When my husband told me scrubbing toilets was “women’s work,” I knew exactly what to do. What happened next involved his precious Xbox, my cousin’s cleaning skills, and a few words that turned his world upside down. The look on his face was absolutely priceless.
Looking back now, I should have seen the warning signs earlier.
A man standing in his house | Source: Midjourney
Don’t get me wrong, Eric wasn’t a bad husband.
He was actually pretty wonderful in many ways. He remembered my birthday, brought me flowers on random days, and could make me laugh until my sides hurt. During our first year together, I genuinely believed I’d hit the marriage jackpot.
“You’re so lucky,” my friends would tell me. “Eric’s such a catch.”And he was, in his own way. He worked hard at his job as a software engineer, pulling long hours and bringing home a decent paycheck.
He never complained about handling the “outside” stuff like grocery shopping, taking out trash, and dealing with car maintenance. These were his domains, and he handled them without being asked.
But inside our home? That was apparently my territory.
I worked full-time too, managing a small marketing firm downtown. Yet somehow, I was the one scrubbing floors at midnight, doing laundry on weekends, and making sure we had clean dishes for dinner.
Eric would come home, grab a beer, and sink into his gaming chair for hours of Call of Duty or whatever new release had caught his attention.
“Babe, you work so hard,” I’d tell him when guilt tried to creep in. “You deserve to relax.”
He’d flash me that boyish grin that made me fall for him in the first place. “Thanks for understanding, Alice. You’re the best wife a guy could ask for.”
So I kept cleaning. I kept cooking. I kept pretending that love meant doing everything myself while he leveled up his video game characters.
