Are Polish men old fashioned?

My partner is Polish and I am English, he has been a fantastic boyfriend up until I had hes baby 3 months ago, he now has no respect for me, he thinks it is wrong to want to look good now, thinks it is wrong I go to exercise classes. I do not cook and he has always known this and now he moans because I do not cook. He now expects me to stay in all day cooking and cleaning. I have not been brought up to be tied to a kitchen sink!! He's mother is old fashioned and spends all day in the kitchen!! Is it a polish thing or am I just with an idot!!!

Well, my wife and I met an older gentleman, round about mid-seventies, recently from £ódź and after dinner, he stood up and spontaneously "Całuję pani rączki!" to my wife sitting across from me at the table! My wife was delightedly taken aback by such "old-fashioned" chivalry (though I'd warned her once that Polish men are wont to do soLOL), the hand kiss having long since vanished from Anglo-Saxon culture, even in the US deep South:-)

While the older Viennese still practice "I kuess die Hand, gnaedige Frau!" and the Hungarians have "Kezicsokolem!", the Poles just seem more sincer about it all!

the latter, I'm afraid.

You're having a maternity leave right now, right?
Then you shouldn't be suprised that he expects you to do cleaning, cooking etc. Someone has to do it, especially the one who's staying at home. Since you together have established a family it's up to you to have a talk on how you see your home should work and assign the home chores. It's not really about being "old-fashioned" but being mature.

As for the home cooking, both women and men in Poland treats ready meals as a half measure. It's for those who works long hours, are always in hurry and don't have time to cook at home. Yes, it's natural that someone cooks in Polish families.

AK, maternity leave is to look after a child, not to do cooking and cleaning. You surely don't realise how difficult it is to try to do something with a tiny baby strapped to you. Babies DO NOT sleep all day. Mine would dose of for few minutes, then wake up, then dose of again. And so on. And taking care of herself is absolutely normal for a woman, the guy is an idiot if he thinks that having a baby turns a women into lactating cooking and cleaning machine.

Anyone jumping to any conclusions about either person in the OP's relationship is doing so based on scant information and that coming from only one party. Ask more questions before passing judgment.

True, but the only judgement here is based on situation quoted, not on reality.

You should have stopped right there.

Foreigner, we will never know the truth. There would be no point commenting anything if it was only to be based on facts. Note the little word "if"in the last sentence of my previous post. Of course he might be a good guy and she might be a sloppy lazy princess, in which case him being old fashioned or in fact modern would be completely irrelevant in determination of the issue.

Though the very few Polish in my acquaintance are "old Fashioned" I dont think it quite applies without details.

1) Are you on maternity leave from employ .... or UNemployed? were you full time before or part time?

A change in finances make eating out and having gym memberships is costly. WHO watches baby while you are at gym? Does it cost?

2) Is he working long hours? He is working LONGER hours to make up for your being out of circulation?

WHO is to clean? Babies SLEEP a lot just not very scheduled. You should be napping and catching up on household sanitation every time that lil creature closes it precious eyes. Modest cleaning IS part of taking car of your baby.

3) How much household chores did he have allocated before?

And as for not cooking.. is he expecting full traditional meals ?or something my 7 year old is capable of preparing?

It is hard to say if he is being an overbearing chavanist on what you say...

Thankyou, you are so right. I don't get to anything with the baby, I would prefer to take my baby for walks and baby groups instead of preparing food all day

When he is at home he would rather drink and smoke. The house is clean but he wants me to do a full spring clean everyday. He doesn't like me looking nice because he is very insecure. He doesn't like the fact that my baby is half English and insists she is full Polish which she isn't. She has an English mother and was born in England.Think it is time to kick him out

Foreigner4

Basicly there can be 2 versions of that story:

1) She does everything in the house, nurtures the baby, while he sits in front of the tv and expects her to serve him. When she wants a bit of time break from the chores for herself, he complains.

2) He works 12 hours per day, coming worn out from the buiding site and sees the same pile of dishes in the sink for several days. Of course there is no time for cleaning up the dishes but there is time for pilates.

Somehow my first impression was the latter (maybe the OP's nickname let me to assume so :), but of course I may be completely wrong. The point is that it doesn't always have to be stereotypical: lazy guys expecting women to serve them.


You are right, I don't have a baby. But the guy might think so (that a 3 month old sleeps all day). That's why the best solution would be if she sincerly talked about it with him. Maybe doing an experiment and let him to care a baby for a whole day and see how he'd manage, make him to realise that's not an easy task.

AK, now you are talking ;) I absolutely agree. Men generally don't realise how difficult it is to care for the baby. They also don't realise how important it is for woman's confidence to get back in shape after pregnancy. Hopefully talking will help.

speaking from experience and from the other side of the equation, I agree 100% with this statement. I didn't appreciate how hard it was and I didn't take into consideration the mental cha nges that were going on at the time inside my wife's head(and body). I was a complete młot (dummy). I needed to be enlightened.

My Polish father-in-law, well into his retirement age, for sure is doing his part in the household. And if I see my Polish friends, household tasks are pretty equally divided.

polish men are amazing and the best .. what's wrong with old fashioned..