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Understanding the Mental Load

Hearing everything Page had to say about the mental load, gender roles, and how to actually manage it hit me hard.

Because the first step is this.

You’ve got to understand what it really is.

Then you’ve got to learn how to communicate it without blowing up or shutting down.

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And finally, you need tools.

Real ones.

Sir, you and your partner can tackle this as a team.

Do not go anywhere.

This episode is going to change how you run your life.

0:46

Today I’m talking to Paige Connell, and if you don’t know her yet, you are about to.

She’s one of the leading voices talking about the mental load and if that phrase doesn’t ring a bell, the feeling definitely will.

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It’s the 1,000,000 tabs opening your brain.

It’s the non-stop planning, remembering and organising all the things it takes to keep a household and a family alive and running.

It’s the invisible work no one sees, no one names and hardly ever talks about.

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Until today.

Welcome page.

1:22

Speaker 2

Hi, thanks for having me SO.

1:24

Speaker 1

You’ve said before that you were overwhelmed and couldn’t pinpoint the reason until you discovered that mental load.

What changed for you once it finally had a name?

1:36

Speaker 2

I think I like many other women and I say women because women tend to carry a disproportionate amount of the mental load.

And you know, I felt it.

I knew I was overwhelmed and burnt out and I felt resentful towards my partner.

But when he would ask me how can I help or what can I do or you know what, what what can I take off your plate?

1:56

I couldn’t pinpoint anyone thing because there was just so much going on and so much of it felt invisible or something that wasn’t easy to hand off.

It wasn’t like, you know, washing the dishes, for example, right?

So once I was able to kind of define what it was that I was experiencing, I was able to better articulate to my partner and have conversations about what it would look like for us to share the work of the mental load for our family and what that meant.

2:21

Because it’s very difficult to describe something that’s invisible to somebody who’s never had to carry it.

It doesn’t feel real to them.

And so even if it feels very real to you.

And so being able to have language and words to describe what was happening to me really made all of the difference because then I was actually able to have conversations, not just with my partner, but, you know, with my friends and my therapist and just, you know, kind of express what it was that was burning me out.

2:45

So that way I could actually change it.

2:47

Communicating the Invisible Work

So men get so defensive sometimes when we try to talk to them about it.

Why do you think they have those kind of emotions when we try to share?

2:58

Speaker 2

You know, I think defensiveness is something that women get very frustrated by because they’re like, hey, who are you to get defensive?

I’m the one drowning over here.

You know, I’m the one doing all of the work.

How can you get defensive right now?

But I always encourage people to take the view, you know, somebody was coming to you with a lot of feedback, telling you things that you weren’t doing well or that you could be doing better.

3:20

I think all of our first reactions is to become defensive, right?

I think.

But in the workplace, when somebody’s like, you’re not doing this well, your first instinct is to want to defend yourself, like you want to speak up in defense of yourself.

And so I will say, I think it’s a normal reaction.

The question is, are they able to move past that feeling, right?

3:39

Like are, is your partner able to feel that defensiveness for a moment and then say, actually, I’m going to listen to my partner try to understand and move past this feeling of defensiveness?

Because if they can’t do that, then we don’t get very far, right?

Because they’re spending the whole time defending themselves saying, but I do a lot.

3:56

And you know, you don’t see what I do.

And I always say, you know, when it comes to the mental load, I think most men want to be good partners.

They want to do their fair share.

They think they are right, especially compared to their their dads.

4:12

They think they are, but they don’t realise that the mental load is not cooking dinner.

Mental load was thinking about dinner, planning for dinner, knowing what was in the fridge, knowing what your kids like, what they don’t like, knowing what they had for lunch, knowing what’s about to expire, knowing you’re running out of ketchup, adding it to the grocery list, right?

4:27

Like that is the mental load.

And they are happy to cook the dinner, but they don’t do any of the other things on the checklist.

And so part of it is not not telling them they’re not doing enough, but saying like, hey, yes, you cook dinner, but I need you actually to own all of it, right?

I can’t own all the things just for you to cook dinner and execute on it.

4:46

I need help with everything.

4:48

Defensiveness and Gender Roles

You are so right.

I also I once used the the fridge as an example.

Like when I open the fridge, I know what’s in there.

I know when it was bought, what’s about to expire like you just said in which dishes I’ve used that why I bought it.

Like, that sums up the mental hurt so, so clearly.

5:07

And I think especially what you said now about the comparison between what our husbands are doing and what their fathers, that’s like a whole generation ago.

There is definitely a big shift.

5:23

But society has strained us into certain traditional gender roles that are still definitely popping up today.

And that makes it so easy for us to get frustrated and point fingers.

But how do we get to a point where we stop blaming the men and actually making them our allies and part of the solution?

5:44

Speaker 2

Well, you know, I don’t think the blame is on men alone.

I think the thing with this conversation is we often place blame on just individual people, right?

We tell women that you should have set better boundaries, you should have had more conversations, you should have married a better guy, right?

You should have done all these things and you know of her men, how did you not know she was drowning?

6:05

You should have done more.

You should have seen it.

You should have stepped up, right?

Like we, we place all this blame on individuals.

And I think in some cases, yes, right, Like there are individual failures within these dynamics.

But on a large scale, at least here in the US and I know in other countries as well, the societal expectations we place on men and women are very, very different.

6:24

And the way we raise men and women and condition them is very different.

And so when we show up in parenting in particular, we show up with a different set of skills and a different set of expectations.

And that is the part we can’t ignore, which is that you and your partner, there’s actually research on this where if you and your partner are what’s considered a Galatian, right?

6:44

You, you both share the work of your home, maybe you’re both working full time, maybe earning a similar income.

You, you’re pretty fair, right?

Pretty fair when they have children, that couple has children, it becomes unfair where they fall into traditional gender roles after kids because the way our society is set up is we prepare women for having children from the time they’re very, very little, right.

7:03

People ask me if I wanted to be a mom when I was like 4.

Like, what do I know about being a mom at four years old?

7:08

Societal Expectations and Parenting

Nothing.

But nobody’s asking my husband that.

At four years old, I was babysitting at 10 years old, my husband was not babysitting right.

I was a nanny.

Like women go through this experience of being taught what it looks to caregive, what it looks like to caregive and men are not.

7:24

Men are not given advice on parenting or tools and tips and tricks and all the things, even the way our, I always like to say in the world of social media, our algorithms.

My husband’s algorithm does not show him anything with kids.

Like it doesn’t show him sleeping stuff, it doesn’t show him food stuff.

7:42

It doesn’t show him anything.

It just shows him, you know, woodworking videos.

And so it’s, it’s funny because I think, you know, we blame individuals when it’s actually so much more than.

7:59

Speaker 1

You make so much sense when you unpack it like that.

It definitely is more than us versus them.

So a lot of men still wait for direction at home.

They want to help, they want to show up.

8:15

But do you think they are women who who gate keeps the household because of guilt when they feel like they’re not doing everything?

8:26

Speaker 2

I don’t think it’s gatekeeping.

I, I don’t even think it’s guilt.

I, I think there is, you know, there’s a layer of guilt because society again, makes women feel like it’s their job, right?

So if they’re not doing it, then are they a bad mom?

Are they a bad wife?

Like there’s more, it’s more of a shame than anything.

Like people shame women into feeling like they’re not being a good partner when they don’t do things.

8:45

But what I see is it’s not really gatekeeping what it is, It’s a lack of trust.

They don’t trust that their partner is going to do it and do it well.

And so they want to hold control over it because one, they care deeply about it.

I always say if if you work in a career for 10 years, right, and a new hire comes in and they take everything over and they’re not doing it the way you would do it and they’re kind of not doing it well.

9:07

And things are falling through the cracks and there’s consequences happening.

You’re gonna wanna hold on to that responsibility.

You’re gonna say, hey, I’ve done this for 10.

I know what I’m doing.

Like, trust me on this.

I know what I’m doing.

This is how you should do it.

This is the way I do it and why I do it that way.

And so oftentimes women struggle because they are the expert, right?

9:25

They’re like, I have made dinner 5000 times.

I can tell you right now our kid is not going to eat what you’re making, right?

Like, I can tell you that they’re not gonna eat it.

So, you know, I don’t know that it’s controlling or gatekeeping.

What I think it is, is it’s a really, it’s really difficult to release the work that you have cared deeply about and has spent a lot of time on to somebody that you don’t necessarily fully trust because you’re worried that they’re going to do it in a way that has an impact on other people.

9:54

And I would also say the other part of this is not just the the trust aspect, but the judgment, right?

So I make lunch for my kids.

Sometimes my husband does.

And when he makes lunch, I’m like, Oh my

10:25

Trust and Control in Household Management

I always think about like my daughters.

I have three daughters.

Their hair.

If I send them to school with messy hair, I will be judged for that.

If my husband says I’m to school with messy hair, he will not, right?

And so it’s less about control, it’s more about where do the consequences land and who experiences that consequent more than the other person.

10:44

Speaker 1

That is so so true.

I once saw this meme of moms saying her husband told her to just sit on the couch and relax.

He will load the dishwasher and then the mom says, I’ve never been less relaxed in and I love watching this man packing all the stuff in the dishwasher.

11:05

So absolutely.

And the lunches and the Macy hair.

I think that’s such a relatable way to explain it because we all feel it.

We all definitely feel that judgment and want to avoid it at all costs.

11:22

Speaker 2

Yeah.

11:23

Speaker 1

Do you think the mental alert is the reason so many relationships feel like business partnerships instead of emotional ones?

11:32

Speaker 2

No, I don’t think so, actually.

I think, you know, it’s funny.

I, I tell people all the time, the work that comes with managing a home and raising kids, the actual work, not the parenting, but the work, the laundry, the dishes, the cooking, the cleaning, the school emails.

That’s just work that has nothing really to do with parenting, right?

11:49

Like being a good parent doesn’t mean you’re good at emails.

And, and so all of this work happens because you have kids, but it doesn’t, it’s not really a part of parenting.

It’s not really a part of marriage.

But the problem is when you enter into a marriage and parenting with someone, there’s going to be a lot of work.

12:05

And so I actually think about them as two separate things, which is that there’s the work of managing your home and your family, and then there’s the relationships.

And for better or for worse, they are tied to one another, but they are separate things, right?

So I always encourage people to view that work really as a system, as a business and working together as team mates, because that is what you need to do to accomplish everything that has to get done, right.

12:30

The Work of Parenting vs. Relationship Dynamics

I don’t need, you know, I could hire someone to come in and fold the laundry.

I don’t have to love that person for them to be good at laundry, right?

But it’s the laundry still has to get done.

And so a lot of conversations I think couples have will say, like I’ve said that to my partner is like when you forget to do something, it feels like you’re telling me that you don’t care about me because if you don’t do it, then I have to and you’ve created more work for me, right?

12:58

It’s like being in a group project with somebody who doesn’t do their fair share and you end up with the work, right?

The problem is at the end of the group project, you don’t have to go home with that person in in marriage, you do, you live this person, right?

And so you have to be working together on the logistics of your family.

13:15

But what I tell people all the time is if that part of your life is running smoothly, kind of like a well oiled machine, like a good running business, it frees up time, space and energy for you to pour into your relationships, right?

To spend time doing things that you like doing.

13:30

Because if all you do is fight about the laundry and the dishes and the emails and the kids and all the things, and you’re just constantly trying to figure out how to do that and you’re never on the same page about it.

The time that you could be spending on planning a date night or doing a hobby together or whatever it is, you can’t because you’re too busy over here fighting about dinner, right?

13:49

So I tell people I, I think the mental load can make it feel like you’re roommates because if it’s really heavy and you don’t have a system for navigating it, it leaves very little space for anything else in your relationship.

But if you are working together to manage it, then it actually gives you more time and energy and space to pour into your relationship.

14:10

So they’re very, very connected.

Unfortunately.

I wish they weren’t.

I mean, unless you have the finances to outsource all of it, which I think most of us do not.

14:19

Speaker 1

No.

So you just mentioned a system to navigate the mentaler to free you up.

What are such a system look like practically?

14:29

Speaker 2

It depends on the couple, but I think the best thing you can do first and foremost is to make the mental load and just invisible labour visible, right?

I always tell couples to write it down, put it in a spreadsheet.

You know, We started with Fair Play, which I’m sure a lot of people are familiar with is from Eve, Rod Sky to Book and then an accompanying game.

14:48

I turned that spreadsheet, that game into a spreadsheet.

But I tell people to make the invisible labour visible right down everything that you guys are doing.

Write down all the emails you’re answering and all the clothes you’re buying for the kids.

14:58

Creating a System for Managing the Mental Load

And you know, today I had to bring snow boots to school and all of the little things that you do every single day.

Just write it down, make it visible, and then come together with your partner and outline how you’re going to move forward.

How are the two of you together as a team going to manage all this work?

15:14

Because there’s a lot of work, right?

It’s a lot of work.

And so how are you 2 as a team going to do that?

And how will that feel fair?

And depending on the couple, you know, for us, fair play worked well because we had a spreadsheet and it basically said who did what, right?

Like who was responsible for what?

15:29

And then if for some reason one person was not holding up their end of the bargain, we could go back to that spreadsheet and say, like, hey, like you, you said you were going to do this thing and you’re not doing it consistently.

Why not?

What do we need to do differently?

Do we need to switch things?

Do I need to take that over and you take something else over, right?

15:45

Having a tool like that can be really helpful.

I will also say there’s a lot of apps these days, like there is no shortage of mental load schools being created because it is such a prevalent issue.

And if that is how your family operates best, there are really great apps that can help you navigate figuring out what feels fair, how to manage it right.

16:05

All of that information can be shared in an app too.

But I think at the end of the day, the most important thing is that you have an understanding of who’s responsible for what and an accountability tool that is not just you, right?

Like the wife can’t be the person being like you said you would do this, having an actual tool to say like, you know, this was your task and I’m not telling you was your task like this.

16:29

We, we know it was your task because I think what can happen is women will feel like a nag, right?

Like, hey, you said you would do the dishwasher.

Hey, you said you would do the dishwasher.

And when they don’t do the dishwasher, he gets annoyed with her because she’s constantly bringing it up.

And when you have a system or a tool or a method for navigating it, then you 2 are in agreement, right?

16:48

You built a tool together.

And then it makes it a little bit easier for the two of you to work towards that pulled together as opposed to it feeling like 1 person’s really driving that ship.

16:58

Speaker 1

Yeah, and for, let’s say single parents or a mum whose husband works abroad or people managing this whole thing by themselves.

What’s your advice for someone like that?

17:12

Navigating Solo Parenting Challenges

So there’s so much nuance to this conversation in any relationship, right?

My partner works long hours at a really unpredictable.

Some people have partners who are deployed right in the Army, right?

There’s, there’s so much nuance here.

I will say, depending on the circumstance, when my husband is gone a lot, 1 of the things I always tell people is his physical absence doesn’t mean he can’t carry some of the mental load, right?

17:37

When I’m travelling for work, I still answer emails, I still order prescriptions.

I still refill my kids groceries from from states away, right?

I’m doing this all on my phone.

Like I can do so much of the work that has to get done even if I’m not physically there.

17:53

And a lot of women might say, like, well, my husband works really long days, for example, he works 12 hour days and then he comes home.

He doesn’t want to do any of those things.

I totally get it.

But I spend most of my nights as a mom answering school emails, ordering new shoes for the kids, filling out forms for doctor’s appointments, whatever.

18:10

I sit on the couch with my laptop and like complete all of the family administration tasks because there’s so much that has to get done.

We can expect the same thing of our partners.

So even if they’re not physically present, if there are certain things they can do when they’re not physically there, I think a conversation about that is really helpful.

18:28

I would also say if there is a way to build a community and support system around you, that is so invaluable.

I really believe that the mental load that a single family home has with two parents and children is more than anyone was meant to carry by themselves.

18:44

I think modern expectations of marriage and parenting and work are just far above what anybody can actually realistically meet.

And so building community and support around you is incredibly helpful if you have the means to outsource different things, doing that to support yourself.

19:01

I think we often shame women in particular for outsourcing, right?

Like why are you going to outsource the food or the laundry or the cleaning?

The men outsource tasks like lawn mowing constantly, right?

Like that’s a very normal thing to outsource dry cleaning their suits, etcetera.

19:17

I think it is okay to outsource if you have the ability to do it and it is beneficial.

So you know, there’s no one solution unfortunately.

And being a single parent or a parent to parent solo a lot because your partner is not physically there is a lot.

19:32

It is incredibly draining.

There’s a lot of work.

And I wish in general that our governments supported parents better, provided things like affordable childcare, right?

Like workplaces that understood parenting expectations and school schedules.

19:48

We just don’t have that right now.

And so we have to build our own support systems around that.

19:53

Preparing the Next Generation

Yeah, I think they are.

The conversation and the messaging out there is definitely moving in the right direction.

So my next question actually segues into that and it’s what can we do to ensure that the next generation of moms and dads have a better understanding of the roles at player?

20:16

Speaker 2

I think first and foremost just talking about it, right?

I have so many women who messaged me who are 60 years old, 70 years old, and they said if I had just known the words, if somebody had just said this to me, I would have been able to do something about it.

But I just thought that this is how it was.

20:33

And I think the more conversations we have about it, the more that we can teach one another what it looks like to build an equitable partnership, what it looks like to share the mental load, what it looks like to raise young boys who participate in the work of caregiving.

I think, you know, we default to women as caregivers in our societies.

20:52

We, we look at women and we’re like, of course she’s going to do all the overnights with the babies.

Of course she’s going to take a sick day when the kids are sick.

Of course she’s gonna do that.

She’s the mom, right?

Men can do that as well.

And actually in my relationship, my kids are like, ohh, can dad stay home?

Like we would like dad.

And I’m like, great, you could have dad because he, he, he participates in that work just as much as I do.

21:12

It’s, it’s not reserved just for women.

So I think it’s really important that we continue just to have honest conversations about it and then model the behaviour because more than anything, modelling the behaviour matters.

I tell people all the time, it’s not just what happens in your home that matters, which it it does matter what your kids see in your home matters.

21:33

But if you think about the television they consume, right?

The TV shows we grew up watching, the dad did nothing.

They were all just like, oh, I don’t know how to cook dinner.

And what do you mean we have a mailbox, right?

Like it was very much like these men who didn’t know how to provide for their family in that way.

21:50

If we can see more models on television and in media and marketing, social media, that also matters because what we see around us, that is the societal conditioning that tells us what it looks like to be a mom or a dad or a good husband or a good.

22:06

Speaker 1

Wife and my work badge you I could speak to you all day.

You are like, just like wisdom and so much knowledge about this, about this topic.

We’ve reached the final five, which is the last five questions every single guest on moments answer.

22:24

And the first one is which part of your human experience was changed the most by becoming a mum?

22:32

Speaker 2

Which part wasn’t, I don’t know.

Um, you know, I think for me, um, yeah, becoming a mom really radicalised me and it gave me so much more empathy for the women around me because I just didn’t understand what everybody was going through as moms.

22:51

And I didn’t understand how difficult it was.

And I didn’t understand how varied the experiences were based on levels of privilege and income and support and all those things.

And so it really just changed how I view the world overall and how I view other people and how I hope to show up and support other people.

23:10

So it really, I mean, there was nothing, there was no part of my life that was untouched by becoming a mother.

23:16

Final Thoughts and Reflections

I agree completely.

So looking back, what would you have done differently?

23:21

Speaker 2

I think I wouldn’t have taken on so much at the beginning by myself if I’d known better.

I didn’t know better, so I can’t undo it.

But I, if I had known better, you know, I would have asked my partner to do the work of researching pediatricians with me and read the baby books and figure out wake windows.

23:38

And I would have expected my partner not to just follow my lead, but be an active participant in it because my husband was always very hands on.

But it was very much my job to tell him what the feeding schedule was or to tell him what the nap schedule was.

And I took all of that on.

And to be honest, I thought that was kind of what you did as a mom.

23:57

You know, this is what moms do.

And I wish I had known from the get go that I should be including him in that work with me.

24:05

Speaker 1

No.

So what are you most grateful for in your mom journey?

24:12

Speaker 2

Ohh, my gosh, daycare.

I, I think childcare is such an incredibly important thing, not just for working parents, but for parents in general.

Parenting can be relentless and having a caregiver that you can count on and that you trust to care for your child is so incredibly important and valuable.

24:32

And I think so often women are made to feel guilty for childcare.

And I have always worked full time and so I’ve always had daycare for a nanny or some version of that.

And our childcare providers are so incredibly special and important, and I’m so grateful for them.

And I am grateful because my kids genuinely love them and enjoy going to daycare or when a babysitter comes over to watch them.

24:56

So my husband and I can, you know, even just go Christmas shopping without the kids, right?

And so childcare is something I’m incredibly grateful for because I think nobody can parent 24/7 and we don’t have villages in the way we used to, right?

Built in support systems to help care for children.

25:11

And so that has been really, really important for us.

25:16

Speaker 1

And what are you telling your own kids about parenting?

25:20

Speaker 2

That they don’t have to do it if they don’t want to.

Um, I, you know, my little ones, my daughters all have baby dolls.

They’re obsessed with them right now.

And we’ll talk about I’m a mom and I’m a dad or, you know, my son will pretend to be the dad.

And I, I asked him.

25:36

I said, do you think you want to be a dad?

And he was like, I don’t really know.

And I was like, yeah, I mean, you don’t have to know that.

And honestly, you don’t have to do it either because I think as a child, it didn’t really seem like I had a choice either way, right?

Like, you just grow up, you get married and you have kids.

25:53

And I want my kids to know that they get a choice and all of those things.

They don’t have to be a parent if they don’t want to be a parent.

And, and, and that, you know, parenting is more than just, you know, feeding a baby a bottle, right?

26:08

They hear if they complain about breakfast, they’ll say, ohh, you bought the wrong yogurt.

And I said no, no, no, daddy bought the wrong yogurt cause daddy went grocery shopping this week.

So I, I want them also to know that like, you know, parenting is a team sport.

26:24

Mom and dad are both in this together.

And so I also talked to them about it that as well.

26:31

Speaker 1

So what is your North Star when you make parenting decisions?

26:35

Speaker 2

Try to think about the entire family as much as possible because I think I have 4 kids.

So, you know, when we make decisions, we don’t just think about one kid, we think about everybody, even if it is about one kid, right?

Yeah.

Should they play this sport?

26:51

Okay, if they play that sport, well, how many practices is it?

How are we going to get the girls back and forth?

Are we all going to go?

Are we not going to go?

When are we going to have dinner?

Right?

My North Star is to try and think about the family unit when we make decisions, not just anyone person.

You can’t always do that, right?

Sometimes you are really thinking about what is best for that individual child or person in your in your relationship.

27:10

But I try to think about what is the impact on every single person in this house, not just the one person that I’m thinking about right now or this one decision.

How is this going to kind of impact everybody?

Because I think that’s the one thing I’ve learned about parenting is that everybody feels everything.

27:29

And so you have to think about that when you make visions.

27:34

Speaker 1

Yeah, that’s, that’s great.

That’s such a great way to think about it and to make your decisions about Page.

Thanks so much for joining me.

What you’re doing is changing lives, and I want to say thank you for standing up and speaking the truth and pushing this conversation forward.

27:52

We need more voices like yours.

Keep going.

27:56

Speaker 2

Ohh thank you, I appreciate it.

Thank you for having me.

28:00

Speaker 1

Followed page on Instagram for incredible advice and resources at She’s a Page Turner.

I really want to encourage you to share pages message about the mental load because this episode isn’t just a conversation, it’s a tool that can change the way moms operate.

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Her advice gives women the clarity and support they need to stop coping and start showing up as their true selves.

In my next episode, I’m joined by Kate Thompson from the Society of Working Moms, a powerful networking platform built on Slack.

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Yes, Slack.

But instead of work messages, it’s a community of working moms lifting each other up, designed to connect, support, and empower working mothers across every industry.

Subscribe and follow to get notified when it’s live.

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See you there.

Watch the full episode: