DH and I too had different expectations when we started living together. DH was the clean freak and me I just couldn't do things right to keep him happy. I was also a single mum and worked full time plus doing a uni degree. DH did not clean literally but expected me to have everything in order. It was a nightmare really. His expectations of his partner were completely ridiculous which I think steamed from the fact his mum did everything but she also did not work outside the home. It was almost breaking point at times as he didn't see how unreasonable it was for me to work as much as his or more at times, have a child and do ALL the home duties.

Overtime he has learnt to help (although that only means washing the dishes occassionally) and occassionally he will mop, sweep or vacuum but never all of them at once or even half the house. He also helps out with the cooking alot of the time but he does more outside then I do such as washing the cars and mowing the lawn.

Our house is untidy alot of the times. I try and have atleast one clean room as that makes me happy to be able to sit down and not see the mountain of work ahead of me or if someone turns up its nice to sit and chat in the clean room. I also wash daily so we always have clean clothes and no more then a basket of dirty clothing at once.

I really struggle to have a home to put everything that makes the house untidy such as the papers, kids toys etc. I'm hoping when we move and the house is much much bigger that it will solve some of our storage problems.