How Did I Get My Man to Do That? The counterintuitive catalyst to more help around the house.
At 8:15 am yesterday, when I got home from dropping Arlo at kindy, I found Andrew vacuuming the house—before heading to work! This wasn’t a typical sight, but it wasn’t super surprising either. Since making The 6 Intimacy Skills a way of life, I feel a lot more supported around here.
However, it got me thinking… how did this happen? Which skill helped create this kind of help in my relationship?
Of course, all of The Intimacy Skills helped cultivate this kind of support in my relationship, but the most unlikely Skill in this case turned out to be the biggest catalyst: Self Care.
How!?
The thing with self care is that it's not always about adding something to your list. Sometimes it's about taking things off. Most importantly, it's about choosing happiness over what 'needs' to be done. Let me explain how this worked for me.
For me, letting go of housework, and in particular the state of our floors, has been huge. I was so quick to grab the vacuum cleaner whenever I had a minute. Even when I had a newborn baby, I remember taking moments while he was sleeping to clean my house and vacuum the floors. It gave me a sense of control to have a clean house, and I didn't realize the opportunity cost at the time. Since exploring self care and the impact it has on my relationship, I can see that this had two major impacts:
Wasting Self Care Time: I was spending valuable self care time on a job that was never-ending. Often, by the time my house was clean, my baby would be waking up, and I would feel frustrated and resentful that I hadn't had any time for myself. My priorities were all wrong, and my need for control superseded my commitment to my own happiness, which had enormous flow-on effects for me, my relationship, and my parenting.
Preventing Help: I was so quick to do it that there was no time for anyone else to jump in and do it for me. I didn't see this one at the time, but on reflection, staying on top of the housework to the degree that I was meant there was never any time for my partner to step in and help me. It was the first thing I did when I woke up and the last thing I did before I went to sleep. Driven by my need for control, I could go a whole day with no self care but felt purposeful and accomplished if my house was clean. How backwards that seems now.
Since discovering the skills, I’ve changed my approach. I deliberately chose to let it go. I try to choose self care and time with my kids instead of cleaning. This is still a challenge for me—I'm a Virgo and I like things in their place—but the more I experiment, the more I understand that playfulness in my relationships, both with my kids and my partner, is directly correlated to self care. And self care is inversely correlated to my commitment to housework.
Even now, as I write this blog, I'm looking around a room full of toys. There are slippers on the floor, pyjamas draped over the couch cushion, and washing that needs to be put away. In the past, I would have prioritized that housework, thinking that I couldn't sit down for work until the room was perfectly tidy. However, now my commitment to you, the women reading this blog, supersedes my need for a clean house.
Letting go of a dirty floor is very hard for me. This week, the floors, in my mind, were DISGUSTING. As much as I couldn't stand it, I summoned the strength to leave them and to continue to prioritize myself. I told myself they could wait until the weekend, and I bit my tongue and ignored the mess.
When I came in and saw Andrew vacuuming, it hit me. My expectations of 'when' things should get done were simply different from his—in the case of the floors, sooner. I had a threshold for when the floors needed to be cleaned, and it was before Andrew's. I had been getting resentful and feeling like he NEVER cleaned the floors or he NEVER noticed they were dirty, that I was the ONLY ONE who ever did it. Whoops, turns out, I was just first to reach the point where I couldn’t handle them as they were anymore.
This week, when I chose to let it go despite how bad they were getting—food spilt under the table, sticks and stones dragged through the hallway, crumbs in the kitchen—I spent time with my kids and focused on my own well-being instead.
When I came home and found Andrew vacuuming, the first thing I did was share my genuine gratitude, of course. It was SO nice to see them clean and not have to do it myself. Then he said, "Yeah, they were pretty disgusting." So BOOM—there's my insight. Andrew hit his threshold of when the floor should be cleaned, and he just did it! All this time, in the past, I was getting angry thinking (and complaining) that "he never" vacuumed. But I was just too quick to do it!
By choosing self care and leaving the floors, my partner took care of them. I am supported. He does clean the floors. He does notice when they're dirty. I am not the only one to want a clean house.
This unexpected benefit of self care reinforced my favorite mantra from this work: we have to let go to receive. In this case, letting go of my need for a clean floor and my need to control the state of our home allowed space and time for me to receive the gift of Andrew's support. And the flow-on benefits of this should be obvious: I had an opportunity to receive something he was doing and to show my appreciation by acknowledging him for that. I was able to share genuine gratitude so that he could see that his support had made me happy and taken something off my plate. This consequently added a layer of intimacy as opposed to eroding one - like I would have in the past (or missing out on the opportunity all together).
Conclusion
Self care is a powerful Intimacy Skill that not only benefits you but also allows your partner to show their support and contribute in ways you might not expect. By prioritizing your own well-being, you create a more balanced and cooperative dynamic in your relationship. So next time, consider letting go of that chore and see what happens. You might just find your partner stepping up in ways that surprise and delight you.
