Man Refuses To Do Anymore Chores After His Wife Starts Calling Him A 'House Husband'
"I feel like she doesn't fully appreciate my value as her husband."
Zivica Kerkez / Shutterstock In a relationship, responsibilities should be split equally. Typically, that means that if one partner doesn’t work outside of the home, they take care of household responsibilities. This is nothing to be ashamed of, just a fact of life.
One man, however, found that he didn’t feel this way. Although he didn’t have a job, he was hurt by his wife’s characterization of him as her “house husband.”
One man stopped doing chores because his wife began referring to him as her ‘house husband.’
An upset husband took to Reddit to ask if he was wrong for refusing to do any chores because he was mad that his wife called him a “house husband.”
The man explained that he and his wife, Bella, were both 28 years old and had been married for five years.
“We both met [at] and went to the same college,” he said. “She pre-law while I was doing animation. She graduated top of our class and went to a T20 law school.”
The man has had a difficult time finding a job since graduation.
“While she was in law school, I had a lot of trouble finding a job in my field, or a job at all, really,” he said. “I ended up working in a kitchen as a line cook to help support us (in addition to loans she took out) while she was going to school so she could just focus on her classes.”
His wife has gone on to have a successful career, while he has not.
“Bella got a very good job in a different state after she graduated, so I quit my job and haven’t gotten another one since. We have no kids, a nice house for the two of us, and are overall living very, very comfortably,” he shared.
Because Bella works, he takes care of things around the house.
“She works very long hours, so I take care of most of the household things. Cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, re-painting the walls, and doing other work and renovations to the house,” he said.
Unfortunately, all is not going well for the pair.
“In the last six months, Bella’s started referring to me as her ‘house husband’ around our family and friends,” he explained. “I’ve mostly been letting it go, but every single time it bothers me. I’m already insecure about not being able to find a good job, and it makes me feel even more inadequate.”
“I told her that she needed to stop emasculating me and making it seem like I didn’t contribute anything to the household … I’ve stopped doing the chores until she apologizes, and she is beyond pissed off.”
It sounds like this man is holding on too tightly to traditional gender roles.
With this husband saying things like he feels “inadequate” and “insecure,” it seems likely that he is struggling with viewing himself as a traditional male provider.
According to the Pew Research Center, “Americans place a higher value on a man’s role as financial provider,” even with all of the strides women have made to be perceived equally.
Pew Research Center went on to say, “Roughly seven in ten adults (71%) say it is very important for a man to be able to support a family financially to be a good husband or partner.”
In other words, the majority of those surveyed believe that it’s important for a man to be a financial provider — so important, in fact, that it is an indicator of being a good partner.
In reality, society is changing rapidly, and it’s completely acceptable for men to be stay-at-home spouses or parents now. This man is not a bad husband because he doesn’t provide for his family financially. Instead, he makes his own unique contributions, which he has stopped for the time being. That may be what’s really keeping him from being a good husband.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer for YourTango who covers entertainment, news, and human interest topics.