10 Weird and Outdated Expectations Women Say They Still Face Today

We might have left asbestos poisoning from households in the past, but some toxins have followed us into the 21st century. When we asked women to recount outdated concerns that still plague their lives, they disclosed a horrific series of infestations and expectations.

1. Having Children

Children can bring immense joy and gratification to your life, but they’re not for everyone. People expect women to give birth and put in all the effort to raise children. The expectation is generally unfair, but it worsens when most people coo at babies while never thinking twice about the mother’s well-being. 

A popular response mentioned women who can’t naturally have children also voice the pressure and frustration of being nagged about getting pregnant. While there’s nothing wrong with enjoying motherhood, you know how the song goes? Girls just want to have fun. 

2. Free Emotional Labor 

Consider using the term “soul digger” the next time a man tries to make you his therapist, the same way men think women are gold diggers. Your emotional state could resemble a damp, wrung-out, forgotten towel, but god forbid you discard the permanent role of nurturing caretaker. 

Expecting women to solve every problem, even if they have too much on their plate, suggests disproportionate emotional labor in a relationship. Women are expected to be the glue of a family but are considered too irrational and emotional.

3. Helpless Husbands 

Would you want to be with someone who can’t take care of himself and essentially act like a toddler? If he acts like a toddler and quacks like a toddler, the relationship will reflect that sad reality. Women are tired of picking up after men who seem oblivious to domestic chores and can’t get why their wives are not too amicable after a long, arduous day. 

Once they start acting like kids, the attraction fades fast. However, according to women who have experienced this, communication can help retrieve an equal footing. 

4. The Double Shift 

It’s not a double but quadrupled shift, according to professional women who cook, clean, maintain the house, and prop themselves like a goddess atop a chaise lounge for their husbands to stumble across after work. Throw children into the mix; you have a potpourri nobody wants to smell. 

If men want a breadwinner in the house, they better bring some serious dough to the table. It’s unfair to want all the benefits of marriage while putting in no work. 

5. The Male Gaze

Women’s lives don’t revolve around men, but most men seem unaware of this. People expect women only to cut or dye hair and wear clothes their male counterparts appreciate. Fashionistas feel uncomfortable dressing to maximize male pleasure and are surprised why septum piercings must be a big deal. If you don’t like it, don’t put a ring on it; move on. 

6. Never Complaining 

How often do men compare period pain to being kicked where the sun doesn’t shine? And they complain twice as much too! Most folks on the forum felt they had to be quiet about their struggles, primarily pain, and illness. They couldn’t even complain about rudeness, which is another outdated notion. 

7. Planning Everything 

One of my close friends gifted her ex-husband a planner before initiating a separation which makes perfect sense when you account for mental and logistical burdens. Thank you notes, social courtesies, and things like holiday planning keep falling to women who recounted their unhappy experiences. It’s like being an unpaid manager. 

“It’s not just the planning. It’s the planning for the planning.”

8. Always Wearing Makeup 

Did you know some jobs demand women to put on heels and makeup for work? Life wasn’t hard enough, and someone decided it was a good idea for women to teeter in 4-inch stilettos in the workplace. The beauty industry endorses women can only look presentable with makeup.

We’d all break out in persistent acne if we slept with our foundation on. As many people pointed out,  it’s not normal to wear makeup all the time; frankly, our skin and lashes could use a breather. 

9. Unrealistic Body Standards

The neverending list of products available online to reduce the effect of aging is horrifying. It’s almost as if women should be vampires, never changing, never aging, immortals with glimmering skin, much like Edward Cullen. However, as someone wrote, unrealistic and time-consuming body standards, such as perfectly flawless skin and nether regions, are sucking the life out of us. 

10. Smiling Constantly 

Why do we still expect women to smile and express happiness, agreement, and contentment constantly? Many feel like it places women on an unfair pedestal of being the better person because, somehow, we’re better human beings.

“Especially in the workplace where all the men are “allowed” to be jerks.”

This thread inspired this post.