Husband doesn't help

Lifestyle Relationships
21

Re: Husband doesn't help

Why not have a direct conversation for him and say you will just do 50% of the housework now and rest is up to him. Oh he needs to eat now? Great, point him to Subway

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Re: Husband doesn't help

best advise here

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Re: Husband doesn't help

I hope saeedin...'s reply is in sarcasm.

Am afraid I have to disagree with khattichic et al here.

This is what I see from your post:
1. You are angry at your husband because he couldn't hold on to a job and bring in enough money to pay the bills.
2. You have become the sole breadwinner rather reluctantly.
3. Since now you are the 'husband' in this relationship, you want your husband to obey everything you say, except you don't want him to think that is what you want.
4. You want to compare notes with rest of the sisterhood on this forum in how to go about doing that.

First of all, you guys just made this change and 3 weeks is not enough time to arrive at a balance. It will take a while for you guys to get adjusted to this new situation. There is a fundamental disjoint between your nature and his; you are lets-go-get-this-thing-done-NOW type and he seems more of a laid back procrastinator. You both need to be patient with each other till you arrive at that balance.

Second, nobody ever changes just coz someone tells them to. If you try to do that, chances are you will break them. This goes for wives too. First rule of any relationship is to accept them for what they are, not what they could be.

Third, you say he does some of things but not the way you want them. You want to decide if you want to choose the chores for him or how the chores get done, but not both.

Finally, I am wary of guys who do all this ibadat, listen to bayans and lectures, read islamic literature etc. I find them to be very reactive and if you push them too hard ( even surreptitiously ), they will go boom.. talaq talaq talaq... barkhaas biryani....

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Re: Husband doesn't help

Are there any lectures from more moderate type scholars who talk about relationship issues and how husbands should help out? If there are, have him watch that.

25

Re: Husband doesn't help

I wonder how he will receive the suggestion that he should watch a lecture on how husbands should help out.....
Wouldn't that be skirting the issue?
Why not sit down and have a talk?

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Re: Husband doesn't help

Seems like he "tries" to help at least. You have to understand that not everything he does will be to you liking. For example dressing the kid, cleaning the house.

Secondly if he does not help in house chores (may be hurting his ego?), how about starting from making him responsible for more work in what he is OK with. For example taking care of kid, grocery etc etc. For house chores, you can start with simply asking him to put his plates in dishwasher and cleanup his side of the dinner table.

If he is touchy about being told of husband responsibilities, try to look for lectures on "wife AND husband responsibilities". May I suggest Tariq Jameel and Ghamadi.

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Re: Husband doesn’t help

I like the idea of first shouldering more “manly” responsibility on him to ease him into his newfound role of being an overly religious housewife. :hehe:

Grocery errands, shopping errands (take the kid out and get diapers), fixing things around the house are a good place to start.

Other roles, you can just say, look I don’t have time to do these tasks, if you have time, you can take care of them since you’re around the house these days looking for another job, would help much, kisses kisses, kthanksbye I gotta run to work. And then stick to it. You said you would not clean the toilet, and the bathtub and fold the laundry and make the bed, then don’t do it. If he doesn’t do it, eventually he’s gonna get so tired of the gand that he will take care of it. If he dares ask you to clean the toilet, just call out from the kitchen that while you take care of the Qorma, he can clean the toilet. If he says he ain’t doing it, then say ok, fine. Keep making the korma, and find a pretty clean public toilet in your local friendly library to use while he uses the nasty one he refuses to clean.

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Re: Husband doesn’t help

Better yet, just send him to PCG for a couple of months for training :slight_smile:

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Husband doesn't help

You should be glad atleast your husband helps around a bit. Although I am SAHM, I have a 9 month old baby and I look after her and home all together! Its so hard n doesnt let me rest and let finish my house chores. My husband on the other hand, sits in office all day, not like me running around a kid and trying to get house chores completed. He comes around lunch time and expects a fully cooked meal in his room and after that he lies in the bed for an hour until his lunch time is finished. He now comes back around 5-6, have his meal in bedroom and asks me to close the door while he wants to rest! Now btw 6-12, he would come out of the room after every two hours for five mins to have a quick play with baby then retreat back to his room.. All the time he's back in the room on his laptop googling random women n checking out random fb profiles or watch porn! How domi know? Because I have caught him..

When baby cries or happily screams a lot he tells me to shut her up, as he's "resting"! Oh, he has moved baby cot of our one bedroom flat to living because he can't handle her crying and he has to wake up early for office! Early is around 8.. He doesn't give a damn that I sleep on sofa!

I am on my foot all day from 7am till 1am, my hubby doesn't lift a finger to help! Apparently his mum did it all too!!

How can I change this? I m sick nn tired of him n all this! I don't have anyone to help me around!

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Re: Husband doesn't help

When he's done with his "resting" for an hour or over then move back into the room and stay there. Talk to him about random stuff and play with the baby and try to engage him in it. And tell him baby's stuff is all iin the room and it's ddifficult for u to whatever so u r going to move the cot back in the room and he can sleep on the sofa. Is the bathroom attached to the room or is it separate. If its not attached and he comes out in the morning to get ready and shower or whatever, say that noise disturbs the baby and he wakes up too early or becomes fussy or whatever. So u want the room back.
And btw if he's not sleeping in there then what's the point of giving him all that privacy for 6 hours where he just comes out 5 min after every 2 hrs. Whatever he's doing in there he can do outside too and with the door open. If he's not coming out u go in, simple as that. Say I'm going for a shower u watch the baby. I'm going to the grocery for something u watch the baby. It will give u some time off and him some interaction with the baby. It seems like a big disconnect right now.

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Re: Husband doesn’t help

:rotfl:

I need to open a desi-husband-training school. Send your problem husband to me, and I will have him trained in a week. He will never try any of these tricks again.

You know, our men are coddled because we women coddle them. In order to be coddled, there needs to be first a coddler.

I agree w/sasha’s advice. Open the door, sit in the room with your baby and do not leave your husband alone. If he says for you to leave him alone then confront him. Why not tell the guy you know he’s staring at girls online?

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Re: Husband doesn't help

And OP for u it's going to be an uphill struggle sorry. Guys who have grown up with won't lift a finger role models and who themselves feel that it is beneath them to do any housework r always hard to change. If u have already done the hint dropping them have a direct conversation with him but not from the angle "ur not pulling ur weight" but how stressed ur feeling because ur finding it hard to manage all these tasks with such limited time. That looking at clutter makes ur mind feel unrest etc. The kinds of Islamic lectures that he listen to dont really need to be "watched" u just have to have ur ears open. So he doesn't have to sit in front of the screen and just do that. He can run it on his phone, wear headphones and tidy up, dust, wipe counters, do dishes, do cooking prep work, the list is endless. If he could multi task while listening to something he enjoys then it might even make his chores a little more enjoyable. If he doesn't know how to cook or doesn't want to cook ask him if he can do the prep work and dishes. I've had a couple of times where someone else did the prep work for me and I just loved it. Didn't have to get my hands dirty and it was like they cook on the cooking shows with everything already neatly lined up. I'm not such a fan of cooking but I didn't mind at all doing that kind of cooking. See if u can get him to add these kind of tasks to his list somehow.

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Re: Husband doesn’t help

I wouldn’t count on that. Some people have a higher tolerance for messes. For some people just flushing the toilet everyday works just fine.

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Re: Husband doesn’t help

most of the posters here have given you good suggestions but speaking from my own experience as well , many husbands start taking their wife’s efforts for granted, for them household chores will always be a woman’s duty regardless of she is working outside or if the the sole breadwinner of the family.

you are doing job not out of desire to work but to make ends meet , i think you just need to tell him that job + household work is taking a toll on you and you are considering to quit and see if this makes him takes more interest in house work. in reality is supposed to provide for you & your baby and I am sure he must have learned that through islamic lectures too.

i hope things get better for you , i really know how hard it is to do house work after coming back from full-time job :hugz:

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Re: Husband doesn't help

Hmm. Op, is husband trying to find a job at all? On the weekends, help him out with job hunting.

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Agree with everything but the last bit…OP has described exactly what my husband used to be - lack of work ethic, no help for me (i go to school full time, we also have a kid), and maybe OP’s husband isn’t…but mine was EXTREMELY short-tempered. He wasn’t like that before marriage so it was quite scary to see. Recently…past i’d say 9 months…he’s become more involved in Islamic lectures and research…and in praying namaz etc. He is a completely different guy. Calm, cool…relaxed…caring…he’s the guy i agreed to marry, the one everyone told me about. Sure we have our ups and downs, i dwell too much on the past and my IL’s, which makes me a bit of a nut sometimes…but on his part, i have to give him credit for changing. And that change came directly from being more religious. If u truly read and understand lectures and scripture on the relationship between a couple…then no, no one says talaq talaq talaq and brushes off the crumbs. That is what jaahil maulvi culture might be like…but not from what i’ve read abt Islam.

To the OP - definitely give this new situation more time before becoming frustrated with your husband. If he grew up in a different situation and has been used to being the breadwinner, then all this is completely alien to him. If u still feel as if there needs to be some change then offer some Islamic lectures for him to listen to, the one’s on family/husband-wife relationship by Mufti Ismail Menk and Nouman Syed are extremely good. Maybe suggest those to him.

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Re: Husband doesn't help

^ what if he's the sort to term the true Islamic lectures as being too liberal (read too pro women, and everything's so la di da) and that they r disco maulvis. Not to say that they're the scholars ur talking about but in general I've heard this term given to those ppl that talk about the aspects of sunnah that would actually make women's lives easier and happier. Instead these ppl love to harp on the highly misconstrued aspects about being allowed to "beat" ur wife, her place is in the home, don't travel without mehram, allowed to have multiple wives (but delete the part where it says to be fair otherwise one wife is better for u if u fear u can't be fair), make tthem cover their "ornaments" or things of beauty, but delete the part about lowering ur gaze etc. Hell the majority of guys in Saudia can't lower their gaze to a woman wearing a full abaya and a head scarf, ab us Mae bhi Hamari ghalti hae k humnay ninja hijaab Kyun nahi kiya ya hum ghar say baahir kyun niklay.
Yes my post is a tangent please dont expand on it, I was just venting about an unrelated discussion :)

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Lol yea

ALL THAT WEALTH OF KNOWLEDGE YOU HAVE ABOUT MEN AND PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS, its time to share it with the world, not just life1.

Youre the smartest woman on here. Not the dumbest, no. Smartest. We men are dumb. TEACH US THE WAY OF THE RELATIONSHIP, SENPAI.

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To be prescribed the title of Mufti takes years and years of scholarly study (i read somehwere 10 years)...if someone terms them as "disco maulvis" then it's their ignorance and stupidity. I know exactly what type of ppl ur talking abt...and it's sad to see them.

When listening to lectures by esteemed scholars they don't harp on without providing references...once they provide the reference it is upon the listener to either take him/her for their word or if disagrees/doesn't believe them...then he has to look up these references and form an argument (based on references) against. How can you call someone a disco maulvi if you pull up Sahih Bukhari and ayat from the Quran supporting your argument?

This is totally a tangent lol but if one wants change to come about, it will take effort. Listening to a lecture, in any academic/religious field, isn't enough...research on ur own part is a requirement for that knowledge to be of any use.

Edit: sorry i expanded Sasha lol i just read the past bit of ur post...but i think ur point might help her as well as this one. I hope so anyway

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Re: Husband doesn't help

Hey everyone.. thanks for the ideas. I don't think he is a lost cause at all. I just need a find a way to get him to realise how hard it is for me. I don't have high standards at all. I compromise a lot. I let him sleep even though I have to wake up for my girls milk or just to pacify her a little.
I just don't want me to resent him for my tiredness.