'Enjoy pilates, honey,’ my husband Adam shouts as I scurry out the front door.My pulse is racing and I’m sweating slightly. The guilt is almost overwhelming.Pilates is the excuse I’ve given Adam for why a standing order of £56 leaves our joint bank account every month.But I’m not squirrelling away secret funds to feed my shopping addiction or a few extra drinks with the girls. No, this money is to pay our cleaner’s wages – the cleaner Adam is blissfully unaware we’ve had for the last two years.I’m not alone in employing a little help around the house. Some say it’s the ultimate status symbol for my generation; I’m 33, and research published this week shows 40 per cent of under-35s now employ a cleaner, compared with 17 per cent of households overall. Across the board, demand for cleaning services has leapt by 142 per cent since 2023.But I’d do anything to keep my cleaner under wraps. My difficult relationship with ‘the help’ stems from my childhood. I was raised by my single mum, who cleaned other people’s houses for a livingSo in order to maintain the illusion that it is me who is the dusting marvel and that I’m regularly stretching out on a pilates mat, every other Friday evening I drive to the supermarket car park, where I sit for an hour thinking about how ridiculous my actions are. I realise, too, that if Adam ever found out my deception, he’d be rightly confused – and probably never be able to trust me again.So why am I hiding the fact I employ a cleaner? We’re both professionals who can afford to do so. Adam, 35, works in advertising, and I’m a solicitor. We live just outside central Manchester.It’s not like Adam wants me to be a Stepford Wife, and believes that not doing the cleaning would be a dereliction of my wifely duties. In fact, he was the one who – two years ago – had suggested we get a cleaner. To which, I said no.My difficult relationship with ‘the help’ stems from my childhood. I was raised by my single mum, who cleaned other people’s houses for a living. I always felt embarrassed of her because of her cracked hands and exhausted face.When school friends asked what my mum’s job was, I would mumble something about housekeeping. But then Mum got a job cleaning for the family of one of my classmates, and the secret was out. I was bullied as a result, my tormentors telling me I was a ‘scrubber’, just like my mum.So when Adam, years later, suggested hiring help after we bought our first house in 2024, my reaction was visceral. Not knowing about the bullying, the way he saw it was we both worked full-time, and so should spend free time having fun rather than doing chores.But I explained to Adam what happened with Mum, and how I never wanted to watch another woman scrub floors while I drank coffee.Though I’ve become middle-class myself, I still carry a deep-seated working-class belief about cleaners being a luxury for the rich and lazy, which I refuse to see myself as. Ironically, I know Mum would have taken Adam’s side. She was very proud of her work, which she saw as allowing people to spend more time with their families.Adam understood, and offered to help. But while he does all the groceries, when it comes to clearing up he forgets where things go.So in a fit of anger, two years ago I said I’d handle the chores myself. The one problem? Despite wanting everything to be perfectly neat, I despise housework.I hate the endlessness of it. The dishes that reappear three hours later. And the bathroom limescale... my goodness, the limescale!So one Wednesday, less than three months after taking on the chores myself, I found myself breaking down in tears over the state of the shower.I could have admitted I couldn’t cope, but I was still so stubborn about being proved wrong – and uncomfortable about being seen to change my iron-clad moral stance. I posted anonymously on a Facebook group looking for cleaner recommendations, and hired Kelly, a local woman in her 40s, two days later.She came round when I was working from home. I explained the situation, and she said I wouldn’t be her only client keeping her a secret. We agreed she would come round once a fortnight for two hours while Adam was at work, and I told him I was starting Pilates so he wasn’t suspicious about the expense.I hated how easy it was to pass Kelly’s work off as my own. Adam hasn’t even noticed that the dreaded limescale is under control.I thought about telling him after the first month, but pride stopped me. Then a month turned into three, and before long, a year had passed. At that point, it felt too late to confess. Now, two years on, I’ve spent £1,344 on Kelly’s secret services.At first, I felt guilty as she cleaned around me. But the more I got to know her, I realised I was helping someone else pay their bills. Now, I’d feel bad about letting her go. But I do sometimes go over the top and buy her gifts to assuage my middle-class guilt.If I’m being honest, my hatred for housework far outweighs the guilt over the lies. Even if those lies could blow up my marriage.Kate Hyberd is a pseudonym. Names and identifying details have been changed.As told to Catherine Renton