Oh please.

A survey of 15,000 American women discovered that female breadwinners ride their husbands about housework and childcare because they’re worried about losing touch with their “feminine” identity.

Excuse me while I go scream into a pillow.

According to the study, which came out of Missouri University, 60 percent of women said they enjoyed the “control” they had as both breadwinner and homemaker, and that directing home activities also helped assuage the guilt they feel for working outside the home.

So moms are guilt-ridden.  And controlling.  And dads can’t handle housework and childcare without written or verbal instruction.  Sound about right?

I think that if we can leave those stereotypical assumptions out of it, there might be room for an interesting discussion here.

Recently, a friend had a Facebook status that read like this:

“Kids are being taken care of daddy-style.  Love the free time, hate to think about the mess I’ll have to deal with later.”

Moms and dads often take care of their families differently — not necessarily in a way that’s better or worse — just differently.  That’s not being sexist, it’s just being real.  I think the majority of women in this study who indicated they relish that “control” are probably the women who are just more comfortable in a world where the darks and whites don’t mingle in the washing machine and the milk is 2%, not skim.

But femininity?  There are a lot of things that I feel when I do laundry — bored, overwhelmed, maybe even a little resentful (I really hate doing the laundry.) — but “feminine” isn’t one of them.  Not even if I was the CEO of a Fortune 500 company who never got a chance to do a bit of housework.

I like studies like this — despite the sexist undertones — because they give us a chance to put marriage and relationships and all of their little eccentricities under a microscope.

One night last week, I apparently sat up in bed and chided my husband — coming in after a late basketball game — for setting the varied child-related detrius on his side of the bed on the floor instead of putting it away.

“I did not,” I said the next morning when he teased me about it.

“You did,” he said, “It was brutal.”

Was I unconsciously trying to control him as a husband and father or to be in touch with my more feminine side?  Nope.  I think that even when I’m asleep, I’m still tired of picking crap up off the floor.

What do you think about these findings?  Even if you don’t agree with their assumptions about why, do you ever find yourself directing your husband or partner’s cleaning and childcare duties when you aren’t home?

Photo: jemsweb, Flickr

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