Woman shares tactics she follows to make husband an 'equal parent,' dividing opinions online

Most of the time, women naturally end up taking most of the mental load in a household. Whether it is about planning important dates and events, chalking up a schedule for the kids, or taking care of household chores, a woman is always expected to take these burdens along with parenting duties. However, Pace Webb, a mom, social media influencer and founder of @ourhomeflows has stirred up an online debate by advising women to make their husbands an "equal parent."

Webb, who helps moms take mental loads with ease, suggested that making their partners "equal parents" will also help them improve their problem-solving skills. In her recent Instagram video, Webb expressed her thoughts on distributing household responsibilities equally. “I stopped answering every question he could figure out for himself,” Webb said in her clip. “It may sound kind of harsh but if you’re always answering the questions, they’re just gonna keep asking you, and you’re going to be the one who does all the thinking.” She explained that mothers need to answer with brief phrases like "Hmm, I am not sure" or "I don't know" instead of providing a direct answer.

Webb believes that giving their partners some time to figure things out on their own "almost guarantees" that they will find the solution to their problem. However, she reminds the mothers that their responses should not be passive-aggressive. Webb mentions that one can also use lines like "I’m in the middle of something right now, but I can try and look in a minute." It’ll never be 50/50 but it can be a whole heck of a lot better than it is now!" she added in her caption. Needless to say, the viewers of her video were torn over the idea of not responding to the queries of your partner.

@califloridatexasmaam asked, "So you ignore him or what? Because I ignore mine and he still keeps asking." @svak321 shared, "My ex would continue to ask me everything about the kids' information. I had to also change my answers and start saying ‘You can go to their school website’ or ‘You look that up through the records department’ or 'You can speak directly with the teachers and put your email on the teacher's list for their reports,' etc." @erlorah suggested, "This is the advice I will give to women getting married or having children. Don’t start that cycle. It’s a hard one to break." @caydenjames2012 added, "How about you? Just stop paying your bills? How does that sound? That's kind of harsh but you'll figure it out."

Webb started making courses for moms to coach them on how to share the domestic and mental load with their partner, minus the drama, when her daughter was 6 months old. On the official website of Our Home Flows, she recalled how she had started to resent her relationship despite having her dream husband and a healthy baby. Webb started her initiative when she realized that there is no one to tell women like her about the mental load one needs to take to care for another human. 

"I realized that I wasn’t sharing the workload of caring for our child or household with my husband and although he was willing to do anything I asked, the fact that I held all the keys was too much to balance while having a demanding career," Webb wrote on her website. "I decided to apply everything I learned from being a chef leading high-production kitchens servicing demanding clients and a CEO managing multi-million dollar budgets and leading executive teams, to running a household and managing my relationship at home." Webb eventually started developing strategies to help couples communicate better and navigate through their domestic workload, especially where the couple holds a full-time job.

You can follow Pace Webb (@ourhomeflows) on her Instagram for more lifestyle content.