Why Marriage Sucks For Straight Women & How Lesbians Do It Better
The hidden inequalities of heterosexual marriage
“It is not simply the presence of a man that is associated with women’s spending more time on housework; it is the presence of a husband.” — Shelton & John.
Despite the decades-long struggle to level the field of gender inequality in the professional realm, the negative effects of patriarchy are still ever-present in our society.
In 2023, women were earning 77 cents for every dollar earned by White men. Compared to 1996—when it was just 75 cents—an improvement has been made.
A slight one.
Very slight.
Squint and you’ll miss it, but it’s there.
And while the enforcement of corrective measures in many industries implies that the focus on gender equality is improving, we definitely still have a way to go.
We often investigate how gender impacts financial prospects, since we have numerical evidence to support our arguments and mark our progress (or lack thereof).
However, what about the areas void of remuneration?
It begs the question:
How much does gender inequality affect the home front?
Like countless women the world over, I was prepared for marriage from a very young age. Raised within the narrow confines of a patriarchal society, it was assumed that I would one day settle down with a husband and bear children.
By the time I was 21, I knew that that pipe dream would never come to fruition. After a long and unsteady stretch of adolescent soul-searching, a few failed attempts at dating men, and one particularly pivotal come-to-Jesus moment in my Barcelona apartment, I realised I was a lesbian.
A lesbian who, thankfully, had this epiphany before the hand of heteronormativity escorted her down the aisle to avow a life of servitude to a husband.
Straight marriage = wifely servitude?
Marriage and parenthood are both arduous and, more importantly, unpaid endeavours. Especially for women.
While a man is able to continue working until the moment his child is born (and immediately thereafter), a woman will experience an interruption to her career due to pregnancy, postpartum, and childrearing.
Bearing children sequesters a woman’s time and energy in a way that is largely uncharted for her male counterparts.
Even for couples wealthy enough to afford hired help, a woman is much more likely to micromanage the goings-on in the household — remembering playdates, shopping for Christmas, organising parties and Halloween costumes, packing lunches, scheduling, delegating, supervising, and worrying.
That was certainly the case in my household growing up.
It was a foregone conclusion that the contents of any Christmas present signed “Love, Mum & Dad” were a complete mystery to my father.
If it weren’t for my mother’s parental overextension, I would’ve RSVPd to no birthday parties, attended no school trips, and probably been dressed as a bedsheet ghost on World Book Day.
She took care of what felt like everything as a stay-at-home mum. Countless hours of emotional graft and self-sacrifice in the name of child rearing.
Nowadays, mothers are expected to fulfil that maternal role while also holding down some form of employment — employment that doesn’t offer the same financial compensation to them as it does to men.
Economic demands have increased the number of mothers in the workforce but absolutely not lessened the need for caregivers or lightened the load at home.
These same economic demands are guilty of pulling husbands and fathers away from the household in the form of overtime at work and/or requiring them to seek additional employment to sustain the family unit.
Consequently, the majority of the housework is not only likely to be allotted to the wife, but she’ll probably be the only person able to consistently see that it’s taken care of.
Women are the typified beasts of domestic burden in the majority of nuclear family units.
A study conducted by The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) shows that eight out of ten women do more housework than their husbands.
While he is likely to give her an extra seven hours of weekly housework, she is likely to save him an hour.
Evidence suggests that straight married couples find it more convenient to divide chores into traditional ‘breadwinner’ and ‘homemaker’ roles rather than simply dividing childcare and domestic duties equally.
So, in cases where a husband might be tasked with chores such as yard work, taking out the bins, or unblocking the roof drains, his wife will be saddled with the cooking, cleaning, and the majority of the childrearing.
So, since same-sex marriage is legal in all 50 states, isn’t the same outcome expected to befall me, should I become somebody’s wife?
No. And thank God.
Same-sex couples, especially lesbians, have a much more equitable approach to dividing domestic duties than heterosexual couples.
We tend to renounce traditional gendered divisions of housework in favour of more important factors such as the nature of the task or which one of us possesses the greatest ability to perform it well.
We are more likely to tackle the matter pragmatically — whoever is better with a Swiffer can do the mopping, she who knows how to handle a weed whacker can tend to the garden, and so on.
I personally delight in homemaking and would gladly sacrifice a night on the town for a night in with my wet vac. But, cleaning out the garage or doing anything where there’s the slightest chance I’ll happen upon a spider?
No ma’am.
While not every same-sex household will adopt a 50/50 split exactly — since every situation is nuanced by factors such as convenience, capability, and willingness — the distribution of chores is likely to be based on mutual agreement, rather than societal expectation, and that’s what is key.
What a lot of people don’t consider is that gendered tasks are largely irregular when it comes to demand and intensity — masculine tasks such as cleaning the car, taking out the bins, and mowing the lawn are less frequent and conducted outdoors most of the time; whereas traditionally feminine chores, such as laundry, dishes, and childcare are primarily indoor and done much more frequently.
So while the husband may be the only one mowing the lawn and the wife the only one doing the dishes, the physical and mental exertion is overall much greater for the wife because of how relentless her responsibilities are compared to those of her husband.
So should all women become lesbians now?
Far be it from me to turn away a willing volunteer for the gay brigade, but no. Lesbian relationships aren’t without their own struggles, and any woman who has ever had her heart broken by another woman can tell you that it’s its own brand of purgatory.
Some men are great. In fact, I know several that make life significantly sweeter.
However, the modern marriage blueprint for straight people needs a facelift — women simply cannot do it all without having the appropriate backup from their men. Hetero couples need to rethink their partnership MO and the best way to do so is to take a leaf out of the Big Gay Handbook.
There needs to be open communication, understanding, and the elimination of gendered tasks. We want to see more women tiling the bathroom and de-weeding the pond, and more men doing the night feeds and darning the socks.
Until then, next time you come across a working mother, buy the woman a gin and tonic and rub her feet. She’s definitely earned it.
Thank you very much for reading! If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to leave them below.
If you enjoyed this read and are feeling generous, please consider buying me a coffee as a token of your appreciation. I will send you positive vibes with every single sip. ☕🌸
© 2025 Natalie S. Ohio. All rights reserved.
I love how you emphasised the potential for straight people to learn from queer folks’ ways of being- I believe this is true for house chores yes but for so many other things we get right!