Ask any parent and they’ll tell you that their little bundles of joy really take a toll in the stress department.
After all, they’re expensive, they’re noisy, and for whatever reason, they’re sticky all the time. I don’t think I want to know why. Between the shrieking at 3 a.m. and the seemingly endless trips to soccer practice, it’s easy to see how any mom or dad would start to crumble under the pressure.
But one survey just found out what stresses mothers out more than their spawn. Drumroll please: Their husbands.
In a survey of 7,000 moms conducted by Today, the average mom rates her stress levels at a solid 8.5 out of 10.
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They’re onto something. Make the tiny freeloaders do it for you.
And among all of the participants, 46 percent of them found that their husbands actually caused them more stress than their kids, to the shock of no one ever.
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On top of the run-of-the-mill stress of parenting, 75 percent of moms surveyed also said that they did the vast majority of household chores. Nothing like a pile of dishes sitting in the sink for three days to drive a wedge between Mom and Dad.
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According to the University of Padova, those little stressors, like feeling as though you’re left out on a limb by your partner on laundry day, can really take their toll on a marriage over time.
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Another interesting and not at all shocking find by the same University is that husbands who lose their wives mentally deteriorate more rapidly than wives who lose their husbands because when we die, there’s no one left to do the husbands’ emotional labor anymore.
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And there you have it, folks. Further proof that having a husband and kids is really just having kids. Relax. I’m only joking.
Maybe.