Why Some Husbands Are Lazy at Home and How to Change This

Many married couples experience conflict because the husband seems engrossed in his work and has no time for helping around the house. If the wife is working fulltime, this can lead to great anger and resentment on her part.

In his book, The Lazy Husband (St Martin's Press, 2005), Joshua Coleman describes the causes of this problem as well as ways to overcome it.

How Childhood Influences Marriage

Joshua Coleman states that every marriage is influenced by the partners' childhood experiences. Subconsciously, people tend to mimic their parents' marriage or if their home environment was unhealthy, they may vow to act in an opposite manner. Both can be damaging to a marriage.

If a man comes from a background where women are regarded as subservient to men, he may appear lazy around the home. His mother may have served her husband, cared for the children and provided sex on demand. While this model was common in past decades, it does not work well in modern society.

A Husband's Focus is to Provide for his Wife

Financial security and wealth are of great value to men. They regard these things as a sign of their worth and status and are willing to work long hard hours to achieve them. Part of their drive for financial security is the desire to provide for their wives and children. Unfortunately, they may take this to the extreme and be so worn out from work that they have no energy left to help around the home or attend to their wife's emotional needs.

Four Types of Lazy Husbands

Joshua Coleman describe four categories of husbands who are often reluctant to help around the home:

• The boy-husband is a man who has never grown up and faced his responsibilities. He is often careless with money, unreliable at work and indecisive. His wife may end up doing all the housework as well as handing the husband's responsibilities while he plays and goofs around.

• The worried husband may come from a difficult family background where he was forced to grow up too quickly. He worries constantly about finances, security and possible disasters and has little energy left to help around the family home.

• The perfectionist husband can be hard to live with. He has high standards for housekeeping, cooking and childcare but is often reluctant to physically help in these areas. His wife often ends up exhausted and feeling inferior, controlled and dominated.

• The angry husband may control and belittle his wife. His behavior is often hostile, abusive, jealous and intimidating. In this case it is essential to work on the anger problem before asking him to help with housework.

Many husbands fall into one of the above categories to a greater or lesser degree. In extreme cases counseling can be helpful. In others, communication and recognizing the problem can be the first step to solving the difficulties. The important thing is that husband and wife learn to work together to overcome their differences and share the workload at home.