So this morning my husband mentioned that the shower needs to be cleaned and I said “that sounds like a blue job”, meaning I think he should do it. We laughed about it and he made a joke about making his dinner plates extra dirty because washing up is a ‘pink job’.
I had put a load of washing on in the morning, and it was still going when I left to go out for lunch. I told my husband it was on and asked him to hang it out, and put another load on when it’s done, because it was a sunny day and I don’t get much time to do washing during the week because of my work hours.
I went to lunch, got home at around 3pm. As soon as I walked in the door I saw the washing basket, filled with clothes, sitting on the table with a piece of paper taped to it that said ‘PINK JOB’. There was also a load of washing in the machine with the same sign taped to the door.
I was kind of shocked at the level of petty, and also annoyed that the clothes had been sitting in the basket for at least 2 hours, and since the sun sets at 4.30ish (and the yard doesn’t get much afternoon sun), there’s no way the clothes would dry today.
I told my husband how frustrated this made me, and also my concerns that the clothes in the basket will probably smell since they weren’t hung up straight away. He didn’t care and just kept repeating that laundry is a ‘pink job’, and if I didn’t like it I shouldn’t have brought up the whole pink job/blue job thing.
We generally split chores pretty evenly – he is a much neater person than I am so if anything he probably takes the lions share.
I’m just confused as to why he’s clinging to the blue job joke I made. He didn’t seem offended or pissed when I made the joke, but he clearly stewed on it all day enough to make the signs and walk past the full washing basket all day while I was gone.
Does anyone have any insight into this? If you were in my shoes would you apologise? All opinions welcome!
46 comments
Yeah it’s the dumbest thing I have ever read and sounds like you created a monster
I’m curious… did he wash the bathtub in the end?
I have never divided chores by gender in any co-habitant relationship I’ve been in and reading this submission I am even more sure it’s a bad idea
Uh I think you fucked it up by making that joke.
What the fuck is that joke anyway???
>he is a much neater person than I am so if anything he probably takes the lions share.
If I had to guess, I think this is the root of the problem. He typically does a lot of the “pink jobs” and found himself oddly triggered in some small way after you joked that he should clean the shower since he’s a man. It nagged at him all day and when you asked him to hang the laundry, it boiled over into a passive aggressive fit.
I could see how the joke might make him feel a bit unappreciated or even emasculated depending on the other social pressures or situations he’s faced in his past regarding traditionally female housework. This isn’t a logical reaction but we can’t alway control our intital emotional response, particularly if it’s rooted in memory. Still, he behaved childishly by leaving the laundry to sit.
If this were my relationship I would apologize because my joke had touched a nerve and explain that it wasn’t my intention. I’d also ask for him to talk to me about it if that ever happened in the future instead of taking it out on our clothes lol.
I mean… you did a terrible joke which could be perceived as an excuse to avoid chores… This is the kind of stuff that would also illicit a petty reaction from me. So i totally understand him even though he is still being a petty idiot. This is just typically not the kind of joke i would make in a relationship, what is next? A joke about how all your numerous exes were much better in bed than him? Again i am not saying he is un the right, i am saying that you played with fire with that stupid joke and you got burned, i guess now you know his “pettiness limit”.
I wouldn’t apologize, i would just say that you won’t make that kind pf joke again.
I agree with what a fellow commenter said – you said he takes on the lion share of cleaning so joking that the shower was a blue job probably made him rethink some things. I think that was an incredibly dumb joke to make in the first place, play stupid games win stupid prizes
Lmao this doesn’t scream that petty to me, just funny 😂😂
In all seriousness, this definitely falls on you. You started this thing with your comment and it sucks that it came right back to bite you in the ass. I understand the frustration with wet clothes being left in a basket – in another circumstance I’d be pissed too – but take some responsibility here!
You mentioned that he’s neater than you and probably does more in your household. I can imagine it to be way more frustrating for him when he says something needs to be cleaned and you’re like “thats a blue job/your job”, while he already cleans most things. Imagine the frustration! He actually cleaned the shower and you’re complaining to him about him not hanging up the washing? I find that incredibly unfair tbh I think you could’ve just sucked it up.
I actually found the blue/pink job pretty funny, but you have taken his response way too serious. I think a fair response to seeing the basket with clothes is being slightly frustrated and thinking “fair enough”, not telling your partner off. It really shouldn’t have been this big of a deal for you.
Id apologize, tell him that his point came across, explore his feelings and if he thinks the chores are evenly divided, thank him for cleaning the shower, and laugh about the silly blue/pink comments together.
Hmm, you have created an interesting way for a couple to talk about roles and chores. Let’s imagine a marriage where the husband spends weekends and evenings fixing and maintaining house/car stuff for 16 ish hours and the wife does 16 ish hours of housework a week. Even if he never does dishes and she never sharpens mower blades they both could be happy or resentful depending on if they appreciate each other’s work. I think the time involved is somewhat fair, but I feel like an hour repairing a dishwasher or appliance is incredibly harder and more frustrating than cooking a nice dinner so maybe time isn’t the best measure?
Try to listen and talk openly to, but really listen hard to understand, and you’ll both have a chance to find a way to keep things going and be happy.
He feels very offended at what you said since he does the most of the chores and the joke set him off. You messed around and found out. I would sit down with him, ask how he feels, listen to what he has to say, apologize then redo the list of who does what.
This problem, to me, is easily solvable. So the fact that you’re on Reddit about it instead of talking to him about it tells me that you guys have bad communication.
The other two examples of bad communication is the pettiness and you thinking he wasn’t bothered by your joke. Either he was pretending and didn’t talk to you or you are oblivious.
It seems pretty obvious that he feels taken for granted. I wouldn’t be surprised that he does a lot more than you give credit for (most likely realize). Asking for help on a particular chore could sound like making demands… or you really are just being demanding.
I just can’t believe that something like this has been made more difficult by your refusal to really talk to each other and hear each other. That’s the part that tickles me…. a whole ass post and waiting on the comments for answers but you can’t talk to the person this post is about? They have to make signs and let the laundry get moldy?
Idk if you wanted an internet army telling you how silly your husband is but you’re boty pretty silly to me.
Yes, apologize. Yes, talk to them.
Sounds to me like you made a stupid sexist joke and he didn’t like it. Apologise, tell him you acknowledge that the joke was in bad taste as he does most of the chores, but also that you don’t respond well to passive aggression and that in future, if you do something to upset him, you’d like him to grow up and use his big boy words to communicate with you rather than leaving snarky little notes like a teenager.
Not a huge deal, you just both need to grow up a bit.
Lol…probably should have just cleaned the shower instead of calling it a “blue job”.
Why do you gender define chores in the first place? Were you actually joking that cleaning the shower was his job because he is a man? Or were you hoping he was gonna do it, like from this post it seems like he does most of the chores?
You made the blue job joke, told him to hang out a load of laundry, *and then went out to lunch for 2+ hours*. I can see where he’d be annoyed.
I guess I’d be kind of pissed if it was chore day and my partner was disappearing for a few hours then giving me tasks to do.
If you knew you were going to be gone all afternoon, why not have said “hey I’ve got laundry started but I’m going to gone. So can you keep the laundry going and I’ll do the shower now?
I mean I (43F) do most of housekeeping, grocery shop, cleaning, etc. But if partner knows he’s going to be gone all afternoon like today, he gets up early and gets laundry going and vacuums (because he know that hurts my hand).
I dunno. I don’t think your joke was that bad at all. His response was immature. But it sounds like you guys need to discuss the division of labor.
Sooo I am confused. Do you split chores evenly or does he do the lions share? Because it can’t be both. If it is the latter then my guess is he feeling taken for granted and using your “joke” to convey that message to you.
So you are saying it was a joke, but i am confused. Was it a joke? Werent you basically saying you were not going to do it? If he hadnt done it, would you have? Did he actually feel like it was a funny cute joke? I agree with another commenter: play stupid games, win stupid prizes. You set the precedent, he just followed them. Yeah you owe an apology for expecting him to do “his” AND “your” chores without asking if he was cool with it, just expecting him to without a true discussion. I never “assign” my partner tasks. I ask, and if they are willing, great, and if not, they are not my maid. It would have been nice if he would have given you a heads up and an actual discussion instead of giving you a taste of your own medicine, but maybe its the only way he feels heard in this situation.
Probably he does a lot of pink job, or used to do.. and you none of the blue jobs.
It’s pretty clear that he knows he’s the tidy one and has just been keeping that frustration quiet. You made a shitty comment that you’re now calling a “joke” and he took it to another level. Maybe he could have handled it differently but he followed your lead and beat you at your own game.n
As someone who used to do the lions share in a relationship there is nothing worse than someone who you already resent for their lack of participation, who you already feel treats you unfairly with their lack of chores or work or whatever, being flippant and laughing about having you do that work because they don’t feel like it. It’s because they clearly KNOW you’re doing more and don’t care how unfair that is, whereas before that you may have thought they were just oblivious about how unfair they were being. This is much bigger than just a joke. You just put him on notice that you do have a awareness you’re pushing more of the work on him, you just don’t care and think it’s funny. There is an imbalance issue here that needs to be addressed.
The advice this person is looking for could be restated as:
“My husband does the lions share of chores, and I am lazy so I would like that to continue or for him to do even more. I made a bad joke about it which prompted him to confront this unfair division. How do I deal with this in a way that I get to continue doing less work and feel good about it?? ”
You don’t. Do more work. That will resolve this.
Why did you even start saying some jobs are a man’s job if YOU are the one who’s going to get triggered when he starts putting out some jobs as a woman’s job?
No, OP, you’re not in the right here. YOU started it. You want it fixed? Sit down with him and admit you were wrong to start segregating tasks.
You don’t get to start a conflict and say the other person is immature for continuing it.
So let’s break this down:
-he already does the lion’s share of chores
-he mentioned to you that the shower needed to be cleaned
-you put that chore back onto him
-then you put more chores on his plate while you go out to eat
Are you really confused why he’s upset? He is the domestic engineer by your own admission. Maybe he wasn’t clear about it, but it seems to me that he was asking you to take over one chore for him by mentioning the shower needed cleaning. You refused, made a joke, and his frustration ended up manifesting with the passive aggressive sticky notes. You should reevaluate your contribution to household chores and he needs to work on communicating more clearly with you.
So he does most of the chores around the house by a long shot, so says you
He mentions the shower, a way of asking for help as he handles the vast majority of the chores
You deflect responsibility by saying it’s a man’s job to do that. Be it a joke or not you deflected responsibility.
You tell him there was more work to do, work you started, and then left for lunch. A two hour lunch.
You come back and the work isn’t done because it’s a “pink job”, the same deflection tactic you used on him earlier.
You get pissed that he dares be petty to you over a ‘joke’, despite having already deflected work onto him and then leaving work you started for him to finish while you go have lunch for two hours?!
Maybe you should just apologize about being petty in the first place and everything and start doing more chores
You should bite the bullet and apologize. If he does the lions share of chores, I’m willing to bet his “the shower needs to be cleaned” was his way of asking you to do it, and you made a tasteless joke about gender norms when he’s already cleaning more than you.
I know from experience how frustrating it is to do most of the cleaning and then get joked at when it’s not really a funny topic for you. My advice? If the person you’re living with is already handling house cleaning way more than you do, just do the chores they don’t want to do. Don’t tell the person who is already cleaning more, to clean more.
It wasn’t a joke because you were actually trying to get him to do something based on his gender. Your actions were sexist and now your husband is making a point. Good on him.
Between the gendered chores and the clothesline I have to assume this post is from 1944
Dividing chores by gender seems exceptionally strange I have to admit.
I think the best thing to do is walk back the concept entirely. Say you’re sorry if the concept caused offence, I doubt that was your intention, sometimes things just land wrong.
You started with the sexism in your home/relationship so…
OP, I really hope you take the time for some introspection here…
You admit he does the lions share . So even though it seemed reasonable to ask him to hang thr washing out to him it might have been the feather that broke the camels back. Maybe start pulling your weight around?
So you put a load of laundry in, and then expected him to do the rest. Hang wet clothes and put new clothes in. Is this how you typically decide chores? Because just in this example he’s doing way more than you. And you’re basically trying to make him do that by leaving right after you start a chore.
If you start a chore you should finish. I get asking sometimes for help. But it’s really frustrating when someone expects you to finish there responsibilities for them.
The fuck? Basic chores are genderless. If you’re human, you do chores. I would never be wi to anyone who said shit like “pink job/blue job”.
Probably not a good idea to make the whole pink/blue job joke in the first place but just apologize. Chores are basic life skills not a “woman’s job” or a “man’s job. Just tell him you were joking around and put the clothes to wash again so that they don’t smell bad
He is hanging onto the joke as a way to communicate that he is frustrated that he does the lion’s share (your words), but when he brought up the shower needing to be cleaned you told him “that’s your problem.” You may have meant it as a joke, but from his perspective and context, it can look like a sign of disrespect.
I actually don’t think he’s being petty at all. You created this joke and he’s continuing the joke. I think it’s that simple. Why? Because either 1) a bad load of laundry is worth continuing the joke or 2) he does most of the chores and it gets him out of doing it this time.
Either way, you really created this entire thing. So you definitely have to accept it, explain that the joke is silly and ridiculous, and you both should put it past you.
But at the end of the day, you are more at fault here than he is for starting the “joke” in the first place.
Good luck, OP!
>I’m just confused as to why he’s clinging to the blue job joke I made. He didn’t seem offended or pissed when I made the joke, but he clearly stewed on it all day enough to make the signs and walk past the full washing basket all day while I was gone.
Yeah, you opened a can of worms.
It’s probably a good bet that a serious discussion is on the horizon about the division of labor in your house.
As a 7 year married man, that’s absolutely what happened. You guys always split the blue/pink jobs and he probably feels he did more of the chores, so when he asked you to do a chore for him and you made the a deal out of the blue job/pink job, it likely pissed him off that he’s been doing pink jobs without poking fun at it.
Yeah he’s being petty, but it’s because you invalidated what he does for you and he doesn’t know how to articulate it and/or doesn’t want to seem like a bitch for complaining about it.
Best of luck!
He’s clinging to it because you were an asshole. You need to apologize for your sexist joke.
He does more work than you,and you tell him to do even more as a “joke.” Then he follows along with your “joke” and you have to ask Reddit for advice instead of just talking to your husband. Are you 12?
household chores are life skills/essentials, not gender roles, they’re every occupants responsibility
I am happy to help my wife with anything if she ASKS me, it’s when she TELLS me to do something we have a problem. No one, herself included, likes to be told what to do.
why would blue mean masculine and pink feminine.
why aren’t they yellow and grey jobs.
Congratulations you played yourself, apologize and move on.
Maybe talk like adults? 👍🏼