DH doesn't care how he looks - AIBU (and shallow)?

[boggysiscuit]

I think I probably am. Thread over. That was easy.

(Not really)

DH and I are probably both 6/10 on physical appearance but we madly fancy each other and all is well with regard to sex life etc.

Buuuut...it does annoy me that he gives literally not a shit what he wears. He works somewhere without a dress code so wears jeans and t-shirt. Maybe a shirt and tie if meeting a Director. Outside of work it's jeans and t-shirt. Maybe a football shirt. Not nice ones. Skanky ones with holes in. He has a gross coat that looks like a sheepskin number a football manager would have worn in the 80s. The elastic on his pants is barely attached. He has one pair of shoes at a time which he wears to death and then replaces.

I have bought him nicer stuff as gifts in the past like well-made t-shirts or Levis rather than M&S jeans but he never retires the old holey stuff (does this make me sound like a controlling bitch?).

I must say he is meticulous about showering, shaving and smelling nice. It's just the clothes.

I do feel a little embarrassed sometimes that he looks so shabby. He says he doesn't care what other people think. This is what makes me think IABU and shallow.

[beetroot2]

Im shallow then as I don't like scruffy.

[Kimononono]

Tell him.

My Dh can get like this. He can look like a homeless person and we actually have our own buisness that he has to make effort for.

His dad is the same.

I supposed it boils down to how much your willing to take and if he actually doesn't give a shit about how you feel.

Dh generally scrubs up well especially if we are going out and if I make a point of that he looks like he is wearing the lost property box he will go and change.

[pepperrabbit]

My DH is similar, he simply doesn't notice what he's wearing but seems very attached to some really manky old clothes.
I explained it irks me - only mildly - but some of his stuff is downright scruffy so we have an agreement. Any item of clothing with more holes in it than the manufacturer intended can be thrown away.
I do all the laundry, and get to impose the rule, but I don't hide what I've thrown away. He's been fine about it because, as I said, deep down he doesn't really care what he wears!
Though I did veto a coat his mother gave him. FFS, she's 75 and had handed on her raincoat - I drew the line at an elderly lady's cast offs.

[Kimononono]

Shoes are an issue with Dh. He will wear his shoes till the are scratched and knackard then he will pass them on to his dad who will wear them.

His dad will even wear shoes when the laces have snapped. We joke that they are steptoe and son

[Kimononono]

pepper 😂😂😂

[ImperialBlether]

I think the bin has to be your friend and you have to just chuck out anything you don't like. If he doesn't care, he won't mind wearing things you like, will he?

[StillMedusa]

My dh is like this... lives in old t shirts and shorts (wears a uniform to work) and sees no reason to bin a 20 yr old t shirt that is more holes than shirt.. and is appalled at the cost of clothes as he still wants to pay 1970s prices

So I just bin stuff every so often and replace. And buy nice chinos and shirts which on rare occasions I force him into... he looks fab dressed nicely!

[ZippyNeedsFeeding]

If clothes have holes in, I throw them away. My husband never complains although he might hide a few things. He doesn't really care about his appearance and I don't mind too much what he looks like either, but I'd rather he didn't look like nobody cares about him. The way I explained it to him was that I really wanted him to be comfortable but I knew that he also wanted me to feel like having sex with him, and nicer clothes helped with that. He was fine with that!

[RubbleBubble00]

I'm even more controlling lol, stuff with holes or worn disappears never to be seen again.

[SaveSomeSpendSome]

I have the opposite problem.

Dh is very fussy with his clothing and wont wear anything he thinks looks a mess.

He wont wear anything with a slogan on or any jogging bottoms.

[bakeoffcake]

Laurie I've now got an imagine in my head of someone resembling a colourful scout leader.

My DH's weekend clothes cause "issues". He's having a phase of buying patchwork, elastic waisted, "hippy" trousers. He looks like a fucking clown. I refuse to go out with him when he has them on.

[CalleighDoodle]

Boggy i read your op and thought my husband is a bigamist! He is 'at his friends house' tonight hmm. boggy is my husband pretending to be your husband? He will be wearing the one pair of jeans he owns with a brown tshirt that used to be black four years ago. He will also be wearing pumps; his only casual pair of shoes.

[Rainbunny]

My DH works in an industry where it's perfectly fine for highly educated people to wear jeans and torn scruffy t-shirts to work everyday. Being somewhat motivated and ambitious he realised pretty quickly that he needed to smarten up his casual work wardrobe and sure enough the old saying seems to hold true, dress for the job you want not the job you have. He's amazed that guys working under him can't understand that it doesn't matter how amazing your doctorate in physics makes you, if you look like you're barely holding it together from your appearance, your competence and motivation will be judged less well.

It's shallow of course but it's also a fundamental part of how humans function. We are animals at the end of the day and visual cues are something we subconsciously process and of course it's harder to be politically correct about subconscious cues.

[arethereanyleftatall]

Oooh I'm like this, your dh I mean!

I'm incredibly confident, and Attach no importance whatsoever to clothes, apart from functionality, as long As they're clean.

I also go out of my way to look scruffy, to annoy the Boden wearing mums at school gates and in waitrose in my vaire naice town, who don't want riff raff.

[arethereanyleftatall]

And if my dh chucked anything of mine out, I'd be really cross.

[8DaysAWeek]

YANBU my DH is the same. He is a very good looking man so he's fortunate to (just) get away with it. We have two very furry little dogs and he thinks nothing of walking out the house in clothes covered in dog fur. I've found myself going over his clothes with a sticky roller on the way to the train station before. Does my nut in!

[VestalVirgin]

I am a bit like your DH, but I do mend the holes in my things. Just never throw them away until they are so holey they only consist of mended holes.

However, I am not a married heterosexual male, and thus people are not going to judge someone else for my scruffy appearance.

Perhaps you can compromise on him either mending the shirts if he wants to continue wearing them, or throwing them away.

I don't care what random other people think, but will try to look nice if I am meeting with friends, just to do them a favour. (I do notice a difference between shabby shirts and nicer ones. I just don't care most of the time.)
Maybe your husband can be persuaded to put on a nicer shirt when he goes on a date with you.

[TheManaha]

Buy him new things but some people are just like that they like to keep things my mum was like that. I use to be buthe then turned into some ocd weirdo where I have to replace everything

[MargaretCavendish]

Another 'this is my husband too' here. Most of the time I just let him get on with it but if we're going somewhere where I care I'll just say: 'oh, I think you should wear the blue shirt [or whatever] instead'. I've learnt over the years to say what specifically I think he should wear; just saying 'oh that's not suitable' panics him. I do mostly just leave him, though - he's happy and as quirks go his awful dress sense doesn't seem that bad (especially by Mumsnet husband standards!). To be fair, though, although I do pay some attention to my clothes, I think a lot of people would consider me not to put much effort in: I don't own a hairdryer, wear make-up less than half the time, am a healthy weight but know I'd look better slimmer but just can't be bothered to prioritise it. I guess if I was one of the glamorous women that I see but know I cannot emulate then I guess maybe I'd care more about having this scruff on my arm!

[MargaretCavendish]

I also think my husband might have very mild sensory issues - he seems to have much clearer views on which of his clothes are comfy than most people (which is one reason that he won't get rid of beloved items even if they're falling apart) and you really can see the discomfort radiating of him in some of his clothes.

[BackforGood]

I think the bin has to be your friend and you have to just chuck out anything you don't like



Can you begin to imagine the response if a poster came on here and said "I got home from work today to find my dh had put some of my favourite clothes in the bin. He says I have to wear x,y,z"

[MargaretCavendish]

I agree with BackforGood that you really shouldn't throw away his clothes. I think it's fine to tell him that you think a particular T-shirt isn't ok to wear to see friends or something, but a) he is free to ignore this advice and b) if he has favourites then why can't he continue to wear his hole-y football kit around the house at least?

Incidentally I have some clothes that my husband hates (he once commented on a dress: 'so, is that... a sort of experiment?'); he is free to tell me this, I am free to ignore him (and do).

[CakeNinja]

Not my dp who wears smart scruffy for work (don't ask!), shorts and tshirt at home but always showered daily, brushes his teeth twice a day, basically good hygiene, buys nice clothes 2 or 3 times a year does a sweep of his one shop he buys clothes from and always looks and smells nice when we go out.

BUT. Sils boyfriend is actually a tramp with a house when he stays with her at weekends, she tells me he doesn't wash, change underwear or brush teeth (and he's a smoker. As am I, but I bloody well brush my teeth, shower and am clean).
He finds clothes when he's out walking his dog and wears them.
We went out to the pub once and he took his shoes off. We all edged away from him when we worked out what the smell was. He thought it was hilarious.

I cannot for the life of me work out what she sees in him. Obviously I am incredibly shallow as I would not contemplate sharing a bed with someone who doesn't keep themselves clean, let alone kiss a mouth that hasn't been washed in 3 days.