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Every family is different which means that we all grew up differently. For example, in my family, my parents tried to bring us up with traditional gender roles. The women cooked, cleaned, and took care of the children despite having to work outside of the home. The men went to work and did the occasional work around the house such as changing a lightbulb, fixing a broken faucet, or cutting the grass. I remember as young as 4 years old, my mother told me that I had to learn how to sweep the house because I was going to be a wife one day.
Everyone who knows me knows that I am very stubborn, and I try to not conform to traditional gender roles. When I was in my late teens to early 20s, I talked my siblings into cleaning up after themselves. Everyone cooked together; it wasn’t a women’s only task.
When I married my husband, we didn’t bother to talk about our expectations of each other. I assumed that since we both had graduate degrees and most of our views were similar, we would have had the same expectations of who did what chores in the home. How very wrong I was.
My husband came from a family that upheld traditional gender roles. The women did all the cooking and cleaning in the home despite being just as busy or busier than the men. The men would fix anything that was broken around the house and did the outdoor chores such as cutting the grass and shoveling the snow.
For the first 3 years of our marriage, we clashed constantly because we never spoke about our expectations of each other. Even though he would get home an hour or two before me from work, he would never get dinner started. I would become overly angry because he was doing nothing during that time and expected that I would come home and get dinner started right away.
Finally I was fed up with it. So I sat him down, and we talked about our expectations of each other. We started with chores in the home such as who was responsible for cooking and when along with who was responsible for cleaning the bathrooms, kitchen, and vacuuming the carpet. Then we spoke about going out with friends and family – how often we should check in with each other to make sure that we’re safe. Once the ball started rolling, we talked about all aspects of our marriage and family that we were creating together.
Seven years later, our marriage has gone much more smoothly. I am not saying that we never have problems or arguments, but what I am saying is that we are not fighting over small things such as who is cooking dinner or loading the dishwasher. We are able to focus our energy on more important things.
Unspoken Expectations Assignment
- Pick one topic to start off with (i.e. chores, child rearing, going out, etc)
- Talk about how those things were done in your family of origin, things that you would like to change, and things that you would like to keep.
- If you two have different opinions/views, find a common ground or things to compromise on. Both individuals have to compromise, no person should be always giving in completely to the other person.
- Remember to utilize effective communication skills while having this conversation.
ARA COUNSELING 