'AITA for asking my partner to help with my household chores even though he has his own place?' UPDATED

"AITA for asking my partner to help with household chores at my place even though he also has his own apartment?"

I (42f) have been together with my partner (36m) for over a year and the relationship has been pretty drama-free so far. For the past six months he has been spending roughly 6 out of 7 days at my place with me and my kiddo (6m) from a previous relationship. We mostly hang out here because I have to be there for the kiddo and because he has roommates, and I don't.

To be clear, I love having him around. A few months after he started spending so much time here, I asked him to start helping with the household chores, though only ones which he contributes to (cleaning and garbage) or from which he benefits (laundry and cooking and use of my car).

I do the great majority of all work associated with my son, as well as the majority overall in the household (really, I only ask that he does the garbage, helps with the car since he uses it, and helps with occasional deep cleaning). He agreed initially but asked me to ask him directly to do these things, which I do, I've even started making lists.

However, he often forgets or puts them off for so long that I end up doing them myself. His argument for not doing chores is that he also has to maintain his apartment and also is making a sacrifice by not being at his place where he can pursue his hobbies. So, his contribution, in effect, is that he is here. Just to be clear, we both work full time (wfh), split mutual costs evenly, money is not the issue.

Things blew up yesterday after I had a hard day at work and with the kiddo. He is in the process of changing jobs and doesn't have much to do at work, so he has been gaming 6-8 hours a day this week. I found it really frustrating that I was struggling to get the laundry and cooking done in between juggling the kid and work and he was gaming on the couch all day.

He got angry when I brought it up (I could have been a little less snarky…) and said that I don't acknowledge the sacrifice he is making by being at my place and that the benefit he gets from my work is negligible since I would have to do laundry and cook for myself and my son even if he wasn't here.

Since the problems we are having are roommate problems and not romantic partner problems, I suggested we go back to dating so that we can each have our own space and he can pursue his hobbies at his place. He got really angry and accused me of trying to end the relationship. So, AITA?

Commenters had a lot to say in response.

JSJ34 wrote:

NTA. He lives in your home 86% of the time. Therefore he should be doing 43% of the cooking/ washing up/ cleaning/ hoovering in areas he uses and taking out garbage bags etc, minus the clearing up after your son part (but most partners would share in that or help your son do what he can if child is still up when he’s there).

BF is benefiting from having meals cooked for him and a clean warm house that he is living in most of his time without any adult responsibilities & effort. He’s using your utilities and home as if it’s a maid service hotel. He has his feet well and truly under the table here with on-site maid and chef, and is hoping you haven’t noticed.

What he said about how “lucky you are he’s staying there” is bunkum, as he’s free to go home.I think your plan of his returning to his own place more and living there is spot on. When he comes over, he takes turns to cook and clean up kitchen or doesn’t come over for dinner!

He does his laundry at his own home, and doesn’t use your car nor get “Gf taxi” service… he takes his showers at his own home or he takes turns in cleaning the shower and bathroom … Use it - clean it, is my motto!

When I was dating and my then bf (/bfs over time) came over regularly, even for an evening they brought food, helped cook or cooked for me, and washed up (I washed up if they cooked), took bin bags out when it was getting full, even mopped after i hoovered kitchen. Just ‘to be helpful’ as they weren’t interested in sitting around whilst I did all the work. I certainly didn’t do their laundry.

OP responded:

Thanks for your comment! I appreciate your perspective. For me it is obvious that if you contribute to the mess, you contribute to cleaning it. Even when I am a guest at someone’s house, I feel uncomfortable if they are working and I am not.

I understand that not everyone grows up with this expectation, but we have talked about it multiple times and I just don‘t know what else to do. I have expressed before that not having a partner contribute equally is a hard limit for me, this isn’t something I can imagine Long term. Thanks for confirming that I’m not the only one who sees it this way!

aj_alva wrote:

NTA. Everything you are saying is a good reason to push him back to his own place... but ask yourself, OP, would things be different if he gave up his apartment? (Probably not, since you still have to cook, and clean, and do laundry anyways...) Is this the kind of relationship you want? Another kid?

OP responded:

Thanks your your perspective here, I appreciate it. He claims that he would take more responsibility if it was our shared space, but I’m not willing to make such a move if I don’t have the feeling that we will share household burdens equally. So he will never get a chance to prove it even if that is the case 🤷🏻‍♀️ thanks again!

OP responded to multiple comments regarding her boyfriend’s sacrificing when he is at her place:

Apparently having all his stuff around so he can pursue his hobbies? His guitar he could bring, but honestly I don’t have space for his gaming PC or huge TV. He has his PS5 here and uses my TV, and his tablet and gym stuff is here as well. I don’t really buy this excuse 100%, I don’t give up all my hobbies to spend time with him and would never expect him to do so for me, that’s not healthy.

I miss him when I don’t see him, but it also gives me time for self-care and individual times with kiddo, which is important, so It’s not like I’m insisting that he be here all the time. Maybe he misses having his own space, which I could understand, but I would never be angry for him to need some time by himself. I can keep myself busy.

Five days later, OP shared an update.

Hi all, I wanted to give a quick update because I really appreciate all the thoughtful comments that came in, they really helped me to clarify my own position. Also, the events of the past few days have blown my mind, though in a positive way (no, nothing at the level of me checking his phone and finding out he’s cheating 😉)

We had a long talk yesterday concerning what had happened and where we saw potential conflicts.

Throughout the conversation, I felt very frustrated because I didn’t feel that I was being heard and understood.\

His comments largely revolved around me needing to ask him, which I was understanding as him shirking the mental load of household chores. At some point I mentioned that I had asked him repeatedly to take out the trash and he hadn’t done so. He disagreed and told me I had only asked him once.

We disagreed on this back and forth for a while until it occurred to me that aside from my initially asking him to take out the trash, I had never directly asked him to do so. I had implied that the trash was looking full, I had commented on the swarm of fruit flies, I had looked pointedly at the full trash can, but the only request he had actually understood was the direct verbal request I had made.

I had mentioned in the comments that we both suspected that he was on the spectrum, but I was unaware what this really means. Him telling me to tell him was him literally telling me he doesn’t understand nonverbal cues or implied messages, only directly formulated language.

We agreed that we would work on getting him a diagnosis and helping him to find tools to understand what people are saying nonverbally and I would work on really verbalizing my feelings more explicitly.

I think this is a good move not only for our relationship, but for him in general. Going through the world missing half the information that most other people seem to implicitly understand must be pretty scary.

I’m sure this update doesn’t fit the Reddit mold (the police were not called, there was no fistfight…) but this change in perspective is blowing my mind. It makes me wonder how many other interactions I have had where I assumed people were being intentionally obtuse or lazy but it was just that we were effectively speaking different languages.

I’m not naive enough to think that a diagnosis will solve all our problems or that this might not later emerge as an incompatibility we can’t overcome, but I see it as an avenue to pursue a solution.

I’ve also let him know that I will still call him out for being a lazy ass, I’ll just have to do very explicitly 😂

So that’s it, we will see where the journey goes from here. If anyone has had similar experiences I would love to hear about them.

The internet continued to share their thoughts.

Anoncommenter wrote:

So, he's still putting the full burden for housework and managing it squarely on your shoulders. This is not the victory you seem to think it is. He doesn't want a partner, he wants a mother. And he has successfully convinced you that he doesn't have to step up at all. Autism is not an excuse for being a lazy slob, and you're doing the autistic community a serious disservice by buying that crock of BS.

OP responded:

Oh, I’m not that naive, if he doesn’t step up on a continuous basis, I will be nagging, and since that is what he wants I won’t feel bad. But I’ll be nagging not by making indirect comments, I will be stating directly that he should take the damn trash out now, because any implied comments or nonverbal communication will go over his head.

So I’m not excusing him from doing chores, he has to do his part, but I’ll feel no shame in speaking very directly about it.

Tinman5278 wrote:

"We disagreed on this back and forth for a while until it occurred to me that aside from my initially asking him to take out the trash, I had never directly asked him to do so. I had implied that the trash was looking full, I had commented on the swarm of fruit flies, I had looked pointedly at the full trash can, but the only request he had actually understood was the direct verbal request I had made"

This issue is NOT just due to him being on the spectrum. People who are not on the spectrum also expect you to say what you really mean instead of hinting around and hoping they'll catch on.

claudia_grace wrote:

When he's alone at his own home, how does he know the trash needs to be taken out? I assume that he sees it's full, or sees the flies, or there's some other indicator. He can do the same while living with you, he just won't.

He doesn't need you explicitly telling him to take out the trash. He just doesn't want to do it, and is hoping you'll do it if he ignores it long enough. Same with the rest of the chores.

Send the man back to his home.

poopja wrote:

Yeah you should use your words but why are "we" working on getting him a diagnosis instead of "he" reads the chore list you wrote up and does it without having to be asked more than once? You are once again taking on his mental load.

This conversation should not have been mind blowing and he absolutely is being intentionally lazy. People are going to rip into you for your lack of communication but the fact is that directly asked him to take out the trash ONCE and that is ENOUGH TIMES.

Arete108 wrote:

He may be on the spectrum, but I find -- as a woman who has done this herself -- that women tend to bend over backwards to try to accommodate mental health issues rather than addressing the problematic nature of the issue at hand. Being responsible for the trash means being responsible for the trash.

If you want to accommodate his possible autism, then you can clearly set out rules now such as, "The trash needs to go out every 3 days, or sooner if it's full or if there are bugs. It is your responsibility to check it every day to see if it is full / has bugs."

That is clear direction, but it also saves you the mental load of trying to micromanage this one chore -- and there are a lot of others to manage as well!