Making the Invisible Visible: Rethinking Labour in Our Relationships

In my last article, I looked at how “self-care” can become a mechanism for keeping us stuck in systems and relationships that are draining and destructive. I explored how genuinely caring for yourself, beyond bubble baths and meditation, often looks like setting boundaries and naming the invisible labour we routinely carry. In this article, I want to offer some practical steps for unpacking inequality in our relationships and moving toward real partnerships, both at home and at work.

What Do We Mean by Invisible Labour?

First, let’s define invisible labour. Coined in 1987 by sociologist Arlene Daniels, the term refers to unpaid work that goes unnoticed, unacknowledged, and therefore unregulated. Today, it’s often used as shorthand for the ongoing tasks of household maintenance and child-rearing that women are still primarily responsible for. Importantly, invisible labour includes not only the tasks themselves, but also their planning, preparation, and scheduling, what we now commonly call the mental load.

Before we go further, it’s worth acknowledging that while invisible labour is disproportionately carried by women in our society, there are also many men who shoulder similar burdens, particularly in caregiving roles or under rigid workplace expectations.

Often going hand in hand with the mental load of household management is another invisible task: emotional labour. This includes anticipating others’ needs, managing feelings (our own and others’), smoothing over conflict, remembering important dates, and being the person who holds everything together emotionally. Like other forms of invisible labour, it’s easy to miss unless you’re the one doing it. We’ll explore that further in another article.

It’s Not Just Going to the Store

A clear example of invisible labour is grocery shopping. If you carry this labour in your household, grocery shopping is a multi-step process. It may begin with cleaning out the fridge and checking the pantry and freezer to see what’s already on hand. Then you might look through store flyers to see what’s on sale, and start planning a week’s worth of meals. That planning likely takes into account evenings when children have after-school activities and something quick is needed, the church potluck on the weekend, dietary needs, budgets, and let’s not forget the ever-changing preferences of family members. All of that information lives quietly in your head as the invisible mental load.

Next comes making the grocery list, possibly a menu for the week if you’re feeling organised. Only after all of this does the actual trip to the store happen. And while you’re there, you might as well pick up a gift for an upcoming birthday, or remember that you’re almost out of dog food, or any one of a thousand similar small tasks that together create an unending load.

If you are not engaged in the invisible labour, you may consider grocery shopping as simply that -  driving to the store and buying groceries, perhaps using a list someone else has written. When this difference goes unnamed, it can easily breed resentment on one side and confusion on the other.

This mismatch in labour can sometimes be the result of weaponized incompetence, a manipulative tactic where someone pretends to be bad at a task, or does it poorly, to avoid doing it altogether. The end result is that someone else takes over, reinforcing an unfair division of labour. This pattern often leads to resentment and is generally a red flag in a relationship.

In other cases, the issue is genuine ignorance. When someone is asked to “do the grocery shopping,” they may take that instruction very literally. This is especially common among some neurodivergent people. They complete the task as they understand it, and are then genuinely bewildered as to why their partner is annoyed or disappointed.

Changing the Language Changes the Load

One practical remedy is to change our language around these tasks. Instead of saying, “Can you do the grocery shopping this week?” try, “Can you be in charge of food this week?” That shift makes the mental load explicit. If this responsibility has previously been yours alone, you may need to spell out the component parts once. Writing them down can help. Then, importantly, step back and let your partner handle it. They are an adult, and learning curves are part of real partnership.

It can also be helpful to take time to reflect on how tasks are understood differently within your relationships. What does “doing the laundry” mean to you versus your partner? Does it include sorting, stain-treating, folding, and putting clothes away, noticing which clothes need repairs or replacement, or just running the machine? What does caring for your children entail in practice? Is your language around these tasks vague or assumed? Are you clearly naming the invisible labour involved?

There is no single “right” way to divide labour in a relationship. Some people thrive when all aspects of work are named and shared as equally as possible. Others prefer having one person act as ‘project manager’ for a household or team. That arrangement can work too, but only if the mental labour involved is acknowledged, respected, and treated as equal to other forms of work.

What doesn’t work, in any relationship, is labour that remains invisible. When work is unseen, it’s easier to dismiss. When it’s dismissed, resentment grows. Naming invisible labour isn’t about keeping score or assigning blame. It’s about creating relationships that are honest, sustainable, and grounded in mutual care. Real self-care, after all, isn’t about enduring imbalance more gracefully. It’s about refusing to normalize it in the first place.

If these patterns feel familiar, you don’t have to untangle them on your own. If you’d like support in exploring these issues in your relationships, I’d be glad to help.

Rebecca