Cofferer of the Household Puns

My wife and I have a 6 month old baby girl and a two year old boy. Wife hasn’t been too happy since returning to her job from her last maternity leave and I actually just got a new job.

At my old job I was working 45-50 hours a week. At my new job my hours fluctuate a lot — it can be anywhere from 60 to 80ish hours a week at the worst. I make a lot more though so there’s that. The pay raise makes it so my family can do really well on just one paycheck. My wife is ecstatic because this means she can be a SAHM which is what she’s wanted.

The issue is that my wife and I aren’t on the same page about what this change would mean. Before, when our work hours were almost equal, we divided housework pretty much equally. We also paid a housekeeping staff to come every other week to help us out. (Plus we have a nanny to care for our kids while we work).

I told my wife that her staying home would mean no more housekeeping staff or nanny. These cuts will help us afford to have just the one income and I also think it’s practical. She was mostly agreeable to that. But then she said that we should divide the chores 50-50 still.

I told her there was no way I was going to be taking on as many work hours as I am and then come home to cook or clean too. That would defeat the entire purpose of her quitting her job.

She looked at me like I was some sort of Neanderthal but I think what I’m saying is completely fair. I’m not expecting her to do any heavy lifting. Just tending to the kids, cooking, and doing a reasonable job keeping up the house. I recognize that this would be an old fashioned way of living and if she ever wanted to return to the workforce I would support her 100%. But I think it’s fair that if I’m the sole paycheck and working crazy hours I don’t come home to more stress and chaos.

Obviously my wife and I will have to work this out between ourselves. I’m mainly posting here as a sanity check to see if my thoughts on this issue are completely off base.

Edit: Well this blew up since I last checked it. I can see people are really passionate about this topic and you all have encouraged me to think more deeply about it. I will read as many of the (4.2K??) comments as I can. I think I’ll let my wife take a look at the thread too since many have gone out of their way to offer constructive comments for both of us.

It feels like it just goes on forever with no end in sight.

Oh, you only have 10 shirts and 10 pairs of pants to put away? Congratulations—8 shirts later and you only have 12 more to go 🤔 It never ends!!

Let’s not even get into the pure hell of matching up all of the socks..

• 2014: Independence 'will cost Scottish families £600 each', Treasury warns

• 2020: ...Brexit depreciation increased UK consumer prices by 2.9%. This represents an £870 per year increase in the cost of living for the average UK household, meaning people have to work 1.4 weeks longer to afford the same goods and services.

I’m Ann Wroe, a journalist at The Economist, and I’ve been writing the paper’s obituaries for over 15 years. Each week I try to capture the essence of a person (or sometimes an animal, or an object) and tell their life story.

Sometimes my subject will be a well-known figure, such as John McCain or Aretha Franklin. Other times they are more obscure, but no less extraordinary. In the last two weeks I've written about Atta Elayyan, a victim in the Christchurch attack, and Mags Portman, an HIV campaigner. I've even written an obituary for England’s most famous fish, a 25-year-old carp called Benson.

Previously I was Books and arts editor and US editor for The Economist, and I also write non-fiction books, most recently telling the life of St Francis through verse.

What would you like to know?

Proof: https://twitter.com/TheEconomist/status/1110223851961679872

We hear all the time about bacteria becoming drug resistant by over prescribing antibiotics, can the same thing happen with viruses or bacteria and disinfectant?

It's very hard to keep my house constantly clean. It should be noted I have two autistic brothers and an autistic Mom, so the only ones who are "normal" are my little sister, my Dad and myself. My Dad works all day and I'm an adult with a few jobs and college.

Anyways it's incredibly hard to keep things clean although I've been working with my family slowly but surely and they're getting better at at least picking up after themselves but I would like to keep things as consistently clean as possible so I don't have to deep clean the house every two.

So far I've been practicing keeping the living room consistently clean and it's been going well...

Also any tips on how to get autistic kids/ adults to be more cleanly on there own would be a godsend.

Thanks!

From experience, does this sound accurate?

Why do you thing this is the case?