I don't know who you are meeting/talking to because both the statistics and the anecdotal evidence say that women are sick and tired of making life easier for men without much expectation of it being reciprocated to the same extent. I'm not saying there aren't instances of what you are describing, but they don't seem to be the norm. In fact, the other way round seems to be much more of an issue.
In a recent story that I published about how much more home-keeping and childcare work women do, even if they also work outside the home, and even if they are the primary breadwinners for their family, I got a lot of frustrated comments from women.
“This is why I will never get married again. Marriage is a raw deal for women. Marriage is how you get trapped in a life of domestic servitude to a man. Don’t give up your own hopes and dreams for some guy who’s just looking for somebody to clean up after him & make his life comfortable. It’s not worth it.”
“(My husband) used to appear quite domesticated prior to “putting a ring on it”. We actually shared a house, so I assumed that I knew what living with him would be like. But apparently saying “I do” removed his ability to operate the washing machine… and that is just the tip of the iceberg!”
“Definition of marriage for women — slavery. If you can’t behave like an adult you don’t deserve to be in a relationship. Women have allowed this shit to happen.”
“For a generation of older men, traditional, live-in relationships remain important because female partners meet so many of their social, emotional, health and domestic needs, said Sharon Hyman, a Montreal filmmaker who’s interviewed hundreds of couples for her upcoming documentary called Apartners: Living Happily Ever Apart. “Women have wider circles of friends. Men don’t so they are relying on women for more,” Hyman said. “For men, often we hear it’s not as easy for them to be on their own.”
The New Reality Of Dating Over 65
After being told their whole lives that they are only complete people if they become wives and mothers, many women are discovering that they are just fine as singletons — some of them as never-married people and some of them as never-again divorcees or widows. The trend seems to be related to a desire for greater independence and autonomy and to have the kinds of love relationships that do not inhibit that.
Married women, even those without children, do the bulk of the housework even when they work outside the home. In fact, the more a woman earns, the higher the percentage of chores she will typically perform. “The more economically dependent men are on their wives, the less housework they do. Even women with unemployed husbands spend considerably more time on household chores than their spouses.” It’s a not-so-subtle way of asserting, “But, I’m still the man!”
“Other than this, our relationship is pretty egalitarian — we have careers, we co-parent, we share responsibilities as much as possible — but when it comes to household management and scheduling, my husband, a considerate special-ed teacher, seems forgetful and even lazy, as if he’s the lackadaisical intern to my executive.
MEL Magazine (a men’s magazine) coined the term, mandholding to describe this phenomenon, the expectation that women are just naturally good at and therefore should be responsible for making life run smoothly. “Free, invisible work women do to keep track of the little things in life that, taken together, amount to the big things in life: the glue that holds households, and by extension, proper society, together.”
