Do you do your husband's laundry?

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Maybe the differences are the way each of us were brought up or what society says to us today regarding our roles as husband and wife. I personally know no other way than to be the one who takes care of the laundry and the rest of the housework, but again as I said, I stay at home. I am a housewife and love it. I would want it no other way.

I did teach my son to do laundry so he will be prepared when he goes off to college. Now if he needs something that isn’t done or ready he will take care of it but I can’t even imagine asking my husband to do laundry. I never saw my father doing laundry or my father in law and both my mother and my mother in law worked full time. That is where I would see it in a different light. If I worked also, I would have a different opinion in sharing the housework because I saw how tired both women were after a hard day at work and then coming home to fix a meal or do laundry. Then it definitely needs to be shared. I think that is maybe how most people who both work see it today. Share the chores. They have to because I think women realized they can’t do both, maintain the home by herself and work fulltime despite what the old commercials used to tell them they could.
 
Diana_Catherine said:
Maybe the differences are the way each of us were brought up or what society says to us today regarding our roles as husband and wife. I personally know no other way than to be the one who takes care of the laundry and the rest of the housework, but again as I said, I stay at home. I am a housewife and love it. I would want it no other way.

I did teach my son to do laundry so he will be prepared when he goes off to college. Now if he needs something that isn’t done or ready he will take care of it but I can’t even imagine asking my husband to do laundry. I never saw my father doing laundry or my father in law and both my mother and my mother in law worked full time. That is where I would see it in a different light. If I worked also, I would have a different opinion in sharing the housework because I saw how tired both women were after a hard day at work and then coming home to fix a meal or do laundry. Then it definitely needs to be shared. I think that is maybe how most people who both work see it today. Share the chores. They have to because I think women realized they can’t do both, maintain the home by herself and work fulltime despite what the old commercials used to tell them they could.
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👍 This is pretty much my outlook in a nutshell. I’m a housewife, and I love doing housework. Oh, sure, there are a couple of chores that I absolutely loathe, but I honestly enjoy vacuuming, scrubbing, cooking, and, yes, laundry. My husband works and handles most of the finances, the latter not because I couldn’t do it but because he really is better at it; he’s an accountant, for goodness’ sakes, and I majored in the arts. I could do it…and it would take me three times as long to do it half as well. Same thing is true, quite frankly, of him and domestic chores.

Now, when the first baby comes, we’ve agreed that I may need more help around the house. We’ll play that by ear. He does know how to do laundry, and he can vacuum. If I need him to, I’ll ask for help in those areas. That having been said, laundry really doesn’t take all that long. It’s not like it’s a hundred and fifty years ago and I’m scrubbing each article by hand! Yay for modern appliances!

And as to your point about your son–ABSOLUTELY. All of our kids, regardless of sex, will be able to do household chores, basic household repairs, budget, etc, etc before they leave for school. Those are tasks which everyone should be able to do. Sure, it’s nice now that I’m married and have an accountant to handle my financial stuff 😛 , but I worked for a long time before I was married and had to budget, do my taxes, etc. So will most women in this day and age, just as most men will not be married at 18 and have someone to do their laundry through college!
 
I am a husband so I am not sure I am allowed to vote, but we usually share that kind of work around the house. She does prefer to do the laundry herself though because she is very perfectionist about how it should be hanged, and she gets grumpy when I do it differently. I do iron everything that needs to be ironed though, like sheets, shirts and so on.
God bless,
D.
 
There is some work that one spouse or the other simply would not do for the other? That’s a very weird concept to me.

I do essentially all the laundry, but not because my husband does not do laundry. When our twins were babies and got sick, we’d strip them down together and clean them up, then I would typically tuck them back into bed and he’d wash out all the barfed-on items and wash them. (This was not an uncommon occurrence–we had “barfers”.)

I agree with those who say that everyone ought to be taught all the skills needed to run a household while they are still at home with their parents. You don’t know that you child won’t remain single or marry someone who becomes incapacitated, and have to do all those things, and in these days you don’t know what your child’s spouse will have been taught. It is hard enough to find a spouse that is worthy in other respects without having to reject someone because they don’t have a skill that can be taught to them after marriage. If the “perfect husband” or “perfect wife” can’t cook or doesn’t know how to run a washer, fine. If you know all these things, all that is necessary is that he or she be willing to learn. Then you’re set.

I also agree that the spouse doing the job gets to decide how it is to be done, within the general boundaries of hygiene, rust prevention, and so on. If that isn’t good enough for the other spouse, then they can voluntarily take on the job and do it their own way, but they do not get to complain about it. Sometimes it is not laziness that gets in the way of an even distribution of the paid and unpaid work that goes into maintaining a household, but the pride of one person who maintains that his or her way is the only “right” way of doing something! 😛
 
No, his mother does. 😛
Well, she does mine too… 😉
Most of the time, at least. It’s a HUGE blessing to have her help us!

When she’s super busy I, do, OF COURSE, do my husband’s laundry! Actually, it’s more of a family affair. Sorting is done immediately (we have color/white/light piles in the bedroom upstairs), then I start/transfer the loads to the machines, but we get the older kids to do all the folding and putting-away… no one gets away without helping! 👍
 
I do all the stain-removing and laundry for my husband and I. When I was in the workforce, all of the laundry was done on Saturday. This included ironing everything and hanging up or folding neatly in drawers. Now, I wash clothing and towels every day and bed linens every 4th day. I don’t follow all of Martha Stewart’s tips, but we are presentable when we go out. My working husband will catch up the washing for me if I’ve had the flu and hamper full.
 
VeritasLuxMea said:
My wife and I have an arrangement—I do the laundry, but she folds it. I find folding so tedious that I gladly volunteered to do the laundry if she would do the folding.
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This seems to me like a fair arrangement. I detest folding laundry, much the same as you.
 
kelvinf said:
I am not yet in this state of life but I am not sure I would do my wife’s laundry nor wish that she does mine. I see this as part of personal hygiene, something everybody takes care of by his or herself. 🤷

I wouldn’t wash her hands for her so…
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Normally I do the laundry. Our washing machine is broken at the moment so my husband takes the laundry to the laundromat. a) because with my heart condition is physically challenging to lug laundry around and b) because the laundromat has some male customers that make me uncomfortable. Although I have gone with my husband to help him sometimes.

As far as hygiene. I was hospitalized a little over ten years with severe digestive issues. I was in massive pain and was vomiting and having bathroom issues. My husband did things for me I’m sure he wasn’t even envisioning he would ever do. I was eventually diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease. When I had my pacemaker/defibrillator wire replaced and was not allowed to raise arm above my head he’d hop in the shower to help me wash my hair. He also injured his right hand at work years ago and stitches and I helped him wash up. Also when lung collapsed years ago, he had to have a chest tube put in and helped him wash up while he was in the hospital.

Really laundry is so far removed from “personal” hygiene to me. Sickness happens -things can get far more personal than washing someone’s laundry -or hands. And then children come -changing diapers, getting peed on, cleaning up vomit -you name it.

Separating laundry by each individual just wastes time, not to mention water, electricity and detergent. Besides what about the kids? Where does their laundry go? If my husband wanted to do his own laundry I wouldn’t make an issue of it. We never considered it because it just seemed normal to put it together and wash it.
 
I am in the minority of NO! I used to do it but then I washed his clothes twice when his wallet was in his pocket. The first time it was a public laundry and someone got the wallet out of the washer and took all the cash (it was a few hundred dolalrs) and then threw the wallet in the trash. So he got his drivers license back but lost all the money 😦 He was upset, told me I should check the pockets! He does manual labor and his clothes are stinky and I don’t really want to be sticking my hands in the pocket so I told him he needs to empty the darn pockets when he takes them off. Fast forward a year or two, we are in our own home with our own washer/dryer and it happens again! This time he had checks in his wallet - payments from customers. You guessed it - the checks were ruined and he was mad again :mad: So now I do my and my son’s laundry and my husband takes care of his own. Now when the wallet gets washed, I’m off the hook ;)👍
 
My husband is just way more uptight about doing the laundry his way than I am, so I let him do it. I could care less about what laundry detergent we use. My husband insists that we use Tide and that he does the laundry better than I do…fine. He can do it. He just lets me know when to pick up detergent and fabric softener at the store. Case Closed. I fold it. It works.

I’ll do laundry if my son and I start running out of clothes and he still hasn’t done it. (Sometimes, he skips a week and then realizes that we have no clean clothes! The basement is also where his “man-cave” is, so sometimes he’s busy doing other things and forgets about the laundry.)

Or in special circumstances, like the stuffies or blankets smell gross or they’ve been peed on, etc…

It works for us.
 
Ms_Manners said:
I’ve become an expert at folding to make things look ironed. So I iron some very formal shirts (not worn regularly), sometimes a tablecloth (but some of them are also just dried and folded the right way).
My MIL is very proud of her housekeeping skills (and rightly so) and at first she was horrified when she heard that I rarely iron, but she changed her mind when she saw that our clothes looked nice even without ironing.
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Most things look fine if you just hang them up right away.
 
I guess as I said earlier that I am kind of assuming that most of the people that share the laundry either both work or both stay at home. At least that is how it is sounding to me.

On another note as someone mentioned, a housewife that recently has a baby and is taking care of this newborn or maybe has many little ones would definitely need her husbands help with the laundry, even if she is the one at home and he goes off to work. She very well may need help in the evenings catching up.
 
I’m a SAHM, so I do everybody’s laundry. 😉
And I fold and put away.
I’m sure if I asked hubby to do it, he probably would - but I haven’t. 🤷

~ PetiteFoi
 
50% of my husband laundry I do lovingly … We still outsource his shirts to be laundered and ironed to his mom.
 
Great thread! My husband is still laughing! Why? Here’s what he told me to share with you:
“I insist that my wife do the laundry because if she didn’t, I wouldn’t have time to do all the grocery shopping and cooking around here!”

My husband I were married when I was 17 and he was 20 and we are now both in our 60’s. Within our first week together, he invited several of his buddies home from the ship—he was in the Navy. Anyway, he bought home a chicken for me to cook and went in the bathroom to shower. When he came out, he discovered that I had never cut a chicken before in my life (much less actually COOKED one!) and that instead of fried chicken we would need to reconsider and perhaps make sweet and sour chicken as I had mutilated that hen in ways I cannot begin to describe–at least not on here! My husband is from a restaurant family and is a great cook. Our 5 adult kids still call HIM for recipes and cooking tips. So yes–I shut up and do the wash! But now, with all 5 kids raised and gone–we do divide the house up into his and hers vacuuming zones! Before the kids grew up, it was their job as both my hubby and I worked–we lost the last our little troupe of slaves (as we used to jokingly refer to our kids) to college a few years back–so now we have to do it ourselves (sigh!) LOL!
 
Mrs_Sally said:
I don’t get this whole separate thing about laundry. we have always done “family” laundry. it is way easier. We also do family folding. Other than a few things clothes are clothes. my t-shirts or jeans or dress pants are just like his and just like my kids and they all go in the same load.:rolleyes:
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I’m with you–I was raised with all the laundry going into one heap (we had a chute in one bathroom that went straight into a collection point in the laundry room, then everything got sorted into lights, darks, whites, and towels). Now, however, I have three hampers (laundry room is on the same floor … yay) for whites, lights, and darks. Everyone’s laundry goes into the same load within those three categories, except my daughter and I have some clothes that require extra care (gentle wash cycle, hang dry or dry flat) that get held out to be their own load.

Even when living with my ex, his laundry got done in the same way.

My rule is that everyone is responsible for getting their clothes to the hamper, and if it’s not there when laundry gets done, the owner is responsible for getting it washed (or doing without until next time). And right now I don’t do laundry at all. My middle son and twins each take one of the loads to the washer, then the dryer, then the fold and sort. I have a rotation for them so no one is stuck with the “hard load” (the whites–it’s the fold and sort that is hard). Oldest son is now out in his own place.
 
I almost always do. If I’m busy and haven’t thrown something in that he needs for work than he’ll run a load. But mostly everyone’s laundry is piled in together and I do it.
 
I agree with Starrsmother - this is a great thread.

Starr’s comment about cooking made me laugh. Both of my folks could cook - but they didn’t always get things coordinated. More than once dinner hit the table with a bit too much seasoning (especially pepper) because they had each seasoned the dish thinking the other had not. My parents were always busy with different things, so didn’t necessarily stay in the kitchen during the whole cooking process. 🤷

Someone mentioned about sorting into loads and issues of having new babies and it reminded me of what my mom told me about when I was born.
At that time she had a wringer washer and no dryer. It was in the basement and the doctor had told her - no stairs for something like 6 weeks. My dad had never done laundry before so my oldest sister who was all of about 5 years old directed daddy on sorting and such.
Yes - you read right, she was about 5 years old.
And the wringer washer, and the fabrics of the time (for those who do not know) requires MORE sorting smaller loads and physically running the clothes through the wringer (usually twice) before hanging the stuff up to dry. We had a nice big basement so there was room to do this. Then - after things were dry they could take them down and bring them up-stairs and mom would fold things.

This may sound strange - but if you knew my sister and my dad - you’d not think it so strange. 😉

Fast forward many years - and my sister is married with husband and children = none of whom know anything about laundry - or cooking - or grocery shopping. :eek:
Then she has a mild stroke…can’t get up and down stairs anymore…tires easily…can’t be stressed out about things…kids and hubby have to scramble to learn all of these skills. No more relying exclusively on mom for all of these things.
It’s great to see how much more the family pulls together now than they did before.

So - I guess the moral in all of this is that it is good for families to each learn the jobs of the other. Maybe not to perfection, but at least enough to understand the basics.

Peace
James
 
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