Yay for role reversal!

When my boss, Sam saw this ad with her boys she said, "Remember Charles and Lili?"

They did.

"Well they do it the other way 'round in their house."

Apparently Sam usually does this when the boys are faced with full-frontal gender stereotyping. Just so they know these things aren't set in stone, you know. Although I think her boys are down with that. At the moment Sam is the main breadwinner in their house while her husband, Dreas is the primary parent.

And it seems to be working pretty well for them.

But, back to me and the jar. Before you start sending your comments about Charles being a wimp, trust me: he's not. He's more than twice as strong as I am and for that reason probably, doesn't feel as if he has to prove it to anyone, especially not to me. I, on the other hand, love showing off. And because I have very strong hands – part of my Neanderthal legacy (that's another column altogether) and exacerbated by years of waitressing, I'm hella good at opening stuff.

So my honey humours me by always passing me stuff to open. Sweet eh?

But there are quite a few areas where we've swapped the traditional roles. And not because we're trying to make a point, but because there are some things that Charles does better and some things that I do better. I, for instance, do all the technical stuff. Charles does laundry.

And it's not just me. I'm surrounded by couples who do things according to their strengths and interests, and not according to their gender. Adeline loves DIY – just the other day she put up floating shelves. Her husband was planting lilies in the garden.

Another friend can't cook to save her life, but ask her anything about airplanes and she'll give you a 40 minute lecture on it.

Now before you start crying "Feminist! Burn her at the stake!" hear me out. I'm not saying men and women are alike. And I'm not saying they should be. Most of the reasons I love men is because they're different from me.

My sister pointed out to me once how adorable it is that men concentrate when they tie their shoelaces. From then on my heart melts every time I see a grown man with a faint frown of concentration between his eyes while putting on his shoes.

And the way men take off their t-shirts – grabbing it at the back and pulling it over their heads.

The way they can make realistic sound effects. How they only notice make-up when it's badly applied. How they'll eat a chocolate in one bite instead of biting it in half and looking at what's in the middle. How they know that David Lee Roth sang for Van Halen followed by Sammy Hagar followed by Gary Cherone, who also fronted Extreme.

We're different and it's lovely. But it starts getting less lovely when certain things are expected and enforced. When we are made to feel "different" or "wrong" when we don't fit in with the stereotype.

The "rules" for what men and women are like should be less rigid. So that no man ever has to feel bad because he's not into ball sports. And no women ever need to apologise because she doesn't like babies.

I didn't get myself a man so that he can open jars for me or change a tyre. I have an interesting, complicated partner with a very wide variety of strengths and weaknesses that has nothing to do with his sex.

And that's not unnatural, that's life.