Husband building up resentment

Exactly!!!

I hate this idea that you must forgive your partner straight away and act normal with them else it’s abusive!

I think it stems from misogyny where we were taught we should just smile and say everything’s ok when the DH did something wrong.

Not wanting to talk to someone as normal because you’ve ruined their financial life (and completely disregarded their opinions) is normal and not abusive.

I would be needing space and time to figure out if I wanted to stay in such an unequal relationship.

OP you seem incredibly reckless and selfish.

You say you’ve butted heads before over money - I am guessing this isn’t the first time you’ve overspent.

Why does your opinion outweigh his?

DH arranged other decorators to come out, he had reservations about this guy, this guy was only available immediately (red flag).

The only reason you’re getting any support on this thread is because you’re a woman.
If DH acted this way he would have had his arse handed to him.

That being said, depending on how long ago this was, he needs to either forgive you and move on or separate.
Obviously if it was only a couple weeks ago then it’s still very fresh and you need to give him space but if this was months ago he needs to make a decision.

No, he's not, they had to empty their ISA. If he is angry, and he is right to be, the best thing he can do is to stay quiet as talking whilst angry is counterproductive and might start an argument or he would say things he shouldn't. This thing with grown ups talk" is pathethic imo, grown ups have emotions and feelings, they can't flick a switch at command to have a conversation. The man took time off work which means he is more affected than he lets on.

@Eudaimonia11 That was nowhere near as harsh as my replies can be before I’ve had at least 2 cups of coffee. LOL

However, sometimes blunt and direct gets the message across more effectively than pussyfooting around someone’s sensibilities. Am off to make a coffee myself now!

He's being fucking pathetic. Yes, he has a right to be annoyed, but adults air out their grievances in a discussion/argument, and then it has to be put to bed. The only time it's okay to bring it up again is if you are about to make the same mistake a second time. Sulking and refusing to talk to you is ridiculous.

So you went behind his back. I wouldn't be impressed either.

OP, we need more information as you can see the opinions are split even more because there is not enough information. If it happened months ago there is a problem. How much money exactly did you lose and did you go behind his back?
I don't agree with being upset and taking time to process this amounts to bullying if he was the one making that decisions the answers here would have been very different. At the moment, if you apologised there is nothing else to do, just give him the space and when you think he is in a good mood sit down with him and talk, come with a plan and take responsability. Best of luck!

I don’t understand doing anything so drastic. What was the urgency to decorate??

@CautiousLurker2 Oh I was quite harsh, I think I posted before my morning coffee!

Sorry @Jamans I didn’t mean to be nasty. Do what you can to put it right. You’ve done wrong but it’s not the end of the world, just don’t do it again.

A bit harshly put, but I do agree. You never hire the first person you consult even with a recommendation - you get several quotes and see if you both like them, just as DH wanted done. And it was you who wanted it done asap - it’s not like it was a broken boiler/plumbing issue where it was an emergency. Decorating could have waited a month until you found the right person.

I think, as others have pointed out, this is about more than the decorator - it is about the fact that you rode roughshod over DH’s preferences and it has cost HIM his savings.

In your position I think you need to do more than apologise for the decorator mess up - you need to acknowledge that you ignored his wishes and he has borne the cost of this. I, too, think you need to repay him the money in his ISA before topping up yours and I think you need to explore relationship or personal counselling to work out why you ignore his input into your relationship [esp where there are financial implications]. I think his simmering resentment is because of both these factors - that he feels unvalued/unheard and has suffered financially for the decision you made. You need to remedy both of these, IMHO.

If this is a cumulative, recurring pattern, then it may be that your relationship long term is at risk if you don’t deal with it.

How long has he been sulking? He can be annoyed but will have to get over it

This! Makes the difference. Also, how much money are we talking about? You mention ISS does that mean you lost your savings? How was the decision made? Also big difference. You talked about choices and convinced him to go with yours? Or he said no and you went and hired him anyway?

When did this happen? This week? Or weeks / months ago, because if this is weeks ago you’ve got serious DH problem. He should have got over it by now, reflected and you should have discussed it together and made a plan /agreement going forward.

Not all people are "talkers-through", many people are "space takers" and needing time before they come around. You can not force someone to talk to you if they don't feel like talking, their feelings are important as well and the way they deal with problems is different to yours, this is not abuse.

I’m so sick of men. Someone he wanted could have done the exact same thing, he should be on your side as a team. They love blame game don’t they? Mine is exactly the same, if I want to order something he tells me it will be better from somewhere else. I found a locksmith and he was crap but omg my partner was vile about it! I don’t know what to say really because I think it’s abusive but I’m sure loads of people in here would say you should have decided together but I know that actually deciding ‘together’ usually means doing whatever the man wants.

Can you challenge the decorator though? He shouldn’t be ripping you off.

What was the reason for wanting it done quickly?

I feel there is a back story here too.

How did he do such an amazing job on your friends but then an awful job on yours?

why did DH not want to use him?
Did he not like the work that was done on your friends?

You made an error of judgement to be sure, OP, but is DH always like this: mean with money so gives you the responsibility for buying things?

He's obviously seething as you pushed forward with something he didn't want to do - you ignored him and done you're own thing.

I think it partially depends on how much it cost. I this was me i wouldn't mind if it cost a few £100 more but if it ran into £1000's then i would be super pissed off.

Why didn't you decorate yourselves?

Where does it say it’s been weeks on end?

She went against his decision - that alone I would be questioning my relationship over.

And then ruined them financially and expects him to smile and tell her it’s ok.

Why would he have a discussion with her about it when that obviously hasn’t worked in the past because she doesn’t listen to him and goes and does what she wants.

I assume he is questioning whether he wants to continue with this relationship and so it’s fair enough that he is trying to avoid talking to OP too much so he can decide what he wants to do.

Obviously if he decides to forgive her then he needs to drop it but as we don’t know how long this has been going on for, it’s reasonable that he takes time to work things out.

It’s upsetting when work goes badly but it’s not ok for him to treat you like this. He’s entitled to say ‘I told you I didn’t like him, please respect my input in future, this has been a costly mistake’ and for you to apologise.

But cruelty in the face of something that you didn’t do intentionally is not ok.

Sorry but I’m team DH here as well. Just how much extra did this disaster cost you to fix?

red flag for me would be the availability for them to do it quickly, recommended or not. What did you have done that has cost so much and why did you need it done so quickly