Sheila Wray Gregoire's Blog, page 56
June 8, 2020
EMOTIONAL LABOR SERIES: How Do We Decide What Needs to Be Done?
When we’re trying to divide up the mental load, one of the problems we run into is agreeing on what actually needs to be done.
This month we’re looking at emotional labor and mental load, and we started our series last week talking about the problem of mental load and the Fair Play solution.
Today I want to turn to deciding what actually needs to be done, what we can let go of, and how we decide on standards.
Sheila's Spotlight: FamZoo Kids' Allowance App!
Deal with the mental load of allowance & chores!
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Spending. Saving. Giving--all in one app. THIS is what I needed for my kids!
We receive a small commission for each sale that helps support the blog and eliminate ads on this site. Thank you for supporting our ministry!
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One of the pushbacks in the comments last week about mental load was that often women are doing too much, and need to get more off of their plate.
Many people said a variation of the argument that women are perfectionists when it comes to housework, which causes two problems:
Men can’t help even if they want to, because they’ll never do enough
Women do things that don’t really need to be done
In the book Fair Play by Eve Rodsky, which I’ve been using at the basis for this series, Rodsky does tackle both of these issues, and I’d like to address them today, too!
Fair Play:
A Game-Changing Solution for Sharing Mental Load and Emotional Labor--
that will transform your marriage!
Check it out here!
What If You’re Doing Stuff that Doesn’t Need to Be Done?
I started this series with the story of Sandra and Mark, and the misunderstanding over Sandra’s morning off. When Sandra came home after her Saturday morning to herself, she ended up having to catch up on a ton of things that had been left undone in her wake–homework not done; piano not practised; shirts not taken out of the dryer; a present not wrapped for the birthday party this afternoon.
Some people commented that Sandra was just doing too much. Why was she supervising homework? Why was the kid taking piano? Why did the birthday present need to be wrapped?
These are valid questions to ask. And one thing that Eve Rodsky says in Fair Play is that before you start dividing out ownership of tasks, you should purge any and all that you don’t want to do. Reduce as much as you can.
What if everything isn’t important? What if you let some of it . . . go? What if you choose with intention what you want to do in service of the home and your family based on what’s most valuable to you and your partner? Rather than doing more, or continuing to believe that you should do it all, save yourself from burnout.
Eve Rodsky
Purge the endless kids’ birthday parties, the Christmas cards, the gifts for all the teachers if you decide to.
But you still have to decide what kind of life you want to live–what values you do have.
Living bare bones, with no extracurriculars at all, with no birthday parties, with no social events, with no church events, isn’t necessarily the kind of life we want to live.
Sure, maybe you get rid of Christmas cards. But if your family is very musical, and if your children are musical, and if you’d love for them to be able to play in a worship band for church one day (and they want that, too), then is taking piano so unreasonable? Is one extracurricular activity per child so unreasonable? For many of us (and especially for our kids) these “extras”, like getting together with friends or doing some family activities, are what make life fun. Sure, sitting in front of a Netflix screen all day is less work. Even staying at home and playing board games all the time is less work. But it’s important to talk as a family and decide: what kind of life do we want?
Denying kids all extracurricular activities, lessons, birthday parties, or outings because it adds to your mental load is a little much. I’d suggest, instead, finding ways to redistribute the mental load so that everyone can have the kind of life they want.
Now, I’ll be the first to say that many families are overscheduled, and I’ve written about that before:
Do Kids’ Schedules Make Your Family Life Crazy
But I think assuming that the reason a woman feels a lot of mental load is BECAUSE the family is too busy is an unfair assumption. It certainly could be the case, but it could also simply be that more of the mental load is on her shoulders (and on her brain).
How Do You Agree on Standards for Doing a Task?
Let’s look at the second half of the critique now: Is the reason that women feel such a high degree of stress from mental load simply because women are perfectionists? And what if the reason that men don’t do more is because they could never do it to her standards?
Rodsky deals with this big elephant in the room as well.
Any action taken by a citizen should reflect the shared values and traditions of that specific community.
Eve Rodsky
I’ll call this the “Minimum Community Standard”–you look at what’s going on in your neighbourhood and in your circle, and you ask, “what would a reasonable person do?”
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For example, the minimum community standard in my neighbourhood for lawn maintenance would look something like this:
The lawn should not be overgrown, although it can be a little long. It can have a few dandelions or weeds, but it can’t be overrun with dandelions. It must not go totally brown in the middle of summer, and so a sprinkler should be used to keep the grass watered, but a few brown patches are okay. Annuals and flowers are nice, but aren’t necessary.
What’s important here is the word MINIMUM. You would not be shunned by neighbours for having a few dandelions and a long lawn. If the lawn became seriously long, or if the dandelions took over so they endangered everyone else’s lawn, you’d be in big trouble. And while most neighbours have some annuals and some perrennial plantings, it isn’t necessary. That’s still a choice. So we don’t have to do the maximum, or even the norm. But we do have to do at least the minimum that is acceptable.
What if you still can’t agree? Rodsky recommends you think of the big picture:
If you cannot come to an agreement over the Minimum Standard of Care (MSC), ask yourselves:
Would a reasonable person (in this case, your partner, spouse, babysitter, caregivers, parents, and in-laws) under similar circumstances do as I’ve done?
What is the community standard, and do we want to adopt this standard within our own home?
What’s the harm for doing, or not doing, it this way? What is our “why”?
…Time is only one component of the fairness equation. Establishing a Minimum Standard of Care—where both partners align with a long-term goal like family safety—encourages a long-term commitment rather than long-term resentment.
Eve Rodsky
Your “why” may be so that your kids learn the value of cleanliness; so that kids stay safe; so that you have an organized and less stressful home. Sometimes it could even just be so that your kids aren’t embarrassed!
And that’s a big point: Do no harm.
When you start talking about the harm that can come from not living up to the standard, some of this becomes more evident.
Let’s see how this plays out in other areas:
Should we wrap birthday presents?
So let’s return to Sandra and Mark. One of Sandra’s complaints was that the birthday present for the party Brian was attending that afternoon was sitting on the kitchen island, but no one had bothered to wrap it. Some in the comments said that wrapping a present wasn’t necessary.
The Minimum Community Standard Solution: In your community, if your child attends a birthday party, do the presents tend to be wrapped? Or would your child be one of the few (or only) child there with an unwrapped gift? In my community, all presents would be wrapped (or at least in gift bags or eco-friendly alternatives). To bring an unwrapped gift would embarrass the child, and thus cause harm. If, in your community, not wrapping is an aberration, then Sandra would have been overreacting and perfectionistic, but otherwise, her desire to wrap is warranted.
Should we iron shirts?
Sandra was upset that Mark didn’t grab the shirts out of the dryer, because now they’d need ironing. Some commenters said that ironing was ridiculous.
The Minimum Community Standard Solution: In your husband’s workplace, are ironed shirts necessary? Would an unironed shirt give a bad impression, and maybe prevent promotions, causing economic harm? Or is it not an issue? In your church or social circle, would unironed shirts be considered out of place? Or is it normal? If he’s a construction worker who goes to a laid back church, the ironing is likely over the top and unnecessary. If he works at a high powered accounting firm, the ironing would be a big deal.
How often should we clean the bathroom?
I received an email from a reader asking, “a wife might consider cleaning the bathroom a weekly job but the husband might consider it a monthly job. How do you decide?”
The Minimum Community Standard Solution: Here’s a quick way to sort that out. Google “chores lists” and see where the chore that you’re in conflict about tends to fit. Is it a weekly? A daily? A monthly? A yearly? Most chores lists separate chores like this, and you’ll find that whatever chore you’re looking for, you can find the general consensus online about how often it needs to be done. And the harm done if you don’t reach this standard? There’s the ick factor, but also the health factor.
How often should we change up the meal plan?
One of our commenters has been saying that a big source of the stress of her mental load is coming up with new meals.
The mental load for dinner has been just too much lately. All of those things go into the decision for dinner plus I have the added pressure not to repeat meals too often (and by too often not more than once every few months).
The Minimum Community Standards Solution: In this case, I would argue that a rotation of about 15-20 meals is certainly within the norm in North America. Especially if everyone in the household gets to pick a few meals they absolutely love, then coming up with a repertoire of, let’s say, 20 meals, would do you for three weeks of meals (with two days a week for leftovers or something else).
More Quick Solutions for Deciding Standards:
If someone insists on higher than the minimum community standards, they should own the task
If someone insists that the towels absolutely must be folded in half and then in thirds, or that fitted sheets must be folded in such a way that you can’t tell they’re fitted sheets, but must look like flat sheets, then that person should likely be responsible for the laundry. If someone absolutely insists on different meals every night, then that person should likely do the meal planning, grocery shopping, and cooking.
You should not expect your spouse to perform to a standard that you are not willing to perform to.
In the comments last week, B said:
My ex, after a couple years of expecting me to do everything to his standards with 2 under 3, one day said, “I guess I just need to lower my standards and do it myself.” That told me a couple of things. 1. His standards were too high to judge his efforts, but not mine. 2. I wasn’t good enough.
B
If doing it yourself would require you to “lower your standards”, then your standards are likely too high.
Don’t be upset at your spouse for performing at the same level that you would
Here’s something else that we’ve heard: She’s been busy all day with the kids, running errands, getting things done, and she realizes too late she forgot to plan for dinner. So she sticks chicken fingers in the oven and they have that with fries, and that’s it. He gets grumpy because there’s not a real meal. The next day he has the kids all day, and forgets to plan dinner, so they order pizza. If the standard of care is that healthy meals are made and served when it’s your turn, then you should expect the same of yourself than you do of your spouse.
Just because someone says their spouse’s standards are too high does not mean they are.
Some people are demanding too much. But I wonder how much of the pushback we’ve had from sharing mental load is that many are happy with the way things are–with not having to pick up any slack or not having to “own” anything? I don’t think women being too perfectionist is as big or universal a problem as it seems to be talked about. Are women unreasonable if they ask the husband to cook dinner, but then they get upset if there are no vegetables in it, especially if children do need vegetables?
I think what we need is a bigger conversation about what minimum standards are, rather than assuming that the woman is being unreasonable. I think the way to do that is to talk about shared goals–health, family fun and togetherness, safety, education, etc. And then let’s see if we can figure this out together!
Posts Coming in the Mental Load Series:
How Emotional Labor Series: How Mental Load Affects Marriage
The Fair Play Solution: Conception, Planning, Execution
The Emotional Labor Series: How Do We Decide Our Standards?
The Emotional Labor Series: How to Eliminate Nagging for Good (June 15)
The Emotional Labor Series: Why The Daily Grind Needs to Be Shared (June 22)
The Emotional Labor Series: Why Everyone Needs Time to Themselves (June 29)
The Emotional Labor Series: How to Let Go and Let Your Spouse Step Up
What do you think? Do you have trouble deciding your standards? Let’s talk in the comments!
Like this post so far? You should also check out:
How to Talk So Your Husband Will Hear
My Husband Doesn’t Understand Me
June 5, 2020
Can We Deal with Mental Load Without Having a Contest of Who Has it Worse?
How does mental load affect stress?
This week we’ve been talking on the blog about mental load and emotional labor, in three posts:
What is emotional labor and mental load?
The Fair Play solution
Our podcast on mental load
A bunch of you have sent me emails, and there were so many great comments left, too! I wanted to highlight some of them, and sum up the week today. Now, if I don’t mention your comment, it doesn’t mean I didn’t appreciate it! There were a ton of amazing ones, both here and on Facebook and Twitter (and in emails!). I just want to paint with a super broad brush and highlight some themes.
(but seriously–you all make me so happy when you comment!)
Sheila's Spotlight: FamZoo Kids' Allowance App!
Deal with the mental load of allowance & chores!
Keep track of allowance, assign chores & mark them off, all in one place. Plus teach money skills!
Spending. Saving. Giving--all in one app. THIS is what I needed for my kids!
Check it out!
We receive a small commission for each sale that helps support the blog and eliminate ads on this site. Thank you for supporting our ministry!
Mental load isn’t the same thing as stress in general
As Rebecca and I talked about in the podcast yesterday, mental load is like chronic stress, a low grade thing that never, ever goes away.
We did invariably get into some discussions in the comments about which spouse is more stressed, and that’s why talking about this stuff can be a minefield. It sounds like you’re accusing the other spouse of having a much easier life. But that’s not the point. It’s not about who is more stressed; it’s simply that chronic stress is debilitating, and if you can deal with it, you should.
As I explained,
Mental load, as I wrote in the post, is: “The never-ending mental to-do list you keep for all your family tasks. Though not as heavy as a bag of rocks, the constant details banging around in your mind nonetheless weigh you down. Mental “overload” creates stress, fatigue, and often forgetfulness.” It’s really decision fatigue, when you have to decide on all kinds of little things constantly, and you have to keep all these millions of details in your head.
Stress is something else entirely. Someone can have a ton of stress with very little mental load. And someone can have stress added to mental load. But if you have a ton of stress and very little mental load, it means that you can also get some “down time” to process that stress or to work on some stress relievers. If you have no time when you’re “off”, then this mental load is always with you.
That’s the difference. Stress is real, but it’s not the point of what we’re talking about this month. And stress would also be helped by sharing mental load, too, so even then–let’s talk about emotional labor and mental load.
Mental load is like grocery shopping
There was some confusion in the comments, but let me explain it in terms of Costco and Walmart. Having a big mental load is like shopping at Walmart. If you want pickles, you have to decide between 25 different varieties. Do you want the value brand or the name brand? Do you care if they have extra garlic or would you rather have low sodium? Is there a savings associated with getting a larger size? Making a decision can be challenging because there are just So. Many. Options. This is called “decision fatigue.”
But what if you want pickles at Costco? There are one, maybe two options for any given item. That’s a LOT easier decision making – either you get *the one type of pickle they have* or you don’t get pickles. There are approximately 120,000 different items for sale at a Walmart supercenter. At Costco? There are only 4,000.
I find it’s easier for me to shop at Costco for groceries simply because there are fewer decisions to make. That’s what mental load is like: you can have the same task, but if there’s more work associated with remembering, preparing, and executing the job, the mental load will be heavier.
Meghan described it this way,
Oh goodness yes, I think you really hit the nail on the head there. It’s not just the doing of the thing, it’s all the little things that go into it that’s so exhausting.
Let’s put it into another example. I’m a runner. I do long runs on Saturday mornings, and I push my daughter in the stroller for all 6+ miles. It’s not a matter of throwing on clothes, lacing up shoes, and strapping the kid in to go. Oh no. I have to lay out my clothes the night before to make sure everything I need is clean. I parcel out all the snack bribes and pick books and toys to bring along. I fill up both our water bottles. I charge my Garmin and my Bluetooth earbuds. I make sure the stroller caddy is loaded with my Goodrs, sunscreen, Larabar, and Nuun tablets. Sometimes planning for the long run is more tiring than the long run itself!
Not 100% translatable to managing a household since I’m talking about a personal hobby, but just thought it would give another perspective to help explain the phenomenon.
Meghan
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The mental load is so heavy lots of women dreamed of being sick
Four different women in the comments wrote some variation of this:
I told a close friend that I was longing for a serious illness to put me in the hospital so I could be cared for for awhile, and she said, in all seriousness, “Every single one of my friends with kids has said the same thing at one point or another.” If that doesn’t tell you how hard the mental load is, I don’t know what would!
Laura Grace
This is serious stuff.
Women want partners. We don’t want to be managers to subordinates.
Another theme that came up in the comments was whether women should make such a big deal about writing lists for men. One woman wrote that this is the preferred way, and women are better at it:
Ladies, we must remember that our husbands are adults… and should be TREATED as such. Sadly, too many women treat their husbands like children. It should be obvious that in that environment, the intimacy and joy of marital sex is not going to flourish. Men feel belittled. Women feel overwhelmed and resentful.
So make a list for your husband. What’s so hard about that? At the very least it will help get the multitude of detailed items OUT of your head. Then perhaps you can work on the list together and check things off, bringing a spirit of unity and cooperation rather than expecting your husband to be a mind reader while you silently simmer inside.
God, by design, made men and women differently. Most men can be more “in the moment” and playful. We women can resent that and become bitter. In truth, we women are jealous. We need the balance that comes when the husband and wife work together for the good of the home / marriage / family.
EDL
But others chafed at the idea of making a list, because it puts them in the role of managing their husbands.
I once heard it explained this way: when a husband tells a wife to just tell him what she wants him to do, it’s like he’s putting her in a manager role and himself in an employee role. So even though he’s doing the work, she’s still responsible for delegating the tasks AND doing all her own tasks as well.
I don’t know about y’all, but I definitely don’t want to be my husband’s “manager.”
Meghan
Others chimed in that while they didn’t want to manage husbands, they could manage kids, and kids should be doing chores. I totally agree, and we’ll be talking later this month in two different posts (at least) about how to hand chores off to kids and let them handle some of the stress (and also how to pass the mental load for their homework, lunches, etc. off to them).
I find FamZoo an amazing app that helps share the mental load of supervising chores and figuring out allowance, while teaching kids responsibility, and we’ll be talking about that later this month, too.
Dealing with too much mental labor is bad for libido!
I want to finish with a comment from Jacqueline, who wrote that she and her husband are going to be having some conversations about how to manage expectations, lighten her mental load, and generally sort out a new normal.
I have just realised after 23 years that my mental load was massive. I totally identify with the examples given!! With three children and being a stay home mum, then starting work part time, then my elderly mother coming to live with us, it’s busy in our house. My husband is very helpful and completely owns the tasks relating to DIY, the garden, the cars and the bikes. He also works full-time in a busy job. Since lockdown my mental load has been greatly reduced as all activity outside the house has stopped. For the first time in 23 years I feel I am completely rested mentally and can think clearly. I have also enjoyed a new more intimate relationship with my husband because I finally found some space in my head. We are looking at ways now to keep my mental load lower than it has been. I’m looking forward to reading the rest of this series to learn how to do this.
Jacqueline
I love Jaqueline’s thoughts. While the COVID 19 pandemic has been a horrible time for all of us, it does give many of us the opportunity to slow the pace and think deeply about what’s working and what’s not working. For some it increases mental load, because everyone’s home all the time. But for others, it’s taken a lot of the normal stuff that drives us crazy off of our plates, and shown us a new way to do life.
My hope in doing this mental load and emotional labor series now, in the middle of a pandemic, is that you have time to sort this out right now. You’re both home more than usual. You can talk about it. And maybe some things will change.
And, again, the reason that I wanted to talk about all this in the first place is that mental load is so related to women’s libido. So guys, if you’re pushing back, remember–no one is trying to blame you. There just may be an unhealthy dynamic going on that is hurting your sex life and marriage that’s actually relatively easy to fix. It doesn’t even necessarily mean more work for you. It just means paying attention more and thinking of some of the asks yourself, without a list.
Are you TIRED of always being too tired for sex?
Do you yearn to actually WANT to make love–and figure out what all the fuss is about?
There is a way! And in this 10-module course I take you through what libido is (it may surprise you!), what affects libido, and how we can reclaim the excitement that God made us for.
Tell me more!
How about you? How do you think about mental load? And has dealing with mental load issues helped your libido? Let me know in the comments!
Like this post so far? You should also check out:
Why Do I Never Want to Say Yes When My Husband Initiates?
What Does It Really Mean to Be Attracted to Your Spouse?
Do We Understand What Rejection Does to Husbands?
June 4, 2020
The Emotional Labor and Mental Load Podcast!
Emotional labor and mental load take their toll on a marriage–because they often exhaust the wife.
So many women experience this, and yet we don’t really have a name for it. We know something is wrong, we feel guilty because we dream of getting away for just a day, we find ourselves snippy at everyone–but we can’t name why.
Chances are it’s mental load!
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We receive a small commission for each sale that helps support the blog and eliminate ads on this site. Thank you for supporting our ministry!
That’s our series for the month of June on the blog, and today on the podcast Rebecca and I introduce the concept:
Browse all the Different Podcasts
See the Last “Start Your Engines” (Men’s) Podcast
What are mental load and emotional labor?
It’s feeling like you have to keep track of every single detail in the household, or else nothing will get done. It’s the feeling that you’re responsible for making sure everyone is okay, and you have to monitor all the relationships around you and make sure everyone is on an even keel.
We talked about it at length in two posts this week–one on the problem; and one on a solution:
How Emotional Labor and Mental Load Affect Marriage
How the Fair Play Solution can Help with Mental Load
We’ve had a ton of feedback on both of those posts, and I think that many of you find this is a big problem in your marriage. I encourage you to read those!
Remember, here’s why we’re talking about this so much this month: mental load is one of the biggest libido killers there is.
When women have a million things in their brains that they’re trying to carry, and they never get any time off from having to remember details or tell someone to get something done, then it’s hard to relax. And that means it’s really hard to get in the mood!
If we’re going to have great sex lives, we need to address mental load.
We mentioned many of the comments we’ve had from people about mental load, including these themes:
When we ask women what would get them in the mood, 50% of them say some variation of “do some housework.” But then men turn around and tell us that doesn’t work. What’s the disconnect? What women need is for men to “own” the task and notice it needs to get done, not just execute the task. You need to relieve some mental load, not just do some housework. But many women don’t have words for this and can’t articulate it, and many men don’t understand.
Making a list for him to do is still work. And it’s managing him. It’s treating him like a subordinate. No one wants to be married to a subordinate. We want a partnership.
So many women dream of getting sick or being hospitalized to escape mental load. This is real, and it’s dangerous.
Women are not Better Multi-Taskers
We have this belief (I know I did until Rebecca shared the research with me) that women are naturally multitaskers while men aren’t.
But brain studies and experiments have shown that’s not true. And when women do handle several things at once better, it’s because we’ve learned how, not because it’s innate. And men can learn it as well.
But the big thing is that women take ownership of more things, and so that means we naturally have to multitask. Think getting dinner made while you’re trying to supervise a 9-year-old doing homework and while a 3-year-old is on the kitchen floor getting into things and crying out for attention. That’s normal for many women. But it’s still supremely stressful, and we don’t do it well.
Honestly, this floored me when I learned this. I really thought women were better at it. This makes me even more adamant that we need to share the mental load!
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No one is saying that men have to do half the housework, or that men are not also stressed.
It is just that when one person carries the majority of the mental load for the household and the kids, it’s very, very draining. And if husbands are wondering why their wives aren’t attentive or romantic or in the mood anymore, perhaps the question should be asked: Is she simply carrying too much?
We’ve got some great solutions to mental load coming up this month, but read Tuesday’s post on Fair Play to get started.
And as Rebecca said in the podcast, she and Connor have talked this out and worked this out in their own marriage. Here’s the main podcast where they talked about it:
Our Boost Your Libido course deals with mental load in module 4, and if you’ve been struggling with libido, you’ll find this 10-module course super helpful. Each video is short, with concrete action steps that you can take to start seeing immediate results.
Are you TIRED of always being too tired for sex?
Do you yearn to actually WANT to make love–and figure out what all the fuss is about?
There is a way! And in this 10-module course I take you through what libido is (it may surprise you!), what affects libido, and how we can reclaim the excitement that God made us for.
Tell me more!
Let me know in the comments: Is mental load exhausting you? Did you know that women weren’t better multitaskers naturally? Let’s talk!
Like this post? You should also check out:
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Help! My Husband’s Lazy and Won’t Get a Job
When Your Husband Won’t “Leave” His Mom
June 3, 2020
Can We Pause and Just Lament Together?
Yesterday I was on FaceTime with my oldest daughter Rebecca as she got her baby Alex out of his crib from a nap. He snuggled into her, and she was laughing about how he was such a cuddly boy–how he is learning to crawl, and he crawls so fast to her so he can be picked up.
We were made for connection. That is a basic human need. We are made to be relational, to be part of a community.
And most of all, we are, all of us, made in the image of God.
This last week has been a wake up call to me, and to much of the world, that many do not experience that “being part of a community”, and connectedness.
Too many are treated as “the other.” And let’s not sugarcoat it. It is because of white supremacy.
And in the U.S., African Americans are heartbroken and are crying out to be heard.
Right now, it’s time for us to listen.
I don’t have anything to teach today, because I am on this journey, too. I want to learn. I want to listen. I have always thought of myself as someone who is not racist, but watching the video of Amy Cooper last week reminded me that we all are racist in some way. We all have our blind spots. And it is time for all of us to be humble and to confront them, as George Floyd’s death so brutally reminded us.
And it is time for those of us who are privileged to listen to those who have been the recipients of that racism. I read this on Facebook from Will Odom, a friend of mine, and it resonated:
The phrase “White Privilege” is being thrown about quite a bit lately. I will admit that when I first heard this term a few years ago, I didn’t fully understand what it meant. To be honest, it offended me. I presumed a lot without trying to educate myself. White people are particularly bothered by this term, and it seems to make them uncomfortable. So…Part of the problem is the way that many are defining white privilege. It is not saying that someone’s life wasn’t hard or that someone else’s life was easy. It’s not saying that someone’s life didn’t have challenges. It doesn’t mean everything was handed to someone on a silver platter. It means that the color of your skin was not an obstacle that you had to overcome. For example, I can jog and walk into a new construction house without fear of being hunted down and shot. It doesn’t mean I didn’t struggle or have problems. It means that my problems were not complicated by the color of my skin. Which for many people, that is not the case. Use the word ‘advantage” if that helps.
Canada doesn’t have the same racial history as the United States, though we have our fill of shame. Whether it’s the Africville cruelty in Nova Scotia, or the treatment of Chinese immigrants in the early 1900s, or the internment of the Japanese in World War II. But most especially for us, it’s the treatment of Native Canadians. My husband has been doing clinics up in a native community in Northern Ontario, and he goes to listen and learn. That should be our posture.
There is so much weeping right now, and that is appropriate. It is time to lament.
It is time for those of us who are not victims of racism to look honestly at our history and ask ourselves two questions:
What has the history of my country, church, or province/state been like for someone of a different race?
How am I myself blind to the prejudice around me today?
I don’t have any words of wisdom for this. I think we should listen to other teachers on this topic–African American, Native Canadian, and others. But I encourage us to listen, and to lament. And I wanted to take a day off of the regular content of the blog and just say that I am praying with my American readers. I am praying for America today. And I am praying that we will listen to the voices that have been crying out to be heard–truly listen, and enter into their pain, for we are all connected. And we are all in the image of God.
Joanna, who works on the blog, was really affected by Billie Holiday’s song Strange Fruit when she first heard it in college. I listened to it, too, and it seems appropriate as we mourn. But for those of us not in America, let’s remember that this is not just an American problem. Let’s be humble together. And lament.
I know the riots are scary–I can only imagine. And I don’t have a good answer, or any answer, really.
But I just know that watching the two videos last week broke my heart, and I think we need to sit with that for a while. That’s why I wanted to post this, even though I’m not American. It was just too sad, and too important, to not say anything.
Please, then, let’s not turn this political in the comments. If it does, I will turn off the comments. I’m Canadian, not American. I write as someone just watching, and I don’t want to get dragged into any ugliness. Rather than fighting each other, let’s listen to those who are weeping, and let’s lament together.
June 2, 2020
EMOTIONAL LABOR: How the Fair Play System Helps Share Mental Load
How does the Fair Play system help you divide up mental load in marriage?
We’re just launching our June series about mental load, where we look at how to balance the mental work that goes into keeping the family together.
Yesterday we looked at what mental load is, and I introduced you to Eve Rodsky’s book Fair Play, which gives a diagnosis of the problem and offers a solution (again, full warning: It’s not a Christian book, and there is questionable language).
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Let me tell you how I was first introduced to the concept of Fair Play, and the solution to mental load that Eve Rodsky suggests.
The Cruise Excursion Decision
I was sitting on the couch in my cousin Danielle’s living room back in November, over on Vancouver Island. Keith was in the adjoining room checking on emails, and I was likely writing something for the blog while chatting with Danielle, who was folding laundry on her day off. As I checked my own email, I found a question about a cruise shore excursion from our travel agent, relating to the cruise we were about to take in January (we did actually take that cruise; we were on the Zaandam in South America right before COVID hit and that ship was sent searching for a dock).
I yelled at Keith, “hey, honey, Melissa wants to know if want to go see penguins on the Falkland Islands.”
“I know,” he replied. “I got the email, too.”
“Okay,” I told him. “I don’t remember what we decided, but it’s likely in that spreadsheet. So I’m deleting the email and you can reply to her.”
“Got it,” Keith said.
And I deleted it.
I didn’t think another thing of it until Danielle started to laugh.
And she proceeded to tell me that we were modelling what Rodsky was suggesting in her book Fair Play. Keith “owned” the “vacation card”, as Rodsky would explain, and so I was handing it back to him and completely ignoring it. I knew I could count on Keith to make the decisions and figure out the vacation thing, so I was literally not going to think about it at all until I showed up at the airport. And I was exceedingly happy about that.
Here’s how the Fair Play system got started
One Saturday morning, Eve Rodsky got together with a bunch of friends to do a breast cancer walk, and then have lunch together. It was their big day off without the kids. They were all excited.
But one by one, each of them started getting texts from home.
When is the babysitter coming?
Where did you put Josh’s soccer bag?
What’s the address of the birthday party?
Do the kids need to eat lunch?
Over that morning, between the friends, they had 30 phone calls and 46 texts. By the end of the breast cancer walk, all the women were demoralized, and they decided to just head home rather than go out for lunch.
Eve got mad on behalf of herself and her friends, and thought she would create a list of all the stuff that women do that often is unseen, so that their husbands would realize everything that was on their plates. She did that, tried to explain it to her husband, but it only resulted in fights and arguments rather than solutions.
(Note: It’s never good to start a discussion with your spouse with the attitude–here’s everything I’m doing right and everything you’re doing wrong! And she learned that the hard way).
So finally she settled on a better system that I think has potential for a lot of our marriages: She created 100 “cards” representing all the work that goes into the household, excluding paid work.
The Fair Play Card System
The system is made up of 100 cards, with tasks and responsibilities from these 6 areas:
Home: Everything that goes in to running the home, including meals, cleaning, organizing, paying bills, etc.
Out: Everything related to leaving home and interacting with the outside world, including school notes and communication, keeping the calendar, extracurricular activities, social plans, and more
Caregiving: Everything related to caregiving for kids, pets, and each other, including grooming, supervising homework, medical appointments, and more.
Magic: The things that make life meaningful and interesting, including church, extended family, friendships, family fun, and more.
Wild: The things that can’t be planned, like a washing machine being broken or a child getting sick at school, plus all the unexpected or difficult life events like handling aging parents, job loss, or accidents.
Unicorn Space: Time to develop passion and purpose for each person.
Each card is also noted to be either a “daily grind” task, that needs to be done regularly and at fairly specific times, like doing the dishes, packing lunches, or getting kids to the bus, or regular tasks that can be done at your chosen time. The deck contains 30 daily grind tasks and 70 regular tasks.
Eve Rodsky
And here’s the thing about the cards: Whoever owns the card owns THE WHOLE TASK–conception, planning, and execution.
The person who owns homework, for instance, isn’t just responsible for sitting down and making sure the kids do the homework. They also have to keep track of when homework assignments are due; check up on whether the homework is done and whether it’s in the backpack; look at the notes that get sent home from the teacher. They do it all.
The problem that we often run into is that we separate conception, planning, and execution.
Conception is thinking of the issue and deciding what to do about it.
Planning is figuring out the tasks that need to be done to complete the project, and figuring out when those tasks should be done
Execution is about doing it.
Conception and planning take place mostly in your brain (or on an app). And so we often think that execution is the big, time consuming task. But actually, execution is often the least of it. It’s remembering all the little things that’s the most exhausting. And when you separate Conception and Planning from Execution, you can run into trouble, like this:
The Hockey Practice Execution Failure
Sandra is in a hurry, and so she says to Mark: “Can you drive Brian to hockey practice?”
What does Mark believe is being asked of him at that moment? He thinks that he has to get Brian in the car, along with his hockey gear, get him to practice on time, and then get him home again. If he does all of those things, then Mark thinks he’s done a great job.
But the problem is that Sandra knows that last week, Brian borrowed one of Jared’s jerseys, and needs to return it. But where is the jersey? Has it been washed yet? Plus this is the week that all the fundraising money is due from selling chocolate bars. That has to be collected and the form has to be brought in. Plus it’s our turn to sign up for snack, and we need to pick up the big tupperware container that held the nachos we brought last time.
Driving Brian to hockey practice is about so much more than just driving Brian to hockey practice. And as Sandra tries to bark out all of these extra orders, it sounds to Mark like she’s gone a little bit insane as she yells at everyone to find Jared’s jersey. Is it still in the dryer? And where is Grandpa’s check for all of the chocolate bars? She thinks it was on the side table and it was never put into the fundraising envelope.
Sandra is always fussing about everything and can never quite calm down, and now everyone is stressed.
What went wrong?
When the person doing the executing doesn’t understand the conception and planning, problems happen. It’s why the person doing the grocery shopping doesn’t know if you can substitute the red pepper for the orange pepper, as we talked about yesterday.
They don’t know what dish the pepper is for.
And it’s why Danielle was laughing at us with the cruise emails. She pointed out there’s another problem: When it’s not clear who owns the cards, you can each do the execution, and mess everything up. What would have happened if I had emailed our travel agent saying, “yes, we want to see the penguins”, but Keith had emailed saying, “No, we already have another cruise excursion booked”? Because I deleted the email and let Keith “own” the whole thing, we didn’t double up and we didn’t confuse each other.
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It’s not about delegating tasks to someone; it’s about someone taking the full ownership of a task, so that the other person can completely drop all of the mental load associated with it.
As Rodsky explains:
It’s not a partnership if only one of you is running the show, which means making the important distinction between delegating tasks and handing off ownership of a task. Ownership belongs to the person who first off remembers to plan, then plans, and then follows through on every aspect of executing the plan and completing the task without reminders.
Eve Rodsky
What are the rules for the Fair Play system?
First, go through the cards and discard those that don’t apply to you, or those that you decide you can live without (do you need to send out Holiday cards?)
Then, once you have the ones that you’ve decided you must keep, divide up the cards between you. They don’t have to be divided up evenly, and often they shouldn’t be. If one person does most of the outside paid work, it makes a lot of sense for another to take most of the cards. And what Rodsky has found is that 21 seems to be the magic number. If one spouse takes at least 21 cards, the other spouse feels like things are fair, even if they’re holding a much larger stack. At least not all details are in one person’s head.
Everyone takes at least one daily grind card from each stack, because the daily grind tasks are the ones with the most mental load that are most exhausting
Everyone MUST get “unicorn time”, or time to develop their own passions and discover their purpose
Everyone MUST get self-care cards
Everyone gets roughly the same amount of free time.
When you own the card, you own the WHOLE thing: Conception, Planning, and Execution
So you don’t have to work the same or do the same number of tasks, but what studies have found is that people feel things are fair not if they’re all doing the same amount of work, but instead if everyone gets roughly the same amount of down time.
Personally, we don’t use the cards, though we have talked through them.
We figured out a similar system on our own. But if you’re a visual person, the cards are a great idea! So check out the book, which has download instuctions (plus full details on what conception, planning, and execution look like for each task). Or you can purchase just the cards!
Honestly, I think talking through a system like this (whether you do it exactly this way or not) is so important for couples, because it helps clear up expectations. Sandra was upset at Mark in our story yesterday because he didn’t remember about piano practice, and birthday parties, and science fair projects, and laundry–but Mark didn’t know he was supposed to. It was never spelled out. Mark is a good guy. Had they sat down and said, “This year, Mark, you be responsible for making sure Brian does his homework,” then Mark likely would have realized Saturday morning that before they went on the bike ride, he should get Brian to do half an hour on his project. It wouldn’t have been a big deal. But because he didn’t “own” the task, he didn’t think of it. And Sandra was disappointed because she felt like she owned everything, and she didn’t have a partner.
Here’s a way to set out those expectations.
Are you TIRED of always being too tired for sex?
Do you yearn to actually WANT to make love–and figure out what all the fuss is about?
There is a way! And in this 10-module course I take you through what libido is (it may surprise you!), what affects libido, and how we can reclaim the excitement that God made us for.
Tell me more!
Now, Keith and I have got this down to an almost science, and we don’t use the cards. For some people they might be overkill. We ended up discussing these ideas on our own, and we figured it out. But for some people, a visible system like this may be exactly what they need!
We’ll talk more this month about what daily grind tasks look like, how women can “let go” of tasks, how we can all start doing less, and why we each need what she calls “unicorn space”. But I’ll leave it there for now, because that’s enough to chew on today!
So let me know: do you run into these “hockey practice” problems? What are some of your biggest frustrations with dividing up mental load? Let’s talk in the comments!
Posts Coming in the Mental Load Series:
How Mental Load Series: How Mental Load Affects Marriage
The Fair Play Solution: Conception, Planning, Execution (this post!)
The Mental Load Series: How to Eliminate Nagging for Good (June 8)
The Mental Load Series: Why The Daily Grind Needs to Be Shared (June 15)
The Mental Load Series: How to Let Go and Let Your Spouse Step Up (June 22)
The Mental Load Series: Why Everyone Needs Time to Themselves (June 29)
June 1, 2020
THE EMOTIONAL LABOR SERIES: Let’s Talk Emotional Labor and Mental Load
Mental load and emotional labor make women exhausted.
We’re starting our mental load and marriage series today, where every Monday in the month of June (as well as a bunch of podcasts and some extra posts) we’ll be focusing on how to balance the mental load and grow a healthier marriage (with higher libidos!).
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Let me tell you what I mean by painting a picture of Sandra and her husband Mark:
The Morning Off Where Everything Went Wrong
It’s a beautiful Saturday morning, and Mark has told Sandra that she’s been so tired lately, she really needs a morning off. He’s going to take the kids, and she’s going to go to the gym and then wander around some antique markets and get some lovely coffee, all by herself. It sounds like heaven.
Saturday morning Sandra’s up early, excited about her outing. As she leaves the house, she says to Mark in passing, “Remember to get the clothes out of the dryer when it’s done.”
While she’s gone, Mark feeds the kids a fun pancake breakfast, and then they head out on a bike ride. They all have a great time, and when Sandra gets home, the kids are energetic and happy, and Mark is beaming.
Sandra smiles, relaxed from her morning, and starts to make lunch when she notices that the birthday present for her son Brian’s friend Jared is still sitting on the kitchen island, unwrapped. And they have to leave in two hours. That’s okay, Sandra sighs. I’ll just do it.
As she goes to fetch the wrapping paper, she sees the construction paper for Brian’s science fair project on the dining room table, untouched. Didn’t Mark get Brian to work on the science fair project? Sandra wonders. And then another thought occurs: What about Janie’s practising piano?
They’re under the gun, because she’s going with Brian to the party this afternoon. She needs to help Jared’s mom, since Jared’s dad walked out last year, and Sandra’s been trying to lend a hand. So now, in the next two hours, they have to get the project started and Janie needs to practice. She starts ordering the kids around, and they get grumpy. Mark tells her to calm down, but Sandra’s feeling the clock ticking. This needs to get done.
After much protest, the kids do comply, at least a little, as Mark heads outside on the riding lawn mower, listening to podcasts. Sandra goes to grab her jeans, and realizes they’re not folded on the bed. Are they still in the dryer? Uh oh. All of Mark’s work shirts were in the dryer. If he didn’t pull them out when the dryer was done, then she’d need to do extra ironing. She checks the dryer. Yep. The laundry was still there.
Mark comes in from outside, and calls out, “Oh, hon, I forgot to tell you. My sister called this morning. She wants to know what venue we should book for Mom & Dad’s 40th anniversary party.”
“What did you tell her?” Sandra asks.
“Nothing. I just told her you’d call her back.”
But they’re your parents, Sandra thinks, and sighs again.
Mark can’t figure out what’s going on. “Is this about the laundry? Look, I’m sorry. I just forgot.”
And then everything bursts out of Sandra. It wasn’t just the laundry. It was the unwrapped birthday present, and the homework, and the piano. It was everything.
“But you could have told me all that,” Mark says. “You could have just given me a list.”
Sandra knows he’s right. She’s overreacting. She feels like she’s outside of her body, watching herself get angry, and she wants to stop it but she can’t. But is it so bad to wish that I didn’t have to write him a list? Is it wrong to want him to know some of this stuff without having to be told? Just for once she didn’t want to have to remember everything.
And besides, the present was right in the middle of the kitchen where he had made pancakes. They had talked about the science fair project last night at dinner–it was all over the dining room table. Janie had been practising for weeks, and the Tuesday recital was circled with stars on the family wall calendar. The dryer had a super loud buzzer that you could hear throughout the house. Was it so unreasonable that she wanted Mark to think of some of these things, too, without being reminded?
Sandra felt like she was always the bad parent while Mark was the fun parent. She didn’t like that. She didn’t want to be grumpy. But she’s just so very tired of always feeling like she’s the one who has to remember everything.
Sandra is carrying most of the mental load for the family, and doing most of the emotional labour
What do we mean by those things?
My cousin Danielle pointed me to a great book called Fair Play: A Game-Changing Solution for When You Have Too Much to Do (And More Life to Live) by Eve Rodsky.
We’re going to be using that book as the backdrop for what we’re talking about this month, and I did find it really interesting when I read it (but it’s not a Christian book, and there is some definitely questionable language. So be forewarned). But I love the way she frames the problem and tries to create solutions that work for everyone without assigning blame.
Here’s how Rodsky defines the problem:
Mental Load:
The never-ending mental to-do list you keep for all your family tasks. Though not as heavy as a bag of rocks, the constant details banging around in your mind nonetheless weigh you down. Mental “overload” creates stress, fatigue, and often forgetfulness.
Eve Rodsky
And that’s not the only thing that wears us down. There’s also this:
Emotional Labor:
The “maintaining relationships” and “managing emotions” work like calling your in-laws, sending thank-you notes, buying teacher gifts, and soothing meltdowns in Target. This work of caring can be some of the most exhausting labor, but providing middle-of-the-night comfort is what makes you a wonderful and dependable parent.
Eve Rodsky
Many women are simply worn down by all of these things.
Now, I’m not saying that men are lazy. That’s not what Rodsky is saying, either. It’s just that because this mental load tends to be invisible, both parties often fail to realize how much energy it is zapping out of the person who is carrying it all.
And again–this doesn’t mean that men aren’t carrying stress, too. But it’s a different kind of stress.
What women often carry is what Rodsky calls “decision fatigue”, where you feel like every small decision in the household needs to be made by you. And it’s tiring. What many women long for is the luxury of being able to think about just one thing at a time, without having to carry all of the other concerns of the family.
Everybody needs to feel as if they have time to themselves; everyone needs to feel like the load is being shared; everybody needs to get some down time.
(Click here to tweet this quote)
This isn’t only about working mothers, either.
Both stay at home spouses and working spouses feel this when they adopt the majority of the mental load (and I’ll refer to women because it tends to be women, but it isn’t always). It’s that feeling that you can never truly get any time off, because you’re always “on”. You are always the one who has to remember everything and hold everything in your head, while your spouse gets to relax. It’s why moms dream of going to a hotel for a day without cell service. It’s not really that they want to get away from the kids; it’s that they don’t want to have to remember everything all the time and be responsible for everything all the time.
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What exhausts people most is not the actual tasks to be done; it’s having to remember everything and get everything done at exactly the right time. It’s the “load” of responsibility far more than it even is just doing the tasks. That feeling like you must remember everything, that you are juggling so many balls all at once, is exhausting.
Take this relatively minor interaction in marriage.
The Grocery Store Text Question
You send your spouse to the grocery store with a grocery list while you’re trying to get dinner ready, or deal with homework for the kids, or even working. You’re busy. And then you start getting interrupted by texts. “They don’t have any red peppers. Can I get orange peppers instead?” And you take a deep breath, because OF COURSE you can get orange peppers instead. So you reply, “Yep.” But you’re tired of being asked for every little thing, as if he can’t make a decision on his own.
Your husband, on the other hand, can’t figure out why you’re upset, because he was only trying to make sure he did the right thing. He was trying to make you happy–so why are you so testy?
He feels belittled. But you also feel like you’re talking to a child. And it’s all so ugly.
Here are two people who genuinely love each other and who want to serve each other, but somehow they end up ticked at each other. Neither one wants that. Neither one really deserves it. But this keeps happening, despite everyone’s best efforts to serve each other.
How can we do this better? In Fair Play, Rodsky proposes a system to help couples talk about mental load and emotional labor, and divide it up so that you each understand each other better and one person isn’t carrying everything.
This isn’t about who does the paid work and who stays at home, or whose responsibility the housework or kids is. This is something far more basic: Everybody needs to feel as if they have time to themselves; everyone needs to feel like the load is being shared; everybody needs to get some down time. But it’s not about getting people to do more tasks, either, or even to do equal tasks (in fact, Rodsky doesn’t even claim that equality in workload is what we’re aiming for, or that equality is necessary for people to feel like it’s fair). All that has to happen is that one person doesn’t carry it all.
The benefits of sharing the mental load?
He feels less “nagged”
She feels like she has a true partner
She has more energy (and often more libido!)
They both become more interesting people
They get grumpy and testy a lot less
Mental load affects sex: it’s one of the main causes of low libido in women.
So here’s why this matters, guys: this affects your sex life. In module 4 of my Boost Your Libido course I talk about how having all of these things in your head all the time can stop women from feeling in the mood. When women can’t turn off all of the things that are in their brains, it’s very hard to make room for sex.
So guys, if you want a happier wife who is more “in the mood”, let’s talk about sharing the mental load at home!
Are you TIRED of always being too tired for sex?
Do you yearn to actually WANT to make love–and figure out what all the fuss is about?
There is a way! And in this 10-module course I take you through what libido is (it may surprise you!), what affects libido, and how we can reclaim the excitement that God made us for.
Tell me more!
That’s what we’re going to do this month: Let’s talk fair play and sharing the mental load.
I promise it won’t be about making anyone feel guilty or lazy. It’s instead just trying to avoid these “testy” interactions that all too many couples have, even couples who love each other greatly.
Posts Coming in the Mental Load Series:
How Mental Load Series: How Mental Load Affects Marriage (today’s post!)
The Fair Play Solution: Conception, Planning, Execution (tomorrow)
The Mental Load Series: How to Eliminate Nagging for Good (June 8)
The Mental Load Series: Why The Daily Grind Needs to Be Shared (June 15)
The Mental Load Series: How to Let Go and Let Your Spouse Step Up (June 22)
The Mental Load Series: Why Everyone Needs Time to Themselves (June 29)
Plus we’ll have podcasts on the myth of multitasking, how men can do emotional labour, and what mental load means for marriage.
I honestly found Fair Play fascinating, and I hope as we work through it you’ll find a new way of looking at your marriage frustrations, too–and I hope that will, in turn, boost your libido!
What do you think? Do you struggle with emotional labor and mental load? Do you relate to Sandra’s story? Let’s talk in the comments!
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Sheila Wray Gregoire has been married for 27 years and happily married for 22! She loves traveling around North America with her hubby in their RV, giving her signature "Girl Talk" about sex and marriage. And she's written 8 books. About sex and marriage. See a theme here? Plus she knits. Even in line at the grocery store.Find Sheila Here:YouTube
Sheila's Favorite Posts on To Love, Honor and Vacuum:
10 ways to initiate sex
10 Effects of Porn on Your Brain, Marriage, & Sex Life
Why So Much Marriage Advice is So Trite
How can Sex be Hot and Holy at the Same Time?
Check out some of Sheila's Books:
The Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex
31 Days to Great Sex
9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage
To Love, Honor, and Vacuum
Check out Sheila's Courses:
The Boost Your Libido Course
The Whole Story: Talking to Your Daughter about Sex, Puberty, and Growing Up
The FREE Emotional Intimacy E-Course
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May 29, 2020
Perifit: The Video Game That Helps Your Pelvic Floor!
Thanks to Perifit for sponsoring today’s post!
We talk a lot on the blog about pelvic floor health, vaginismus, and postpartum sexual pain. Rebecca and Joanna (with whom I just finished writing The Great Sex Rescue, due out from Baker books next year!) both have had postpartum sexual pain, which they discussed on the podcast, and I, of course, suffered from vaginismus, as I’ve talked about here and also in The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex.
Are we just outliers? Nope! Sexual pain is really common… but it doesn’t get talked about
Is it just a fluke that the three of us have all had sexual pain issues? Not really. One study, for example, found that 50% of women have sexual pain 3 months postpartum after their first child was born. And that’s not counting primary vaginismus, vulvodynia, and other forms of female sexual pain (dyspareunia).
But the problem with women’s sexual pain issues: it doesn’t get talked about enough. It’s a woefully understudied area in the scientific literature. As of May 28, 2020, there are 404 published journal articles on vaginismus on PubMed, which is the US government’s database for journal articles. Erectile dysfunction? That has 25,377.
And the church doesn’t do a great job either: there isn’t a single article on vaginismus or postpartum sexual pain on Focus on the Family’s website. Oof.
Okay, so pelvic floor dysfunction is a big deal and no one is talking about it. What are women to do?
We need a strong foundation (literally.)
First of all: we need to make sure our pelvic floor muscles are strong! Why? Because the pelvic floor is the… floor of the pelvis. I know that’s obvious, but let me explain why it matters with a quick story from Joanna:
When I was 12, I wore my grandmother’s old sneakers to run cross country. They were nice shoes, but grandma had really high arches in her feet and I have almost no arch. Unfortunately, because of the differences in how our feet were built, the shoes created gait problems that made my running really slow. I still have problems running quickly for long periods of time – I have to focus really intensely on my posture because of the bad habits I created when I had the wrong shoes. A problem with my feet became a problem with my hips, knees, and so on. Fixing the problem started with fixing the issues with my foundation.
The same principle applies to our pelvic floor. Having a strong foundation helps to keep the rest of our core strong. Plus, having a strong pelvic floor is linked to a lower risk of tearing postpartum, less problems with leaking urine when sneezing, jumping on a trampoline, or busting your gut laughing. It’s also associated with more intense orgasms!
The traditional advice has been for women to do Kegel exercises and they are often an amazing part of a good pelvic floor health regimen. But Kegels can be genuinely difficult to do – it’s often hard to isolate the pelvic floor muscles from the abs or muscles in the butt. Plus, let’s be honest, they’re boring. Genuinely, I don’t get the same sense of accomplishment from doing Kegels that I do from yoga or going on a walk or lifting weights. It doesn’t make me sweat and it feels more like making the bed. I’m NOT saying they aren’t important, but I know many women have a hard time being motivated to do them… and I think that’s largely due to how boring they feel.
The other difficult with Kegels is that it’s hard to feel like you’re making progress because the results are relatively intangible. I’m working on my flexibility right now by doing yoga and my goal is to get my heels to touch the ground when I do a downward facing dog. That’s very tangible: I’ll know when I’ve achieved it. Kegels are different and it can be hard to know if they’re working or not, especially if you aren’t in pelvic floor physiotherapy.
Pelvic floor exercise is clearly a good, important thing. But most of us find it really hard to be “on it” and get the exercises done. Clearly we need to change something.
Disclaimer: we do not recommend using any pelvic floor item before having an examination done by a pelvic floor physiotherapist. Many women suffer with a weak pelvic floor and the Perifit would be excellent for these women, but others have different issues that may not be helped with kegel exercises, or may be made worse by excessive kegels. If you are interested in the Perifit, please talk to a licensed professional about your personal pelvic floor physiotherapy needs and ask them if the Perifit is right for you.
Enter Perifit: the company that turned doing pelvic floor exercises… into a video game.
Gamification is a really amazing psychological strategy that we can use to motivate ourselves. Having trouble reading your Bible? There’s an app for that. Want to learn a language? There’s an app for that too. All of these apps use periodic rewards to help motivate us and to keep us engaged. (That’s also why mobile games can be so “more-ish”. But hey, let’s use a weird feature of the brain to help keep us motivated to do things that are good for us!)
We were REALLY excited when Perifit offered to let us try their pelvic floor exerciser. It’s a small, medical grate silicone device that includes two sensors so that it works both the superficial and deep pelvic floor muscles. Amazing!
It connects to an app on your phone and then you can use your pelvic floor muscles to control a little butterfly or bird as she flies along, collecting prizes as you go. Think “jetpack joyride” but with your vagina. No joke, you can even unlock “flappy bird” as a game option in the app.
One review made a point that really made me laugh:
Playing a video game with your vagina is a singularly exhilarating experience—it almost feels like magic. It occurred to me one night when I was using Perifit in a skirt that if someone were to ask what I was doing, I could have convinced them that I was practicing with a telepathy app.
The Device that Makes Kegel Exercises Less Confusing and Boring, Vice
Because Perifit is connected to an app, it also lets you know how strong your pelvic floor is since it does a quick “check in” each time you start the app. It also gives you a lovely statistical report that you can access after each session, which allows you to see your progress over time. I don’t know about you, but I know seeing measurable progress really helps me to stay motivated. Frankly, that’s really hard to manage with Kegels alone and the reports that come out of the app are one of the features I like best about Perifit.
Now, here’s the thing: if you’re experiencing major sexual pain, whether you have primary vaginismus or are dealing with postpartum pain, we think it’s really important that you talk to your doctor and/or pelvic floor physiotherapist before trying it. Some women need toning and strength training as part of their pelvic floor physiotherapy. Others need more loosening and would be better helped by dilator sets or other therapies.
But if you’re looking for pelvic floor strengthening, Perifit is a great option to investigate. They also have a 100-day trial period, too, with a money-back guarantee!
Am I a flappy bird?
Have you tried pelvic floor exercises? And do you think gamification could help you keep your pelvic floor toned? Let me know in the comments!
May 28, 2020
Start Your Engines Podcast: Do You Rush Through Foreplay?
Let’s talk gender differences–and gender differences with foreplay!
On the last Thursday of every month we like to do the podcast that’s aimed more specifically at men (though women will enjoy it, too!). And this week Keith and I tackled the problem with overblowing gender differences and downplaying personality differences or family of origin differences. And then we tackled some sex questions!
So first, listen in!
Browse all the Different Podcasts
Listen to the Last Regular Podcast
Main Segment: Are gender differences overblown?
A man wrote in with this question:
As a man I don’t want to read a book about how to love my wife…written by a man. If men could figure it out I wouldn’t need the book. All these marriage books written by men are helpful to understand myself, but are woefully inadequate when addressing my wife. I’m reading your book 9 Thoughts (because I didn’t realize it was written for wives), but I’m learning a ton anyway… except what I want to know, which is how to love my wife. What I’ve recognized is that I have been loving my wife like a guy would want to be loved, and surprisingly it’s not working, but it’s taken me 18 years to figure out what I was doing wrong. Now I need help figuring out how to do it right, and I’m stumped. I love your perspective, because it’s so similar to my wife’s, so I want you to write the book, but would take reading suggestions if you have any in the meantime.
The main point Keith and I were making is that often we think distance between us is caused by gender differences–when that’s not really the main issue. And even if it is, working towards understanding each other isn’t as out of reach as we often make it sound.
If you didn’t read it yesterday, check out Keith’s post on gender differences!
And you may also appreciate these, too:
Can we stop it with the gender stereotypes already? (a podcast from last year!)
MBTI and Marriage (our 5-part personality series)
Take the Emotional Needs Inventory!
I wanted to get practical in this podcast and talk about how to feel closer to each other, and one of the best ways is the emotional needs inventory! It’s a free download, and then you can read it through with your spouse and do the exercise (it seriously doesn’t take very long), but it will give you some insight into how your spouse likes to be loved, and your spouse will understand what small things they can do that reap big dividends.
Are We Rushing Through Foreplay?
A woman asks:
We’re both Christians and pretty shy on the topic of sex, so when I first read your book “The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex”, it really helped me and our marriage a lot, thank you! I was stuck in the bad girl mind set that I had to be perfect for everything to be right! Recently my husband asked me a question that really stumped me, what is foreplay? I struggle with most of the time not getting anything out of it because it’s rushed but I try to enjoy it since it makes my husband happy.. I was wondering if you had any advice?
I think a lot of times couples rush through foreplay because they feel like intercourse needs to be the main event. And women feel guilty if we make men spend too much time on foreplay, because we feel like we’re being selfish and demanding too much, and we should get as much out of intercourse as he does. And some men feel as if women are somehow broken if they need more attention.
So I talked in the podcast about how for many women, foreplay IS the main event. They don’t orgasm through intercourse.
Can we please start saying instead, “she comes first”, and make HER the main event before intercourse? Some women don’t need that, of course, but many do.
Incidentally, I’m starting work this week on my orgasm course (finally!). I’m excited about that (sorry if that’s a poor choice of words). But it should be out in August!
What about sex during COVID?
Keith and I tackled this one together from a woman who is nervous about physical contact during COVID:
I was wondering what tips you have for couples and sex during this pandemic?
Obviously our kiddos are home all the time so there’s not a lot of alone time to connect. We have 2 boys ages 15 and 12. My husband and I have played some board games together because I know those are things that help him to connect with me. Our communication is good. It’s just really hard for me to focus on sex. My mind is in a hundred places and I’m not an essential worker dealing with stress many are.
We are also not kissing. Mostly just out of fear. I still go to the grocery for us and I would hate to bring something home to him. I take all necessary precautions going to the store mask, gloves etc as well as going as soon as stores open for less people. I don’t want our sex life to diminish but it’s just so hard for me to be into it.
Okay, so as far as I know, all the guidelines are that you do NOT have to socially distance from relatives at home unless you’ve been exposed to COVID or you have it. So there is no need to avoid kissing (and even in our Good Friday post by the wife of a NYC internist, they weren’t socially distancing).
We need to find a way to get perspective on this. It’s one thing if you’re talking about 3 weeks; but we’re way beyond that now, and likely this will last at least another year. So ask yourself:
What’s the worst that can happen?
What’s the chance of that worst case scenario occurring?
What are we giving up in order to avoid that worst case scenario?
I know this is scary for many, but I think we have to realize that we aren’t in control, and we have to be willing to accept some risk in our lives. How that looks for each family we’ll all have to individually decide, but I think clinging to each other in uncertainty is worth the risk myself.
If your spouse is having a hard time with that, then try to talk it through with those three points, above.
Now today I would LOVE to talk about rushing through foreplay in the comments. What do you think? How can we avoid feeling like foreplay is “extra”? Or do you have any comments about the pandemic and sex? Let’s talk!
Like this post? You should also check out:
MBTI and Marriage: Just Your Type!
May 27, 2020
Are Men from Mars and Women from Venus?
Are we overblowing gender differences? Are men from Mars and women from Venus?
It’s Keith on the blog today for our men’s corner!
It seems you can’t go to a marriage conference, or read a book on marriage or even have a conversation about relationships without at some point the issue coming up about how different we are.
“Oh, he’s a man; that’s just the way they are.”
“Well, brother, you know women!” (Which actually means we feel we don’t know ANYTHING about women).
It’s one of those things we tend to take for granted. Sheila & I are not immune, either. When we speak at marriage conferences, we often talk about the issue of gender differences. As a speaker, you want the participants to enjoy themselves and gender differences is just such a ripe area for humour. There’s just too much low hanging fruit to resist. And it is a good way to get people to relax and to lighten the mood if we can talk a bit about some of the funny ways that we see the world differently.
I do think there are differences between men and women. I also think that it is okay to acknowledge and talk about that in the same way that we talk about other differences such as our families of origin or even our basic personality. In a healthy relationship we recognize that we are not always going to see the world exactly the same way and that is normal. But I think we can get into trouble when we place too much emphasis on these differences–and especially if we start getting prescriptive about them.
You may also enjoy:
MBTI and Marriage (our 5-part series on personality differences in marriage)
Emotional Needs inventory
Like most people, when Sheila & I were dating and getting to know each other, our differences were the main things that attracted us to each other.
When Sheila and I got married, however, sometimes those differences grated and caused tension.
I think this is a fairly common experience. When you are single, you can organize your world the way you want. You get used to things being a certain way. Your life experience, your personality, your gender and hundreds of other factors make you who you are and make you see the world the way you do. It is only natural to assume that your way of understanding how the world works is the CORRECT way to see how the world works.
Now the amazing thing about getting married is all of a sudden there is a person – whom you love so much – who sees the world in many ways very differently than you do. And the first couple of years of marriage can be a real shock as you process how someone so amazing could be so wrong about so many things. (What kind of trauma did you go through that made you think the toilet paper roll folds under instead of over?)
Healthy people in healthy marriages recognize that they are products of all these influences – background, gender, etcetera – and realize that other people with different experiences will have different ways of understanding the same situation. They learn to sort out what truly are character or moral issues from issues that are just differences of perspective and they treat those two things very differently. Much of the first year or so of marriage is sorting all that out and learning to recognize that when your spouse is “wrong” about how the toilet paper goes on the roller it is a very different thing than when they say something hurtful or do something selfish (as we all do at one time or another).
But I worry in the Church that we have drifted a bit past the mark when it comes to gender differences. Saying “let’s recognize that God made us different and appreciate that in each other” is something I would fully endorse. However, too often I hear it framed in terms of “men are like this and woman are like that” and I find that very problematic for several reasons.
First of all, the differences within the genders is often greater that the difference between the genders.
Take something easily measurable like height. The average woman in the United States is 5’3½” and the average man is 5’9”. So to say that men are taller than women is true – five and a half inches on average to be precise. But to say that means that all men are taller than all women is clearly not true. In fact, the normal range for height in women is considered 4’11” to 5’8” and for men it’s 5’5” to 6’2”. In both cases, the difference within the gender is nine inches, quite a bit more than the 5.5 inches between them.
The reason this is so important is that there are always exceptions to general trends and these exceptions are normal and to be expected.
As another example, take watching (or otherwise following) sports. Men tend to like sports more than women, but there will be some men who have no interest in sports whatsoever and some women who remind us that sports fan is short for sports fanatic. These people are not wrong for being the way they are. God is very creative and everything he makes comes in so many different shapes, sizes & variations, humans included. But so often with gender differences we slip past the concept that “men/women tend to be” into the territory of “men/ women always are” without even realizing it. And when we do that, we risk making our brothers and sisters who are those exceptions feel like they are somehow broken or defective.
I remember after one marriage conference a couple came up to Sheila and me afterwards and were so appreciative that when we talked about libido differences we mentioned that in many cases the woman has the higher libido in the relationship. This woman had never even heard that was a possibility and so despite being in a fairly common situation, she had lived for years feeling there was something wrong with her and perhaps even shamefully so. That is an unnecessary and avoidable tragedy.
So when we talk about gender differences I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to acknowledge some people are the exceptions –and that’s okay. Because they matter, too.
Going shopping?
Use my link to support this blog!
The other thing that concerns me is just how extreme people get about emphasizing the differences between the genders.
When I listen to some people talk, it sounds like men & women are two different species entirely. (Silly me! I thought we were two versions of human.) Even the wording that men are from Mars and women are from Venus bothers me a little bit. Yes, we are different from each other, but we are not aliens from another planet! Appreciating gender differences should draw us closer together, not push us apart. Understanding that the way my spouse processes things is not wrong, but in fact is actually similar to a lot of other people can be very helpful in a relationship.
But often what I hear makes it sound like men and women are so different that they will never understand each other.
To me that just sounds defeatist. I know I will never full understand the world from my wife’s perspective in the same way that I could never understand it fully from one of my male friend’s perspective – simply because I am not them! I can only imagine what it’s like. But to me, that’s the whole point- – trying to imagine what life is like from their perspective. In marriage, trying to see things from your spouse’s perspective is such a powerful force for good. To suggest the differences between men and women are so great that we can never understand each other, however, suggests that there is no point in even trying. And giving up on understanding each other is never going to make any marriage grow stronger.
But in some circles in the church we go even farther than that. We actually try as much as possible to accentuate the differences in gender!
Not satisfied with moving from “men/women tend to be” into “men/women always are” we go flying right past that into “God has ordained that men/women shall be”. We give very prescribed definitions of how a man should look, think & act and how a woman should look, think & act if they want to be “biblical”. And if people don’t measure up, the clear implication is that there is something wrong with them. Typical of this mindset is this quote from the Wikipedia page on Mark Driscoll where he laments that the problem in the church today is that “sixty percent of Christians are chicks, and the forty percent that are dudes are still sort of chicks.”
Frankly, the whole thing drives me crazy on so many levels.
First off, the blatant sexism inherent in this way of speaking – that women are not just different from men, but actually inferior – I find completely nauseating.
Secondly, I quite simply have no time for people who want to tell me what kind of man I am supposed to be. I am quite confident in who I am. And I am not going to lose any sleep over whether someone the likes of Mark Driscoll thinks I am “chick-ified” or not.
But what really saddens me is that we seem to miss how completely misplaced this whole concept is! It takes us in the exact opposite direction of where we want to go. We all want a marriage where we grow closer together over the years, more and more in tune with each other over time. But how are you possibly going to get there if you invest all your time and energy trying to be as different from each other as possible? It’s insane! The Bible encourages us, both men and women, to be more like Jesus, not to be more like the ideal man or the ideal woman.
Wouldn’t it be healthier if we made it less about trying to be a godly husband or a godly wife and more about just trying to be godly?
So yes, we should value and appreciate the differences we see in each other including differences based on gender. But let’s agree they are just one part of who we are and they are certainly not insurmountable obstacles to a healthy relationship. And, please, instead of trying to cram people into molds their Creator never meant for them, let’s focus on appreciating our spouse for who He actually made them to be.
What do you think? Are gender differences the biggest difference you face, or is it personality, or backgrounds, or emotional needs? Let’s talk in the comments!
Like this post? You should also check out:
MBTI and Marriage: Just Your Type!
May 26, 2020
9 Fast & Free Ways to Help Bloggers and Authors that You Love
Did you know there are small things you can do–things that cost nothing–that can really help bloggers and content creators that you love?
Because it was my 50th birthday yesterday, I feel like this may be a good time to post this (like, here’s what you can get me for my birthday!).
Thank you so much for all your birthday wishes and wonderful emails and notes. I’m saving them all to read them tonight when I have a chance to sit down with a cup of tea, but know that they mean the world to me!
Before I do, though, I’d like to tell you a few simple things that you can do to help content creators. And to do that, I want to paint a picture of what we face.
We have a lot of expenses
Before I hire staff or get paid myself, I have out of pocket expenses of about $1500 to run this blog each month. Then there’s all of the staff that I hire to help. So before I even get paid, I have to spend about $7000 a month. Now, not everyone spends that much, but I’m just being up front about roughly what things cost me. And one thing I’m passionate about is being able to keep people employed.
We rely on several different sources for income
So how do I make money?
Royalties from my books
Sales from my store
Affiliate fees from Amazon and other products I recommend
Advertising fees from ad networks
Sponsored Posts
For years what allowed this blog to grow as it did was that advertising revenue from my ad networks was actually huge. But I don’t like hosting ads, for various reasons. And ad revenue is down because of COVID, so next week we’re taking a leap of faith and we’re turning the ads off. I’m hoping that we’ll be able to replace some of the income by boosting other revenue streams, but I know I’ll lose some. However, I’d rather do it that way. I’d just feel better about it.
I wanted you to know all of that up front so that you’ll understand why these things will help:
Practical things you can do to help your favourite bloggers & creators
1. Leave a 5-star review of any books you’ve read
So few people actually review books after they’ve read them, but believe me–it helps so much. And for me, especially, if it’s possible to leave a 5-star review, it would really help, because I do have a lot of detractors who leave 1-star reviews that I need to counter.
If you’ve ever read The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, or 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage, and you could review them on Amazon, that would help so much! Bookstores often choose what new titles to order in based on Amazon ranking and ratings, so if you like the book, review and rate the book!
2. Leave a 5-star rating & review podcasts
Listen to the podcast? Leave a rating there, too! Again, ratings matter when it comes to getting other people to listen.
3. Subscribe to emails
When publishers look at giving someone a book contract, they want to know what that person’s “platform” is. And basically that’s a number–how many people follow you on social media or subscribe to your emails. I know everyone gets a lot of emails, but I try to put extra content in mine, and give special coupons to my email subscribers. So signing up helps us a ton!
When you sign up for my emails, there’s a chance to also sign up for our prayer letter where we get personal and practical, too. That would help us immensely.
4. Share great posts on Facebook and Twitter
Read something that resonated with you? Hit that share button! Traffic matters, and often people discover me because they saw a link on social media. Google also likes blogs better when they have a lot of social media shares.
5. Like our posts on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram
Speaking of social media, you’ve probably realized that you don’t see everyone’s posts anymore when you’re on Facebook or Instagram. Those platforms only show you selected people. Want to help us creators be seen more? Like us EVERY TIME you see a post. Seriously. The more engagement our posts get, the more people they will show it to. And the more you like us, the more likely you are not to miss anything!
You have no idea how much hitting that like button matters to us!
6. If you’re going shopping at Amazon, use our link
If you buy something on Amazon after following one of my links, I earn roughly 5% of what you buy. It’s a large source of my income.
I’ve just created a module that will be in every post, that will look roughly like this:
Going shopping?
Use my link to support this blog!
If you’re going shopping anyway, find an author you love and follow the links for their books on Amazon–and then buy whatever you need to buy. That gives them a commission even if you don’t buy their books! (And I’ll try to have this stripe more available so you can use my link).
7. If you like a product we talk about, use our link
I’m also going to replace my ad network ads with one big “Sheila’s Spotlight” ad at the top of each post starting next week with an affiliate product that I really love and actually use myself. I’ve chosen 12 that I’ll rotate through that you can be assured that are honest to goodness favourites of mine. Again, using my link gives me income.
8. If you ever buy something because we told you to, leave a comment
It’s easier to get sponsored posts if people can see that others appreciate what I recommend!
9. Say thank you and be encouraging
I know that many people read my blog without ever commenting, and that’s truly okay. But let me tell you: the more comments I get on posts, the more encouraging it is for me. It’s hard sitting in my yellow chair with my laptop on my lap and typing into cyberspace everyday. When people comment, I know they read. And when people say something encouraging, it’s so helpful, especially with all the negative emails we get. People take time to write when they’re mad; they rarely do when they’re happy. So send a blogger or author you love an encouraging comment every now and then. You have no idea how much that means!
Okay, I think that’s it. Obviously I could also tell you to buy my books or my courses, but I think that goes without saying. I wanted to give you some practical things you can do on a daily basis that take almost no time even when you’re NOT buying from me.And remember–these tips apply to other authors and bloggers you follow as well!
So thank you, again, for all the birthday wishes. Here’s how you can support me. I’m super excited about the ads coming down next Monday, but I have to admit–it’s a bit of a leap of faith, because I still want to be able to pay my staff. But we’ve all talked about it and planned for it, and this is the right step. So I’m counting on you all to help me like this! 
