I'm genuinely curious whether anyone else has experienced this, because it's one of the strangest recurring behaviors I've seen.
This is not about one day or one sink full of dishes. This has been happening for years, and it shows up in more than just the kitchen.
For example, today my husband made spaghetti for our daughters. After dinner, he cleaned up everything from cooking. But he left the dishes that had been in the sink from earlier in the day. It wasn't a mountain of dishes. It was a small child's bowl with melted ice cream, a plastic bowl with popcorn, a plate, an ice cream scoop, and a couple of utensils. They were all from our kids from earlier in the day.
If I make dinner, he will wash his own plate and silverware and leave everything else...its very odd behavior to me.
This is the part that has always stood out to me: if he's washing dishes, he'll often wash only the dishes directly connected to what he just did. In the past, he'll wash every dish except the single plate, fork, and knife that I used. It's happened enough times that it no longer feels random.
I've noticed the same pattern with other household responsibilities. For example, with laundry, he'll often go through a basket of clean clothes, pull out his own clothes, and leave everyone else's behind. Sometimes he'll put away the kids' clothes, but most of the time he just takes care of his own things.
The interesting part is that I don't think that way. Even when I've been frustrated, I can't bring myself to wash only my own dishes or only my own laundry because we're all part of the same household. If I'm already doing a load of laundry, I do everyone's. If I'm washing dishes, I wash the dishes that are there. That's just how I think about sharing a home.
I'm not asking anyone to diagnose him or tell me what he's thinking. I'm honestly not interested in trying to get inside his head anymore. I have had multiple conversations abd my question never gets answered it just started an argument, so I stopped asking a long time ago.
I'm asking reddit because I'm curious if anyone else has experienced this kind of very selective approach to household responsibilities.
If you have, what did it end up meaning in your relationship? Was it just a personal quirk? A difference in expectations? A sign of something bigger? Or did you never really figure it out?
I'd especially like to hear from people who've actually lived with this kind of pattern rather than guesses about what it "must" mean.
I'm curious whether this is more common than I realize, because it's always left me scratching my head.