My wife and I have been married for four years. I’m 33 and male, and she’s 32. Her name is Steph.
Steph is a SAHW and since we got married, she has been incredibly inconsistent with household labor. I work a physically demanding job, and it would really help if Steph could at least cook dinner more than once or twice a week. Instead, she sits at the dinner table, hunched over her phone for hours a day. She’s completely addicted to it, but she refuses to even have a conversation about this.
Now about twice a year I have an opportunity to visit a foreign country for work. The nature of the work is to supervise construction and instruct the workers there. The compensation for these trips is always fantastic and Steph is appreciative when I go because I bring home a pretty fat paycheck after.
Three weeks ago, I was about to depart for two weeks on such a trip. At around 10am, I texted Steph and said that time was tight, but I’d be home at 12:30 to pick up my luggage. I asked her if she would make me something for lunch, and she agreed to do so. I stressed that I had approximately ten minutes to eat and then head to the airport.
At 11am I texted her again, saying I’d be home as planned at 12:30. Again, she said, “OK.”
At 12pm, I texted her, saying that I was leaving. I walked in the door at exactly 12:30, only to find her sitting at the dinner table, hunched over her phone. When I walked in, she gave me this bewildered look.
She had done literally nothing. Nothing was cooking.
Steph stood up in a panic and said she’d start making me lunch but I told her that it was pointless. She sheepishly apologized and I responded,”Don’t say sorry. Just be less ducking useless.” This made her very upset. I just picked up my luggage, left, and went to the airport. I did manage to pick up some food at the airport, but I really would have liked a home-cooked meal before eating out every day for two weeks.
I got home last week, and Steph was still angry. She expressed her anger, claiming that my comments were excessive. I asked what she had been doing those two weeks, and she insisted that she was “super busy” (see: Instagram and Netflix).
I gave her an ultimatum: that she had one month, until 1/10 to get her sh*t together and be a proper homemaker. I told her that if she couldn’t, I was going to divorce her. Steph was super upset, and for the past week, she has been sulking (see: Instagram and Netflix). She told her family about it and her mother basically blamed me for Steph’s lack of direction in life.
I know it’s nonsense that a 32-year-old woman needs to have her hand held to do anything, but was I being ridiculous with my ultimatum?
Comments:
Comment 1:
Why can’t she go back to work? Why does she have to stay home? I think it’s fair to say if you’re not going to do the duties of a stay-at-home wife, then you need to work.
Reply:
Yeah, she can go back to work and use that salary to have someone do housekeeping around the place or other tasks like yard work or get a meal service or other thing in place that would make both your lives easier. If she doesn’t want to do those tasks herself, then she can help work to fund those tasks getting done.
Comment 2:
Despite having a degree, I work an hourly job that requires only a high school diploma. My minimal organizational skills have made me the “best” in my role, according to corporate in our region. I spend all day on my phone or playing my Switch and yelling at my manager to come to my office because it’s his turn to play. I keep getting small raises, a dollar here and there, each year because, again, the bare minimum somehow makes me more productive than the rest of the pack. If I knew it could be like this, I might have just skipped college, tbh. I tell my other college friends who get laid off all the time (temp-to-hire is predatory, in my opinion), but they see the work as beneath them for some reason. I’d rather have a steady paycheck than beg for work in any of my triple majors, and that same logic should apply to OP’s wife, imo.
Response to reply:
What do you do? My husband needs a new job.
Another Reply:
Without entirely doxxing myself, let’s just say have him look toward the office jobs in the transportation industry. Especially in the repair aspect of it. There are always positions open in parts rooms and as front desk personnel. My main counterpart is a 64-year-old woman who did what I told her to do (the bare minimum) and she’s in the same boat as me (which is a very good boat, because we seem like superstars compared to others in the field, even in our company). There are also fueler positions, most of which start at like $24/hour depending on where you live. On the sales part of it, all of the parts vendors are also CONSTANTLY needing desk personnel and delivery drivers. All of these jobs tend to be union as well, so he’ll have protections. All of these jobs, whether you’re in repair, sales, parts vending, etc are hourly, offer overtime, and have pretty decent benefits. There’s always openings, younger folks tend to think it’s beneath them and leave within 6 months so even if there isn’t an immediate opening near you, there should be one relatively soon.
