How does DH survive at work?

oP I feel for you - very familiar situation as there are a LOT of enabled men around who hold down senior roles.

As a person who has been single most of my life what I find frustrating is the number of women who complain about this but do nothing and continue to enable these men! (I have to work with these facilitated men and they can be so irritating!)

Anyway I've come to the conclusion that these women accept it as the trade off is the income their senior mgr DH brings in. Nice main income, nice house, nice holidays - don't want to lose that so women suck it up.

You're not going to be able to change him at this stage as you're 20 years in ----so you need to ask yourself if it's all worth it and whether you can continue a relationship where you are enabling someone you don't respect and, importantly, who doesn't respect you.

I was in the same situation, just with less years together - 10 only, however 2dc and 2 pets. Been arguing quite a lot in recent 2 years as despite being the higher earner, I did the lion share of work with everything. He even moaned about me not washing my car often enough. I needed to point everything out, remind him of events, school stuff etc. He never remembered that pets need food or vet appointments. Zero idea how much the bills were or whom the suppliers were, and zero interest in learning when I tried to discuss with a color coded spreadsheet to hand. He would never put anything on a wall diary or digital one, he would never tell me what he had planned etc. The arguments were always about me nagging and my supposed attitude as I wasn't treating him like a man. I told him if he didn't like it he could go. One day he actually did. That was 3 months back. He already wanted to come back but only to share the house as he figured out he is lonely and doesn't like living in a mess. He also said he will continue to go out etc as a single man even if he mover back in. He also mentioned how clean my house is now that he is not there and why I suddenly do all the chores without complaining and if I did that while he was here, we would still be together. The bloody cheek! I told him to do one and that he is never coming back and this is the reason why my house is so clean. I am still doing it all myself but my mental health has improved greatly! I don't have another child to parent, I don't have the blatant disrespect, I don't have to listen to football or stupid videos on his phone. I don't have telly blasting at 3am as he fell asleep with it on (every night). The list is endless. I feel bad for my dc as they have to go to his every other weekend but I actually get a break and feel much more positive and set up for the week.

OP, remember, you cannot make someone into something they are not and never were. You do however need to decide whether you fancy another 20 years of gaslighting over your supposed attitude. He will probably get worse the older he gets.

He doesn't care enough, does he?
Correct. Or rather, he doesn't care enough. My DH is similar but after 30+ years I've had enough and desperately trying to find a way out. I cant cope with the thought of living with him this way for the next twenty years compounded by the fact I will get no respite once hes retired. Just think ....24/7 of gaslighting bullshit. No thanks.

From reading your posts it sounds like your H dulls your shine. When you have a moment, I suggest having a read of these two threads that are in the relationships board. Both posters started off complaining about sulky husbands.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/4572101-plucking-up-the-courage-to-leave?page=1

www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/3448545-Confronting-DH-about-his-sulking

Not all couples therapy is like this. We had some because of very similar reasons - I pretty much did every fucking thing while he took weeks to do the smallest, basic task that I'd managed to delegate to him.

It came to a head last year and I basically said "sort couples therapy or we are done and I mean it." He did and I genuinely think he was gobsmacked that the therapist kept asking him "why?"... "why don't you show any interest helping sort the family holiday/the new car/the broken window? Why don't you take over the cooking when she does a nightshift? Why don't you sort anything at home? Why is it her job?"

She suggested having a weekly meeting and divvying up everything that needed doing so I wasn't carrying the mental load. It sort of works unless it involves him spending money - as he is notoriously cheap, things that might have a cost don't often happen. Then I remind him of the counselling, how expensive it was (i.e more that just fucking getting a light fixed in a bedroom) and he snaps back into being somewhat useful again.

It is worth a go. Last year he was pretty shocked to realise just how much I resented him and disliked the lazy fucker way he was behaving. Proper wake up call.

We both work full time, I'm the higher earner and I have a job which can involve all sorts of last minute shenanigans from very early starts to travel. There really was no wiggle room for him to be a twat. I definitely feel warmer towards him after counselling (although he still will default to lazy fucker if we don't have the weekly meetings and I may murder him over his inability to sort a window cleaner which has been on his to do list for about three months now. Yes I could do it, but it has been labeled as his job and he needs to sort it out).

Is?? So you are still with someone who is like this???

I've lived with male housemates like that - they didn't want to do anything at all. I just wanted them to do someone tasks, like do the bins, for hygiene reasons, but I guess as they were living with a woman they thought I should be doing this for them.

I got really fed up with sugar coating my requests for help. No matter how nice my tone, they always had a bit of an attitude or sour face. I saw what it was. They wanted me to grovel before them because they didn't like that their Lordships were being asked to do humble woman-work.

First I'm really sorry he's so unsupportive. I feel for you deeply. I had this too.
I was helped by counselling. My DH was passive aggressive and a covert narcissist, but I was not told this and did not realise at the time.
Even when I was on the floor outside the bathroom where I collapsed when I was so sick when I first found out I was allergic to mussels, he just stepped over me and peed in the loo without a word. My eight year old phoned the Doctor. I was so worried about how to look after the children I did not realise how abnormal, how abusive, it was of him to step over me and ignore me and just use the loo.

Your husband is being passive aggressive. You are being abused.
But I think you do not even recognise you are being disrespected. You think it's his personality, his 'style' or something and, when you find it a problem in trying to run a home with young teenagers, you ask how does he manage at work? But you really need to step back and see that he is abusing you. He probably abuses quite a few people at work, but as we know, work is different. We put up with stuff because we need our salary or we look for another job, we avoid that person... or that person tones it down in case you complain.

You need to learn self-respect. You are wearing yourself out, doing everything for the family, going to get the extra things from the DIY with him even though he didn't respect your advice and buy the right thing in the first place. It's interesting to me that he wanted you to go to the shop to suss out what was needed for the project which he would have been wiser not to have begun but rather to follow your advice in the first place. He seems to need you but to resent that fact.

You need to value yourself. Start saying no. Start ignoring him and having your own life. Start saying, 'Thursday nights from 7 you are in charge, each week I'll be out and on Saturdays. This is my time off.' And don't leave meals for them. Food in the fridge/freezer, ok, but not a prepared meal.

Your situation is so horrible for you that it is easy to get sucked in to every little niggle and allow him to pull all the strings by his behaviour. Because children have to be taken care of straight away he can force you to be on edge and dancing to his tune while he does not care about doing his bit. It becomes a constant argument about each problem he causes. Each problem he causes because he wants to upset you.

I am sure that at work he has a secretary who runs around him doing all the small stuff and he is sarcastic to juniors who do not jump as soon as he wants something. Many people get promotions who are basically horrible people. I had a Head of Dept in a University who did not know how to take out a Library book and who bullied and blackmailed everybody, but a few women still hung on his every word. Other people did his job for him, somehow he, like quite a few academics I've known, coasted by while others did his job.

But in your case, I think your problem is you have married a cruel man who abuses you and who gets his kicks out of putting you down. Do not interact with him while he disrespects you. If he cannot be bothered to communicate, then just let him get on with it and go and do something for yourself. If he finds you and asks why you didn't come and find him (e.g. when he sat in the car) simply stay calm and a little remote and say he hadn't bothered to come and tell you he was ready to go so you assumed he'd changed his mind. Don't argue, don't get drawn in. Don't let him see you upset.

I recommend you seek a Counsellor to whom you can talk so you can get a perspective on this. At the moment you are so swallowed up in the every-minute demands of the home and work that you can't see the wood for the trees. Also look online for help with how to be assertive and setting boundaries. I found Stephanie Lyn on YT ages ago and have been really impressed with her. Look up her talks on assertiveness and setting boundaries. I found this one just so you can get started, but do look around for what suits you; * *

Men are perfectly capable of doing stuff at home, like they do at work but most don’t as they know their wife will.

YANBU.
mad someone else said- he is treating you as unpaid assistant and is a lousy partner and parent.
Best advice we got at pre- marriage counselling was to share a calendar where we put all of our and kids appointment etc- no one forgets. And if it’s not in the calendar isn’t happening- ie if I put I’m out of friends and he ‘forgot’ to put in calendar he wants to go play soccer with buddies at the same time- he stays home and I go out.

@Montyman1 That sounds so bad. I'm guess he is not the man you thought you married, is he?

Having spent time with senior people, he gets by with one or all of these -

Being mentally present and caring what people think of him in a way he doesn't when he's at home

Doing the bare minimum

Dividing many aspects of his job into small pieces and allocating them to people underneath him who are having to do those tasks on top of their own jobs

Avoiding making important decisions and delaying them to the point where everyone gets fed up and makes them for him. Then when something goes wrong, he can blame them, and when they go well, he can claim what an amazing team he had (lead by him of course)

Taking credit for other people's work generally

Gaslighting people. Telling people to one thing and then 3 weeks later telling them they should be doing the opposite like they're completely stupid, when it's him that's actually forgotten he give them the first instructions in the first place

Going back on the decisions he has made (but not admitting it) and making other people seem like they're crazy by instinct they got the wrong end of the stick

An important life lesson: people behave differently with different people.

For all sorts of reasons. Ranging from their own interests to their own interests.

OP I know you've said you have ADHD (in relation to your son having it) but there is no reason at all why your dh might not be as well - I don't know if it helps to see some of his behaviour as being a result of this rather than sheer selfishness! Obviously you know him better than me (!) but I wouldn't rule out him being being neurologically atypical.

Spot on. 'Well I was going to say sorry but now I realise it's all your fault because you didn't ask nicely so I won't. Yeah boo, sucks to you' 🙄😤

I would bin him off, OP tbh.

LTB and get a new job as well as a divorce. Then both problems are solved.

Have a google of “sunk cost fallacy”

I was hesitant about calling time on things with exH after 17 years.I should have done it sooner than I did.

you don’t have to put up with his bullshit negging “oh well I can’t do what you asked as you had a TONE”

you don’t have to live life effectively mopping up his chaos.

if you split you’d be doing what you do now, but not literally catering to a manchild. And it’s astonishing how much lighter life becomes 🤗

Instead of changing your tone, tell him that tone policing is a tactic used by those who are in the wrong to silence those who are in the right. Because it's true.

They’re different skill sets

I had the same issue with my exH. Director of a huge international bank. Genius level clever but … outside work he was a total moron. Actually worse than that…when we broke up I realised that my life simply did not change. I still did absolutely everything for DCs and in the home, I just didn’t have someone telling me that I was rubbish at everything. I can only imagine that he and possibly your husband are fantastic delegators…mine was completely oblivious to anybody else’s feelings and continually took credit where it totally was not due. That dead inside quality was likely why he was so successful in the city 🙁 I don’t miss him or his goal hanging ways …

He's probably got some super duper secretary at work who does all the thinking for him and efficiently smooths the way for him so he looks good and in fact does everything for him except wipe his bum. So he doesn't have to think at all!

This.

From bitter experience.

Came on to say this 👆🏻 most large firms are crawling with them

Everything you have said sounds like my husband. Except I work for/with my husband and yes, I am PA at home and PA at work. I’m not meant to be PA at work but he seems incapable of doing anything properly I.e. finishing a job from start to finish, managing staff, managing his time, returning calls/emails, he can be so unprofessional. I’ve just lost respect for him.

Your husband probably manages away fine at work because he can ‘talk the talk’ - my husband was ‘talking the talk’ to me for years about his work. Now I’m working there myself I know when he’s full of cr** lying to me yet again about a deadline that’s been missed, or a call that’s he’s supposedly made that’s it actually all his fault, not someone else’s like he would have led me to believe when I worked elsewhere.

We are restarting counselling again after yet another meltdown on my end from not being listened to and having to be mother to our two children and to him. This of course has been exacerbated since starting to work with him and the easy solution would be to leave my job with him but I fear the business would fail and we would be left destitute.

Therapists/Counsellors are only human, and there are good ones and bad ones out there. You find one who works well for both of you.

Yes, and this is why women need to keep their feet in the door re. employment following Maternity Leave, if only for 1-3 days pw. Or at least ensure they have qualifications and a decent amount of relevant work experience that is likely to allow them to return to work after taking a career break to become SAHM’s, without taking too much of a detrimental hit to their earning power when they do eventually return to the workplace.

Everyone needs options/a Plan B/a Fuck Off Fund, just incase things go tits up.

OP - That 30k Redundancy Payment should have been ring-fenced as insurance. It should have put in a savings account in your sole name, just in case…
Especially as you gave up your financial independence to stay at home 24/7 to look after your DC which were created by ‘both’ of you.

It sounds like you provided free childcare whilst using your 30k redundancy payment to support yourself and the household?

Did your Husband’s financial contribution to the household increase when you became a SAHM?

I would only then consider that 30k Redundancy Payment as disposable family income, once I’d returned to work and also felt reassured that the Father of my children had lived up to the basic expectations of being an involved parent and partner/Husband in all aspects of family life, where possible.

It’s not automatic to think this way when we’re young, but knowing what I now know re. relationships and the sacrifices of parenthood, I will be advising my Daughter’s to do the above.