Housework isn’t usually taken seriously as a task of labour, but it’s a lot harder than people think.
Whether you go to work or stay at home, there will always be a constant stream of things to do to keep your home functioning, food in stomachs and clothes clean - and if you’re not doing it, someone else is doing it for you.
But what many people don’t consider is that the way that we include the word ‘help’ when asking for a hand with the dishes could be detrimental.
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This is why former therapist and mum is changing the script when divvying up housework to her children, after battling the same thing with her husband a year prior.
Sam Kelly is a former therapist who now coaches’ mums on how to manage stressors and issues.
She once tried to ‘do it all’, picking up work and housework and childcare but is now changing the way that she views labour and words it to her three kids, Hero, 11, Goldie, nine, and Shepard, six.
The 38-year-old spoke to Good Morning America about why she no longer asks the kids for ‘help’ around the house.
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She explained that she had hit her breaking point with an uneven division of labour with her husband, Chas Kelly, 18 months ago. After splitting tasks more evenly, Kelly realised that she was continuing the same pattern she had been doing with her husband with her children.
She said: “It's a Friday night and I'm sitting down to make a list, a Saturday chore chart list for my kids, and I was like, ‘What am I doing? I am doing the exact same thing for my kids that I just spent the past year of my life trying to work with my husband to unlearn.’”
This is why she now refuses to use the word ‘help’ when talking to her children about housework.
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Sharing to Instagram, she said on a post: “I try to never phrase ’help’ when referring to the work of managing a home.
“When we say things like ‘helping mom,’ we're implying that it's mom who has the actual ownership over the job of managing the home and everyone else is just ‘helping’ support her in that role.
“But that's the message we're working to deconstruct here. It's not mom's job or role to be the one in charge of everything for the home and family while everyone else just chips in and helps here and there. The work of managing a home is 100 per cent of a team effort.”
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Now, she uses the word ‘work’ as it communicates that tasks within the home are actual work and not the responsibility of one person.
She explained: “Labeling it as work doesn't have to be a negative thing. It fact, it's healthy for kids to see work as morally neutral and something that they can become familiar with”.
“Increasing their tolerance of an comfort level with work simply by using the word ‘work’ vs. ‘help’ will increase their resiliency. So let's call it like it is: They're not helping you. They're working with you.”
The mum went on to tell GMA that she’s also teaching her kids to 'notice what needs to be done in the house' and then getting stuck into the task.
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Even though a lot of people were divided about her opinion, it could save a lot of mums struggling with managing the whole home.
Topics: Instagram, News, Parenting, Sex and Relationships, Life
Britt Jones