Less jargon. More ‘oh, that thing.’

These words are tools for describing ordinary life, not labels to pin on your partner. Start with the definition that matches the job or conversation in front of you.

Agreement

A decision both partners understand and accept, written clearly enough to recognize later.

Anti-scorekeeping

Anti-scorekeeping is Tiptoe's term for making household work visible without turning it into a contest between partners, so that you can see who owns what without tallying who is ahead. It does not mean ignoring an unfair split, and repeated gaps still need a conversation.

Appreciation

Appreciation in a relationship is a specific acknowledgment of what your partner did or who they are, offered without asking for anything in return. Research links feeling appreciated with being more responsive and committed, but appreciation does not replace a fair division of the work.

Check-in

A short, agreed time to hear how the week felt, look ahead, and discuss one useful change or next step.

Date deck

A collection of date ideas you can browse to find an activity both partners want to try.

Date plan

The practical arrangement that turns an idea into time together, including when and how it will happen.

Default parent

The default parent is the parent who is automatically expected to notice, remember and respond first on anything about the children, whether or not the couple ever agreed to it. It is an informal term that describes a role, and either parent can hold it, regardless of gender or job.

Done means

A shared description of the outcome that finishes a responsibility, including any important boundaries or timing.

Emotional labor

Emotional labor, as sociologist Arlie Hochschild defined it in 1983, is managing your feelings to produce a required display as part of paid work. In everyday speech it now also describes managing moods and relationships at home, which Hochschild's own term for private life, emotion work, fits more closely.

Fair play cards

Fair Play cards are the task cards from Eve Rodsky's Fair Play method, in which a couple goes through a set of household responsibilities and decides who will fully own each one. The book describes 100 household tasks and a figurative card game, and a physical deck was published in 2020.

Gatekeeping

Household gatekeeping is holding on to a responsibility by limiting how someone else can do it, for example through rigid standards, redoing their work or supervising each choice. Research first studied it as maternal gatekeeping, but any partner can do it, and it often does not come from wanting control.

Handoff

An explicit transfer of responsibility that the receiving partner understands and accepts.

Household admin

Household admin is the office work of running a home: scheduling, bills, forms, phone calls, renewals and coordinating with other people. Law professor Elizabeth Emens calls the broader category life admin, and it tends to go unrecognized even though a household cannot run without it.

Invisible labor

Invisible labor is real work that goes unrecognized because its results look automatic or because it happens out of view. At home it includes tasks such as restocking, wiping down and arranging, which tend to be noticed only when they stop.

Key date

An occasion worth remembering, such as a birthday, anniversary, holiday, or personal milestone.

Love map

A love map is the Gottman Institute's term for your detailed, up-to-date knowledge of your partner's world, including their stresses, friends, hopes and everyday preferences. It is the foundation level of the Institute's Sound Relationship House and needs regular updating as your partner's life changes.

Mental load

Mental load is the noticing, planning, deciding and checking behind household work, including everything that happens before and after the visible task. It is carried by whoever would be the first to realize something was missed, and it often goes unseen by both partners.

Mutual yes

An option both partners independently want to choose, rather than one person agreeing only to end the discussion.

Ownership vs helping

Ownership means carrying a household job from noticing through follow-up, without being reminded, while helping means doing an agreed part of a job that someone else remains responsible for. The practical test is who would notice first if the job did not get done.

Partner profile

A place for useful details your partner wants you to know, such as preferences, sizes, or a coffee order.

Private date vote

A preference on a date idea that is not simply published as an individual answer to the other partner.

Recurring task

A task expected to return on a chosen schedule, with enough detail to act when it comes around again.

Repair attempt

A repair attempt, in John Gottman's words, is "any statement or action, silly or otherwise, that prevents negativity from escalating out of control." It can be an apology, a joke, a pause or a request to start over, and it only works if the other person is able to accept it.

Soft start

A soft start is a way to open a hard conversation by stating the specific problem, how you feel and what you need, without blaming or criticizing your partner. It is based on the softened start-up described by the Gottman Institute, and it is meant for everyday disagreements.

Weaponized incompetence

Weaponized incompetence is an informal label for a pattern in which someone claims they cannot do a task, or does it poorly, and the work then passes to someone else. It may be deliberate or unconscious, and it is not a clinical term.