The Mental Workload: Mothers’ Invisible Work

Many couples believe that both parties share the burden of household and family responsibilities equally in the home. However, the responsibility for logistics and planning still falls mostly on the woman. This is what we refer to when we talk about the mental workload – mothers’ invisible work.

Society has definitely changed the way it views respect and equality. Today, it is common for men to participate to a greater extent in household tasks than before. Given that women are more involved in working life, more and more couples share the tasks at home as well. This is logical and fair.

But even with that said, if we take a closer look at the matter, we often come to the conclusion that things are not quite as equal as they might seem. It is true that the division of physical tasks, such as cooking, cleaning, babysitting, etc., can be equal. But the responsibility for planning, organizing and implementing the whole thing in many cases still falls entirely on the woman.

What is the mental workload?

The term mental workload refers to all the invisible work required for the various areas of family life to function smoothly.

It is to continuously and consciously need to think about all future tasks and how to handle each one. It is about anticipating, organizing and remembering everything that needs to be done.

It was the sociologist Susan Walzer who in her study described this concept and the gender imbalance that it often implies. But to make us aware of this inequality, we must first be able to distinguish between physical and mental tasks.

Physical information:

• Clean and keep order at home.
• Go shopping for food.
• To take the children to preschool and school and pick them up.
• Cook dinner.
• Fold laundry.

Examples of mental tasks:

• To remember that some household products run out, such as toothpaste, and to make sure to buy more before they run out.

• To remember that your child has a study visit today and will finish school an hour early.
• To plan meals in advance and remember to take the necessary ingredients out of the freezer so that they thaw in time.
• Deciding what the children will wear to an upcoming wedding and making sure everything is clean and tidy for the event.

The tasks that fall into the mental category often fall almost exclusively on the woman. Men do not usually spend the same amount of time on this kind of mental planning. And if they do, it usually has to do with their own job and not household or family responsibilities. Women, on the other hand, think, organize and plan their work, social and household life, as well as those of their family members.

How can we make the mental workload visible?

Changes take time and that is why society continues to assign women the responsibility for running the home. This makes it difficult to make visible the fact that this is unfair. We have come to internalize the idea that it is our job to such an extent that we hardly question it. In fact, we often even feel that our value as individuals is linked to our ability to organize our homes and families.

So what is the solution?

The solution to freeing yourself from this heavy burden is to simply share it equally with your partner. But you have to do it in a real and effective way.

It is not fair that your partner promises to take responsibility for certain mental tasks if he later forgets them and fails at them. It is also not acceptable for the woman to have to give detailed instructions to the man every time he leaves home in matters concerning children, meals, schedules, etc.

Both parties must be determined to do their fair share of both physical and mental tasks for it to work. To achieve this, a good strategy can be to divide different tasks per area – for example, one of you takes on the responsibility of planning and preparing meals. In the meantime, the other can take responsibility for things that are related to your children’s schooling.