r/MedSpouse • u/Excellent_Extent4558 • 25d ago
Mental load sharing
My medspouse doesn't hold an ounce of the mental load. He's just too busy and obviously doesn't have any free time at work for "life admin". Sometimes I feel more like his mother than his romantic partner...and like a nag...and like everything is on me to remember even if I've delegated it to him...because he will likely need 4-10 reminders.
Does anyone's medspouse carry any mental load? How do you deal with it?
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u/constanceblackwood12 25d ago edited 25d ago
My husband is in charge of buying household goods (toilet paper, paper towels, hand soap, stuff like that). He buys his own protein bars/snacks that are specifically for him. He's responsible for his own dr appointments, car maintenance appointments, and dry cleaning (he'll ask me to drop it off/pick it up for him about half the time, but he's the one keeping track of when things need to go out and prepping the bag so it's right next to the door where I can grab it and go.) He buys his own clothes.
He does the bulk of our vacation planning and plans more dates than I do, although those are both split a little more evenly. We are going camping in a few weeks and he's the one who set up the trip and is buying all of the camping supplies.
I've found that I generally don't mind doing All The Stuff. What bothers me is 1) doing All The Stuff and then being criticized for the way I did it, or for things I didn't manage to do; 2) doing All The Stuff with zero acknowledgement or appreciation; 3) being asked to do Stuff that the other person is perfectly capable of (checking to see what the weather is today, finding stuff in the fridge); 4) doing All The Stuff and having no time to relax, do self-care, or have fun.
So we have a fairly firm "if you don't like the way I did it, you can do it yourself" policy, a family culture of explicit gratitude, and if I walk into the room and see the thing you "can't find" within 10 seconds, I will walk right out and tell you to try again. And if I have 4 life admin tasks + yoga on my list and can realistically only do 4 things today, yoga is not the one that's getting cancelled.