I didn't mean my post as harsh as it reads and see that, I'm sorry for that.

I know you have had so much on your plate and I can't presume to know how I'd navigate half the waters, but I really hope things get better for you.

If you don't like the way the house looks, and nobody else cares, then can you define some spaces that you do care about and forget the rest? Like, physically map the house and mark them down? It sounds like you are on a quest for physical and mental boundaries.

For example, I do not care if the kitchen is clean, but a messy kitchen bothers my husband enormously. Therefore, he is much more likely to clean it. There are other things that are the other way round.

Maybe a weekend at a hotel would do you a world of good.

FP, I'm not being hyperbolic when I say that your situation sounds desperate. The physical stress your body is under, compounded by the physical labor required to care for children and house pretty much on your own, plus the lack of sleep...that's all one thing. But the emotional strain of not having your family seem to care enough to have your back and even just do their own share ( never mind picking up some extra slack given condition that your body is in) has got to be deeply upsetting.

I get that you need a clean house for your sanity; you need that fixed and you need it fixed now. . I completely understand. But that's just the top layer of the problem. Please, please, please start seeing a therapist just for yourself if you can; I vote for seeing one separately even if your dh agrees to go back to marital counseling with you. You've got to do some self-care. You're under so much stress that it's not a luxury.

Have you thought about telling the boys that you own the dishes and buy the food, so if they can't clean up behind themselves, they can't use your dishes and eat your food?

Yes, assign them one set of dishes each.

I've not read any of the other posts so forgive me if I'm redundant.

BOTH of you need to stay in therapy, together, seperate whichever.

Release yourself from the idea that your house must always be clean, it won't happen. Delegate, delegate delegate. Pass around the resposibilities by either giving them a chance to volunteer certain chores or give them the responsibility, period.

Tell them simply, "I need your help". All who live in the house are all responsible for the daily/weekly upkeep.

I told my brood, if you want, find an appropriate place for it cuz if I find it laying around for more than a day, it's either mine or the trash cans.

If you continue to do it all, they have no reason to step up. Only you know the best way to make it in thier best interest to be more responsible.

Not the best advise, but it's helped around here quite a bit.

I pray you can get things more balanced.

I had a long response typed out that I lost when the board broke.

I just want to offer some support. I'm in a similar situation and I feel resentful and pissed off all the time. It's not healthy and I'm trying to make some changes. Tell your dh what you have told us, try to make him realize how you feel and make him go to counseling. I know that's easier said than done.

If you ever need to vent feel free.

If it was me (and it was-I just self medicated) I would push the marriage counseling.


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FP -- from the sounds of it you've already fallen into the pattern of doing everything for the littles, just as you did for the bigs. That's the dynamic you can change, and you might be able to enlist your husband into doing more to help be an example to the kids.

Two things jumped out at me (and keep in mind James and Linus are the same age and while older, Nikki is functionally at that same level):
1) Why are you scrubbing the walls that one of them drew on -- put a pair of kid-sized gardening gloves on them and hand them the magic eraser and tell them that they made the mess they get to clean it up? (the first time I made my two stand there and scrub for 30 minutes was the last time they wrote on the walls - mean yes but at 5 and 9 that shit needed to end.)

2) Both of the littles are old enough to know the evening routine -- they know they need to wash their hands and faces and brush their teeth before bed, the stink eye on that shouldn't have gone to your husband but to the kids.

I got tired earlier this year of having to nag my two through the morning routine and the bedtime routine every day. It made our mornings hugely stressful and I felt as if all I was doing was yelling. I made them charts out of file folders and velcro that laid out what they needed to do each morning and each night. They flip up each step as they complete it. Now they want to play in the morning or watch tv and the simple question is "did you finish your routine?" No more I forgots or I didn't remember. Those excuses have been taken away from them.

If the littles don't have regular chores -- they need them, or you might be in the same place when they are older. Are they going to be done perfectly? - nope but they're getting done.

As for things like vacuuming the crevices on the couch -- I'm assuming that need comes from people eating in the living room? No more food in the living room unless the grown people in your house are willing to clean up after themselves by taking turns vacuuming the couch and floor. Someone is eating in the living room pick up the plate and bring it to the table.

No one willing to wash up the dishes? -- paper plates. (or the one set of plate each and they get to wash their own).

are the throw ways good for the environment no. but if they put you in a better place health wise both mentally and physically that's more important.

No offense, but either we live in squalor or you're a neat freak. I vacuum the crevices in the couch about 2x a year, not every week. I clean the bathrooms once a week. Maybe 2x if they get grody, but I don't wipe down every day.

Your little two are old enough to help with cleaning the bathrooms, too. They can clean sinks and sweep the floors.

With the older two, I'd hand them the cleaning supplies, tell them it will be done to your standards or you will keep sending them in there until it's done.


Also, I think I would sit them all down and have a family conference and tell them that the maid service is ending. They will start to help, all of them. End of discussion. That's when you can tell the older two that if they can't clean up, they can't eat your food or use your dishes. Even the youngers can put their dishes in the dishwasher every day and help fold clothes, etc.

Everyone has given great advice, and I appreciate it all--but this all really resonates. You aretotally right about the littles. I actually used to make S & J do a lot of chores--including scrubbing wall scribbles-- but when the focus changed to their emotional issues, I took that kind of stuff off the menu of battles to pick. And I forgot to get back to the original menu with new kids.

with bleedsink on the littles and routine. We had a Cork board with the routine (written and in pictures) on it at those ages and no story until those things were done, and if they ran out if time for their story that was too bad. I sent them to it at the same time every evening and they caught on quick. I think they were 3 and 5 when I started it.

As for the bigs - my kids rotate weeks on dish duty. Monday through Sunday one kid gets it. Then the next week, it changes. Its simply expected. Puck up your own crap and do dishes. I don't think its too much to ask of people you provide for. I ask who's on dishes? And let it go. If it takes 2 hours, its their time, not mine.

As for your husband, you say if you ask him, he does it without complaint? Maybe its just not being able to see what needs to be done or it doesn't occur to him that it needs to be done as often as you like? I'm not sure how to read your situation. I do think if you are asking for counseling he should meet you halfway.

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I'm of the opinion that of one spouse thinks things are bad enough to need counseling then it doesn't matter if the other one thinks everything is fine. They should go because they love their spouse and obviously things aren't good for the one requesting it.

Amen. 😢


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A couple of thoughts.

1. I agree that your little kids should be able to go through their bedtime routine without someone standing over them reminding them of what to do. I suggest a laminated list with a dry-erase marker to cue them (wash hands/face, brush teeth, put on PJs, brush hair, etc.)

2. There was a Family Fun article years ago about a woman who had each family member make a plate, cup, and bowl with a design on it (so, uniquely identifiable) and it was your responsibility to keep your own stuff clean, and all other dishes got packed away. This was actually while they were getting ready to move, but she discovered that her kids, when they couldn't eat again until their plate was clean, would wash it. Unfortunately, the potential downside here is a big kid who uses a paper towel as a plate for Doritos and scatters crumbs everywhere. So YMMV.

3. I do not use this system, but I know people who do: http://damiana.dreamwidth.org/205315.html I don't know if it could be adapted to your situation. It's organized around providing a positive incentive for people to seek out and do household tasks, but you'll have to come up with something that everyone wants.

4. I think it's completely reasonable to insist on a few more sessions of marriage counseling; I don't think it would necessarily require a LOT of them to come up with some plans for dealing with this.

5. Do you have some equivalent to those two-hour trips to the cigar bar? Because you absolutely should, and some of those evenings your dh should be staying home while YOU go out.

6. I totally get the resentments here. My frustration is that I feel like a lot of the tasks that I do all of, every time they need to be done, my dh doesn't view as work, I guess, or doesn't realize it is work that someone (specifically me) does. His own messes are invisible to him. There are also tasks I never do and leave for him every time, and sometimes he acts resentful of my failure to help with those things and I don't think he's got any grounds for bitterness. At all. Given all the things he doesn't seem to even notice are a task that needs doing.

7. I totally agree that your kids should be helping more, both big and little, but making the kids do shit is absolutely a task. And it shouldn't be 100% on you. (I will note that this is one of the things dh gets pissy about: he gets on the girls about picking up their crap more than I do.)

One time dh saw me taking down his shower curtain in his bathroom and putting it in the washing machine. He was like, "What are you doing? Why are you doing that?" . He had absolutely no clue whatsoever that a shower curtain gets skanky and that *someone* cleans it regularly so that it doesn't stay that way. It had never, ever once crossed his mind.

I had to point out to him that if there is something in the house, especially something that gets used on a regular basis, and it's NOT disgusting that's because I clean it. The daily house shit, even the shit he uses/steps over/dirties every single day...it's just not on his radar to do anything about any of that. I mean, it is NOW but we've been at this for 20+ years. Like my friend Joel likes to say, "I broke him, now anyone can ride him." . But it took a lot of doing to get him there.

im going to disagree with most here.

you cannot make an adult go to counseling. if he doesnt want to go, you need to decide if you can live with him the way he is. you sound like a major cleaner. like way over the top. i think my house is pretty clean and my kids say mine is the cleanest of all of their friends. i do the crevices like once a year. counters every once in a while. lol but not every one needs things to be that clean. the kids will survive if their faces are dirty when they go to bed. if it is his night to do the nightly routine, then it gets done how he does it. period. if you want it done a certain way, then do it yourself. you cannot make somoene else be as anal as you. think of it this way. if you get divorced, whenever the kids live with him, they are not going to have clean teeth and clean faces and they're not going to have a story read to them and they're not going to have a clean house while they are with him and all of that is ok and youll have to just deal with it. so, if you love him, try to learn to just deal with it now. if you dont love him, then move on. but obviously, you are not going to change him, if it's gone on this long.

btw, your husband sounds like a dick. and i am totally on your side here. i just agree w whoever posted, that you can only change yourself, not him.

Fuck, YEAH it is, and with some children *coughMINEcough* it's a HARD task.

Y'all have given me good advice and made me feel better. My husband mostly isn't a dick, I swear. And I...mostly am not a psycho.
No, really.

You do sound like my mother the neat freak with your cleanliness which is what I was getting at earlier. At our house everyone cleans on either Saturday or Sunday and the rest of the week pretty much only the dishes and kitchen get cleaned.

I’m sure this will either sound like backpedalling or denial or just undermine any credibility I had in saying I’m not a psycho (mostly), but I just have to (not condescendingly!) LOL at the idea of me being a clean freak. My house is crammed to the rafters with people and I am insanely short on time for all the things every single day. My bedroom is a fucking disaster right now. Not like a, “Oh, I didn’t make the bed and it is triggering my OCD” disaster, but like a “I can shut this door and not look at crap, and when I’m in here it’s dark and my eyes are closed, so things that aren’t done being sorted/put away can go in here” disaster. We keep the linens for our bed in a cedar chest, and the cedar chest has a drawer in the bottom that’s too small and inconvenient to use for almost anything. So I stick socks in there after the laundry, to be sorted later. Right now, that drawer, with its couple dozen odd socks, is pulled out and on top of the cedar chest. On top of that is a laundry basket with all the stuff that needed to go “upstairs” as I cleaned the living room the other day. Other day as in, Saturday, I think. Also on that chest is at least one, but I think 2, of the “organizer ()” bins that are supposed to be in the hall closet, containing makeup and toiletries. There’s probably a stack of books there, too. Next to the chest is an armchair. I cleaned it off this weekend (it was holding a tangle of hangers and a bunch of winter coats that were going to storage, and had held those for…IDK, a week or two) but now it’s piled up again. I could guess at what’s in it, but I don’t actually know. Probably more laundry.
DH’s side of our bedroom pisses me off, so I don’t know what’s over there, beyond “all his clean clothes” and a bunch of other clothes that aren’t clean.
I couldn’t find my debit card yesterday, so I emptied my giant shoulder bag all over the temporarily cleared off dining room table. This morning I put back everything that actually belongs in the bad, and…left the other stuff on the table when I went to work. I may or may not get to all that stuff tonight. If I don’t—even if I do —it will very likely end up in another laundry basket of “stuff to put away when I have time” and get carried up to The Heap.

I don’t sweep or mop the kitchen every day. Like, “not every day” is a HUUUUUUUUUUUUGE understatement. That floor is kind of gross and sticky as often as not. More often than not. I wipe spots, if I spill things. Mostly.

There’s a partial preschooler-sized handprint of something…could be jelly? IDK, maybe nutella? …on the wall in my living room. I keep walking by it, registering it momentarily, and thinking “I should get that. Or maybe ask/tell/make [someone] get it.” And then some other fire breaks out, and I don’t and no one does. I think it’s been there going on a week.

Vacuuming the couch & chair is a necessity. Deirdre does a lot of crafts, and the kids are allowed to snack in the living room. Because we don't have an EIK or a family room, and the dining room table is usually covered with mail and crap.