CAROLYN HAX
Dear Carolyn: Yesterday, I spilled a bunch of breast milk on the floor because I was pumping while simultaneously trying to clean up our living room during my lunch break from work.
My husband got irritated at me about the spill, which came -close- to hitting his laptop (but didn’t!), and I was apologetic.
On reflection, though, I am furious about that interaction. I have the kind of breast pump that can be worn on the go, and the implication is that I can work while wearing it. But it’s not enough that I’m providing food for our baby while working a full-time job, I have to triple-multitask by trying to do housework during work hours because he never does.
And instead of noticing that I’m spinning so many plates that one came -close- to dropping, and offering to help, he snapped at me for the near miss. Am I just spiraling, or do I have a point? And, is there any way to get this point across without just sounding like a harpy? — Sigh!
Dear Sigh!: You have about eight points (multitasking again!). And your worry that you’re coming across as a dammit-can-weplease-get-to-the-point-when-this-gendered-BS-stops “harpy” only underscores the quadruple bind you’re in. You have to earn it, feed it, clean it, and not offend anyone who doesn’t like the mild discomfort of being reminded that you’re doing triple to his single. His actions were, and inactions are, inexcusable.
You said it well in your letter, ad were calmer about it than I’m being here. So print it out sans last paragraph for him to read.
Good luck. And stop doing more than your housework share. That won’t fix much and certainly doesn’t fix the need for whatever housework it is, but sometimes the answer to a severe imbalance starts with flat refusal to do more things than a so-called equal partner.
Readers’ thoughts:
■ Become the harpy. Be the harpy. Embrace the harpy. But practically, the starting place that I have found most helpful to my own internal thought processes for these conversations is, “I am overwhelmed. What can we do to fix it?” This frames the solution as a joint project rather than taking on the additional work solutions on my own.
■ Read your letter again and pretend someone was asking you that question. What advice would you give someone whose husband was not only watching them clean while pumping breast milk, but who chastised them when it got in his way? Every now and then Carolyn answers a letter that you really want to be fake but you know isn’t.