{"id":2288,"date":"2020-05-26T12:29:21","date_gmt":"2020-05-26T17:29:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/?p=2288"},"modified":"2020-05-26T12:29:21","modified_gmt":"2020-05-26T17:29:21","slug":"can-this-time-at-home-help-your-marriage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/2020\/05\/26\/can-this-time-at-home-help-your-marriage\/","title":{"rendered":"Can This Time at Home Help Your Marriage?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Image by Sasin Tipchai<\/a> from Pixabay<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Reprinted with permission from Psychology Today<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

No doubt you\u2019ve seen the headlines about women\u2019s burden\u00a0increasing as everyone stays home<\/a>.\u00a0This pandemic, with mandated isolation at home with our families, forces us to pay\u00a0attention<\/a>\u00a0to our loved ones and our family dynamics. Those sheltering in place with spouses and children are spending more time together than anyone ever hoped or dreaded.\u00a0Many of those lucky enough to be able to work from home are doing so while trying to homeschool as well.<\/p>\n

I think I will scream if I see one more magazine article about couples where the father shuts his study door after breakfast and protects his work time during the day while the mother tries to homeschool her children while also working full-time for pay, online. Are all the men out there really still Neanderthals?\u00a0Is the coronavirus really a disaster for feminism<\/a>?<\/p>\n

We do not yet know if both parents, in two-parent families, are being pressed into simultaneously working for pay and doing the child care that has suddenly morphed into teaching. Or whether only mothers are handling this double shift on steroids.<\/p>\n

What can we guess from past research?\u00a0We know that the many\u00a0mothers in heterosexual families do\u00a0more child care and housework than their husbands<\/a>\u00a0before this crisis began. And we know this extra work matters. Research shows that\u00a0motherhood still hampers women\u2019s careers<\/a>\u00a0while fatherhood increases men\u2019s earnings.\u00a0Forthcoming research in\u00a0Gender & Society<\/em><\/a>\u00a0shows there is not only a\u00a0gender<\/a>\u00a0pay gap but a benefit gap too.\u00a0Currently, it feels as if the world is going to hell in a handbasket and taking feminism with it. Can we hope for anything different in the middle of a crisis?<\/p>\n

I think so. Let\u2019s start by getting our facts straight. Only then can we use research evidence to help shape our decisions about family life. In heterosexual partnerships, men, overall, do less housework and child care than women do, even when both work full-time for pay outside the home.\u00a0But, over time, each generation of men, internationally,\u00a0does more than their fathers.<\/a>\u00a0While we should not forget that men often do less than their wives, \u00a0we also should remember that most men\u00a0do more than their fathers.\u00a0Change is possible.\u00a0Change is happening<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0wide-angle lens only looking at\u00a0sex<\/a>\u00a0differences obscures as much as it illuminates.\u00a0Statistics that only compare men vs. women hide the diversity within each group.\u00a0Here is some really big news that gets lost.<\/p>\n

First,\u00a0as my colleague and I have shown,\u00a0<\/a>nearly everyone in American society believes that women and men should have equal rights at work, and most believe that men and women should share the work at home equally as well.\u00a0But even more startling is that nearly half of\u00a0American parents, both women and men,\u00a0report that they equally share the work of earning a living and running their homes.\u00a0<\/a>Now, surely some are reporting egalitarian marriages because they are mixing wishful thinking with everyday reality.\u00a0But still,\u00a0surely many people report accurately.<\/p>\n

Very few men in previous generations shared the work at home.\u00a0I\u2019m old enough to know this from experience. In the 1970s, my then husband\u2019s boss told me we shouldn\u2019t have children because I wasn\u2019t the kind of wife\u00a0a lawyer needed if he was to be a father.\u00a0Can you imagine a boss telling his male employee\u2019s wife that now? So let\u2019s not underestimate the cultural changes that have occurred.<\/p>\n

If some\u00a0couples are really walking the walk, as well as talking the talk, what does that mean for the rest of us?\u00a0Good news for the single heterosexual woman. No woman has to settle for a man who doesn\u2019t share her commitment to equality;\u00a0feminist men are out there.\u00a0I know because I talked to some of them for my last book,\u00a0Where the Millennials Will Take Us<\/a><\/em>.\u00a0We also know from\u00a0international research<\/a>\u00a0that feminist ideas matter: Those couples that endorse feminism are most likely to share the housework and child care.<\/p>\n

If you are a woman now facing working from home, or perhaps an essential worker on the front lines every day, and married to a man who hasn\u2019t noticed how much effort it takes to run your household, now is the time to show him.\u00a0If you are a man married to an essential worker who comes home after her day at the hospital to a dirty house where you’ve been working all day, how fair is that?\u00a0If you are a woman married to a man who claims to believe you are in an equal partnership and then doesn\u2019t clean the bathroom or supervise the online classes, here is your chance to change that.\u00a0Try this.<\/p>\n

Families are all home together for more time than anyone could have ever imagined.\u00a0Kids who are old enough need to step up and help around the house, as well as sit in front of their screens for both school and pleasure.\u00a0So it\u2019s the perfect time to have a frank conversation, a family conference, about housework, care work, and equality.\u00a0Who should be doing what and why?<\/p>\n

Research shows<\/a>\u00a0that women who work at jobs that require negotiation tend to have more egalitarian marriages. They bring those skills home to challenge the often hidden and taken-for-granted male privilege in families.\u00a0Of course, negotiation takes time\u00a0and energy.\u00a0At the moment, many of us have\u00a0the time, and in the long run, this will save energy.<\/p>\n

In this moment, every family has two options.\u00a0You can do whatever you have always done, and for many\u00a0heterosexual families that means letting the workload fall disproportionately on women\u2019s shoulders.\u00a0But with women so clearly being “essential workers” in this crisis<\/a>,\u00a0perhaps afterward, they will be\u00a0mad at the gender inequality at home, and maybe eventually get even, leading to more divorces in the coming year.<\/p>\n

There is another path. We are a species that can adapt and change.\u00a0Just because something has been so in the past, does not mean it has to be so in the future.\u00a0You can be one of those families based on respect and equality, where men don\u2019t expect wives to manage the family affairs as well as do more of the child care, cooking, and cleaning.<\/p>\n

How do we get from here to there?\u00a0Each member of the couple should sit down and make a list of what needs doing and who should do it.\u00a0Then come back together \u2014 and if you have kids, include them \u2014\u00a0so that each of you has to make sensible, logical arguments and\u00a0sound like an adult.<\/p>\n

How many meals have to be cooked each day, dishes washed or stacked into the dishwasher?\u00a0Don’t forget about clothes that need to be cleaned and\u00a0toilets washed.\u00a0Comparing those lists can be enlightening. Just don\u2019t have the woman of the house make the list or you have just undermined the process. If that’s what happened, rip up that list and start over.\u00a0Much of the work is in management of the household and research shows that often gets ignored.<\/a><\/p>\n

Compare lists and\u00a0then begin to negotiate.\u00a0Volunteer for tasks so that they are shared fairly. Don\u2019t leave one parent (read: mother) to be the enforcer, or you are back right where you started, presuming the family work is a mother\u2019s job.\u00a0Assign a different person each week to be \u201cthe enforcer,\u201d to make sure everyone is doing their fair share.<\/p>\n

This pandemic is turning life upside down. We all feel somewhat out of control. One important lesson I’ve learned from Kerry Ann Rockquemore, who facilitates a group of people in the Joy Collective,\u00a0<\/a>is that it is very important to take control of what you can, to empower yourself by making\u00a0goals<\/a>\u00a0and meeting them, especially\u00a0in a moment in history when so much is externally constrained. So take charge of what you can indeed control.<\/p>\n

We can\u2019t control the virus\u00a0or the need to stay at home,\u00a0but we can use the unexpected time together to make home a better place, and our marriages more equitable partnerships.\u00a0Why not give it a try?\u00a0When will there ever be a better time, and more time, to make your\u00a0marriage<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0family\u00a0stronger and more fair?<\/p>\n

Barbara J. Risman is a Distinguished Professor of Sociology in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago.\u00a0 She is also a Senior Scholar at the Council of Contemporary Families.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reprinted with permission from Psychology Today No doubt you\u2019ve seen the headlines about women\u2019s burden\u00a0increasing as everyone stays home.\u00a0This pandemic, with mandated isolation at home with our families, forces us to pay\u00a0attention\u00a0to our loved ones and our family dynamics. Those sheltering in place with spouses and children are spending more time together than anyone ever […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2095,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[8959],"class_list":["post-2288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-families"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2288","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2095"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2288"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2288\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2290,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2288\/revisions\/2290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}