Things my DH has found to do while we are trying to leave for Christmas

I’ve witnessed my dear friend suffering from this affliction. I love her to bits but she’s one of those people who can not be on time.
Her lateness is legendary. We will arrange to meet our group for lunch at 12 and she will turn up at 13:15 when we’re finishing. She has missed the start of concerts, movies. Her own child’s performances.

We were going somewhere that we couldn’t be late for so I said I would pick her up. I arrived 15 minutes early and called her from the car. She was getting in the shower! She let me in and was in a tizz and upset. I just apologised for being a bit early. She agreed she didn’t have time for shower and hair wash. It was now time to leave. She just couldn’t. Was running around picking things up and tidying up and changing her shoes.

Eventually I said we had better get going and she sort of froze in her hallway. Insisted we had left too much time and she should take the shower. I was honestly not trying to be mean but if I wasn’t there we were going to miss something that cost a fortune. She just couldn’t leave without making herself late. . It’s definitely a mental health thing with some people rather than trying to be deliberately harmful.!

Oh dear I do this.

There’s an element of time blindness, terrible sense of priority and false expectations about how I feel things should be left.

There’s also the procrastination to avoid packing because if I don’t start it I can’t forget anything
I actually drive myself nuts with my own ridiculousness.

Probably adhd.

We had about two hours in which to clear the chaos out of two bedrooms for imminent guests when DH said musingly that we really ought to sand down the dining table. For some reason that struck me as a marvellous idea.

For about ten minutes I offered to help dismantle the table, find the wax and/or go to B&Q for sandpaper, while DH said no, no, he thought it would be more sensible to clear the bedrooms.

He vanished to clear the bedrooms.

DD sidled up to me and murmured that she has no idea whether that was reverse psychology or just both her parents losing the plot in the face of a deadline. TBH, by that point, neither had I.

Dh has described it as a fear of dead time coupled with time blindness. So we are organised and almost ready to go and we have about 20 minutes to kill. He is unable to relax and will mentally go through all the random things he could do, then settle on a job to fill the gap but grossly underestimate the time it will take. These days i have to corner him and ask what he is doing and how long he thinks it will take. I tell him how long it will take in reality and explain why he cannot do this. He fights against this urge,.sometimes I have to suggest something like sweeping the floor that's quick or suggest he packs the car or puts on his coat or shoes or goes to the toilet so he is truly ready and not kind of ready, where he has to just get one thing that turns into 10 things. I don't think its a control thing it's definitely a ND thing with my DH. What upsets me is when he doesn't heed advice and gets argumentative. He is much better since an adult diagnosis. Ds when younger used to say he was getting his crazy brain when he had bouts of this and we found ways to help him. Sometimes I ask DH if his crazy brain is bothering him and he will admit yes. These are the moments when it's manageable and we work as a team. The times he gets defensive and ignores me are the times I can't forgive.

You should have left him with the hoover and traveled alone x

Oh this is a thing? Mine is exactly the same! I feel like my life revolves around his bowel movements. Why are they so selfish? I told mine tonight that he is going to the toilet again because he’s massively fat and won’t stop eating - I’m sick of pussyfooting around him.

One word: ADHD?

My DH has it and honestly watching him "prep" to leave the house to get where he/we needs to be makes me want to rip my hair out. Completely time blind, disorganised, no planning, no prioritisation. He's still chaotic even on medication. It's hard work, every day.

I could have written this post! It sounds like my husband who has recently been diagnosed with ADHD.

This thread brings back the memory of the time my wife realised I’d decided that just before leaving for a long-haul flight was the ideal time to fix a fence post.

Now, to be fair (to me) we were just killing time. If we’d have left then, we would have been massively early for check-in, gales were forecast while we were away, and I hadn’t noticed the post moving before

But I shall always treasure the expression on my wife's face that clearly said, “I’ve married an idiot.”

NAHALT.

There are far too many women on this thread minimising the appalling behaviour of their husbands, rather than face the unpalatable
truth that they are married to an utter dick.

Far too often they will be laughing at you behind your back. They have zero respect for you or your children.

Sounds like he has ADHD.
ADHD is highly genetic.
Others in his family will have it too.

That’s what I’d think. I’d also say once he’s done that it’s too late too go!

These stories are all included in Tales of the Unexpected episodes - I loved that show 😂 Roald Dahl has a wonderfully wicked mind!

I didn't grow up in the UK. First Roald Dahl I ever read was a collection of short stories which included that one 😄 There was also one about a sweet old lady poisoning backpackers... and possibly the story about a woman who bludgeons her husband with a frozen leg of lamb? She then cooks the lamb and feeds it to the nice police officers investigating the murder. Murder weapon is never found 😂

DH invited his mum to stay for Christmas. He's actually been great this week with getting 'guest-ready' jobs done (like sprucing up the bathroom, last minute gift buying, cleaning windows and doing all the laundry) but the one thing I'd asked him specifically to do was clear all his painting stuff away. It's usually all over and under the kitchen table (and in a growing shitpile in the corner of the kitchen) which usually doesn't bother me but if he wants to invite people to stay, we need somewhere to feed them and put all their stuff. He's been promising me faithfully he'd set today aside to do it. 6pm he tells me that it's not like his mum will be arriving early tomorrow so he can just do it in the morning, but he can't just move the stuff, it all needs sorting and 'rationalising' as well. "It should take a maximum of 3 hours..."

I've told him if he doesn't start on it in the next hour he'd better hope it makes a comfortable bed because it'll all be on the patio with him sleeping on top of it tonight otherwise.

The easy solution would be to agree on a departure time, firm and leave without him if he's running late.

or just delay the departure until the following day and start doing your own things too. Women can also have the urgent need to go for a run or to the gym, to go and get their nails done, or start a spreadsheet for work that will keep them busy for a couple of hours

How can anyone be ready "on time:" when there's not departure time in the first place?

It's this short story by Roald Dahl. "The Way Up To Heaven"

Free PDF here

I think a lot of people on this thread would find it cathartic!

You need to go to assertiveness classes and sort your selfish useless husband out - how long has he been getting away with such poor behaviour?

I assume they're driving due to OP's lack of follow up posts.

I would not have been happy with his ridiculous behaviour today that was just showing you he hadn't done the things he needed to do in a timely manner (present buying) and clearly dumped everything else on you while he pissed off to do pointless things.

I actually think a lot of the time this is exactly it.

A lot of these men have very nice wives who would rather think their other halves have adhd or whatever when really they’re just selfish, controlling pricks.

It reminds me of that episode of Tales of the Unexpected where the husband actively enjoys making his DW anxious and stressed every time they need to be on time for something.

Eventually he gets locked in their elevator and she leaves (the empty house) without him for a month long holiday 😂 I recommend it!

When DH was well enough to go away, we inevitably had a major row in the ten minutes before we planned to leave. Never when we were leaving our holiday place!

Husbands are the strangest creatures on planet earth. Mine is not too bad but will suddenly have an unquenchable desire to mow the lawn. On stranger days, he will then go shopping. its a mystery why this bug suddenly surfaces when we have a long trip.

Stranger things

Cue the horror music.

You have my sympathy. My DH once decided to do a 3 hr wash of our campervan just as we were due to leave for the Channel Tunnel. His rationale? He didn't want the french people to think we are dirty beasts!

I was once doing dinner for about 8 of our friends and all their kids and my DH suggested he should sugar soap the banister? Words failed me.

I’ve seen a few comments like this.

It’s got nothing to do with his perfectly working bowels.

It’s got all to do with control. He will delay and delay, as he thinks I have planned to leave too early or I’m allowing too much time for traffic.

We live in the middle of nowhere, we are often faced with road closures or bad weather. As such we have missed expensive events and concerts. Nearly missed flights.

It’s the control mechanism he has to delay me, I can’t actually argue about when his bowel is ready to go. So we leave when he wants to. I’ve often called people we are meant to be meeting to say we haven’t left yet. I’m standing there perplexed as I watch him try not to forget anything as well.

The distraction technique of housework and other things does not work on me. I will call him out on it the second he starts. I’ve walked back in on him logging back into his work laptop. The kids are also sick of waiting at home when they could be on the way to their grans.

We often don’t take him places, we’ve also gone on holiday without him. Watching him leave the house is soul destroying.