Feminist Advice Friday: How do I know if my expectations are too high?
A reader's husband has made a lot of changes, but things still aren't equitable. Now she wonders if she's asking too much.
This summer I’m revisiting some of the earliest Feminist Advice Friday questions, and updating my responses. Here’s a reprint, with a more detailed response. Feel free, as always, to leave your own insights in the comments, since we are smarter and more effective when we combine wisdom!
A reader asks…
I have been working on my husband to take more responsibility for houshold labor and parenting for years. It started when we had our daughter, with little hints here and there. Then at some point I started reading you and other writers, and started more aggressively demanding change.
He has definitely made a lot of changes. But even though we both work outside the home and make about the same, our household labor balance is still far from 50/50. For holidays and stuff, it’s even worse. He doesn’t buy the kids presents, doesn’t buy presents for his family, barely remembers Mother’s Day. I’m honestly getting mad just writing about it.
Again, he’s really made a lot of changes though. He does our daughter’s hair. Things are continually moving in the right direction. They’re just moving So. Slow. At the rate we’re going, we won’t achieve anything close to equality before we’re both dead.
I’m tired. I’m tired of hounding him. I’m tired of being the one to take responsibility for making our relationship equitable. Shouldn’t he care about it, too? Shouldn’t he care about what he’s modeling to our daughter? But I grew up with a really patriarchal family and so did he. Our friends mostly have typical shitty marriages where the mom does everything and the dad golfs all the time. Our marriage is better than that.
I really love him. He’s smart and funny and lots of other good things.
And I just wonder: Am I asking too much? Is this the best we can do? I don’t want to be beating a drum for improvement forever. I don’t want to always be the one saying it’s not good enough.
Help me figure this out.
My answer:
I see two distinct issues here: The first is your belief that maybe, in asking for equality, you are actually asking for too much. The second is that your husband is capable of changing, as demonstrated by his behavior, but continues to refuse to pivot toward true justice in your relationship.
Just phrasing things that way is helpful for understanding the reality of your situation, I think.
But I want to start by reassuring you that you are not asking anything close to too much. The belief that you do not deserve equality is rooted in the notion that you are fundamentally less than your spouse—that your time, your needs, your work, and indeed your humanity matter less than your husband’s. That’s misogyny that has broken into your brain to hijack your thoughts.
I hear this kind of guilt from lots of women. They all feel inadequate because they can’t do it all. They frame their husband’s efforts as some kind of bonus. But it was never meant to be this way.
Your needs are just as important as his. And when his needs include needing you to sacrifice more so he can get more than you do, his needs are not just less important, but offensive. If what he needs is to continue having leisure time you don’t get and continue forcing you to police him into more equality, then his needs spring from the idea that you’re just less important than he is.
That’s a pretty fucked up way to think about your spouse. But it’s exactly what he is doing.
Let’s also look at how you’re thinking about this issue. You, too, have framed this in terms of his needs and what he is doing. You talk about all the effort he has already made. The hidden assumption here is that a man can only be expected to make so much effort. But you’re making more effort than him, day after day, week after week, year after year. So why is it ok for there to be a limit on the effort required of him, but not of you?
Every time he hints that you’re asking too much, or relaxes when you are working, or pretends not to notice your child’s needs, he is sacrificing your well-being so he can get more than he deserves and more than his fair share.
Every time you tell yourself that maybe you’re asking too much, what you’re really asking is whether you are worth as much as him. As long as he is not doing an equitable share of housework and parenting work and other forms of domestic labor, as long as he is not meaningfully contributing to holidays and planning and all the other things that form a family’s life together, you’re not asking too much.
You’re asking too little. And that’s exactly what he’s giving.
Too little.
Back to your question:
When are you asking too much?
You’re asking too much when one of too things is true:
When what you ask is so demanding that it makes it impossible for a person to have a meaningful, fulfilling life. If, for example, your husband worked 120 hours a week, you might be asking too much if you expected him to do an additional 20 of housework.
When what you ask depends on the other person giving more than they get, or is rooted in the idea that you are simply entitled to get more than they are.
Your husband, not you, is asking too much. He is the one treating it as an unspoken fact that of course you must do more than he does. Of course you must have less free time, less support, less space in your brain.
Reframe things to reflect reality.
Your husband is asking too much. I can’t say it enough.
So what now?
Armed with the understanding that what you want is both reasonable and the bare minimum, it’s time to revisit the household labor conversation with your husband. Give him one more shot. Tell him exactly what you need, and then ask him why he thinks he doesn’t have to give it. Ask him why he thinks he should get more leisure time than you.
Make him answer for his behavior, instead of allowing you to feel like there’s something wrong with you for wanting better. Don’t let him get away with gaslighting you either. Give him a final chance to get all the way to equality, and make clear that anything less is less than you deserve.
I wrote a while ago about setting meaningful boundaries with a spouse, and I think some of that might be relevant here, since it seems like you don’t want to leave but also want to be able to meaningfully enforce some norms. Readers, what say you?
I publish #feministadvicefriday a day early on Substack, as well as on Fridays on Facebook. You can submit your own question to zawn.villines@gmail.com, by messaging my Facebook page, or anonymously by using this site’s contact form. Please share your thoughts on this column and its advice in the comments!
My husband’s job is more physically demanding vs. mine is more mentally/emotionally demanding. We work the same number of hours, though. He feels that because of this difference, he should be allowed to sit with his feet up and/or nap in his recliner while I cook dinner, serve dinner and clean up after dinner and get the kids ready for bed. I can understand needing a few minutes to transition to home and recharge after work, but if he just helped me with the domestic labour between 5-8pm, we could eat earlier, get the kids to bed earlier and get ourselves to bed earlier. He joins the party once our toddler is completely ready for bed, to say goodnight to our big kid and put the toddler to sleep (5 mins). Any suggestions?
I’m in this same situation, though we’ve only been together 3.5, his improvement is both noticeable and Too. Damn. Slow. I’ve been waffling a lot on how to keep approaching this from a gentler angle, and getting really damn clear that whether or not he’s conscious of it, his behavior is SEXIST. Hoping this word will shock and appall him, I’m getting closer to using it in the hopes it will open his eyes to what the imbalance really feels like for me.