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I am a partner in a City law firm and lucky (wise?) to have married a man who gave up his career to stay home with our two young children. He is happy and so are the children. However, I am increasingly irritated that I get home in the evening exhausted to find them all slumped on the sofa watching television, homework often undone and the kids not yet bathed. I usually end up doing it myself. I’m doing a rotten job of managing and motivating my husband. How to do it better?
我是伦敦金融城一家律所的合伙人，我很幸运地（或者说很明智地？）嫁给了一位愿意放弃工作、专门在家照看两个年幼孩子的男人。他和孩子们对此都感到很开心。然而，令我越来越受不了的是，每天晚上当我筋疲力尽回到家的时候，总是发现他们都窝在沙发上看电视，功课总是一点也没做，孩子们也没洗澡。结果总是我自己动手做这些事。我在管理和激励我的丈夫方面做得太糟糕了。怎样才能做得好点？
Solicitor, female, 40s
律师，女性，40多岁
Lucy’s answer
露西的回答
It doesn’t matter if it was luck or wisdom: in marrying a man prepared to slouch about on the sofa all day you did the best thing possible for your career. The one thing that unites women at the very top is that they almost all have beta husbands.
说是幸运还是明智其实无关紧要，嫁给一个成天想窝在沙发上的男人，对你的职业生涯或许是一件再好不过的事。职场女强人的一个共同特点是，她们几乎都有个弱势老公。
That is the good bit. The bad bit is the gnawing, desperate, hysterical rage you feel when you get home to find the children unbathed. I know that wasn’t how you described it, but I’m putting words in your mouth having had experience of this sort of thing.
这是好的一面，不好的一面是，当你回到家发现孩子们还没洗澡时，你会难受、绝望、怒气冲天。我知道你没有这么说，不过我经历过类似的事情，我是在借机说我自己的感受。
When I get home tired to find my grown-up children still surrounded by the detritus of breakfast, I let loose a rage so elemental that my husband often has to intervene.
当我一身疲惫回到家，发现已经长大成人的孩子们吃完早餐后都没有收拾的时候，我就会大发雷霆，我先生经常不得不介入。
Because I understand your situation so well, I know what the answer is. Or rather I know what it isn’t.
由于我能切身体会你的感受，我知道问题的答案是什么。或者准确地说，我知道答案不是什么。
It is not better management and motivation for your husband. Abandon all hope that you can change the way he does things.
问题不在于管理和激励你的丈夫。放弃一切认为你可以改变他做事方式的幻想吧。
If he runs the show at home, then rules have to be set by him. People like you and me who think it matters hugely that baths are at a fixed time are constitutionally different from people who don’t think it matters a jot. Nothing can be done to turn one sort into the other.
如果家里由他打理，那么规则就该由他说了算。你和我这样认为每天定期洗澡非常重要的人，与那些认为这种事无所谓的人生来就不一样。没办法把其中一种人改变成另外一种。
You have three options. The first is to bathe them yourself. This can work, but – here’s the catch – you have to do it cheerfully. If you do it as an angry, resentful martyr you become loathsome to everyone, including yourself.
你有三个选择。第一个选择就是自己给孩子们洗澡。这可以解决问题，关键在于，在这个过程中你要保持愉快。如果你做这件事的时候像一个充满愤怒和怨恨的受气包，你会在所有人的眼中——包括你自己——变得令人生厌。
Alternatively, you could pay someone else to do it. This can be fine, though if the point is that your husband is looking after the children, it rather spoils it if the nanny is doing it instead.
或者你也可以花钱请别人来做这件事。这办法也不错，只不过，原本是由你丈夫照看孩子，现在要让保姆来做，事情就有点变样了。
Or, third, you learn to stop minding. This is terribly hard to pull off for control freaks like you and me. But it is a bit easier than the alternatives. Comfort yourself with the fact that if the children are old enough to do homework, it can’t be long before they start bathing themselves. In the meantime, I suggest you open a bottle of wine as soon as you get through the door. It takes the edge off.
或者还有第三种选择，就是你要学会不再介意。这对你我这种有控制欲的人来说极其困难。不过这比其他办法要容易一点。你可以这么安慰自己，等孩子们长大一点，能独自完成家庭作业以后，他们很快就可以自己洗澡了。还有，我建议你一进家门就开瓶酒，这可以让你放松。
Your advice
读者的建议
Get a nanny
请个保姆
Ask yourself if he really is capable of more. Mine wasn’t. If you can afford it supplement his care with a nanny who understands that the children must be bathed. Workplace management skills do not typically work at home.
你问问自己，他是不是真的能多做一些事？反正我的丈夫是做不到的。如果你能出得起钱，就再找一个知道孩子们必须洗澡的保姆。职场的管理技巧在家里通常没用。
Marketing director, female, 40s
销售总监，女性，40多岁
He isn’t staff
他不是你的员工
It sounds like you see your husband as a member of your support staff. If he feels you ignore his concerns about his demotion from partner, he may see non-compliance as his only option.
听起来你似乎将你的丈夫视为你的支持团队的员工。如果他担心自己作为伴侣的地位降级了，并且觉得你无视他这种感受，他可能会将不服从视为唯一选择。
Non-compliant support husband, 40s
不愿顺从的后援丈夫，40多岁
Make a list
列一张家务清单
My wife works full-time and I am self-employed so I do all the child and house duties. I ask my wife for a list of things I should do during the day and that makes me motivated.
我太太是全职工作，而我则是自由职业者，因此我负责孩子们的所有事宜和家务事。我让我太太每天列一张我应做事情的清单，这样我会感觉很有动力。
Self-employed, male, 38
自由职业者，男性，38岁
Anger issues
关于愤怒
Your husband and children are happy but you are full of anger and resentment? Unless you and your husband can come to terms with your issues, I predict you are headed for divorce and he will get custody of the children with big support payments and alimony.
你丈夫和孩子们很开心，而你却充满愤怒和怨恨？除非你和你丈夫在你的问题上能达成一致，否则我预言你正走向离婚，你丈夫将获得孩子们的抚养权并得到大笔抚养费和生活费。
Former stay-at-home father
前全职爸爸
Talk to him
与他谈一谈
Your husband could well be depressed. He gave up his career for you yet rather than trying to communicate with him, you prefer running first to strangers in a newspaper. That’s daft. Try having a real conversation with him.
你丈夫可能会很郁闷。他为了你放弃了自己的职业生涯，而你有了问题不与他沟通，却宁愿在报纸上求助陌生人。这么做很愚蠢。试着与他真正谈一次。
Anon, male, 40s
匿名，男性，40多岁
Use sex
用性爱手段
The simple answer is to use sex. When the kids are bathed and homeworked before you get home he gets lucky and when they are not he doesn’t.
最简单的办法就是用性爱手段。如果你回家前孩子们洗澡了，功课也做了，他就能得到奖赏。如果啥都没干，他就没那么幸运了。
Anon
匿名
Get him a job
让他去工作
I only know of two families where the husband took on the “househusband” role and both husbands suffered nervous breakdowns and attempted suicide. I would never allow my husband to be a househusband for an unlimited time, even though he was man enough to offer.
有“家庭主夫”的家庭我只听说过两家，两位丈夫后来都因为精神崩溃而试图自杀。我永远都不会让我丈夫无限期地做主夫，就算他特爷们地提议这么做也不行。
