Eight years I’ve spent as a homemaker. Not because it was my ambition, but because that’s how life unfolded. I have two children, a husband who works all day, and a home that never stays clean for long. I rise at 5:30 every morning. Before anyone else wakes up, I’m already making breakfast.
By 7 oclock, I’ve washed up, swept the sitting room, made the beds, and got lunch halfway sorted. As my husband heads out for the day, he says, Just take it easy at home. As if being at home means an easy life. The moment the front door shuts behind him, my second shift begins: laundry, mopping the floors, cleaning the bathroom, gathering up the childrens toys, popping into the shops, then collecting the kids from school.
When the children get home, theres still no break. Homework, afternoon snacks, quarrels, shouting, more dirty clothes. In the midst of this chaos, my husband comes home exhausted, and parks himself in front of his phone. If I ask for a hand, he replies, I work all day. Once, I replied, So do I, and he took offence. Says Im exaggerating and dont know what real tiredness feels like.
One day I told him I wanted to go back to work. I want to earn my own money, leave the house for something more than cleaning, feel useful beyond chores. He answered, Wholl look after the children then?, Why did I marry you, if not for this?, Thats just selfish. My mother-in-law chimed in, saying a good wife stays at home.
I started to feel invisible. No one asks how I am. No one thanks me. If the meals too salty, Im to blame. If the house is messy, Im at fault. If the children have poor marks, its my responsibility. Everything lands on me.
There was one evening I snapped. Washing dishes at ten oclock, aching back, and I overhear my husband on the phone: My wife doesnt work, she just stays at home. I dropped the plate in the sink and simply broke down in tears.
Now Im exhausted. Tired of work that pays nothing, without hours or gratitude. Tired of feeling my life is locked inside four walls. Tired of being just a homemaker.
And I truly dont know what to do next. Should I keep my head down, should I stand my ground, should I get a jobeven if it might stir things up at home?
I wonder, is the homemaker really privileged, or is it a burden everyone pretends not to see?
Today, as I jot this down, I realise the lesson is simple: the hardest work can often go unseen, but it deserves respectboth from others and from oneself.
