Women Still Carry the Majority of the Mental Load — Here’s What We Can Do to Change That

Women have historically and stereotypically been the keepers of the home — while the men are out trying to spear an elk or whatever, women have been expected to take care of the children, prepare meals, and generally keep the wheels from falling off the household.

Australia likes the think of itself as fairly progressive when it comes to gender relations. After all, we were the second country in the world, after New Zealand, to entrust women with the responsibility of both running and voting for elected officials. That is, of course, if you’re non-Indigenous — otherwise, you had to wait until 1962.

But in the century and a bit since that decision, things have changed exhaustingly slowly. Granted, women now have far greater access to paid maternity leave and reproductive rights, and it’s illegal to discriminate against women, but the demands called for by the women at Australia’s first International Women’s Day feel all too familiar to the issues plaguing half the population today. And they weren’t even asking politely not to be killed while walking home late at night.

Many of those day-to-day issues are centred on domestic work. The Australian Bureau of Statistics’ latest census data revealed that, on average, women in this country spend four hours and 31 minutes per day doing unpaid domestic chores. Men? Three hours and 34 minutes.

While this is one kind of physical load that women have to contend with alongside their jobs, the mental planning and preparation for this work is another kind of load that can take an equal or greater toll.

French cartoonist Emma wrote this amazing comic explaining mental load, a feminist term created to capture the burden of having to mentally keep all of the things required to keep a household running in your head. It’s unseen and often unappreciated work typically placed on women by men thanks to the roles that they place them in.

As Emma explained, mental load is not the doing. Doing a task, or asking for a task to be done, is not the hardest part of it. It’s knowing a task needs to be done that is taxing.

“When a man expects his partner to ask him to do things, he’s viewing her as the manager of household chores,” she writes.

“So it’s up to her to know what needs to be done and when. The problem with that, is that planning and organising is already a full-time job.”

“When we ask women to take on this task of organisation, and at the same time to execute a large portion, in the end, it represents 75% of the work,” she estimates.

“Mental load means always having to remember.”

While the ABS data above captures some of this by, for example, revealing that women aged 35-44 were the most likely age group to report always feeling rushed for time, it doesn’t account for the actual planning of household chores. Planning the shopping list, knowing when the kids need picking up, and making sure you keep a mental note of where every single sock in the house is currently residing… Women partially take on this role because they have been raised in a culture that expects this of them, but partially because its simply easier than battling with a partner — usually in a heterosexual relationship — over things that don’t seem that big.

So, How Do We Share the Mental Load?

Researchers at the University of Melbourne highlighted last year that mental load increased dramatically during the pandemic as housework increased for both parents in single, same-sex, and hetero relationships. Given that the mental load of housework is mainly placed on women, it follows that women suffered the most when this housework increased. They said that this rise is likely what pushed many women out of the workforce or into part-time work as the pressures during the pandemic became greater.

They defined mental load as ‘cognitive labour’, including scheduling, planning, and organising, that takes an emotional toll. They also described is as being never-ending, with the anxiety of it being able to strike at any moment.

In order to make the mental load of running a household visible, whether you’re married with kids, divorced, cohabiting with a partner, or in a semi-serious relationship, the key is to speak about it. Men often don’t realise the work that goes into this cognitive labour thanks to a lifetime of conditioning. Sometimes women are also unaware of the stress and strain they are put under by having to keep all of this stuff in their heads. Talking about it is the first step to being able to effectively balance it.

Much of the change required is about perspective shift. Emma, of the above comic, says that “men have to learn to feel that their home is also their responsibility.” She suggests that men, at the start of parenthood, insist on their right to be with their child from the first months of their life and make raising their offspring as much their responsibility as their partners. This means demanding longer and better parental leave, something the government is thankfully working on.

She also notes that both partners should divide up chores and make certain aspects of their home the responsibility of either partner. Women, she writes, should become more tolerant of things being left undone and become more comfortable with the idea of leaving the house without every single thing being taken care of in advance. Their partner should respond by picking up where they’ve left off.

“A role reversal can often be more effective than confrontation,” she writes.

As for the researchers from Melbourne, they suggest making mental load visible. While they’re referring to the academic quantifying of that “unrelenting internal nag,” writing down everything that needs doing in a week and the planning and mental note-keeping that is required is a good way of explaining and demonstrating the burden otherwise being carried by a partner. Then divide and conquer.

They advocate for governments and employers to acknowledge and recognise the load that is placed upon women with this unseen work and put in place policies that will lessen it. Increased remote work or flexible working options is something that has been already proven to support women in the workforce and increase their productivity. Better, more affordable childcare options would also help take the strain off child-rearing.

“Ultimately, the mental load is a mental health issue and companies and governments should treat it as such. This will unburden families, and particularly mothers, from managing the mental load alone,” they write.