UBC October 2026 - What are we doing today?

To kick this writing challenge off, I'll type a story for you that I found on social media, @_awaken_one_ to be exact. It was one of those "slide shows" that stretches over what feels 20 pages. Here goes:

I told my husband that if I disappeared for a week, the family would probably fall apart. 

He laughed. I wasn't joking. And when I told him that was exactly why I was so tired of being married to him, he stopped laughing. 

I'm 35. My husband, Daniel, is 38. We've been married for eleven years and have two children, 7 and 4. Daniel is kind, he works hard, he loves our children.

If I described him to you, you'd probably say I was lucky. Sometimes I think that's exactly why I've stayed quiet for so long.

There was never one terrible thing. No affair, no screaming, no secret second life. 

Just thousands of tiny responsibilities that somehow learned my name. Permission slips, groceries, dentist appointments, birthday presents, school e-mails, medicine refills. 

Daniel would always help when I asked. Eventually I started wondering why I always had to ask. 

Last Saturday, I woke up at 6:30 because our youngest wanted breakfast. By 9, I had made pancakes, started laundry, found a missing soccer jersey, ordered a birthday present and reminded Daniel that our oldest had a party at 2. 

At 10, Daniel Dalked into the kitchen and said "what are we doing today?"

Something about the word "we" almost made me laugh. Because "we" apparently meant I knew where everyone needed to be, what everyone needed to bring, what time we needed to leave and whether somebody needed to eat first. 

So I said "I don't know - why don't you tell me?" He looked genuinely confused. 

He said "why are you being like this?"

And suddenly eleven years came pouring out of me. I told him I was tired of being the person who remembered everything. Tired of delegating. Tired of reminding. Tired of hearing "you should've just told me".

Then I said something I had never admitted before. 

"I don't want help anymore. I want a partner who notices."

He went quiet. Then he said "that's unfair. I do loads around here."

And he does. He cooks sometimes, he does bedtime, he takes the kids places.

But I asked him one question:

"When was the last time you noticed something needed doing before I mentioned it?"

He couldn't answer.

So I kept going. I asked who knows when the children need new shoes. Who remembers teacher appreciation week. Who notices we're almost out of toothpaste. Who knows which child is suddenly afraid of sleeping alone. Who already has tomorrow happening inside their head while everyone else is still loving today. 

He said "but you're better at those things."

That sentence hurt more than I expected. Because I wasn't born knowing how to fill school forms or remember cavvine appointments. 

I became "better" because forgetting wasn't an option. Nobody ever asked whether I wanted to become the family's memory. It simply happened.

Then I told him the part that made him angry.

"Sometimes I envy you"

he asked what this was supposed to mean. I said "You became a father, and somehow stayed Daniel. I became a mother, and everyone slowly started treating the woman I was before like she was optional."

He didn't speak for a long time. 

That night, our daughter crawled into bed beside me.

She put her tiny hand on my cheek and whispered "you always know what I need." I kissed her forehead, and after she fell asleep, I cried. Because being needed that deeply is one of the most beautiful feelings I have ever known. It is also exhausting. 

That's the part I wish people understood. You can love your family and still feel crushed by how much of yourself it requires. You can appreciate your husband and still resent the things he doesn't see.

You can love being the person everyone depends on and occasionally fantasise about being responsible for absolutely nobody. 

Those feelings don't cancel each other out. 

The next morning, Daniel made breakfast, packed the kids' bags and took them out without asking me what they needed.

It was small. But for the first time in years, nobody asked me for the plan. I sat alone with my coffee and wondered: How many women aren't tired of their families at all?

How many are simply tired of being the person who has to remember everything for everyone?

The last page of that Instagram post shows "the solution" ;-)

So here are my thoughts.

"What are we doing today?" is definitely something that immediately makes me angry. Especially when I have already told everyone and sent the Outlook invitations, as I always do for any scheduled event. And God knows we have a lot of hockey games that require exact departure times, equipment, clothing and snacks to be sorted out. By me. So everyone else can just show up.

So yes, I understand and relate to the mom who wrote this. Maybe AI wrote it, but whoever did, they certainly hit the nail on the head.

I admit I also understand and relate to Daniel. Or, for that matter, my husband.

I do think we are "better" at this, too, and I wonder whether it's nature, nurture or a combination of both. We watched our mothers doing it when we were little girls, and we played house. That's when our training started. We had dolls to feed, dress, bathe and put to bed.

But what about the tomboys? The girls who had absolutely no interest in "girly things" and spent their childhood climbing trees, building forts and getting dirty? Did they escape the training? Or did they simply acquire it later, when real children came along?

And because I personally think I am better at this than my husband, it's hard for me to delegate. I worry that he might forget something or do it "wrong", which of course is unfair. Still, I'd rather do it myself. That way I know it's taken care of.

And I don't usually resent him for that.

Except when he tells people about things "we" organized, arranged or improvised.

If I take care of everything, at least I want the credit.

I don't actually think my husband is incapable of noticing things. I think I have spent so many years being the person who notices them first that there is rarely an opportunity for him to do so.

If I know we have a hockey game on Saturday, I have already put it in the calendar, sent the Outlook invitation, checked the departure time, thought about what everyone needs to wear, whether the equipment is ready, whether we need snacks, and probably mentally rehearsed the entire operation before anyone else has even thought about Saturday.

So when Saturday morning comes and someone asks, "When do we need to leave?"

Oh, that one gets me.

Especially when the answer has been sitting in their calendar for weeks.

And perhaps there is another uncomfortable part to this.

If I insist on being the person who notices everything, remembers everything, schedules everything and decides how everything should be done, I can't then complain that nobody else takes ownership.

At some point, you have to hand over an entire piece of the responsibility, including the possibility that it will be done differently from the way you would have done it.

And, admittedly, that's not always easy.

Maybe the trick is not just getting someone else to notice more, but learning to let go a little, too.

So where do you draw the line between sharing the mental load and simply wanting things done your way?

PS: The pictures I posted are from ten years ago. I was invited to a friend's wedding in Seattle, outside of school vacation, so I went alone. But of course I made sure everything at home was taken care of first: Baggies containing clothes for every day, a "Dad & Son Survival Kit" with their staple foods, after-school activities, lunch at Colin's grandparents', playdates... Check.

With what I know today, I think I should have just left. They might have figured it out themselves.

Well, except for the day hubby texted me: Colin had been invited to a birthday party two days from then. What gift should he get? Where did the family live? And how was hubby supposed to pick Colin up when he had to work?

Welcome to my world! 😂