God, I don't even have kids and sing it. Housekeeping alone is enough of an unpaid job to do, much less child-rearing.

Now and then I've baby-sat for a friend's three kids (well, it wasn't always three but anyway, yeah). It's not without its rewards; a shining smile or that look of enlightenment at something explained for the first time, those are wonderful rewards. But it damn well is work and damn if I do it for free. (Unpaid is different than for free. It's a favour. But it's acknowledged as one, and not just something that I do for the pure and joyous delight of being around her children. Mind you, I'm planning to offer to take the eldest to a museum if he's interested in the exhibit in question because he's a cool kid and I'd like to spend some time with him and share a cool experience. But it's still work, because he is a child and not yet an adult. Work I may choose, but work nonetheless.)

But relationships in general, even, are unpaid work that is so rarely recognised as work. Oh, and who usually gets to bear the brunt of maintaining and improving relationships in Western culture? Right. *sigh*