THE rock-solid foundation of any successful relationship is a never-ending battle to prove you’re the most shat on. Employ these tactics:
Make noise
There’s no point doing a household chore unless your lazy, shiftless partner can hear the effort you’re making. Take out the bins like you’re in West End hit Stomp, empty and fill the dishwasher with more clattering than dinner in Beauty and the Beast, and complain throughout. Make the music of suffering.
Fall asleep often
Provide solid evidence of your gruelling days by falling asleep often and obviously at the breakfast table, halfway up the stairs, in the shower and mid-conversation. When roused, blame your partner for doing nothing apart from in bed, where they either selfishly initiate sex, snore or steal the sheets.
Stagger
Never move from place to place unless you’re dragging your exhaustion-crippled carcass from room to room to a constant soundtrack of groans. Even sitting on the sofa is too much for your weary bones to handle. And it’s all their fault for never hoovering.
Invite their parents over
It’s always good to remind your partner of the lifelong nightmare they’ve condemned you to, while eliciting sympathy from your mother-in-law as you labour under the yoke of supporting their ingrate child. Expect lots of hushed admonishments to ‘clean up after yourself, she looks drained.’
List tasks
The only conversation you can summon is an endless list of tasks: those you’ve completed that day, at great personal cost, and those languishing undone because you’re too fatigued and literally nobody is helping you. Your partner will retaliate with their own, but you’re too tired to listen.
Spell it out
Communication is key, so how will your partner ever know how crushingly hard life is for you if you don’t tell them? Use anything from passive-aggressive reminders like ‘I’ve put your folded washing on the bed darling’ to ‘I’m too tired to choose what to watch’ to screaming ‘IT’S WORSE FOR ME’ into their face.
