Skill: Relinquishing Control

How Letting Go of Control Got Me More Help Around the House

I walked through the front door after dropping Arlo at kindy and immediately noticed the sound of the vacuum cleaner. Andrew was vacuuming the house before work.

Now, this wasn’t one of those movie moments where angels started singing and I suddenly saw my husband in a new light. He has always helped around the house. But standing there in the hallway, watching him vacuum up crumbs and dirt that had been driving me mad for days, I had one of those uncomfortable realisations that tend to arrive when you’ve been experimenting with these skills for a while.

For years, I would have told you I was the only person in the house who noticed the floors. I would have told you I carried the mental load. That I was the only one who cared whether the house was tidy. That if I didn’t do it, nobody would. And honestly, I had plenty of evidence. Or so I thought.

The thing is, I like a tidy house. Actually, that’s probably understating it. A tidy house helps me feel calm. It helps me feel in control. Even when I had a newborn baby sleeping in the next room, I would use those precious moments of quiet to clean. Not rest. Not read. Not have a cup of tea. Clean.

The floors in particular seemed to have a hold over me. If I had ten spare minutes, I’d vacuum. If I finished one job, I’d start another. I wasn’t consciously thinking, “I need to do this before Andrew gets the chance.” But that was effectively what was happening.

I was always first. First to notice. First to act. First to solve the problem. Then, unsurprisingly, first to feel resentful.

The story I carried was that Andrew never vacuumed. He never noticed. He didn’t care. I was the only one who wanted a clean house.

Then came self-care.

One of the things I’ve learnt through this work is that self-care isn’t always about adding things to your life. Sometimes it’s about stopping. Sometimes it’s about leaving things undone. Sometimes it’s about choosing happiness over productivity. And for me, that can feel wildly uncomfortable.

That particular week, the floors were bothering me. The boys had dragged half the outdoors through the house. There were crumbs under the table, dirt through the hallway and enough mystery debris in the kitchen to keep me distracted every time I walked through the room.

Every time I noticed it, I had the urge to grab the vacuum. But I didn’t. Not because I was making some grand statement. I simply chose something else. I played with the kids. I went for a walk. I worked on my business. I prioritised things that filled me up.

The floors stayed dirty. And they stayed dirty. And they stayed dirty.

Until one morning I walked through the door and found Andrew vacuuming.

When I thanked him, he looked up and casually said, “Yeah, they were getting pretty disgusting.”

I actually laughed. Because there it was. The insight.

He noticed.

Of course he noticed.

His threshold was just different from mine.

All those years I had been gathering evidence that he didn’t care about the floors. When really, I just cared sooner. I had confused “different” with “doesn’t care.” And I had confused “not doing it my way” with “not doing it at all.”

It’s funny how often I find myself doing that.

The deeper lesson had very little to do with vacuuming. It was about control. I had spent years believing that if I wanted support, I needed to make sure everything happened. I needed to remind. Manage. Organise. Oversee. Keep things moving.

What I couldn’t see was that my control left very little room to receive. Because receiving requires space. If I vacuum the floors every single time they get dirty, there is no opportunity for Andrew to vacuum them. If I solve every problem, there is no opportunity for him to contribute. If I jump in before anyone else has a chance, I rob myself of the possibility of being supported.

That doesn’t mean never vacuuming. It doesn’t mean sitting on the couch waiting for someone else to rescue me. It simply means noticing where I’m gripping too tightly. Where I’m stepping in too quickly. Where my need for control is getting in the way of the very thing I want.

Because what I wanted wasn’t clean floors. Not really.

What I wanted was support. Partnership. The feeling that we were in this together. And ironically, I found more of that when I stopped trying to create it myself.

Journal Prompts

• Where am I stepping in before someone else has the chance?

• What am I doing that I secretly wish I had help with?

• Have I mistaken “different” for “doesn’t care”?

• What support might become available if I loosened my grip?

• Where could I experiment with relinquishing control this week?

Ready to Go Beyond Reading About the Skills?

Learning about The 6 Intimacy Skills™ is powerful. Living them is where everything changes.

If you’re ready to stop trying to figure it all out on your own and want support applying these concepts to your real relationship, Love Unlocked is my coaching program for women who want to heal the disconnect, bring back the spark, and create lasting change from the inside out.

Learn More About Love Unlocked

And if you’re not sure where to start, book a call and we’ll talk about what’s happening in your relationship, what you’re longing for, and whether these skills could help.

Book a Call

With love,
Kayla