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AIBU?

DH and his phone

10 replies

AliceAbsolum · 02/04/2019 21:27

All day. Brushing his teeth, on the loo, in bed. We can't watch anything or go for a walk without him periodically checking it every 5-10 min. I've started to give up talking to him because he's always in the screen.
It's really upsetting me, I feel like it's seriously coming between us. He's on Instagram and Strava and Reddit, he's not messaging other women or anything but it feels like I'm second best.
We have discussed it, he says it's a problem then 2-3 days later his usage is the same again. I am powerless and I feel like I'm watching our relationship get more and more distant. It's heartbreaking.
Or am I just being precious and this is the modern world and he's kind and funny and respectful and loves me and I should just chill out?

OP posts:
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moreismore · 02/04/2019 21:31

I am this person thanks to a mat leave on my own with kids (DH away for 6 mo), rural living and phone being only link to anyone! I mean to be better each time it’s pointed out and then within days I’m back again. I think I need to go cold turkey. Or have somewhere in the house it just stays. I actually sort of hate my phone now.

My point is, it’s a hard habit to break. If you could discuss it again and maybe come up with new strategies? Can he set usuage limits for apps or times of day when he can/can’t access them maybe?

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Roxybaby12 · 02/04/2019 21:37

I feel your pain! My husband has a personal phone and work phone and is glued to both all the time! Even when he’s taking a week off work to be with me and the kids he’s still checking his work phone! And the number of times I’m busy cleaning, doing the washing etc and I walk into the living room and he’s on Facebook or Instagram! I mean come on-at least acknowledge your children (3+5)..
I’ve now suggested weekdays after work he leaves his work phone in the office or turns it off (when he works from home). At weekends he leaves it at home and his personal phone stays in his pocket. I don’t even have Facebook never mind all this other stuff! Grrrrrr
Good luck x

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EngagedAgain · 02/04/2019 21:46

He might be kind and funny etc, but it's still not the done thing. My partner has done this at times, but has eased up on it (a bit) The time I find it most annoying is when we supposed to be having us time, which is usually only a maximum of 2 hours a day. To the other poster I would think you have good reason to be on it.

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FiveLittlePigs · 02/04/2019 21:50

We have discussed it, he says it's a problem then 2-3 days later his usage is the same again. I am powerless and I feel like I'm watching our relationship get more and more distant. It's heartbreaking

My relationship with my ex 15 years ago. His was gaming. :( He still maintains that he did nothing wrong in all his spare time playing live games on the pc and all his meals sitting there, if I dragged him away to even acknowledge DD, his head was facing the screen in case he had to rush back to it.

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BarrenFieldofFucks · 02/04/2019 21:53

Get him to download offtime or similar and go cold turkey

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Dragongirl10 · 02/04/2019 21:57

Op this would be a deal breaker for me, can you not get him to agree phone free times, ie meals, walks, bedtime?

If not then he is creating a real problem for your marriage.

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Shinyshit · 02/04/2019 21:59

Are you sure he's not messaging other women. It's certainly a possibility on Reddit, the gonewild subreddits are really popular with men and there's plenty of nudes, sex chat exchanged.
Just heads up because my dh was always on Reddit, spent hours in loo, etc, turns out he was porning it up any chance he got.

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avocadoincident · 02/04/2019 22:01
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Fr3d · 03/04/2019 00:10

This has caused a serious issue in our relationship Sad. I used to try and get him off it, we'd argue and then I just gave up. Now we are getting further and further apart Sad.

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KellyW88 · 03/04/2019 01:49

My DH became addicted to a silly mobile game and would be glued to it for HOURS every night, if I spoke to him he’d either not process it properly or get fed up with my attempts to converse with him - like he’d decided to regress to being a teenager!

I approached it first as gently as I could, like you experience, he’d improve for a day or two and then back to his old habits! Then I tried logic with him to explain why it bothered me so much, again he agreed he could see it was a problem - then again back to old habits! I got petty and started copying his actions, to show him how it could make a person feel when they were disregarded for a device, he barely noticed because he thought I’d just stopped nagging him...

He made the mistake of telling me this one evening and I BLEW, not suggesting you do the same but once we calmed down we thankfully managed to have a heartfelt talk about the situation. I explained that it felt like I was living with a roommate at best and a bratty teenager at times too, that I couldn’t play second fiddle to a game. Then, why did he feel his phone deserved more attention than me, what drew him in so much? He thought about his answers to these questions for days and finally he explained his reasons as best he could and we hit an impasse for a bit.

It took an argument for me to burn out completely emotionally about the situation and finally just address the situation candidly (I’m not big on arguments, I rarely raise my voice) with him. Basically I said it had to improve otherwise I couldn’t see much more of a future for us (our DD and DS were around 9 months old then).

Also I demanded one “phone free” evening every week to begin with. Where he was welcome to do whatever when I went to bed but not before, he wasn’t overly keen on this though, he managed to do it after a few mishaps with our router that meant he couldn’t access WIFI for a bit (he knows I did this now by the way - as childish as it was for me to do it we actually manage to laugh about it now).

He’s much improved, there are times he will come home from work and immediately out comes the phone, other times he will get to a certain time of evening (after our now 17 month old twins are asleep for the night generally) and immerse himself, then there are spates of time where he’s completely switched on and engaged in the real world. He’s stopped with the petulant teenager bit completely as I also told him every time he behaved that way, I’d be extremely blunt in my replies :’) plus he’s a very doting dad and that keeps him on his toes now the twins can run circles around him lol.

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