Susan Lehman, a mother of two in Washington state, bowled over with anger when she woke up to a sink full of dishes.
“My husband had people over for a big game last night,” Lehman, 43, begins a now-viral TikTok video. She then zooms in on the mess that was waiting for her when she came downstairs. Oh, but what is that on the counter? It’s a handwritten note that reads, “I got it!” with an arrow pointing to the stack of dirty tableware.
Lehman’s voice softens.
“What a good guy,” she says in the clip. “I just love that he acknowledges that he left a mess in the sink, and don’t worry, he’ll take responsibility for it.”
“We’ve come so far,” she adds.
Lehman, a hairstylist, and her husband, Matt, who works as a commercial loan officer, have been together for more than 25 years and share two teenage sons. Lehman says her spouse wasn't always a "note leaving" guy.
“After we got married, we definitely fell into these very cliche roles, where I did the cleaning and he did the man things, and for a long time that arrangement worked,” Lehman tells TODAY.com. “And then one day I was like, ‘You know what? Other people can help me in this house.’
Lehman also needed to modify behaviors.
“We both needed to change,” she notes.
After several “difficult” conversations, Lehman says Matt began making dinner for the family. He now does laundry without being asked.
“Matt and I are high school sweethearts but it feels like a new relationship,” she says. “The old me would have freaked out over the dishes and I would have probably woken him up — but the old Matt wouldn’t have left a note, either.”
In case you're wondering, yes, Matt did the dishes!
Though the comments section on Lehman’s video is flooded with supportive feedback about the couple's communication skills, some people felt Matt was being praised for doing the bare minimum.
- “The bar is on the floor.”
- “Wow man child cleaned up his own mess. Everyone clap.”
- “I mean, that he is responsible for that should be normal?”
- “Is he your kid or something, because that’s how you’re treating him.”
- “That’s expected of him, not something nice btw.”
“Those people missed the point entirely,” Lehman tells TODAY.com. “That bare minimum note was the max for me. Our communication is better than it’s ever been and I’m proud of how far we’ve come. Everybody — our sons included — pitches in now. I can't tell you how much our lives have changed."
Matt shared his side of the story on Jan. 18. In a TikTok video, Matt explains that he ran the dishwasher, but there wasn’t enough room for everything. Rather than stay up and wait until the cycle was complete, he rinsed the bowls and left them in the sink.
"I didn’t want Susan, who wakes up a lot earlier than I do, to come over and see this mess,” Matt says. “And I said, ‘I’ll just let her know that I’m going to handle it in the morning."