DP saying "Leave that, I'll do it later"

[CCaK]

Frequent scenario:

I'm about to hoover.
DP says he'll do it.
6 hours later I hoover.
DP does sad puppy face "I said I was about to do that, why don't you ever let me help"

Ditto: leaving pots to soak for 2 days, leaving wet washing in machine overnight.

Etc etc.

If you say you're "about" to do something don't leave it 2 fucking days! In that time I could have done the whole fucking house.

Lockdown is doing my head in.

Mine doesn’t do this. He is fully house broken.
We tend to both do a thing at once. Say I’m going to hoover, then he’ll go sweep the kitchen & wipe the counters. If I’m folding laundry, he’s washing the dishes.
He understands that him sitting around while I’m working is not ever going to happen.

Some great possible responses on this thread. Some additional ones...

'I'm doing x now as it needs to be done now. It sounds like you want to be helpful, so you could do y now?'

'if you were planning to do it, best do it now as it just gets worse if you leave it'

Oh great, thanks. I'll leave it for you then.

'When were you planning to do it? Because I am sick of empty promises'

'I don't want to leave it, I want it to be done.'

'Where have I heard that before?'

'Mmm, I've learned my lesson with you and 'later' actually so I'll just crack on thanks.'

add a "by" time or "do this whilst I do X". Could you do the washing before tea? Could you do the bins whilst I do X? Sometimes it happens that the intention is there but not the sense of urgency.

My DH foolishly says this just after I start. So I hand the hoover or whatever to him, smile, and say 'on you go then'. A smarter man would wait until i'd finished, but thankfully he's not smarter or I'd be pissed off much more often! 😁

HE HAS HOOVERED.

About 14 hours after saying he was about to.

I must now obvs rush off to kiss his feet and worship him. 🤮🤮🤮

We have moss on our roof and sometimes when the birds hop about a whole load will fall off and land by the front door. It has a startling resemblance to horse manure.

One day when leaving for work I found a great pile of it, and started sweeping it up, muttering under my breath (at the birds).

DH appears, must have been off work that day. "Leave that, I'll do it tomorrow. "

Tomorrow!

This is because he is "helping you with your jobs".

If you have inadvertently married a man who thinks housework is your job then you have to give some jobs to him in their entirety and then sit on your hands. It helps if they are jobs that hurt him personally if not done.

So, make somethings his jobs then never ever ever do them no matter what.

Perhaps start with children's laundry: from gathering it up, wash, dry, put away, answer questions about have I got a clean t-shirt, etc.

You don't even think about it. Well, if he is desperately ill or away for a week for work you'd do it. Otherwise, not. Gallic shrugs and vague grunts on the topic of children's washing are your new friends.

Honestly though, twat he is at times, he does actually do stuff.

Just several hours/days after I would have done.

In theory he thinks I'm stealing jobs from him in his "man mind" and therefore preventing him from being useful as he intends. I'm just impatient and too fast. Allegedly.

Tempted to send him to live with my mother for a month after lockdown. He would come back grovelling. When my mum wants shit done she means within 1 hour and god help you if you don't do it immediately.

Love it @TorkTorkBam!

I’m giving DP a list every day as I’m working and he is furloughed. If I was him, I’d be plotting ways of killing me but he actually wants a list. It’s still annoying that I have to think of things but better than coming out at 3pm to find the washing up still there, the dishwasher full of last night’s load, the carpet furry and the table sprinkled with crumbs!

I just don’t understand how he doesn’t see what needs to be done.

DH is getting worse and worse as we've been on lock down. We have divvied up the jobs and I seemed to be doing his jobs as well as mine. I have just stopped - he isn't getting any tea because the pan I want to use is still dirty from 2 days ago. XH was like this, with the helping and the hurt "was gonna do that" crap. Promised myself that no future relationship would have me resenting my partner or living with learned helplessness. Too easy to slip back, clearly!

I just don’t understand how he doesn’t see what needs to be done

Oh he does but he has an excuse ”if you'd only told me I would have done it”

I'm sure that he doesn't need a list when he's at work!

Of course he sees what needs to be done. Done by you. Not him.

It is optional for him. You make it optional for him. He doesn't care whether you want to do it or not. He chooses away with whatever he can get away with because he is a selfish lazy person. Highly unattractive trait to me.

Sounds like my husband. A list of his favourite phrases: I'll do it after/ in a bit/ later/ tomorrow/ when I've got time.
I could have whatever it is done in the time he spends thinking about it

At a PP. no, they aren't all like this.

My husband has never said he will do X later when he sees me doing something. We have our own jobs that mostly that person does but we all pull our weight.

Oh god I know what you mean OP. And they're genuinely aggrieved that you've done their 'job' . Dickheads.

I now smile and say 'that's bollocks' when DH starts his 'leave that I'll do it later' spiel, surprisingly he often agrees with me and does it right there and then.

As DameHannahRelf said
‘ I wouldn't do anything for him again, don't do his laundry, don't make him dinner, if he leaves shit lying around, throw it in a bag or box for him to sort himself. When he moans that he has no clean clothes, he's starving, or can't find something, tell him he just needs to be patient, you'll do it later...’
And
‘Oh and of course when he cracks and does some stuff himself, put on an innocent face and say "oh I was just about to do that".‘

Yep. So annoying.
Or the added action of leaving the dirty pots on top of the counter where the dishwasher is to 'put in later'... why??? Just fucking put them in now.

Drives me insane. It's a good thing I'm a keyworker because if I was home all the time with him I would have lost it by now I think!

DH used to do that a lot. One day when he said that I should leave that and he'd do it, I told him that either he did it right this second like I was going to or he should stop pretending he was trying to help. It stopped and he now just gets on with things.

My H had a slightly different take on things "leave that, you can do it later". This spectacularly backfired when DD2 was born by C-section and the health visitor came round. She said to me in H's presence "you shouldn't be doing housework!" to which he replied bright as button "Thats EXACTLY what I keep telling her" be beamed, "she can do it tomorrow!" Then he stood and waited for his good boy pat on the head from the Nice Lady.

Instead she said "how can Dishing sit here with all this around her, nothing being done? Its very stressful for her so YOU can do it!" Later H said he hoped that woman wouldn't come round again.

Did he do the housework dishing?

DP used to do that.

I changed it by, as soon as he opened his mouth, smiling broadly and saying 'Oh, thank you!' and handing him the vacuum cleaner/dishwashing brush/cat turd shovel/whatever it was, not giving him the opportunity to finish his sentence with '...in a minute'.

There is no 'in a minute' here. It's either done now or not - and I also answer with 'Can you...?' in a way where saying no would seem churlish, so things that I actually want to do need done properly stay with me.

@TorkTorkBam probably not