May 19, 2025 • 62 mins
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(00:00):
(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Thanks for joining us on Not Boring CEs,
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All right, y'all, let's get to learning.
Becky Holland is a licensed mental health counselor
in the state of Washington.
She has been practicing since 2018 and currently
(00:21):
works in her own private practice.
She specializes in working with women that struggle
with anxiety, burnout, people pleasing, perfectionism, and perinatal
concerns.
She also has extensive experience working with survivors
of narcissistic abuse and dysfunctional family dynamics.
When she's not working, you can find her
cuddled up with a book and her two
large dogs, Dipstick and Doodle.
Welcome, Maggie.
(00:43):
Welcome back to Not Boring CEs.
I'm here with Maggie Holland, and we are
gonna be talking about the mental load.
You guys may have heard of this in
like your social media accounts.
You maybe heard it in some CEs.
Hopefully this is something we're talking about more
and more.
Maggie is gonna walk us through the mental
load and why it's important clinically for our
(01:03):
people.
So thanks for being here.
Absolutely.
Thank you for having me, Allison.
Yeah.
So can we just start off with what
is the mental load?
Yeah, yeah.
And you know, I think there's a lot
of things that get lumped into this.
So I think this is a really great
place to start.
So I think of the mental load as
kind of encompassing all the cognitive work that
(01:23):
it takes to do all the more non
-tangible tasks that are required for your household
and your relationship and your family and your
work life to function.
And so as we're thinking about this, a
lot of times this is kind of thought
as that endless to-do list, right?
Like you get three things off of it
and four things appear.
(01:45):
You know, it's never really done.
There's always more that has to get done.
And so it's kind of all the cognitive
work that goes with that.
But as we talk about this, and as
we look at our families, and as we
look at our relationships, both with our partners
and with extended family as well, I think
it's really important that we also include the
emotional labor that comes with things because that
(02:08):
can kind of be something that isn't seen
either.
So it kind of can encompass a lot
of things, but it's basically those things that
mainly happen inside of your brain.
And it's not always, sometimes it can include
a thing that you like do, right?
Like unloading the dishes is definitely some domestic
work.
And you have to think, oh, we don't
(02:28):
have any clean dishes.
That needs to happen.
But it's that the thinking portion of all
of these tasks is really what that mental
load is referring to.
Yeah.
I think sometimes what I see is people
talk about the mental load as the unloading
of the dishwasher, not just the noticing that
it needs to be done.
Yes.
And this is the distinct piece of it,
(02:48):
where you may, like I love, we'll probably
talk about Eve Rotsky at some point in
here, maybe.
Yes, we will, yes.
I love her framework for how things get
done, but it doesn't mean you don't notice
that it needs to be done.
Even if it is the other person's task,
it's their baby in the household, we still
notice, and then we manage our feelings around
it.
(03:09):
Yes, absolutely.
Yeah, and I think that portion of it,
so there's a lot of names that come
with this, right?
So there's emotional labor, and then there's the
mental load.
And as we're talking about it, what we're
talking about with the dishes, that's domestic labor,
right?
So there's lots of subnames for that.
And I think a really important subname that
helped it click for me was when I
(03:30):
heard the phrase invisible work, because a lot
of times this work, for a lot of
reasons that we're gonna talk about, is devalued,
and when it's devalued, that means that then
goes unseen, and then that being unseen is
also unappreciated.
Yes.
And so then if it's not conceptualized as
(03:51):
work, then it's taken for granted and people
don't think about it a lot, but you
still have to, you're still using brain calories
to think about there's no clean dishes, right?
Or like somebody wants macaroni and cheese tonight
and there's no pots clean in the house.
So that is work that happens too.
And so the thing that really helped it
click for me was when somebody used the
(04:13):
phrase invisible labor, because it doesn't always get
seen.
Some of it gets seen and sometimes a
part of it gets seen, but the whole
process doesn't always get seen.
Yeah.
Yes.
I think about how our culture in America
is so productive and capitalistic, and this idea
that because it doesn't fall under the kind
(04:33):
of work that's paid, because it doesn't fall
under, this is a vocation or a job,
whether or not you're working outside the home,
we're all working inside the home too, there's
always work to be done there.
Yeah, and I think as we talk about
this, a big issue, particularly in our society,
is that we are a capitalistic society and
(04:56):
cue groans from everybody, right?
Like this is where we live and work.
And I think a big trap that people
fall into as they consider the mental Lotus
work is as we start breaking work down
into like worthy work or like paid versus
unpaid work, because we live in a capitalistic
society.
Of course, people often are thinking about the
(05:16):
paid work because that's what pays the bill.
So we can stay in our homes and
we can put food on the table, but
this is still work too.
And it doesn't make it less important just
because there's not money that comes with it
necessarily.
But I think sometimes people dismiss it because
of that dichotomy is, is it paid or
not?
(05:36):
So can we talk about some examples of
invisible labor so that people can really see
how it's at play in their own life
and maybe some of their own reactions to
these things and how it gets done in
their own household?
Yes, absolutely.
You know, so I'm gonna give like a
really tangible one and everybody gets frustrated by
it.
So we're gonna start with a fun one
(05:57):
first, right?
So as I was preparing for this, kind
of closer to Christmas, I was watching Home
Alone and that's just the best example of
a mental load that I think I've ever
seen in a movie because all these kids
are running around the house packing and Kevin,
the youngest is running around asking his siblings,
(06:17):
I don't know how to pack a suitcase.
What do I pack?
Like, what are the things that I need?
And the siblings are telling him he's dumb
and, you know, doing sibling things.
But then one of the siblings says, I
don't know why you're worried about it.
Mom's gonna pack it for you.
Why are you even freaking out about it,
right?
So then they get together.
Kevin obviously doesn't make it into the van.
I hope I'm not spoiling Home Alone, but
(06:38):
that's the premise, so welcome.
And then, you know, the mom is sitting
on this plane and I think they're going
to Paris and the mom is talking to
the dad and she's like, I feel like
we're forgetting something.
And she starts checking down this to-do
list of, is it the garage door?
Is it the coffee pot?
Is it whatever?
And as she's going through things, her husband's
like, yeah, no, we did that, we did
(06:59):
that.
It's no big deal, don't worry about it.
And then she's like, oh, we forgot Kevin.
That is the mental load right there.
She's sitting on a plane.
Her kids should all be on the plane.
Her and her partner should have done that
together.
Her kids should be on the plane and
she should just be able to sit.
Her husband's like reading a book.
And so she should be able to sit
on the plane and be on the plane.
(07:19):
And so that's an example of mental load
that's not so close to home for everybody.
So if you need to like share that
with a partner or a client, there's a
good example.
But yeah, she should be able to just
sit on a plane and just read her
book like the husband is.
But instead she's ticking down the to-do
list when she literally cannot do anything from
a plane anyway.
So there's a cinematic example, I love to
(07:41):
use those.
Yes, I like your point that it's less
personal to be able to use home alone
to ease into this conversation with a partner.
Absolutely, yes.
And so let's do an example that's a
little bit more close to home.
Everybody hold your breath, this is a frustrating
one.
So let's use an example, a huge domestic
(08:02):
task that absolutely must happen every single day
is we gotta eat dinner every night.
It's gotta happen, we've gotta prepare it, we've
gotta cook it, we've gotta sit down and
eat it otherwise everybody's gonna be unhappy.
And it's a pretty big task in and
of itself, the tangible piece of that, and
it's really visible because you all know if
you don't get your dinner, that's a pretty
(08:22):
visible one.
But let's look at the mental load that
goes into this example specifically.
So there is picking out the meal that
we're gonna be having.
There is checking the pantry and the fridge
to make sure that you have all the
ingredients that you need for that dinner to
happen.
Whatever ingredients are not in your house, you
(08:43):
have got to add those to a list.
You have to make sure that list goes
to the grocery store with you.
You have to make time to go to
the grocery store.
You have to walk through the grocery store.
You have to pick up all of those
ingredients.
And so this is some of that mental
work that goes into that.
And we're not even touching on, do we
have the finances to cover this meal?
Is this within budget?
(09:04):
This isn't even touching on if you have
somebody in your family has really serious food
allergies, you have to now check the ingredients
if any of those allergens are in that
food.
And so we're just kind of touching on
some of those off the top of my
head, but hopefully that's giving a picture of,
there's a lot more than just putting dinner
on the table that goes into getting dinner
(09:26):
on the table.
And that process can start up to a
week, sometimes weeks before that dinner ever happens.
If you buy in bulk or if you
have a big family, you're needing to consider
those things for.
So there's a lot of work that goes
on before that food ever gets pulled out
of the fridge to be cooked.
There's a lot of work that happens mentally
(09:47):
before that.
Yeah, and I would say with that, there
are people who love to cook.
The vast majority of people I know, and
I used to love to cook, but the
vast majority of people I know with families
have gotten to the point where they hate
to cook.
And so there is this task that isn't
pleasurable, that has all this mental load step
(10:07):
stuff beforehand that somebody is on the hook
for every single day.
Yeah, absolutely.
And it takes time and it takes energy
and none of us wanna do it, almost
none of us.
And somebody has got to.
So it's just kind of one of those
things with adulthood that we have to tackle.
Yeah, absolutely.
(10:28):
Yes, and then, okay, add in the piece,
if neither of us like it, now that
comes into the research of what's an easy
meal to cook, right?
Researching dinners in 30 minutes or less, right?
That's work too.
And it's okay to not like cooking dinner.
It's okay if no one in the house
likes to cook dinner, but that is something
(10:49):
to then consider, but somebody has to do
it.
And that can be pretty tiring to have
to force yourself to do things you don't
wanna do every day.
And we're not even talking about the emotional
piece of if somebody in your household doesn't
like it and refuses to eat it, and
now you have to cook a second dinner.
I was sorry to bring that up for
everybody, but that happens too.
(11:09):
And so that's now part of it.
Well, and because you've already done this one,
I'm just thinking about, particularly when one of
my daughters was smaller and she has some
food aversions, and how I would have already
done this thing I hated doing that I
didn't wanna do after doing lots of other
adulty things that I didn't wanna do all
day, and then to have her refuse the
(11:30):
food.
I know that as a parent, it's my
job to make sure my child eats.
And like, sure, I guess we can do
noodles and Parmesan again for you.
But I already did all this other work.
Yeah, and so as we're talking about it,
I know this feels like something that as
we highlight it, it can get, well, man,
this is really getting pretty big, out of
(11:51):
control pretty quickly.
And I think that's why it's so important
that we talk about it is because, your
daughter having food aversions, that happens whether we're
acknowledging it or not, whether we're acknowledging the
work it takes to like, okay, I'm taking
a break from my meal and I'm getting
up and I'm going to start the noodles
and Parmesan.
It's great to do that for your kid.
And also we just need to acknowledge that
(12:12):
that's more work, right?
Yeah.
So it can pretty quickly grow and grow
as we start looking at it.
And I think that's why it's important for
us to look at that.
Yes, absolutely.
Should we talk about the mental load and
how it's kind of stratified across our society?
Yeah, absolutely.
(12:33):
So this conversation, I'm sure people have been
talking about this far earlier than the 1980s,
but this conversation really started in the 1980s.
Particularly there are sociologists, Arlene Kaplan Daniels, I
believe, and a lot of work around invisible
labor.
That's kind of where that term comes from.
(12:54):
And so again, coming back to this capitalistic
standard of understanding work as focus on activities
that you have to do and you get
paid for them, that means just because of
how things are separated by gender, which let's
definitely get into that in just a second,
but women's work, quote unquote, is not just
(13:17):
any job that you do outside of the
house, but it does tend to fall on
women more once you get home.
And so all of this, like making the
noodles with Parmesan, right?
That is then kind of considered more women's
work.
I hope your partner's not like that, Alison,
but that's usually considered good.
But then that work, when it falls to
(13:38):
women, tends to be devalued more.
And it's usually unpaid.
It's limited by, you're limited by the demands
of the unpaid work that happens in the
home.
And there's a lot of moral implications that
go with this because it's divided by gender.
So this kind of, that's where that started.
That was her kind of premise of Invisible
Work in the 80s.
(13:59):
But a lot of this comes down to
how we view gender and how we assign
worth.
So yeah, that's probably our next place to
go.
Yeah, let's do it.
Yeah, yeah.
So let's talk about, particularly because we're talking
to clinicians right now.
And so we have to kind of know
who are we particularly on the lookout for
this for in our sessions?
(14:20):
When does this typically show up in relationships?
Let's talk about that stuff.
So as of right now, I hope that
this is shifting because of Eve Brodsky and
all the conversation around this stuff.
But as of right now, all of our
research is still showing that women still do
a majority of the childcare and the domestic
work at home.
(14:41):
Really hard to quantify emotional labor, but I
don't think I'm going too far out on
a limb to say that women do a
majority of the emotional labor in our households
as well and in our relationships.
And something that's really alarming with this, with
modern women is that even when we have
two earner families, like let's take a heterosexual
relationship, man and a woman, they are both
(15:03):
working outside of the house, they're working full
-time, women are still picking up a majority
of the childcare and domestic work on top
of working a full-time paid job, right,
that society sees.
And so, as we're looking at this, this
disproportionately affects women, and obviously this disproportionately affects
(15:25):
heterosexual relationships, you know?
And so the level of that though, let's
talk about that as well.
So we had a recent study by the
United Nations, I believe, that kind of quantified
this for us and showed that not only
are women doing more work, even though they're
(15:45):
working outside the home too, but they're doing
almost three times as much unpaid mental load
work as their male partners are doing.
So I'm just gonna let that sink in
a little bit.
So take a traditional heterosexual relationship, they're both
working outside the house, they're working the same
40 hours in a week, and then she
(16:07):
comes home and she's doing three times amount
of work.
Once she punches out at work, she comes
home, she's doing three times more work.
That's a problem, huge problem.
So why?
Let's talk about that.
Why might this be happening?
So I pulled a study and I pulled
(16:28):
a quote from that that I thought was
really, really helpful.
And so that quote is that women have
more favorable attitudes.
This is literally what the study said, I'm
not just saying this.
This study came out and said, women have
more favorable attitudes towards cleaning, cooking, and childcare
than do men.
I'm taking a deep breath as I read
(16:48):
this next part because I get frustrated by
it.
Women enjoy it more, they set higher standards
for it.
That part doesn't make me mad, I think
that's true.
And they feel more responsible for it.
I think that's probably true too.
The first part of women enjoy it more,
I'm like, no, I don't enjoy this cleaning.
No, no.
But so then the rest of this quote
is furthermore, women's favorable and men's unfavorable attitudes
(17:12):
are associated with women's greater contribution to household
labor.
Let's break that down for a second.
Can I ask, when did this study come
out or the thing that this was quoted
from?
I didn't pull any research that wasn't within
the last five to 10 years.
So this- Oh, for God's sake.
I was like, it was like 1963.
(17:32):
I'm trying to scroll down to my footnotes.
I'm like, which one is this?
What's the footnote?
But I'm like, no, I didn't pull anything
that wasn't the last five to 10 years.
I think the oldest study that I pulled
was the 2009 study, so.
Okay.
I won't throw anything.
I'll just feel it.
That's exactly why we get to talk about
this, right?
I'm like, because as I'm going through this
(17:53):
research, I'm like, okay, this is at first
it made sense.
I'm going back to the beginnings.
This is from the 1980s.
No big deal.
Well, that still is alarmingly recent, right?
Most of our lifetimes.
But yeah, as I'm starting to pull research
that like, wait, what do you mean this
research came out in 2020 or this one
came out in 2017?
(18:13):
What do you mean?
No.
Yeah.
So all of the things that I'm pulling
and quoting last five to 10 years, which
is horrifying.
They got the data that said that women
enjoy it more.
They're not just throwing it in there, right?
So why would women be saying that we
enjoy it more?
Like if it's on a Likert scale, for
instance, I don't know what their methodology was,
(18:33):
but if it's on a Likert scale, socialization
goes into that.
I don't know anybody that, I know some
people who would like to clean one room
and be done.
But the ongoing ever-present job of cleaning.
Yeah.
Society, yes.
I'm just like, yes, society.
(18:55):
All the feelings, yes.
Yes, all the feelings.
I have to take deep breaths as I
talk about this.
As I think about this, talk about this
to other clinicians, to my clients.
We're all in this together, everybody.
This is why we're in this work, even
for these frustrating pieces.
But yeah, a lot of this is societal
conditioning, right?
So there is a lot of societal expectation.
(19:15):
There's a lot of societal messaging, as we
also consider when you grow up, don't forget
that all-important behavior modeling, like watching moms
and what moms do, right?
And how they're messaging and signaling to their
children.
This is what mom does.
This is what dad does.
Now, a lot of this, I just wanna
acknowledge we're talking about primarily heterosexual relationships.
(19:37):
We're gonna talk about how this applies to
same-sex relationships in a little bit.
But yeah, there's a reason we're talking traditional
heterosexual relationships with traditional values of man, woman,
mom, and dad, and households.
So we'll talk about that in a little
bit.
So think about growing up as, again, watching
what does mom do?
How does she act about things?
(19:58):
What are the expectations here?
And I also really like to acknowledge the
different reinforcements that come in from society, both
positive and negative.
So as we're talking about positive, that is
praising for the housework.
That is, you know, comment like, oh my
gosh, your house looks like it's straight out
of a Martha Stewart magazine, right?
(20:20):
Or, oh, your kids are so well-behaved,
as if you have any control over that
when you're out in public.
But it is praise for that work that
you've been doing to raise kids that can
act however people are praising in public.
But with that positive praise, I think it's
also really important for us to acknowledge the
negative reinforcements that come with that too.
(20:42):
And we're talking mom guilt.
We're talking shaming that happens.
And that can be really, really intense.
Whether somebody has said it to you or
they haven't said it to you directly, doesn't
really matter, because I could probably pick out
an example from a movie as well.
Let's Go Back to Home Alone, right?
Then her, I don't know if it's her
sister.
(21:02):
Gosh, I should have watched that before more
recently, but it's whoever is traveling with them.
And she's sitting right there on the airplane.
And Kevin's mom is literally saying like, what
kind of mother am I that I left
my youngest child?
That's mom guilt and shame, right?
Right, the dad wasn't bemoaning what a bad
dad he was.
I'm pretty sure he went back to his
book at this point.
(21:22):
That dad seemed to actually care, but I'm
pretty sure he went back to his book
at this point.
And he was like, it's okay, sweetie.
Like there's nothing we can do on this
plane right now.
And so that's also negative reinforcing.
If you don't do these things, you're gonna
have a bad time.
So there's a lot of reinforcing that happens
on an adult level.
(21:43):
But I think it's also really important for
us to acknowledge that this starts much younger,
that behavior modeling.
But also if there are boy children and
girl children, any combination of household stuff, disproportionately
the girl children get tasked to help mom
with more of the domestic load and the
mental load than boy children tend to be.
(22:05):
So that can include things like cleaning or
like, honey, can you go in and grab
that grocery list off the counter?
Because we're already all in the car.
Typically, girl children tend to get 50%
more tasks than their boy siblings do.
And so this starts really, really young.
And it even starts with, if mom is
(22:27):
cleaning, I mean, there are pink and purple
little broom and mop sets that you can
buy.
The concept of child kitchens, our children mimic
everything that their parents are doing.
And that includes a misdivision of domestic labor.
That includes mental load work as well.
(22:47):
And if you watch little kids playing with
Barbie dolls or dolls, you're probably gonna at
some point in time, watch the fight go
through of like, you didn't remind me of
this.
And that happens even in their play.
So it starts really, really young.
I think about how that ends up playing
out with time.
(23:09):
Like when you say women are doing three
times the amount of household labor, that's spread
out over the evenings and the weekends.
It's our downtime is disproportionately spent on maintaining
the household.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
And I think we mentioned talking about Eve
(23:29):
Rodsky.
So what we're talking about there specifically, she
kind of did this fair play book that
talks really directly about dividing this domestic labor,
working with the mental load stuff.
And something that really struck me as I
read through that was she did a ton
of interviews for this.
She's not a mental health therapist, but she
(23:51):
did her work.
It's a really great book.
And she interviewed hundreds and hundreds of couples,
fine tuning, she's got this card deck that
you can divide the work out.
We're gonna talk about that more later.
You can divide the work out.
And so she did all of this fine
tuning.
She had all of these beta testers and
then she interviewed them.
And a theme that she pulled from all
of her research for this was, and I
(24:14):
quote, there is this notion that men's time
is finite and women's time is infinite.
Women can just come up with more time,
right?
And, but as we're talking about it, it's
just women have to, someone has to do
it and women just do it and figure
it out.
And so it's after work, it's in the
(24:35):
middle of the night, it's on their mornings,
it's on the weekends, sometimes it's in the
middle of their workday, like a teacher calls
and says, so-and-so doesn't have lunch
money.
And you're like, okay, here's my credit card.
That is mental load work and that's domestic
work.
And so as we're looking at it, all
of those things, I know that piece doesn't
sound really big, like, okay, here's my credit
card to reload.
(24:55):
That phone call maybe takes five minutes, but
if you have a five minute call every
single day of your workday, you've all of
a sudden spent a half an hour doing
work for your family while you're at work.
So it adds up really, really quickly, even
these small little chunks of ones.
But coming back to that, like the valuing
of time, yeah, there is this notion that
(25:17):
men's time is finite and women's time is
infinite.
Like magicians pulling flags out of their hand,
infinite time, they just pull time out of
the cosmos somewhere.
Mm-hmm, because it all still needs to
get done, right?
So it appears as such, it seems as
though, but really there's this huge consequence to
(25:37):
us around our wellbeing because we prioritize these
things that do need to get done at
our own expense.
Yes, absolutely.
And we're talking a lot about, I'm using
a lot of examples with kids, that is
not accidental and that's not a bias I'm
just playing on that I have not looked
(25:59):
at.
The reason I keep bringing up kids, obviously
there's a lot more work when there's more
people in the household, right?
But our research also points to that even
men who did closer to their fair share
of things before having kids, kids is like
the great game changer when it comes to
mental load.
Things can still absolutely be imbalanced before having
(26:20):
kids or if you never wanna have kids,
a client never wants to have kids, things
can still absolutely be imbalanced because of these
social learnings and stuff.
But our research shows that once kids come
into the equation that even if a partner
was doing fairly equitable household work, that they
significantly cut back after kids come into the
(26:43):
picture.
And so some of the stats I was
seeing on this is up to five hours
a week, right?
And so- Of less work.
Less work than the female partner.
And some of that's, you can't really help
it because if you're doing chest feeding, breast
feeding, like he can't do that, right?
A male partner just can't do that.
(27:03):
But it's not being compensated for the things
that a male partner can do just across
the board.
Not all partners are awful in this way,
don't get me wrong, but it's just acknowledging
that bias that comes in of just research
shows across the board, it's pretty stark after
kids.
It's most noticeable after kid or kids come
into the picture.
(27:24):
And the more kids obviously that a family
has, typically the more imbalanced it gets.
So how does this play out for same
-sex couples?
I'm curious if there's a better split there.
I really want there to be for God's
sake.
There is, there absolutely is.
(27:44):
Yeah, so research on same-sex couples tends
to show that it is much more egalitarian
with the assigning of tasks.
And it just tends to be that there's
more communication around it.
My gut says that this is also some
societal learning around how male versus female should
be quote unquote communicating.
(28:06):
And so in same-sex marriages, relationships, they're
closer to the same page, usually doing things
better.
But for the most part, our research shows
that it's much more equitable as they're dividing
by labor.
And same-sex marriages tend to actually divide
based on their strengths a lot more naturally.
(28:28):
And so there tends to be, when it
comes to mental load, all relationships have their
issues.
But when it comes to mental load and
domestic work tends to be less resentment around
those tasks because there's better communication about it
and just already more equitable division of labor.
And then they come back and talk about
it as well based on strengths, weaknesses, working
(28:50):
with each other with that.
Yeah.
Okay, awesome.
That's good to hear.
And that's primarily why I'm talking about heterosexual
relationships is because that's primarily what we're talking
about today.
Like this doesn't tend to impact same-sex
relationships as much, but it can still happen,
right?
Anything can happen in any relationship, frankly.
(29:10):
But just across the board, for the most
part, this is primarily impacting female women who
have a male partner, particularly more so when
they have children, kid or children, yes.
Okay.
Good news there.
So if you primarily work with same-sex
couples, it's definitely something to be aware of.
It's definitely something to look at because it
(29:31):
can still happen, but it just doesn't tend
to happen as often.
So a little sunshine of good news right
there.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
So I'm thinking about how we bring this
up in session with clients, particularly.
I mean, some people are coming in for
relationship struggles.
(29:52):
Some people are not coming in for relationship
struggles.
They're coming in because they're overwhelmed because they
feel like no matter what they do, they
can never catch up.
(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Thanks for joining us on Not Boring CEs,
where we don't think you should be bored
to death while getting your continuing ed.
Keep listening here, then hop over to notboringces
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All right, y'all, let's get to learning.
Becky Holland is a licensed mental health counselor
in the state of Washington.
She has been practicing since 2018 and currently
(00:21):
works in her own private practice.
She specializes in working with women that struggle
with anxiety, burnout, people pleasing, perfectionism, and perinatal
concerns.
She also has extensive experience working with survivors
of narcissistic abuse and dysfunctional family dynamics.
When she's not working, you can find her
cuddled up with a book and her two
large dogs, Dipstick and Doodle.
Welcome, Maggie.
(00:43):
Welcome back to Not Boring CEs.
I'm here with Maggie Holland, and we are
gonna be talking about the mental load.
You guys may have heard of this in
like your social media accounts.
You maybe heard it in some CEs.
Hopefully this is something we're talking about more
and more.
Maggie is gonna walk us through the mental
load and why it's important clinically for our
(01:03):
people.
So thanks for being here.
Absolutely.
Thank you for having me, Allison.
Yeah.
So can we just start off with what
is the mental load?
Yeah, yeah.
And you know, I think there's a lot
of things that get lumped into this.
So I think this is a really great
place to start.
So I think of the mental load as
kind of encompassing all the cognitive work that
(01:23):
it takes to do all the more non
-tangible tasks that are required for your household
and your relationship and your family and your
work life to function.
And so as we're thinking about this, a
lot of times this is kind of thought
as that endless to-do list, right?
Like you get three things off of it
and four things appear.
(01:45):
You know, it's never really done.
There's always more that has to get done.
And so it's kind of all the cognitive
work that goes with that.
But as we talk about this, and as
we look at our families, and as we
look at our relationships, both with our partners
and with extended family as well, I think
it's really important that we also include the
emotional labor that comes with things because that
(02:08):
can kind of be something that isn't seen
either.
So it kind of can encompass a lot
of things, but it's basically those things that
mainly happen inside of your brain.
And it's not always, sometimes it can include
a thing that you like do, right?
Like unloading the dishes is definitely some domestic
work.
And you have to think, oh, we don't
(02:28):
have any clean dishes.
That needs to happen.
But it's that the thinking portion of all
of these tasks is really what that mental
load is referring to.
Yeah.
I think sometimes what I see is people
talk about the mental load as the unloading
of the dishwasher, not just the noticing that
it needs to be done.
Yes.
And this is the distinct piece of it,
(02:48):
where you may, like I love, we'll probably
talk about Eve Rotsky at some point in
here, maybe.
Yes, we will, yes.
I love her framework for how things get
done, but it doesn't mean you don't notice
that it needs to be done.
Even if it is the other person's task,
it's their baby in the household, we still
notice, and then we manage our feelings around
it.
(03:09):
Yes, absolutely.
Yeah, and I think that portion of it,
so there's a lot of names that come
with this, right?
So there's emotional labor, and then there's the
mental load.
And as we're talking about it, what we're
talking about with the dishes, that's domestic labor,
right?
So there's lots of subnames for that.
And I think a really important subname that
helped it click for me was when I
(03:30):
heard the phrase invisible work, because a lot
of times this work, for a lot of
reasons that we're gonna talk about, is devalued,
and when it's devalued, that means that then
goes unseen, and then that being unseen is
also unappreciated.
Yes.
And so then if it's not conceptualized as
(03:51):
work, then it's taken for granted and people
don't think about it a lot, but you
still have to, you're still using brain calories
to think about there's no clean dishes, right?
Or like somebody wants macaroni and cheese tonight
and there's no pots clean in the house.
So that is work that happens too.
And so the thing that really helped it
click for me was when somebody used the
(04:13):
phrase invisible labor, because it doesn't always get
seen.
Some of it gets seen and sometimes a
part of it gets seen, but the whole
process doesn't always get seen.
Yeah.
Yes.
I think about how our culture in America
is so productive and capitalistic, and this idea
that because it doesn't fall under the kind
(04:33):
of work that's paid, because it doesn't fall
under, this is a vocation or a job,
whether or not you're working outside the home,
we're all working inside the home too, there's
always work to be done there.
Yeah, and I think as we talk about
this, a big issue, particularly in our society,
is that we are a capitalistic society and
(04:56):
cue groans from everybody, right?
Like this is where we live and work.
And I think a big trap that people
fall into as they consider the mental Lotus
work is as we start breaking work down
into like worthy work or like paid versus
unpaid work, because we live in a capitalistic
society.
Of course, people often are thinking about the
(05:16):
paid work because that's what pays the bill.
So we can stay in our homes and
we can put food on the table, but
this is still work too.
And it doesn't make it less important just
because there's not money that comes with it
necessarily.
But I think sometimes people dismiss it because
of that dichotomy is, is it paid or
not?
(05:36):
So can we talk about some examples of
invisible labor so that people can really see
how it's at play in their own life
and maybe some of their own reactions to
these things and how it gets done in
their own household?
Yes, absolutely.
You know, so I'm gonna give like a
really tangible one and everybody gets frustrated by
it.
So we're gonna start with a fun one
(05:57):
first, right?
So as I was preparing for this, kind
of closer to Christmas, I was watching Home
Alone and that's just the best example of
a mental load that I think I've ever
seen in a movie because all these kids
are running around the house packing and Kevin,
the youngest is running around asking his siblings,
(06:17):
I don't know how to pack a suitcase.
What do I pack?
Like, what are the things that I need?
And the siblings are telling him he's dumb
and, you know, doing sibling things.
But then one of the siblings says, I
don't know why you're worried about it.
Mom's gonna pack it for you.
Why are you even freaking out about it,
right?
So then they get together.
Kevin obviously doesn't make it into the van.
I hope I'm not spoiling Home Alone, but
(06:38):
that's the premise, so welcome.
And then, you know, the mom is sitting
on this plane and I think they're going
to Paris and the mom is talking to
the dad and she's like, I feel like
we're forgetting something.
And she starts checking down this to-do
list of, is it the garage door?
Is it the coffee pot?
Is it whatever?
And as she's going through things, her husband's
like, yeah, no, we did that, we did
(06:59):
that.
It's no big deal, don't worry about it.
And then she's like, oh, we forgot Kevin.
That is the mental load right there.
She's sitting on a plane.
Her kids should all be on the plane.
Her and her partner should have done that
together.
Her kids should be on the plane and
she should just be able to sit.
Her husband's like reading a book.
And so she should be able to sit
on the plane and be on the plane.
(07:19):
And so that's an example of mental load
that's not so close to home for everybody.
So if you need to like share that
with a partner or a client, there's a
good example.
But yeah, she should be able to just
sit on a plane and just read her
book like the husband is.
But instead she's ticking down the to-do
list when she literally cannot do anything from
a plane anyway.
So there's a cinematic example, I love to
(07:41):
use those.
Yes, I like your point that it's less
personal to be able to use home alone
to ease into this conversation with a partner.
Absolutely, yes.
And so let's do an example that's a
little bit more close to home.
Everybody hold your breath, this is a frustrating
one.
So let's use an example, a huge domestic
(08:02):
task that absolutely must happen every single day
is we gotta eat dinner every night.
It's gotta happen, we've gotta prepare it, we've
gotta cook it, we've gotta sit down and
eat it otherwise everybody's gonna be unhappy.
And it's a pretty big task in and
of itself, the tangible piece of that, and
it's really visible because you all know if
you don't get your dinner, that's a pretty
(08:22):
visible one.
But let's look at the mental load that
goes into this example specifically.
So there is picking out the meal that
we're gonna be having.
There is checking the pantry and the fridge
to make sure that you have all the
ingredients that you need for that dinner to
happen.
Whatever ingredients are not in your house, you
(08:43):
have got to add those to a list.
You have to make sure that list goes
to the grocery store with you.
You have to make time to go to
the grocery store.
You have to walk through the grocery store.
You have to pick up all of those
ingredients.
And so this is some of that mental
work that goes into that.
And we're not even touching on, do we
have the finances to cover this meal?
Is this within budget?
(09:04):
This isn't even touching on if you have
somebody in your family has really serious food
allergies, you have to now check the ingredients
if any of those allergens are in that
food.
And so we're just kind of touching on
some of those off the top of my
head, but hopefully that's giving a picture of,
there's a lot more than just putting dinner
on the table that goes into getting dinner
(09:26):
on the table.
And that process can start up to a
week, sometimes weeks before that dinner ever happens.
If you buy in bulk or if you
have a big family, you're needing to consider
those things for.
So there's a lot of work that goes
on before that food ever gets pulled out
of the fridge to be cooked.
There's a lot of work that happens mentally
(09:47):
before that.
Yeah, and I would say with that, there
are people who love to cook.
The vast majority of people I know, and
I used to love to cook, but the
vast majority of people I know with families
have gotten to the point where they hate
to cook.
And so there is this task that isn't
pleasurable, that has all this mental load step
(10:07):
stuff beforehand that somebody is on the hook
for every single day.
Yeah, absolutely.
And it takes time and it takes energy
and none of us wanna do it, almost
none of us.
And somebody has got to.
So it's just kind of one of those
things with adulthood that we have to tackle.
Yeah, absolutely.
(10:28):
Yes, and then, okay, add in the piece,
if neither of us like it, now that
comes into the research of what's an easy
meal to cook, right?
Researching dinners in 30 minutes or less, right?
That's work too.
And it's okay to not like cooking dinner.
It's okay if no one in the house
likes to cook dinner, but that is something
(10:49):
to then consider, but somebody has to do
it.
And that can be pretty tiring to have
to force yourself to do things you don't
wanna do every day.
And we're not even talking about the emotional
piece of if somebody in your household doesn't
like it and refuses to eat it, and
now you have to cook a second dinner.
I was sorry to bring that up for
everybody, but that happens too.
(11:09):
And so that's now part of it.
Well, and because you've already done this one,
I'm just thinking about, particularly when one of
my daughters was smaller and she has some
food aversions, and how I would have already
done this thing I hated doing that I
didn't wanna do after doing lots of other
adulty things that I didn't wanna do all
day, and then to have her refuse the
(11:30):
food.
I know that as a parent, it's my
job to make sure my child eats.
And like, sure, I guess we can do
noodles and Parmesan again for you.
But I already did all this other work.
Yeah, and so as we're talking about it,
I know this feels like something that as
we highlight it, it can get, well, man,
this is really getting pretty big, out of
(11:51):
control pretty quickly.
And I think that's why it's so important
that we talk about it is because, your
daughter having food aversions, that happens whether we're
acknowledging it or not, whether we're acknowledging the
work it takes to like, okay, I'm taking
a break from my meal and I'm getting
up and I'm going to start the noodles
and Parmesan.
It's great to do that for your kid.
And also we just need to acknowledge that
(12:12):
that's more work, right?
Yeah.
So it can pretty quickly grow and grow
as we start looking at it.
And I think that's why it's important for
us to look at that.
Yes, absolutely.
Should we talk about the mental load and
how it's kind of stratified across our society?
Yeah, absolutely.
(12:33):
So this conversation, I'm sure people have been
talking about this far earlier than the 1980s,
but this conversation really started in the 1980s.
Particularly there are sociologists, Arlene Kaplan Daniels, I
believe, and a lot of work around invisible
labor.
That's kind of where that term comes from.
(12:54):
And so again, coming back to this capitalistic
standard of understanding work as focus on activities
that you have to do and you get
paid for them, that means just because of
how things are separated by gender, which let's
definitely get into that in just a second,
but women's work, quote unquote, is not just
(13:17):
any job that you do outside of the
house, but it does tend to fall on
women more once you get home.
And so all of this, like making the
noodles with Parmesan, right?
That is then kind of considered more women's
work.
I hope your partner's not like that, Alison,
but that's usually considered good.
But then that work, when it falls to
(13:38):
women, tends to be devalued more.
And it's usually unpaid.
It's limited by, you're limited by the demands
of the unpaid work that happens in the
home.
And there's a lot of moral implications that
go with this because it's divided by gender.
So this kind of, that's where that started.
That was her kind of premise of Invisible
Work in the 80s.
(13:59):
But a lot of this comes down to
how we view gender and how we assign
worth.
So yeah, that's probably our next place to
go.
Yeah, let's do it.
Yeah, yeah.
So let's talk about, particularly because we're talking
to clinicians right now.
And so we have to kind of know
who are we particularly on the lookout for
this for in our sessions?
(14:20):
When does this typically show up in relationships?
Let's talk about that stuff.
So as of right now, I hope that
this is shifting because of Eve Brodsky and
all the conversation around this stuff.
But as of right now, all of our
research is still showing that women still do
a majority of the childcare and the domestic
work at home.
(14:41):
Really hard to quantify emotional labor, but I
don't think I'm going too far out on
a limb to say that women do a
majority of the emotional labor in our households
as well and in our relationships.
And something that's really alarming with this, with
modern women is that even when we have
two earner families, like let's take a heterosexual
relationship, man and a woman, they are both
(15:03):
working outside of the house, they're working full
-time, women are still picking up a majority
of the childcare and domestic work on top
of working a full-time paid job, right,
that society sees.
And so, as we're looking at this, this
disproportionately affects women, and obviously this disproportionately affects
(15:25):
heterosexual relationships, you know?
And so the level of that though, let's
talk about that as well.
So we had a recent study by the
United Nations, I believe, that kind of quantified
this for us and showed that not only
are women doing more work, even though they're
(15:45):
working outside the home too, but they're doing
almost three times as much unpaid mental load
work as their male partners are doing.
So I'm just gonna let that sink in
a little bit.
So take a traditional heterosexual relationship, they're both
working outside the house, they're working the same
40 hours in a week, and then she
(16:07):
comes home and she's doing three times amount
of work.
Once she punches out at work, she comes
home, she's doing three times more work.
That's a problem, huge problem.
So why?
Let's talk about that.
Why might this be happening?
So I pulled a study and I pulled
(16:28):
a quote from that that I thought was
really, really helpful.
And so that quote is that women have
more favorable attitudes.
This is literally what the study said, I'm
not just saying this.
This study came out and said, women have
more favorable attitudes towards cleaning, cooking, and childcare
than do men.
I'm taking a deep breath as I read
(16:48):
this next part because I get frustrated by
it.
Women enjoy it more, they set higher standards
for it.
That part doesn't make me mad, I think
that's true.
And they feel more responsible for it.
I think that's probably true too.
The first part of women enjoy it more,
I'm like, no, I don't enjoy this cleaning.
No, no.
But so then the rest of this quote
is furthermore, women's favorable and men's unfavorable attitudes
(17:12):
are associated with women's greater contribution to household
labor.
Let's break that down for a second.
Can I ask, when did this study come
out or the thing that this was quoted
from?
I didn't pull any research that wasn't within
the last five to 10 years.
So this- Oh, for God's sake.
I was like, it was like 1963.
(17:32):
I'm trying to scroll down to my footnotes.
I'm like, which one is this?
What's the footnote?
But I'm like, no, I didn't pull anything
that wasn't the last five to 10 years.
I think the oldest study that I pulled
was the 2009 study, so.
Okay.
I won't throw anything.
I'll just feel it.
That's exactly why we get to talk about
this, right?
I'm like, because as I'm going through this
(17:53):
research, I'm like, okay, this is at first
it made sense.
I'm going back to the beginnings.
This is from the 1980s.
No big deal.
Well, that still is alarmingly recent, right?
Most of our lifetimes.
But yeah, as I'm starting to pull research
that like, wait, what do you mean this
research came out in 2020 or this one
came out in 2017?
(18:13):
What do you mean?
No.
Yeah.
So all of the things that I'm pulling
and quoting last five to 10 years, which
is horrifying.
They got the data that said that women
enjoy it more.
They're not just throwing it in there, right?
So why would women be saying that we
enjoy it more?
Like if it's on a Likert scale, for
instance, I don't know what their methodology was,
(18:33):
but if it's on a Likert scale, socialization
goes into that.
I don't know anybody that, I know some
people who would like to clean one room
and be done.
But the ongoing ever-present job of cleaning.
Yeah.
Society, yes.
I'm just like, yes, society.
(18:55):
All the feelings, yes.
Yes, all the feelings.
I have to take deep breaths as I
talk about this.
As I think about this, talk about this
to other clinicians, to my clients.
We're all in this together, everybody.
This is why we're in this work, even
for these frustrating pieces.
But yeah, a lot of this is societal
conditioning, right?
So there is a lot of societal expectation.
(19:15):
There's a lot of societal messaging, as we
also consider when you grow up, don't forget
that all-important behavior modeling, like watching moms
and what moms do, right?
And how they're messaging and signaling to their
children.
This is what mom does.
This is what dad does.
Now, a lot of this, I just wanna
acknowledge we're talking about primarily heterosexual relationships.
(19:37):
We're gonna talk about how this applies to
same-sex relationships in a little bit.
But yeah, there's a reason we're talking traditional
heterosexual relationships with traditional values of man, woman,
mom, and dad, and households.
So we'll talk about that in a little
bit.
So think about growing up as, again, watching
what does mom do?
How does she act about things?
(19:58):
What are the expectations here?
And I also really like to acknowledge the
different reinforcements that come in from society, both
positive and negative.
So as we're talking about positive, that is
praising for the housework.
That is, you know, comment like, oh my
gosh, your house looks like it's straight out
of a Martha Stewart magazine, right?
(20:20):
Or, oh, your kids are so well-behaved,
as if you have any control over that
when you're out in public.
But it is praise for that work that
you've been doing to raise kids that can
act however people are praising in public.
But with that positive praise, I think it's
also really important for us to acknowledge the
negative reinforcements that come with that too.
(20:42):
And we're talking mom guilt.
We're talking shaming that happens.
And that can be really, really intense.
Whether somebody has said it to you or
they haven't said it to you directly, doesn't
really matter, because I could probably pick out
an example from a movie as well.
Let's Go Back to Home Alone, right?
Then her, I don't know if it's her
sister.
(21:02):
Gosh, I should have watched that before more
recently, but it's whoever is traveling with them.
And she's sitting right there on the airplane.
And Kevin's mom is literally saying like, what
kind of mother am I that I left
my youngest child?
That's mom guilt and shame, right?
Right, the dad wasn't bemoaning what a bad
dad he was.
I'm pretty sure he went back to his
book at this point.
(21:22):
That dad seemed to actually care, but I'm
pretty sure he went back to his book
at this point.
And he was like, it's okay, sweetie.
Like there's nothing we can do on this
plane right now.
And so that's also negative reinforcing.
If you don't do these things, you're gonna
have a bad time.
So there's a lot of reinforcing that happens
on an adult level.
(21:43):
But I think it's also really important for
us to acknowledge that this starts much younger,
that behavior modeling.
But also if there are boy children and
girl children, any combination of household stuff, disproportionately
the girl children get tasked to help mom
with more of the domestic load and the
mental load than boy children tend to be.
(22:05):
So that can include things like cleaning or
like, honey, can you go in and grab
that grocery list off the counter?
Because we're already all in the car.
Typically, girl children tend to get 50%
more tasks than their boy siblings do.
And so this starts really, really young.
And it even starts with, if mom is
(22:27):
cleaning, I mean, there are pink and purple
little broom and mop sets that you can
buy.
The concept of child kitchens, our children mimic
everything that their parents are doing.
And that includes a misdivision of domestic labor.
That includes mental load work as well.
(22:47):
And if you watch little kids playing with
Barbie dolls or dolls, you're probably gonna at
some point in time, watch the fight go
through of like, you didn't remind me of
this.
And that happens even in their play.
So it starts really, really young.
I think about how that ends up playing
out with time.
(23:09):
Like when you say women are doing three
times the amount of household labor, that's spread
out over the evenings and the weekends.
It's our downtime is disproportionately spent on maintaining
the household.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
And I think we mentioned talking about Eve
(23:29):
Rodsky.
So what we're talking about there specifically, she
kind of did this fair play book that
talks really directly about dividing this domestic labor,
working with the mental load stuff.
And something that really struck me as I
read through that was she did a ton
of interviews for this.
She's not a mental health therapist, but she
(23:51):
did her work.
It's a really great book.
And she interviewed hundreds and hundreds of couples,
fine tuning, she's got this card deck that
you can divide the work out.
We're gonna talk about that more later.
You can divide the work out.
And so she did all of this fine
tuning.
She had all of these beta testers and
then she interviewed them.
And a theme that she pulled from all
of her research for this was, and I
(24:14):
quote, there is this notion that men's time
is finite and women's time is infinite.
Women can just come up with more time,
right?
And, but as we're talking about it, it's
just women have to, someone has to do
it and women just do it and figure
it out.
And so it's after work, it's in the
(24:35):
middle of the night, it's on their mornings,
it's on the weekends, sometimes it's in the
middle of their workday, like a teacher calls
and says, so-and-so doesn't have lunch
money.
And you're like, okay, here's my credit card.
That is mental load work and that's domestic
work.
And so as we're looking at it, all
of those things, I know that piece doesn't
sound really big, like, okay, here's my credit
card to reload.
(24:55):
That phone call maybe takes five minutes, but
if you have a five minute call every
single day of your workday, you've all of
a sudden spent a half an hour doing
work for your family while you're at work.
So it adds up really, really quickly, even
these small little chunks of ones.
But coming back to that, like the valuing
of time, yeah, there is this notion that
(25:17):
men's time is finite and women's time is
infinite.
Like magicians pulling flags out of their hand,
infinite time, they just pull time out of
the cosmos somewhere.
Mm-hmm, because it all still needs to
get done, right?
So it appears as such, it seems as
though, but really there's this huge consequence to
(25:37):
us around our wellbeing because we prioritize these
things that do need to get done at
our own expense.
Yes, absolutely.
And we're talking a lot about, I'm using
a lot of examples with kids, that is
not accidental and that's not a bias I'm
just playing on that I have not looked
(25:59):
at.
The reason I keep bringing up kids, obviously
there's a lot more work when there's more
people in the household, right?
But our research also points to that even
men who did closer to their fair share
of things before having kids, kids is like
the great game changer when it comes to
mental load.
Things can still absolutely be imbalanced before having
(26:20):
kids or if you never wanna have kids,
a client never wants to have kids, things
can still absolutely be imbalanced because of these
social learnings and stuff.
But our research shows that once kids come
into the equation that even if a partner
was doing fairly equitable household work, that they
significantly cut back after kids come into the
(26:43):
picture.
And so some of the stats I was
seeing on this is up to five hours
a week, right?
And so- Of less work.
Less work than the female partner.
And some of that's, you can't really help
it because if you're doing chest feeding, breast
feeding, like he can't do that, right?
A male partner just can't do that.
(27:03):
But it's not being compensated for the things
that a male partner can do just across
the board.
Not all partners are awful in this way,
don't get me wrong, but it's just acknowledging
that bias that comes in of just research
shows across the board, it's pretty stark after
kids.
It's most noticeable after kid or kids come
into the picture.
(27:24):
And the more kids obviously that a family
has, typically the more imbalanced it gets.
So how does this play out for same
-sex couples?
I'm curious if there's a better split there.
I really want there to be for God's
sake.
There is, there absolutely is.
(27:44):
Yeah, so research on same-sex couples tends
to show that it is much more egalitarian
with the assigning of tasks.
And it just tends to be that there's
more communication around it.
My gut says that this is also some
societal learning around how male versus female should
be quote unquote communicating.
(28:06):
And so in same-sex marriages, relationships, they're
closer to the same page, usually doing things
better.
But for the most part, our research shows
that it's much more equitable as they're dividing
by labor.
And same-sex marriages tend to actually divide
based on their strengths a lot more naturally.
(28:28):
And so there tends to be, when it
comes to mental load, all relationships have their
issues.
But when it comes to mental load and
domestic work tends to be less resentment around
those tasks because there's better communication about it
and just already more equitable division of labor.
And then they come back and talk about
it as well based on strengths, weaknesses, working
(28:50):
with each other with that.
Yeah.
Okay, awesome.
That's good to hear.
And that's primarily why I'm talking about heterosexual
relationships is because that's primarily what we're talking
about today.
Like this doesn't tend to impact same-sex
relationships as much, but it can still happen,
right?
Anything can happen in any relationship, frankly.
(29:10):
But just across the board, for the most
part, this is primarily impacting female women who
have a male partner, particularly more so when
they have children, kid or children, yes.
Okay.
Good news there.
So if you primarily work with same-sex
couples, it's definitely something to be aware of.
It's definitely something to look at because it
(29:31):
can still happen, but it just doesn't tend
to happen as often.
So a little sunshine of good news right
there.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
So I'm thinking about how we bring this
up in session with clients, particularly.
I mean, some people are coming in for
relationship struggles.
(29:52):
Some people are not coming in for relationship
struggles.
They're coming in because they're overwhelmed because they
feel like no matter what they do, they
can never catch up.
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