Don't Place Your Value in Cooking and Cleaning
Would you ever have your partner or significant other rate your performance in your relationship? Would you really want to hear their response if you asked? If you didn’t get the rating that you liked, how would you defend yourself? I’m not here to start any trouble in your happy home nor will be I before you long, but a conversation occurred on one of the shows that I watch and it really rubbed me the wrong way.
On Tuesday, I was watching the show “Married at First Sight,” a show where couples get married to one another sight unseen. These couples have eight weeks to marry, live together, and decide if they want to stay married after the 8 weeks are done. This season, one of exercises involved the couples rating their performance so far during the course of their relationship. I personally think an exercise like this will only cause trouble but hey, I’m not an expert.
Like I expected, one of the women was a given a rating she didn’t like and started listing all the reasons why she should have scored higher. She stated that she cooked and cleaned for him and how she put up with his messy ways. What caught my attention during this whole discussion was how she only listed cooking and cleaning as reasons why she should have received a higher rating. I thought to myself, “Is that all you bring to this relationship?” This woman owns her own home, has a successful career, and seems like a great person, so why are those two things the only reasons why she thinks she deserves more points?
As black women, we are raised with the mindset that cooking and cleaning are thing that we need to master and perfect in order to keep our partners happy or to have a successful relationship. It doesn’t matter if you have a successful career, have great communication skills, or the ability to uplift your partner when they are going through a rough patch; cooking and cleaning is what matters most. This stigma that all we have to bring to the table is culinary skills is rooted in the mindset that women don’t offer much else other than partnership. Heaven help if your partner steps outside the relationship because all of the blame is then placed on you. You weren’t doing your job. You must keep your spouse happy and maintain your home in a constant state of good condition.
Ladies, we have more to offer a partnership then cleaning someone’s dirty underwear or being able to make breakfast in the morning. Our worth isn’t rooted in being able to make biscuits from scratch or how to get a stain out of his work shirt . I’m not saying you shouldn’t take care of your partner but we have to make sure we are using household duties to measure our performance in relationships.
It’s time we start breaking down these mindsets from the past. We all have our strengths and weaknesses, and the goal of a successful relationship should be being able to figure those things out while maintaining a good balance. Let that be your focus instead of feeling like a full stomach and a clean kitchen will keep your partner happy and earn you a gold star.
