Men baffled as exhausted mums rebrand housework as 'domestic engineering'
Trying to juggle everything that comes with being a parent, working a job, and trying to manage a busy household is exhausting. People, especially mums, often share memes on social media detailing how they went into a room to sort out one thing but couldn’t do it because there were 30 other things that needed to be done before it. It’s a familiar story.
Laura Danger, 34, a Chicago-based educator and life coach, advocates for labour done at home to be recognized as a job and be covered under schemes from the government. The mom-of-two had to leave the workforce in 2022 after finding childcare so unpredictable and expensive that it seriously impacted her mental health.
Since then she’s become an outspoken supporter on the matter social media platform TikTok, where her videos discussing topics like unpaid leave and domestic labour have resonated with people and racked up over 34 million likes and gathered more than 500,000 followers.
In one of her most recent posts, Laura shared a video of a mom attempting to do something very simple but constantly getting thwarted at every opportunity by something else that needed to be done. Branding being a stay-at-home parent ‘domestic engineering’, the woman was being filmed by her partner as she told him she was feeling overwhelmed.
When asked ‘why’ by her husband, she replies: “I’m trying to clean the kitchen because it’s a disaster but then while cleaning I realise I’m hungry. So I’m going to make some carrot juice but I can’t make my carrot juice because there are no glasses clean. Well, I’m going to load these in the dishwasher but when I open it, it’s clean and full, so I have to unload it. And then I noticed some new clothes that we got for Ember that haven’t been put away.
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“So then I go to put them away but then I realise her room’s a disaster, so then I start to clean up some clothes and put them away in the closet. And then [seeing them in the closet] I realise their tennis shoes are destroyed and I need to buy new tennis shoes for school that starts on Tuesday, so then I come to the kitchen and to make a list but wait, I have no pen.
“So then I’m just going to put it in my phone so I don’t forget it, oh wait, when I open my phone I get an email from my management company about a partnership that I've got to do. In order to record a partnership I gotta put on eyelashes because I don’t want to look like a naked mole rat. But wait, I want to shower but I can’t shower and get my eyelashes wet, so I've got to shower first but I can’t shower first because I want to dye my hair but I can’t dye my hair after the shower.”
Looking close to tears, the woman throws her hands up in the air while the man behind the camera appears to be laughing. He then suggests his partner goes for a nap, to which she replies she can’t because the bed is a mess. Talking about what just happened, Laura reveals it is a perfect example of domestic engineering.
She says: “She just outlined about 15 things that he could jump in and do and instead he laughs at her and tells her that he’ll do the juice, which was the first thing she said she couldn’t do because of all of these other things. By suggesting that she sit down and take a nap he’s completely dismissed the overwhelm and all the stuff that she’s under. They’re in a situation a lot of us know, which is the nag paradox.”
Laura explains that this is a very common problem amongst partners because if she gives directions and he doesn’t do it right or up to a certain standard, all the other stuff with be affected. She also states that by laughing at her he’s dismissing all the stress that she’s under and by offering to do the carrot juice he clearly doesn’t understand what needs to be done.
Inviting people to discuss the video in the comments section, she was inundated with replies from differing points of view. One person wrote: “So true I’ve never heard of domestic engineering… It’s so exhausting when nobody wants to help and then acts like it’s not a big deal but they aren’t.”
Another user wrote: “You know he's going to bring up that he made the juice that one time over and over again when she says he doesn't help.” Someone else said: “The carrot juice is when he stopped listening to her and just started the inner eye roll and chuckle.” And a fourth person added: “The nap suggestion is infuriating. I’m not a tired toddler. I’m an adult who is breaking under all this mental pressure.”
But others felt Laura was being too harsh and there were more simple resolutions. One person wrote: “She could have just grabbed a clean glass from the dishwasher and made her carrot juice, then asked him to help with some things." Another user added: “I think it was a nervous laugh because he doesn't know where to start so his thought was carrot juice.”
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