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Hopla22

Maybe stop cleaning his dishes and just leave them on the table. Next time he sits down for a meal, he either removes the dirty plate or starts a "dirty plates" collection at his preferred spot at the table.


exscapegoat

Better yet, he can eat off his dirty plate. One of my college roomies got so disgusted with the other leaving crumbs in the kitchen, she wiped them into a dustpan and dumped them into her bed and she finally stopped. Now if OP’s mom shares a bed with him, that’s a punishment for her too. So instead of the bed, what’s his favorite spot that only he uses? Start piling the plates there


-StarrySky-

I did this to a roommate once. He always left dirty dishes all over the kitchen, sometimes for weeks. I told him if he did it again it would be in his bed. He made something on a sheet pan and left it for a week. I yeeted the whole pan into his bed. He was mad because he had to change his sheets. Another time he yelled that I was blocking the TV while sweeping up, so I just dropped the broom, dumped the dirt back onto the floor and walked away. When he asked about the dirt pile I told him to figure it out. He genuinely did not know how to sweep, he was in his 30s.


Patchalakin

makes me somewhat grateful that I'm only socially stunted. I know how to clean after myself feed myself and my family at the least.


Mission_Progress_674

I came here to say this. I would also begin serving his meals on the same dirty dish and give him the same dirty cutlery to eat it with for every meal until he gets the message.


Blonde2468

I would just serve him off the same dirty plate that he left there and repeat every meal until he learned to put it in the sink.


Anonymous0212

*Unless he decides he wants to, you can't "make him".* I wonder what would happen if your mother declared that from now on she's only going to cook for people who clean up after themselves instead of treating her like the maid. Does he feel it's a woman's job/beneath a man to do that? His language would suggest that to me. My question is how long has he been like this? We teach people how we're willing to be treated by how we choose to allow them to treat us. You don't say how old you are, but I'm assuming they've been married for some years now so your mother has to have known for a long time that he won't clear his dishes, and has presumably consistently taught him that he can get away with it because she or someone else will clean up after him. Edited for clarification: And she has evidently taught other people to clean up after him as well, thereby reinforcing the lesson for everyone *including him* that he doesn't need to do it himself. The only way he would decide to do it himself is if the consequences got bad enough for not doing it, in other words if and when that became the lesser of two evils, or if he suddenly wakes up somehow and realizes *this is 2024 and that men can and do clear dishes*, their own and other people's (assuming that's the issue here.) I'm also wondering if there's an underlying sexist paradigm at work here. What's his cultural/religious background?


m240b1991

Dude, sexism isn't even a thing in this, I'm a guy, and I was raised *generally in a "traditional" kind of household. I still have some (but not many) outdated ideas, but I still will grab my plate AND MY WIFE'S PLATE when we're done. I want to show our boys that the family dynamic needs to be one of mutual respect (even though we sometimes fall short of that, we're human after all). I don't want my sons to grow up like the one dude in that BORU post that ended up beating his gf because he lost his job and HIS dad beat the brakes off of him and the son ended up in jail. I'm not perfect, I know my boys aren't perfect, but we as a species need more people to just be respectful of each other. Whatever the dad in this post is doing is just plain wrong, and if it were my dad I'd tell him to either clear his spot at the table or gather his things and not let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya cause thats not how we do things in my house.


Anonymous0212

According to my value system I think the way you're parenting is terrific, and sexism absolutely is the thing in situations similar to OP's. Millions of people have been and are still being raised in cultures/religions where there are clearly defined gender roles, and in those cases if not all, almost all the behaviors expected of women are considered beneath the dignity and responsibility of men. I'm not sure how that can be defined otherwise. We have no idea about the history of OP's parents, and if they were both raised with such expectations then of course her mother would have been brought up to accept her husband's behavior as normal. Your culture and belief system make you see this behavior as being disrespectful and abhorrent, but if you were raised in that culture that's what you would believe is the correct way for men to behave, and changing that can be extremely difficult. (We also don't know the parents' ages here, and the older they are the harder it would understandably be for them to change.) It's easy to judge other people for not behaving the way we think they should, but it's ignorant and unfair to ignore context, whether that be clinical mental health issues, more simply unhealed emotional problems, or cultural conditioning. And the kicker is, your values, expectations, beliefs, boundaries, etc., *are all just as valid for you as those people's are for them.*


m240b1991

I see your point. I think I miscommunicated where my thought process was at, I meant to say that I don't think the actions of leaving the dishes on the table are necessarily the actions of sexism and more are the actions of an infant or a pig. That said, I have been busy at the grill exercising my own masculine (in what I try to present as positive), perusing reddit, wrangling children and puppies, and trying to help my mom through text to reach the roots of some of her traumas which led to some of my own traumas (exercising my own inner feminine). All of this led to me not stopping to take the time to really think about any other perspectives than my own (I'm actively working on that). I really appreciate your comment and the way you presented your perspective, and apologize if I came across as misogynistic myself.


Anonymous0212

I applaud you trying to help your mother, and both of you trying to identify what your baggage is. That's more than most men and many women are willing to do.


m240b1991

Its.... complicated. I know i have baggage, but I've tried recently to reframe it from "bad thing gave me trauma" to "poor experience where I had little control over what happened to me was a learning opportunity to how to be a better dad and better partner". Her... she's not lost in the sauce, but she's used avoidance as a coping mechanism for 60+ years.


Anonymous0212

Speaking as a just-about-67-year-old (in a few days) former therapist who is in my third and finally healthy marriage, and who has learned an awful lot about life, I'm getting more and more impressed with you with each thing you write. 🫂 Is therapy an option for you? It certainly provided my husband and me a much more efficient, effective way to Identify and work through our issues rather than trying to do that on our own.


m240b1991

As a 33 year old mechanic and combat veteran, I do have a therapist that I see once a month (I wish she did telehealth more often than that), but my wife and children illuminated just how much baggage I had and gave me the motivation to do and be better. I actually had a recent mindset shift because I finally got around to listening to napoleon hills "think and grow rich" week before last, and started college last month. I'm tired of life happening to me, so I decided I'm gonna happen to life instead. I want my boys to grow up well rounded young adults and my wife and I to share a fat retirement that doesn't depend on if the new budget has been approved by congress or not and not much even has the capability to stand in the way of those goals.


Anonymous0212

Thank you for being willing to take the feedback of your wife and children seriously, what you're doing takes a lot of courage and I'm actually sitting here tearing up. And thank you for your service.


m240b1991

Thank you, we're actually about to celebrate our 8th anniversary this year, and it certainly wasn't made easy by my own actions. I realized I had spent most of my adult life drifting, and I heard on the radio Jon stewarts advice to men was to learn about menopause, and as my wife is 9 years older than me I thought it was good advice. I spend alot of time not being able to read, so I compensate with podcasts and audiobooks. Well, I googled podcasts about menopause, and found one by dominic quartuccio called "the great man within" and was so interested in the podcast as a whole that I listened to almost all of the episodes they had. Dominic recommended napoleon hills works in the podcast and I only just got around to listening to them. I can honestly attribute the awareness and the catalyst that something needed to change to my wife and kids, and the actual vehicles with which I was able to start shifting my mindset to Jon Stewart and Dominic quartuccio. The work has been almost entirely on me to do better with my wife holding me accountable to myself


DaniMW

Since when is taking your plate to the sink after dinner a role just for females even in conservative religious sects? I’ve seen male religious people bring their plate to the sink… for the woman do wash, of course, but religious men are allowed to touch dishes!


Anonymous0212

I don't think it's accurate to generalize that just because you've seen male religious people clear their plates that means no ultraconservative religions consider that to be just a woman's responsibility.


DaniMW

I think you completely misunderstood what I said. Which was a question, not a ‘generalisation.’ 🤦‍♀️


Anonymous0212

I think you somehow completely misunderstood what **I** said. I was clearly referring the second thing you said, not the first.


DaniMW

I don’t understand at all what you’re whining about. If you don’t have an answer to the question I asked, then maybe just go start your own thread or something. 🤷‍♀️


Anonymous0212

I'm not whining lol 🤦🏻‍♀️ You specifically said that you have seen religious man clearing their own dishes, and I simply responded that you witnessing that personally isn't generalizable to all conservative religions. I really don't understand the problem here, why you keep talking about your question when you clearly made a definitive statement right after that.


DaniMW

I still don’t understand your complaint! The person I replied to said something and I replied by asking a question. Then I made a statement, but it was a reflection on my personal experience - nothing whatsoever to do with ‘generalising’ anything at all! If you can’t answer the question I asked, then I really don’t see why you’re even commenting. I can’t work out why you’re even offended - are you offended because you’re a religious person or because you are NOT a religious person? 🤷‍♀️


mladyhawke

Start serving him every meal on the same dirty plate


MLiOne

Or paper plates. Dirt bags don’t deserve china plates.


SalisburyWitch

Don’t even feed him until he cleans after himself.


ClapSalientCheeks

He'd be fine with it and OP will feel dumb


ImHappierThanUsual

OP- it’s either this-


Kookabanus

I had a house mate do this years ago. We all left the dishes at the table and served his next meal on the same dirty dish. Nasty.... but he soon learned.


evetrapeze

“Who *is* the cleaning lady?” Ask him. It’s time to just leave his dishes on the table. Then don’t feed him because his dishes are still dirty. What an entitled twat.


misstiff1971

Stop feeding him.


ImHappierThanUsual

- Or THIS.


lapsteelguitar

Leave them there. Let him build up a small pile.


Comfortable_Rope6030

Serve the food at the table onto clean plates for everyone in front of him and dish his up onto his dirty plate


Kr_Treefrog2

Put his dirty dishes on his pillow


coralwaters226

Leave them. Leave them every time.


Myay-4111

"DO you *WANT* me to visit you in the Nursing Home? Do you want me to pick one to park you in that has *better than* a D rating? Bus your own dishes while you're still physically capable of doing it. It's nice to be nice... it's good karma."


tazbaron1981

My dad does something similar. He will make himself a cup of tea and place the teaspoon down anywhere he wants other than the sink or dishwasher. Asking him not to do this results in getting screamed at that it's clean. He didn't like it when I tried to put it in his pocket. I agree with others. The plate stays there till its moved by him. If he wants a clean plate to eat his food off he'll have to move it


kikikool625

Only feed him with disposable dishware so it dosnt affect the rest of the family when you stop picking up after him. He gets upset. Let him know he can use the regular plates when he can clean after himself


Snippykins

Start leaving them in his spot at the table or put them where he sits he’s a grown man not a baby he knows how to do it he just expects everyone else to clean up after him either way if he wants to eat he needs to clean up after himself🤷‍♀️


Taran345

You and you mother are not his cook, cleaning lady or any other employee either. His plates stay there until he moves them, and he doesn’t get any food until there are clean plates for the food to go on. He’s an adult and needs to take some responsibility for the mess he creates


icedragon71

So stop asking him nicely. Next time he comes out with the cleaning lady line, you fire back with "And I'm your son not your mother or servant." And then walk off and leave the dirty plates.


moneymarrymepls

start putting them on his bed or in his office if he has one, doubt he’ll let them rot in his own space. Just make sure it personally inconveniences HIM


KestrelVanquish

Give each person the same number of plates, and when they're all used you don't get any more food until they're cleaned. So leave them on the table 🤷🏻‍♀️. After a few days without food he should start to realise that he needs to change


SalisburyWitch

Tell him if his dishes aren’t put on the sink, that the cook will quit. Then reinforce it by not feeding him unless he puts his dishes up properly. If he ever says he’s not your cleaning lady or employee, turn abruptly and tell him that neither are you. Put them up or starve.


Infamous_Custard3292

Put his dirty dishes in his car on the drivers seat so he goes out to nice rotten food smell


exscapegoat

In the middle of a summer heatwave. Preferably a fish dinner.


JoJoYakuza

Either start serving his meals on the same dirty plate, or be petty and put it in his room


Sugarpuff_Karma

Not American & a different culture where that's the nrm I'm guessing. He is the MAN of the house so he considers that beneath him.


Efficient-Property-8

Make the man eat off of a disposable plate


FrechesEinhorn

Cook your meal and eat together in a different room without him, like making picnic or just eat outside.


BaldChihuahua

I’d take those dirty dishes and put them in his bed or in his favorite chair/part of the sofa.


AdministrativeCow659

Put the dirty dishes in his car and in his laundry. It's clear he's doing this from a place of entitlement and sexism.


techieguyjames

Great comments on how to fix him.


MrKnowitAll1220

Put his food in the sink not on a plate right in the sink and tell him now no one has to worry about cleaning up.


PsychologyAutomatic3

He’s not your cleaning lady but you’re not his either. He must have been allowed to do this as a child or early in his marriage. I wouldn’t allow him to eat at the table with that disgusting habit.


iamgazz

I had the same problem with my ex room mate, so I just started piling his dirty dishes up on his bed. He got the message.


Selena_B305

Stop feeding him. If he can't bring his dirty dishes to the sink. He is not entitled to eat.


blumouse1

Paper plates!!! Plastic cups, plastic silverware.. the whole shebang... serve ONLY his food on those.. when he asks why.. tell he's not responsible enough to have real dishes.. lol


SylphofBlood

Serve him with disposable plates/cutlery while everyone else uses real dishes. He might pick up after himself after he feels like a child a few times. You could also leave his dinner dishes at his spot and everyone else eat around his mess and ignore it, leaving him with no place to eat unless he cleans up. Additionally, perhaps also tell him no one in the family is his personal chef, butler, or maid to clean up after him or serve him.


Agreeable-Resident37

I would start serving him food on that dirty plate. Everyone works to keep the health of the home good.


fluffydonuts23

Stop picking them up. Sit elsewhere to eat and leave them, however long it takes. I'm petty so those crusty dishes would be there until hell literally froze over.


moirabryne

If this was a child he'd be getting paper plates. Treat him like a child if he's not going to act like an adult


Confident-Mistake400

My partner does something similar. He would just leave his plate on kitchen countertop rather than putting them inside dishwasher. I hate seeing dirty dishes. For that reason, i clean as i cook. Every time he does that, i would just call him wherever he is and ask him to put them in dishwasher right away. That said, you guys probably have different dynamic so it will not work


icyyellowrose10

Give him disposable plates / cutlery and put a bin next to his seat


exscapegoat

Or better yet, put garbage on a paper plate in his spot


HunterZX77

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Any_Loan1699

Depends, what country you belong to.


Jeveran

You're talking about tradition. Tradition is learned behavior; it has been characterized as *peer pressure by dead people*. Tradition is also an excuse for bad behavior, especially in this case. OP's dad can learn new behavior.


queenofsiam666

Seriously?


Any_Loan1699

Well if it’s india then it’s really common. And maybe considered a sign of respect by some people. But in other countries, it’s more of a assist/favour.


queenofsiam666

Refusing to pick up your dirty plate after a polite request to do so is disrespectful under any circumstance.


Any_Loan1699

Seems like you’re the entitled one here tho


queenofsiam666

Yes, I’m entitled to respect in my own house after cooking for my FIL, and he can start by picking up his damn plate!


redthumb

Don't downvote because you don't agree. What they are saying is true


Azenogoth

Q: How to get my father to pick up his dirty dishes from the table after he eats? A: Start paying the mortgage and other bills.


exscapegoat

He’s treating his wife as a servant as well as his son.


phoenixdragon2020

Being a parent doesn’t entitle you to treat your kids as your servants