Weddingbee Blog

I remember when Mr. Peng and I first moved in together. It was a couple years before we got engaged, and I had fresh thoughts in my mind about being the perfect “housewife”. I worked a normal schedule, but when I was able to come home, I cooked, I cleaned, I made a point to play a good female role in the home. (You just vomited, I’m sorry.) I’d grown up embracing traditional gender roles. My mom was a housewife, and my dad the breadwinner. Even though I worked, I still thought it was appropriate for me to do the lady things and for Mr. Peng to be a dude. Quitting work was never something I wanted to do, as I enjoy my financial freedom. But I still thought it was appropriate for me to do the chick things, and for him take care of the technical and manly aspects of our relationship.

The years rolled on, and let me tell you, this chick stuff is exhausting. The novelty of it all wore off quite some time ago. I find very little joy in coming home after a long week and asking my husband to lift up his feet while I vacuum the rug under him. So, I just do all of it much, much less than I used to. Plus, living in a condo, there isn’t exactly a ton of manly stuff that needs to get done around here. No lawn to mow, no holes to be dug, no big random things that need to be hauled around. We don’t even have to drag our trash out to the street; someone does it for us. So, naturally, some of the chick jobs should be passed onto my husband, right?

Family sitcoms throughout the ages have joked about how attentive and “useful” women are before they get married, and how it quickly falls apart once marriage enters the picture. My unsuspecting husband has fallen victim to this same comedic phenomenon.

I’ve become that wife that no longer constantly fulfills my womanly duties. I’m THAT wife that, (as a recent example) when asked if I can iron my husband’s shirt, laughs wordlessly at him as I rush to get done whatever it is that I need to be doing. While not only is it incredibly mean to laugh at your husband, it is worse because there was a time that I would have eagerly snapped up his shirt and ironed it to perfection. Now I think, ‘If you want that crap ironed, you should save your pennies and buy a steam dryer.’

I constantly kick myself for ever establishing a “housewife” role as a working woman. Somewhere along the line, I realized that if I’m going to pay half the bills, then we should be splitting the housework evenly, shouldn’t we? Em derrrr…

I went to a wedding a couple months ago where I roomed with Mr. Peng’s friend and his girlfriend who just moved in with each other. I saw him hand her not only HIS shirt for the night, but his friend’s shirt as well, and, just as I would have years ago, she eagerly snapped them up and lovingly ironed them to perfection while I sat on the bed and rolled my eyes. I only hope that she one day actually becomes a housewife, and not a working wife, or she too will probably one day betray her future husband and laugh at him when he hands her a shirt to iron.

What about you? Have you always strived for a relationship free of gender roles, or like me, did you envision yourself to be a traditional housewife (even if you have a career)? Have your responsibilities to each other and your home shifted as your relationship has progressed?