything in your post except for some of the feelings you share. Yes, she's taking advantage of you, so what? Since when does an able man go around saying "I can't take it and I don't know what to do"? And predicting that you will explode? Please. You need to own your feelings and get yourself under control. You're letting what your wife does, or more accurately, what she doesn't do wrap you up like some kind of insecure teenager. You choose what to do and what not to do based on your character, which appears to be on the upper side of excellent. What your wife does or does not do should have no bearing on this. You are the only person that can do anything about how you feel and I would hope that you can find your way to feel good about yourself since you clearly have a lot to feel good about.


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## kevint (Mar 14, 2009)

I don't think house work is just for the woman to do.I don't mind doing house work.In fact i do most of the cleaning here.Im a little anal about having a clean place so I think if I want the house spotless I'll get up and do it myself.I don't think house cleaning should be a game changer.


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## tajd (Oct 29, 2011)

I too am in the same boat of having to do nearly everything around the house. Plus my full time job, my small business, my volunteering, and all the outdoor work too. 

But that's for another thread i'll be working on posting.

I just wanted to say my coping method has been to lower the expectations I have of my wife. That way when things don't get done, it doesn't hurt as bad.

Perhaps this is not addresing the problem but i'v tried just about everything to address the problem and no changes.

After 4 years of this the resentment is really starting to set in. Good luck to every man in our shoes!


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## tseug (Oct 30, 2011)

Wow, also another thing I'm going through. My wife was always like this before we were together and I was always the neat OCD cleaner.

I love and feel satisfied when my home is organized and clean. It is important to me and I take pride in it. My wife is the opposite, would rather do 100 other things than help out. She is messy but she can find anything in her mess.

After 8 yrs of having fights, arguments, etc. I have come to the realization that if it is important to me then I have to do it myself or cause a fight that doesn't solve anything.

We tried splitting it up, checklists, easy chores, 1-2 chores. Even when she did it it wasn't up to my standards. She has one bedroom in the house that is hers and as long as she keeps the door closed its fine. Her clothes, everything is in there. She does her own laundry and has agreed to take out the garbage once/wk. I do everything else but I will have to live with it and have learned to accept it. If we weren't together I be doing it anyway, so whats more important. She suggested bringing in a maid, but I cannot justify paying someone when I can do it myself!

If this is the only issue and everything is ok, then do you want to risk your relationship over it. If you do then fine, you just have to live with your decisions.


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## pidge70 (Jan 17, 2011)

I hope my man realizes how lucky he is that I have OCD. He used to complain that I cleaned too much.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## liveing tolive (Feb 10, 2015)

well i understand ,that we as a couple ,me and wife are supposed to share ,cleaning duties to keep our house not perfect but comfty,but i rarely get to see here clean and when she does she might,complain about it or just do half the job,but i try to tell her ,and she comes out with the most drastic measures for she wont have to do any work at all,she thinks because we have children that they are supposed to do everthing aswell ,but yes ,they have there share of chores,and when they do not follow threw she complains to me about it,well i have done a positive thing and posted ,post to remind every one ,of what to do,even for my self .im disabled but i still function ,and i dont understand why she doesnt ,she so easy to blame others ,for not working around the house,but she does not at all lead threw example,also the post i put up happen to be removed ....what do i do ?????...and for a greater example every one cleans up ,but then she becomes the biggist critic,and insults are work ,but not for one momment does she do it her self,to show every one what her idea off cleaning it is.....i get the most angry verbal abuse ,that i dont think i can handle any more ,she is 43 but always looks for a excuse to blame blame blame what should i do??????help..


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## liveing tolive (Feb 10, 2015)

dwalt78 said:


> I am not a clean freak or have any neatness diseases. All I like is to have a tidy organized house. It is our home and you would think you would want your home to look nice and be proud of it but I she does not care. I am the only one that keeps up with the house. My wife thinks that if she puts away dishes in the dishwasher that means the house is clean. Laundry will pile up, papers will pile up, dust will pile up and well everything else. I feel I do way more than my share and I feel like she takes advantage of it. If I mention to her that I need more help around the house she goes to the extreme of things. Fine, I won't do my cafe mom or I won't go to my therapists. I say to her calm down I just need help. All I am asking is if she can maybe do the dusting or clean the carpet or the laundry room. Yet, she never does. Last night when we were talking she said if it was not for me then I would not do anything that the house would be a mess but I try to do a little bit just to make you happy. What, we purchased a nice house and you don't care to do anything with it. It is so difficult, I mean I have organized her closet for her from A-Z and guess what it looks like a junk yard again. I stack wood 30 face cords of it, then I cleaned the laundry room then I put away clothes I do the finances because she says that stresses her out. I just can't take it and I don't know what to do anymore. I dust the house, I get up on the roof and clean gutters, I mow the lawn, I make the nice dinners, I rake the leaves, I clean the basement and the garage, I change the oil of our cars. I just do it all and I am going to explode.


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## liveing tolive (Feb 10, 2015)

wow i understand ,and im getting alot of divorceing from her,,,is it a possibility is there any way to get this deal done ,well yes keep to ur guns and god shall lead the way go to a church once a while on the sneak and see what the angels speak to you ,of wow i just thought about that and im going to try it my self...


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## JustTired (Jan 22, 2012)

Man, I feel like a slob & I am not even one after reading this thread! LOL!!! I work full time & so does my husband. When I was single, it was way easier for me to keep my house clean. Fast forward to now....add 3 dogs, a 3 year old, & a husband - I have a hard time keeping up!!! My house is not trifling but it certainly can be a bit cleaner.

Soooo....to remedy my issue I hired a housekeeper last week. I have decided that I can only do so much & if I want more done, I need to delegate it to someone else. My housekeeper will be coming through every 2 weeks starting on Friday & I couldn't be happier! ;-)


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## SurpriseMyself (Nov 14, 2009)

Runs like Dog said:


> No. She doesn't clean because she's a slob.


That's what he needs to find out. Is it:


Because she's depressed and has no desire to clean or make a home that is nice to live in? I know that our home has gone downhill since I've stopped feeling love and desire for my marriage.

Because she isn't feeling heard, loved, something else? If you ask your SO to clean the toilets, will they think to themselves, "well, I asked you to spend one night a week with me on a date night, but you can't do that so why should I do anything you ask?"

Because you haven't clearly divided the household responsibilities? I don't like being given orders. I'd rather say, "I will do this, but not this" and hope there's little that neither of us is unwilling to do, even the gross stuff. For example, if the toilet is clogged, it's his job to fix it. If it's dirty, it's mine. 

Because it's not important to her. If she doesn't care, then she doesn't care. You will have to ask for a minimum of things, though, so she doesn't take advantage of you. This is called meeting your needs.


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## SurpriseMyself (Nov 14, 2009)

pidge70 said:


> I hope my man realizes how lucky he is that I have OCD. He used to complain that I cleaned too much.
> _Posted via Mobile Device_


There is a limit, though. I remember an old boss of mine told me his stay at home wife vacuumed the house 3x a day.

Guess what - he divorced and found a younger woman.


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## Giro flee (Mar 12, 2013)

I am also a spouse who has just lowered my expectations for any help. If my husband does something, I'm grateful but I had to let go of hoping he would do some chores. 

The resentment was killing our marriage. He doesn't care if things are clean or in working order. This is how he grew up as well. Our pre-marriage counselor pointed out this problem before we married. Young and in love we thought he was overstating the problems this could cause. 

When we were younger, poorer, and with small kids the workload on me was enormous. We almost divorced. As the kids got more self sufficient and helpful, and we had more money, my workload has decreased and I try to just expect nothing. If we were to divorce I would still need to do all of the chores so that wouldn't help.


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## Erudite (Jan 28, 2015)

I do ALL of the day to day work around the house. DS has chores and he is good about helping when asked but H does nothing.

The problem in my marriage is that we have a lot of stuff and my H has an inability to complete projects without help, he gets overwhelmed. He does not know how to clean up after himself either. I do it all around the house (except for gutters and cleaning the chimney).

What that means is that instead of doing a fair number of chores extremely well, I do ALL the chores, inside and out, to the bare minimum standards. I have to do it all, clean up and around all his messes, and I have to at least make the effort to do it to his standards because....if I don't when we argue he hits me with what a poor housekeeper I am!


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## Zouz (May 28, 2014)

I am a full time bread winner , she works 5 hours aday ...

I used to help a lot , wash dishes , mop the floor , laundry, cook , you name it , until I discovered that no matter what I do she claim I don't do it properly ; Dishes are not clean enough , laundry either dirty after washing , or lost colors , etc ...

So I gave up and started self support only ( wash, clean only what I use....);

we ended up having piles in kitchen and running out of laundry ....

today I am inviting visitors ; there will be a big fight after it .

But still this will kill her arrogance ....


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

*My rich, skanky XW would work, and do a lot of it, but it preeminently was outside work like with her horses, feeding cattle, or in the performance of other ranch chores, or yard work around the house.

But she quite often let the inside of the house just go to hell. Her no-account kids refused to clean up after themselves and it was always an habitual mess. So I pretty much started in on just doing it myself, as I think that the cleanliness of the inside of my house is paramount, more especially when I have family and friends often coming over to visit. 

My XW must have had other thoughts, as she soon hired a maid to come in once a week to do the cleaning. That being the case, it did make my job a tad easier to the point that I could help out with yardwork such as mowing, leaf-raking, edging ~ and continued to do so, up to the point where she sternly told me that I was not doing it to her exacting specifications ~ when I told her that if she didn't like the way I was doing it, that she could just do it herself. Which she graciously took me up on!

Now while she had intoned the same thing about my ranch chores, I relented there because her Mother, the actual ranch owner, always seemed to convey praise on me for doing things out there the way that she liked them done! But my XW was often at odds with her Mom on those very same ranch/farm tasks as well!*


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