Does saying “just tell me what to do” actually help—or does it leave one person responsible for managing everything?

This week, a listener asks why she’s always the one who notices when the toothpaste is empty, the PE kit is still in the washing machine, the dog needs wormed or somebody needs new shoes. She doesn’t want another pair of hands—she wants another brain carrying some of the mental load.

That sparks a very honest debate between Chris and Lisa about invisible labour, financial pressure, resentment and why household responsibilities are never as simple as 50/50. Do men and women carry different kinds of pressure? Are we too focused on what our partners haven’t done? And is “just tell me what needs doing” part of the problem?

Also in this episode:

• What happens after Chris’s Fringe run

• Whether Man Up: The Musical could go on tour

• The household jobs that quietly cause resentment

• Why an empty toilet-roll holder can start an argument

• Letting a 12-year-old attend a sleepover when you’ve never met the parents

• The family code word that means “come and get me—no questions asked”

• Scottish adverts we can still remember nearly 30 years later

Whose side are you on? Is “just tell me what to do” a reasonable answer—or does that create even more work? Tell us in the comments.

Subscribe for more honest conversations, parenting chaos, relationship debates and questionable jokes from Chris and Lisa.

🎥 Main channel: Winging It Couple

📹 Behind the scenes: Winging It Vlogs

📱 Social media: @wearewingingit

🌐 Website: wearewingingit.uk

#MentalLoad #MarriagePodcast #WingingIt

My Wife Says I Can’t Wash Dishes Properly! | Winging It Podcast

Apparently, after 20 years together, we’ve finally discovered the real threat to our marriage.

Chris’s ability to wash a dish.

This week on Winging It, Chris and Lisa get into the important stuff. The kids are finally back at school, Chris is one week away from taking his debut show to the Edinburgh Fringe, and Lisa has some fairly strong opinions about his approach to housework.

We also get into the invisible pressure of keeping a family and home running, why a “quick trip” to IKEA is never quick, whether you should actually praise your partner for doing everyday jobs, and the difference between giving helpful feedback and treating a grown man like he’s just successfully used the toilet for the first time.

Plus:

🎭 Chris is starting to panic about the Fringe

🏫 The strange mix of relief and guilt when the kids go back to school

🛍️ The nightmare that is school uniform shopping

🏠 Who actually carries the mental load at home?

📱 When does being on your phone become too much?

🧹 Why Lisa’s “one-hour reset” is NEVER one hour

👏 Does Chris deserve a “well done” for washing the dishes?

🤔 Another AITA gets put to the Winging It test

🦩 And we finish with Fact or Fiction, where Lisa is annoyingly good at knowing completely useless information

It’s marriage, parenting, money, housework and the everyday arguments that really shouldn’t matter quite as much as they do.

Basically, another week of Winging It.

👇 Tell us in the comments:

Should you thank or praise your partner for everyday jobs around the house, or should they just get on with it?

And more importantly…

Who washes the dishes properly in your house?

👍 Like the video

💬 Join the conversation in the comments

🔔 Subscribe for new episodes of Winging It

🎙️ Listen to the podcast:

wearewingingit.uk

📱 Follow us:

@wearewingingit

Winging It is Chris and Lisa, married for 15 years, together for 20, raising three daughters and discovering on a weekly basis that absolutely nobody knows what they’re doing.

No perfect families. No celebrity lifestyles. Just real life, real conversations and two people doing their best to wing it.

#WingingIt #Podcast #CouplesPodcast #Marriage #MarriedLife #Parenting #Relationships #FamilyLife #UKPodcast #ScottishPodcast

Nobody has life completely figured out. We certainly don’t.

This week on Winging It, Chris and Lisa are back talking about marriage, parenting, grandparents, technology, consumerism, DIY disasters and the small matter of whether you should check with your partner before booking a weekend away with your mates.

It starts with an AITA that causes a surprisingly big debate.

A husband has the chance to finally go away with his friends after two years of trying to organise it. The dates work, nothing else is officially booked, so he pays a £240 non-refundable deposit.

There’s just one problem.

He doesn’t ask his wife first.

Is he a grown adult who shouldn’t need permission from his partner? Or, when you’re married with children, is checking first simply part of being a team?

And is it actually about permission at all?

From there, things go in the usual Winging It direction.

We talk about Lisa’s newfound obsession with DIY and interior design, Chris’s questionable history of choosing paint colours, Toy Story 5, children being constantly encouraged to buy more stuff, YouTube and advertising, and why Lisa would happily delete greed from the planet.

There’s also another parenting dilemma:

What happens when your children stay with their grandparents and ALL your rules disappear?

No bedtime. Unlimited screens. Sweets whenever they fancy them. Apparently even chocolate for breakfast is on the table.

Do you say something, or accept that getting spoiled rotten is part of having grandparents?

Plus, we introduce “What Have You Winged This Week?”, talk about Chris preparing for his Edinburgh Fringe musical, discover what Chris and Lisa would each remove from the world forever, and somehow achieve a genuinely astonishing result in the Winging It word game.

It’s marriage, parenting and everyday life without pretending we know what we’re doing.

Because we don’t.

We’re winging it.

💬 YOUR TURN

Would you book a weekend away without checking with your partner first?

And when the kids stay with their grandparents, should your rules still apply?

Tell us in the comments. We want to know which side you’re on.

📩 Got a dilemma, confession, question or “What Would You Do?” for the podcast?

Email: [email protected]

📱 Follow Winging It

Facebook, Instagram & TikTok: @wearewingingit

🌐 Website: wearewingingit.uk

🎙️ WINGING IT

Chris & Lisa. Married, three kids, two dogs and absolutely no instruction manual.

Can you actually be too nice?

According to Lisa, the answer is yes… especially if you’re driving.

In this episode, we catch up after a busy summer and settle into our brand new studio with a conversation that starts with motorway etiquette and quickly spirals into marriage, parenting, communication and everything else life throws at us.

Along the way, we talk about Chris’s song Welcome Home unexpectedly reaching the UK charts, family holidays in Millport, why sticking a phone to your head isn’t always the best way to film a vlog, the latest on Chris’s Edinburgh Fringe musical, and some exciting new projects we’re working on.

We also dive into two listener dilemmas:

• Would you hide your partner’s clothes to teach them a lesson?

• What would you do if a family member criticised your parenting in front of your child?

As always, there’s plenty of laughter, a few disagreements, and honest conversations about family life from two people who definitely don’t have everything figured out.

If you’ve enjoyed the episode, we’d love it if you followed the podcast and left us a review. It really helps us reach more people.

📧 Get in touch

[email protected]

🌐 Website

wearewingingit.uk

📱 Follow us

Instagram, Facebook & TikTok: @wearewingingit

After weeks away, we’re finally back in the new Winging It studio… and the dogs immediately took over.

In this episode, Lisa talks about finishing counselling and the surprising moment her therapist told her she no longer needed regular sessions. We discuss what therapy actually changed, learning to advocate for yourself, relationship mistakes, difficult conversations, birthdays gone wrong, Rock Choir, the Edinburgh Fringe, and why personal growth isn’t always comfortable.

We also attempt to record a podcast while being constantly interrupted by Winston and Angus, who clearly had plans of their own.

In this episode:

• Finishing therapy and what comes next

• The birthday mistake we’re still talking about

• Learning to stand up for yourself

• Rock Choir and finding joy in work

• Edinburgh Fringe preparations

• Relationship reflections

• Two very chaotic dogs

If you’ve ever tried to have a serious conversation while pets, children or life itself had other ideas, this one’s for you.

🎙️ Winging It with Chris & Lisa Duke

#WingingItPodcast #CouplesPodcast #Therapy #MentalHealth #Marriage #Relationships #Counselling #DogOwners #PodcastUK #ADHD #PersonalGrowth

What started as a summer working abroad in Corfu quickly turned into something we didn’t expect.

In this episode, we tell the full story. From the moment Chris was pushed into the pool during a show and tore ligaments in his ankle, to dealing with the aftermath in a country that suddenly didn’t feel quite so welcoming.

But the injury was only part of it.

We talk about what life was really like working abroad, the cracks that started to show behind the “dream” lifestyle, and how things gradually spiralled. From poor living conditions and sewage coming through the room, to feeling completely unsupported, this was the point where everything began to shift.

There’s also a more honest conversation about money. How small, unnoticed spending builds up, how ADHD plays into impulse decisions, and the system we’ve started using to take control of it before it gets out of hand.

It’s a mix of chaos, reality, and a few moments where all you can do is laugh at how ridiculous it all was.

In this episode:

• The pool accident and ankle injury

• What medical care abroad was actually like

• The reality of living and working in Corfu

• When the “dream” started to fall apart

• The hotel conditions that pushed things too far

• ADHD, impulse spending, and money struggles

• The system we’re using now to fix it

🎭 If you want to support One Missed Call (Chris’s men’s mental health musical heading to the Edinburgh Fringe):

👉 https://missedcallmusical.com

Every share, every donation genuinely helps move this forward.

In this episode of Winging It, what starts as a simple word game quickly turns into chaos. Chris and Lisa test whether they are actually compatible by trying a game where they must say the same word at the same time. It sounds easy… until it absolutely isn’t. Along the way they talk about:

• Sitting through a real criminal trial at Glasgow High Court

• Why justice sometimes restores your faith in the system

• Being brutally honest about the cost of living and financial stress

• Dealing with internet trolls

• Parenting, illness and trying to hold life together

• A powerful dream that felt like healing an inner child

And of course… the game that nearly caused a divorce. If you enjoy honest conversations about life, marriage, parenting and the occasional ridiculous argument, you’ll feel right at home here.

Subscribe and join us every week as we continue Winging It.

Divorce does not have to destroy your family. In Episode 16 of Winging It, we sit down with professional family mediator Patsie Nielsen to talk honestly about separation, co-parenting and what children really experience when parents are in conflict. Patsie has spent years helping families navigate some of the most difficult conversations of their lives. Her focus is always the same: the children. Not who wins. Not who’s right. Not who gets the better lawyer. The children. In this episode we discuss: • Mediation vs going to court • Why conflict harms children more than separation itself • How to tell your children you’re separating • Parenting plans and why every family should have one • The reality of co-parenting in two homes • How extended family and social media can make things worse • What children actually say when they’re given a voice If you are separated, considering divorce, or trying to co-parent well, this conversation could change how you approach it. Find Patsie Nielsen here: 👉 https://nielsennurture.co.uk/

This week we talk about the number we never really talk about.

25 stone.

Not for drama. Not for sympathy. Just honesty.

We look back at the breakfast show years, the routines that quietly got out of hand, and how it slowly became normal. We talk body dysmorphia, food noise, ADHD and dopamine, gastric bands, hospital scares, and the uncomfortable truth that you can be “medically fine” while still knowing something isn’t right.

Now we’re back in the gym. Five sessions in a week. Energy improving. Showers conquered. And the scales going up.

So what does progress actually look like when you’re trying to change years of habits?

This episode is about weight, consistency, self-awareness, and starting again without turning it into self-hate. It’s about saying the number out loud, then carrying on anyway.

If you’ve ever struggled with food, motivation, or the cycle of “right, this time I’m doing it”, this one will hit home.

🎭 Support the musical One Missed Call

First impressions can be brutal.

Sometimes they’re wrong. Sometimes they linger longer than you expect.

In this episode of Winging It, we talk honestly about how we first saw each other, what was said behind the scenes, and the moment those early judgements finally came into the open. It’s funny, awkward, and quietly revealing, because relationships don’t start clean, even when they end up strong.

If you’ve ever discovered what someone really thought of you at the beginning, this conversation will feel familiar.

🎭 Support the musical One Missed Call

A one-man musical about men’s mental health, fatherhood, and the moments that change everything.

https://gofund.me/03b16d496

📘 Wilfred, The Littlest Dragon

A beautiful children’s book about being different, being brave, and being yourself.

https://jillcgrant.co.uk/