The Awkward Middle

Couples who decide to change how they divide the household often expect the hard part to be the conversation. Usually it isn't. The hard part comes afterwards, in the weeks and months when the old arrangement has stopped working and the new one hasn't settled.

I call this the awkward middle. If you are trying to change the division of household labor in your own home, this is the stretch to prepare for, because most attempts fail here, and in predictable ways.

What the middle feels like

For the person taking on new work, usually the man, the middle is full of mistakes. He forgets the PE kit. He buys the wrong size. He doesn't know where anything is, and every question reminds both of them that he hasn't been doing this.

For the person handing work over, it is often worse. She watches tasks done differently, sometimes badly. She knows exactly how to fix them. Every instinct says to step in, and stepping in is how the old arrangement comes back.

Both are unlearning habits built over years. Habits change through repetition, and repetition takes time that feels wasted.

Three ways it fails

Regression

Under pressure, people return to what they know. A busy week, a sick child, and suddenly she is doing it all again because it's faster. Once the pattern is back, nobody quite remembers deciding to give up.

Rescue

She steps in to fix something he is doing badly. Each rescue tells him the task is still really hers. In 1999, Sarah Allen and Alan Hawkins described maternal gatekeeping: beliefs and behaviours that, in some mothers, limited fathers' involvement in family work. About a fifth of the 622 mothers in their study fit the pattern. Later work stressed that gatekeeping is often a response to low involvement as well as a cause, and I don't think it explains most stalled changes. In the awkward middle, though, rescue is where it bites.

Resentment

He feels criticised for trying. She feels she is still doing the work, now with the added job of watching it done badly. Both start to wonder whether the old way was better. I described what happens when a task done badly drifts back in Weaponized Incompetence.

How couples get through the middle

The couples who reach the other side do a few things on purpose.

They agree in advance how long the middle will last. Three months is a common choice. During that time mistakes are expected and nobody reverts, however busy it gets.

They agree on what counts as an emergency. If a mistake is unsafe, she steps in. If it's only different or slower, she doesn't. Mismatched clothes are not an emergency.

They transfer whole areas instead of single tasks, so he learns the noticing as well as the doing. See Helping Is Not Holding.

And they talk about it on a schedule, once a week, instead of in the moment. In John Gottman's laboratory studies of newlyweds, couples in which the husband accepted his wife's influence tended to do better. Some broader claims from that work have been questioned. A weekly review still gives her influence somewhere to go besides an argument at the kitchen sink.

Why it is worth it

There is evidence that changes, once made, can last. When Quebec reserved parental leave weeks for fathers in 2006, Ankita Patnaik found that the affected households showed less gender specialization in paid and unpaid work years later. Those fathers went through their own awkward middle, at home with a baby, and it changed their households for good.

That is the hopeful part. The middle is temporary, and the arrangement on the other side can last for decades.

Questions people ask

How long does it take to change the division of household labor?

Many couples find the transition takes a few months. Agreeing on a set period, often around three months, helps both partners push through the mistakes without reverting.

What is maternal gatekeeping?

A term from Sarah Allen and Alan Hawkins for beliefs and behaviours that limit fathers' involvement in family work. Later research suggests it is often a response to low involvement as well as a cause.

Why do couples slip back into the old arrangement?

Usually through regression under pressure, through rescuing tasks that are done badly, or through resentment on both sides during the transition.