Stacey Mathias, a mother of three, says her head "never stops thinking", even when sleeping she remains aware of the mental list of tasks to be completed. She explains the concept of "mental load" — the burden of planning, organising, remembering, and anticipating the tasks that keep the family and household running.
These tasks include remembering school runs, monitoring academic progress through parent WhatsApp groups, deciding which areas of the home need cleaning, monitoring children's sleep, making doctor's appointments, and buying school uniforms. According to academics, this work falls disproportionately on women, particularly mothers, in addition to them handling most of the physically demanding household work.
A survey on mental load involving three thousand parents in the United States and supervised by academics from the University of Bath and University of Melbourne showed that mothers handle 71 per cent of household tasks requiring mental effort, such as monitoring when bed sheets and towels need changing, and remembering when food in the refrigerator will run out. The study also showed that fathers handle many tasks described by researchers as "incidental" — tasks that occur less frequently, such as remembering when car maintenance is needed.
Leah Reubenor, a professor at the University of Melbourne, describes mental load as invisible, continuous, and boundless work. She says: "You don't bring a plate to work, but you take your mental load with you wherever you go." Mental load has become a popular topic on forums such as Reddit and Moms Net, where women seek advice on how to talk to their partners about feeling overwhelmed trying to balance so many different responsibilities.
Mothers speaking to BBC News said they monitor school WhatsApp groups discussing matters such as non-uniform days, school runs, birthdays, and lost items, seeing themselves as "the parent automatically responsible for the children" while their husbands do not join the school group at all. Sophia, a 35-year-old mother of three from Portsmouth, said she pays for school runs and orders lunch through her children's school app, and her husband has never downloaded the app at all.
She noted that she has tried many times to explain the concept of mental load to her husband, but feels he does not understand it and dismisses her concerns as merely "a quick task". Sophia said: "It's a quick task if you can do it straightforwardly, but I have to plan, anticipate, and think ten steps ahead all the time."
Sam Perry, deputy head of school, content creator, and father of two in London, said that when his wife first raised the issue of "mental load" after the birth of their eldest child, he "did not really understand it" and was "somewhat defensive" because he thought he was doing a lot of work — changing nappies, feeding the baby, and other tasks. He said that when he asked what he could do to help, it actually added to his partner's thinking burden.
Stacey said: "I always tell my husband: if I have to ask you to do something, it just adds more mental load to me." It took several months of dialogue and listening before Sam realised that the issue was not just completing tasks, but the thinking around them — not just cooking dinner, but knowing what food is available at home, planning meals, and buying necessities.
Natasha Wallace, a clinical psychologist, said some women come to her feeling tense because of the pressure of organising household affairs. She added: "Often for them it is not one stress factor, but the realisation that hundreds of small requests fall on them, and their brain and body cannot just stop working." She said many women live in a pattern of automatic work, so they often do not realise how much intellectual burden they are carrying, and this constant and low level of stress can affect the nervous system, which can lead to poor sleep, irritability, and decision fatigue.
Anita Clare, a parenting expert and author of the book "Switching Between Work and Parenthood", said overall intellectual exhaustion extends to our professional lives and causes unsustainable work burnout. A study showed that men with higher incomes do less physical and mental work at home, but when women's incomes increase, they reduce physical household work but continue to do the same mental work. Clare said women rarely feel that stepping back from family life is an option for them, so their choices become slowing their career, working part-time, or stopping work and staying at home — decisions made by many women.
She added: "If the household burden is reduced, and the mental load is reduced, it will create the energy and ability and attention that allows you to do more tasks and also perform better at work." Many women interviewed by BBC News said they believe the inequality begins with maternity leave.
Wallace pointed out that because women typically receive much longer maternity leave than the paternity leave men receive, they become "the parent automatically responsible for the children" at a very early stage. She added: "When you become the person who knows everything, knows where everything is, and has done everything, everyone starts depending on you for everything, and therefore you remain the central person even if you return to work."
In England, mothers can take maternity leave of up to 52 weeks, with 39 weeks available as paid leave, while fathers can take leave of up to two weeks with statutory paternity pay, and both parents can take shared parental leave.
