[jezabelle]

Oh I'm so here! My man is 38, I've been with him for 5 years and we now have two kids. Since I've known him he's been talking about getting a job, I'm talking 5 years! I have now have 4 kids (5 if you include him), and I'm at home on disability as I have Lupus and Fibromyalgia. The topper is he does nothing to help me out around the house, not with the kids the housework nothing! I tell him to leave about once a month, but he won't go! Why can't he just be a man, get and job and provide for his family?!!

[seraphine]

I confess: I am also with a guy that takes a few jump-starts to get doing things. lilyblue, someone should coin your words.

It sounds like a lot of you ladies are just like me: independent, hard-working, ambitious, caring, and at times, easily taken advantage of. I have a daily calendar (that my boyfriend gave me, amusingly enough) called "For Women Who Do Too Much." Normally I would have been insulted, but I read the daily quotes and found them helpful, more than anything (all written by women, for women). The quote that landed right on my boyfriend's birthday (ironic, I know) was:

"Happy is the woman who knows the difference between taking care -of-, and caring -for-."

When I thought of it that way, it helped me to separate the things I help him do/do for him out of general affection, from those things that I do because he wasn't taking up the slack.

I've had to push him to get a job, buy a car, do his laundry, clean up after himself, help in making meals, fill out paperwork, stay organized, change his underwear (only half-joking on that one, heh), etc… and he was in the military! What I've found out is that he is just not strong in executive matters, and I... well, I can be the "bitch who must be obeyed" when it comes to taking care of business. *chuckles* It's all a matter of a Type-A personality in love with a Type-L (for laziness) one.

What advice can -I- offer? Hmm. If your significant other has the above issues that mine has, and you are as far opposite from them in that sense like I am, it's a personal choice whether you want to come to a compromise. If you use baby steps, usually it does work. I have actually had discussions about this with my guy, and this is basically what HE said: "Offer me something that I will really appreciate, such as not pestering me about doing (A.) quite so often, because the more you bug me about it, the less I want to do it. Then in turn I'll try a bit harder to do (A.). I may not do it to your standards at first, but eventually if we keep compromising we'll find a happy medium."

This works with chores, too. You'll pick up the stuff on the ground if he'll vaccum. You'll make the dinner tonight if he'll wash up and put away the leftovers. It sounds silly and rather obvious, but it has tremendously helped the health of my relationship, and undoubtedly others. He won't really know and really (I mean really) respect what you want unless you communicate in a way (compromise) that makes him feel less threatened, less talked down to, and more like it's also his idea.

So who wants to row this boat with me? *chuckles* Best of luck to you all, ladies!