'We finally had a conversation about how exhausting it was for me to be the person who always had to notice, always had to remember, always had to delegate.'
I told him I wanted him to take equal initiative and equal responsibility instead of being another person in the home whom I had to care for. I needed a true partner.
Where many men would have become defensive or dismissed emotional labor because it’s too difficult to understand, my husband immediately gave it an honest go. He began doing the laundry without being asked. Tidied without being asked. He took the kids out of the house during my work hours without expecting anything in return. He started keeping the calendar with me, planning meals with me, communicating with me instead of expecting me to run the show.
As I started becoming accustomed to the new balance of emotional labor in our household, I felt like my brain could finally work at full capacity again. Soon after, I started in writing a book on emotional labor, an endeavor I never could have taken on if I didn’t have a husband who was so ready and willing to take on his fair share. When I asked him why and how he rose to the challenge with so little effort, his answer was simple: he was doing it for me.
While I may have taken on emotional labor because I was raised to subconsciously believe it was my job, he was able to take it on out of love. He did it not only because it was the right thing to do, but because he wanted our relationship to be better. Coming home to find that the laundry has been folded and put away is more than a nice surprise. It’s an act of love, one that reminds me that I’m not in this alone.
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