My husband took a day off work, but while I cared for our toddler, Leila, and handled the housework, he spent the day playing video games. When I mentioned it to my mother-in-law, she handed me a list of things she had stopped doing for her own husband. “You’re not his maid,” she told me. “You’re his wife.”
I made a list too. I stopped picking up his dry cleaning, washing his running shoes, and remembering everything he needed. Then, when he kept us waiting for a family trip to the park because he was still gaming, I took Leila without him. He was annoyed, but I was tired of putting our lives on hold.
His sister Nina came to stay with us soon after and saw how much I was carrying. One night, I broke down over a dropped mug. The next morning, I finally told my husband the truth: “I don’t want a divorce. I just don’t want to stay married and feel invisible.”
He began to listen. He washed dishes, took Leila to the park, and slowly became more present, though we both still had difficult days. A year later, on our anniversary, he handed me a list of his own: things he was working on doing better, including helping without being asked and putting down the controller when I spoke. For the first time in a long while, I felt heard.
