Mental Load: What It Is and How to Stop It from Destroying Your Relationship

Has Purity Culture Harmed Your Sex Life? How To Overcome Religious Shame | Vanessa Marin Sex Therapy

June 17,2021

Do you secretly keep score of who does what in your relationship? 

Do you feel like your partner gets to be carefree and happy while you’re stressed out trying to hold it all together?

In today’s episode, we talk about one of the most popular topics we’ve ever talked about: mental load.

If you’ve never heard the term before, mental load refers to the invisible mental burden of keeping track of household and family needs. 

Seriously, people go bananas whenever we talk about mental load, so this is an episode you don’t want to miss!

 

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In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • What mental load is, and why it’s so harmful to relationships. 
  • How mental load impacts your sex life in particular.
  • Why women are socialized to carry the majority of the mental load. 
  • A step-by-step plan to balance the mental load between yourself and your partner, so you don’t create resentment and frustration.
  • What to do if your partner doesn’t do tasks the way you’d like them to.

Here’s a glance at this episode:

[02:38] What mental load is.

[03:47] Why it’s so hard to carry the mental load.

[04:32] Fascinating poll results about people’s least-favorite mental load tasks.

[11:00] Why women are socialized to carry the majority of the mental load.

[13:25] How mental load can ruin your relationship.

[15:06] The specific impact of mental load on your sex life.

[22:23] Our best tips for balancing mental load in your relationship.

[48:35] Listener question: Why isn’t it a two-way street? There is no mental load that my partner bears for the family.

[49:41] Listener question: How do you help your partner understand mental load?

[51:00] Listener question: I’m a stay-at-home mom and my partner works. I feel bad asking him to do things since he works a stressful job all day.

[53:05] Listener question: My partner says it’s not fair for me to expect him to read my mind.

[54:07] Listener question: How do I remind my partner to do their mental load tasks? If I don’t remind him, he won’t remember.

[1:00:04] What if my partners learning their new tasks affects the family? For example, forgetting to pack snacks for the kids.

Links & resources

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