ResistanceIsFertile (@ResistanceIsFertile)

The myth of mental load You wake up in the night, thinking of the to-do list, the upcoming kid’s birthdays, grandma’s heart scan, the seven appointments across three kids over the next five days, and the dripping faucet… By myth, mental load isn’t what most people call it. It’s not that it doesn’t exist.   You can go look at what people say or write to describe it, “Mental load, also sometimes called emotional labor, is having lots of things on your mind. It’s having to remember to pick up eggs, to label your kid’s PE kit, to plan the Christmas shopping, to buy and make dinners for the week, to read the communications from school—the list goes on. Even if you ask someone else to buy eggs, it’s you then checking that the eggs were in fact bought. It’s essentially project management. And when it’s at work, that’s what we call it. Project management. Or just management. It’s a whole job. Yet when it’s at home, we call it, well, we don’t really have a word for it.” So what is it, then? “Mental load” is just women renaming the curse in Genesis 3 and their duties in Timothy, Titus, and elsewhere in the Bible. It generally is a combination of three things - Lack of skill and systems Sin Poor leadership (a husband who won’t step in and say no and provide leadership) When it comes to sin, mental load is generally a mixture of a few primary sins Worry/anxiousness Complaining Sloth - some women are slothful in their duties, few are willing to say this. Fear of man What we really want to emphasize here is that “mental load” is a made up term that seeks to justify women in their lack of skill or sin, instead of actually seeking to help them on both fronts. Jessica and I want to help households on both fronts.  More importantly, God wants to help households and women on both fronts. On the lack of skill side, much of our writing the past few months has been focused on helping households grow in the skills that allow them to reflect what the Bible requires - an older term often used in Christian history - orderly.  Orderliness has many aspects,  but to keep it simple it basically means that a household runs in good order, practically and morally. Folks joyfully and peacefully do their duties and they are done well.   Many women need practical help in our day, because few Titus 2 women exist in our day. But that isn’t all they need. Women tend to struggle with particular sins, and they tend to struggle with them in particular ways.  A fair bit of mental load is about giving a new name to common women’s sins.  Because when something is no longer sin, it no longer needs repentance.   Mental load is used to evoke pity and avoid repentance. How is mental load tied to sin?   Let’s shoot straight - when you listen to what many women describe as “mental load,” or talk about their mental load,  they are describing exactly what the Bible calls worry and anxiousness.    They are also often complaining. They are describing two things the Bible repeatedly tells us to repent of, and they need to be repented of because they are sin. And while these are not particularly female sins - men complain and worry as well - mental load is especially about how women particularly engage in these sins. “Do not be anxious about anything, but through prayer and petition make your requests made known to God.” “‘Do not worry about tomorrow…” Also, often, a fair portion of the mental load for women is tied to another sin, the fear of man.  Why are they so worried about so many things, about so and so’s party and this and that… because they are afraid.  Afraid of not meeting someone's expectations, of making someone unhappy… So, their mental and practical schedule becomes more and more overloaded because they won’t say no, and they won’t say no because they are afraid of how so and so may take it or what whose it news it will think or this or that group may respond… They are operating - often without anyone willing to point it out - out of the fear of man.   Now, there is a great deal more that could be said here - some of these challenges are hormonal for women, especially around childbirth and perimenopause and menopause. Hormone issues for both men and women can significantly magnify underlying struggles and sin issues. And, there are also cultural issues in our day, where placing women into roles and duties the Bible reserves for men further complicates the picture. But, none of these changes the underlying, more fundamental issue.   Folks create new names for old sins, and we have been doing this for decades, especially in America.  They do so because they don’t want to hear that their emotions and actions are sinful. They don’t want to hear this because they don’t want to have to repent.    Mental load is primarily a way for women to ignore the need for repentance and growth, both practically in terms of the duties God has given them, and spiritually, in terms of the ways they are prone to sin.   So, let’s do away with the myth of mental load, and instead help households develop the skills and systems to run orderly, and where sin is present in it, in love name it and call them to repent of it