Helping behaviors is a primary form through which gendered cooperation takes place. Men and women often offer and seek help from each other. While helping seems positive on the surface, there are subtle details and nuances to consider. We focus on understanding how certain types of help reinforce traditional gender roles. We conduct experiments that observe men’s and women’s behaviors in situations where help can be given or received. Our findings consistently show that both women and men engage in helping behaviors that prevent them from acquiring tools for independent coping in counter-stereotypical domains. Within traditionally masculine domains, we find that some women seek and some men offer dependency-oriented help, providing direct assistance rather than enabling women to cope autonomously. For instance, women may prefer receiving the final answer to a challenging math problem instead of an explanation that empowers them to solve it independently. Similarly, men may take over parking a car instead of guiding a woman through the process. In a "mirror image" of this gendered dynamic, when men undertake domestic tasks like childcare or house cleaning, they often seek dependency-oriented help from women, rather than assistance that fosters autonomy. This pattern of helping further contributes to an unequal division of household chores within heterosexual couples. Additionally, we examine the dynamics of cross-gender helping in professional contexts, where women frequently bear the burden of organizational "housework," impeding their advancement. We also find that businesswomen receive less empowering support, which consequently hampers their ability to thrive in business environments.