I went on mum strike & walked out on my family – I refused to return until my bloke stepped up, I called off our wedding
STANDING in the kitchen mopping the floor while her three children mess up the freshly tidied living room Karla Loft, 32, can’t wait for the day to end.
She still has the toys to put away, beds to make and dinner to cook before tackling the kids’ bath time.
Karla has been up since 7am working through the list of daily household chores, entertaining the kids and fitting in admin work for a youth project she helps run.
At 6pm when her fiance Carl Scott, 42, gets home you might expect the pressure to be taken off the mum, but Karla is at her ‘multitasking peak’.
Instead of saying hello and offering to lend a hand, her partner of eleven years starts huffing and puffing about the state of the house.
“The kitchen’s tip,” he moans.
“The lounge needs vacuuming and the kids are already driving me crazy.”
That was the moment mum of three and model snapped, making the decision to give up her household duties for a week, the chaos of which we see unfold in tonight’s episode of Mums on Strike on Channel 5.
“I went on strike for a week to get my fiance to clean,” she explains in this exclusive interview with Fabulous.
“Radical action was needed. I walked out and spent a week in a hotel.”
And radical action was taken with Karla even making the decision to call off the wedding to fiance Carl.
“I never stopped cleaning and caring for the kids while working and all he did was complain,” Karla says.
“Carl never recognised how hard I worked. He never helped with the housework or cooking. We had started arguing all the time. Our relationship was on a knife edge.
“If we were to survive as a family and couple I needed to strike. I had to force Carl to walk in my shoes and do the work himself.
“It was a make or break.”
Karla lives in Hastings, Sussex with her long-term partner of eleven years, Carl Scott, 42, a youth projects manager and their three children Alfie, 13, Tyler 9- and four-year-old Maddison.
According to Karla Carl always gave 110% to his job as Youth Projects manager but 0% effort at home assuming housework was easy and he didn’t need the help.
“Carl is obsessive about whatever job he does,” she explains.
“Over the years it’s meant he lost track of what it was like to run a house, look after the kids and work part-time.”
Carl’s disregard for housework, cooking and childcare had gotten so bad his long suffering fiance had called off wedding plans.
“We had planned to marry last year but instead we were arguing all the time so I felt I had no choice,” she says.
Karla says her shock and awe strategy to show Carl she was working as hard as him started when she applied for Channel 5’s Mums on Strike.
“I applied for the show in the hope it would help Carl respect the work I did,” she says.
“Our relationship was hanging by a thread. I needed a radical solution that would work.”
When the family were accepted for the TV series Carl assumed they’d come in and film their daily lives.
“I never expected Karla to walk out, it was a twist I didn’t see coming,” says Carl.
“The crew filmed us at home for two days and I thought it was a walk in the park.
“Then I got home on the third night to a video message from Karla saying she was on strike.
“I went into shock, ‘I was like this isn’t happening, I have a full diary of work tomorrow ’ I freaked out,” he admitted.
“I felt sick, It wasn’t what I expected or what I had signed up for.”
Karla stayed in a hotel for seven days and forced herself to relax while Carl was left to manage the house and the kids.
“I’d never been away from the kids for longer than a day and it wasn’t easy, I didn’t realise how exhausted I was,” she says.
Back home Carl had convinced himself caring for the children and the house would be ‘easy peasy.’
“After the first few hours I was an absolute mess and so was the house,” he admits.
“I can’t multitask, my focus has always been solely on my job.
“But caring for kids and constantly cleaning up mess was a shock to the system,” Carl says.
“I’d get the kids to the lunch table and think I had time to start the dishes in the kitchen.
“One of the kids would spill a drink and then I’d be left with the mess in the dining room and the mess in the kitchen.
“Within a few hours I realised I had no idea of just how much Karla did all day.
“Multi-tasking and dealing with multiple small jobs like hoovering, mopping, cleaning separate rooms and factoring in three kids is like making kittens walk in a row.
Cleaning and household chores in numbers
Well Polished conducted a survey and the results are in!
Most Hated Household Chores
- Cleaning the oven – 34%
- Ironing – 15%
- Cleaning the toilet – 10%
- Washing the dishes – 5%
- Decluttering – 4%
Most Liked Household Chores
- Cooking meals – 21%
- Decluttering – 12%
- Hoovering – 11%
- Doing the laundry – 9%
- Tending to pets 8%
Men VS Women: Who Puts the Work In?
Men spend 7 hours 54 minutes a week cleaning.
Women spend 12 hours 15 minutes a week cleaning.
“It’s impossible.”
In the meantime, Karla was given the chance to give her fiance a list of jobs he had always refused to do.
“I had asked Carl one hundred times to clean the fish tank for me and he refused point blank,” she says.
“When I went on strike that job topped the list.”
Carl adds: “It was disgusting. I hated that the most. I realised I am bloke who thinks stacking the dishwasher is an exhaustive task.”
Carl admits his seven days of ‘daycare daddy’ and ‘multi-tasking Manny’ almost ‘drove him crazy.’
“I’d collapse onto the bed at 11pm and realise I still had emails to answer,” he says.
“Karla going on strike showed me I had never understood what being a working mum was like.”
When the mum of three returned Karla said she was met by a new man.
“He promised to never moan about a bit of dirt on the floor again and now he does 50% of the housework, cooking and childcare,” she says.
“He’s a new man, it’s amazing.”
The couple now have a rota system in place each week which ensures they know who is cooking and who is cleaning.
If I had not gone on strike we wouldn’t have survived
Karla Scott
“That means I know what I have to do and I can factor it in to my day,” says Carl.
Karla says the arguments have stopped and their wedding plans are back on.
“We’re getting married next year, the experience really saved our relationship,” she says.
“He has new respect for everything I did and do and that’s the way relationships should be.”
Karla’s now on a mission to encourage all women in Britain to strike if their partners are not pulling their weight.
“It really works!” she says.
“If I had not gone on strike we wouldn’t have survived.
“Now I tell all my female friends to strike when their partners start moaning. It’s the best thing I ever did.”
Mums on Strike continues on Sunday at 9pm on Channel 5 and My5.
