Social life - who organises?

[Werk]

In my house I organise all of our social activities and I am fed up with it.

Over the years DH has let his friendships dwindle to practically nothing. He sees his friends perhaps once every 3 months. One slightly more but that is because I am friends with his wife (more so than him with his friend now).

Every weekend he looks to me for things to do. Yesterday he and the DC (6&4) just sat there asking me what we are doing today. I just said nothing and that's what we did.

My DC have a two week half term and I have organised everything, seeing my MIL, play dates, cinema trip, soft play, swimming - Everything. DH saw our neighbours last weekend and they suggested doing something for Halloween together - he came in and told me to message the neighbour about it. We have a group WhatsApp - he is on it, I told him to message, he has hands. He still hasn't.

He mutes WhatsApp groups.

He expresses concern that our eldest has few friends but he does nothing at all to foster those relationships. He refuses to have play dates at weekends (family time!) and works all week so cannot facilitate them during the week. So he blames me. He won't go to any of the school social events and won't try to make friends with the parents which is basically what you have to do with children this age. It is all down to me and I find it hard when he isn't on board. Other parents meet with other families but he won't do it.

His MIL (widowed) was the same - she and FIL had no friends and now she is lonely and has resurrected two friendships from the 1980's but that's it.

He does it with my family too. We have a big Christmas meal together in December each year. He rarely comes. This year he said he would but is now procrastinating and won't give me his menu choice for the restaurant. Just being difficult.

He has always been quite shy but it is getting worse with age. I have several groups of friends and do socialise regularly but whenever there is a couples night I have to either go alone or not go at all. The thing is, when he does go he (seems to) have a good time and says we should do it more often.

He slags people off all the time - my family are too common for him (and his mother, that's another long story), some of my friends are not his cup of tea and so on.... he likes no one, really. In the next breath he complains that he has no friends 🤷🏻‍♀️

I do suspect autism of some description but he won't do anything about that.

I feel so jealous when parents at the school gate talk about going out with other families from school (and even group holidays which are out of the question). I am also jealous of my sister and her husband who have a wide and varied social life because they do loads of things with friends from each side (if that makes sense) whereas we have a small pool of people limited to the few friends of mine he will tolerate.

I am not sure he will ever change and I probably just need to suck it up, does anyone else have the same thing? How do you cope? Could you change it?

I’m in kind of a similar situation OP, except my DH does have a few friends, one group he socialises with once a week, he does go out with work mates sometimes and then he has his childhood friends that he sees every few months (they all live a few hours away)

BUT, when it comes to my friends and socialising, he’s always been really weird. Really serious and hard work and I have no idea why as he’s not around me and around his own friends. He just can’t seem to relax around my friends, it’s like he’s got a poker up his arse. They’re too polite to say anything but I know all of my friends and their partners dread spending time with him nowadays which is so sad. We’re not invited to ‘couples’ things etc. It makes me really sad and a bit cross because I’m like ffs, just be NORMAL and talk about normal, lighthearted stuff (as it’s a Saturday night and we’re all out for a few drinks and to relax and no, people don’t want to spend all night talking bloody politics of about the 1065 ways you can recycle )

But the main bug bear has been he NEVER organises anything socially at weekends. It’s always left to me. I’ve said to him so many times, I’m fed up of being social secretary, we’d do nothing if it wasn’t for me. Not even with other people, but just in general too, I organise just for him and i to do stuff at the weekends occasionally, but he wouldn’t ever think to!

Sorry OP, no real advice as I kinda have similar with mine. I don’t think they’ll ever change personally. Could you try just not organising something for a few weeks and just leave him at home with DC at the weekend whilst you go out? Maybe he’ll become so bored that he’ll reach out to people? With the texting back on the WhatsApp, I would definitely make sure he does that. Even if you have to help him ‘draft’ a response to the group, make sure the reply comes from him.

I too suspect my DH is on the spectrum so it is difficult but could you perhaps suggest some form of behaviour counselling? Ways to improve confidence when socialising etc? It sounds a bit like your DH is a bit anxious?

Anyway, good luck!

Thanks @Twirlywhirly1 my husband is the same with my friends' husbands - they are all quite blokey and talk about football etc but he isn't interested. Doesn't even fein interest either. He doesn't drink, which is fine, but he just sits there in silence.

Because he isn't sporty he isn't interested in our DS joining sports clubs which I think would help the situation. It's like he can't bring himself to put himself out of his comfort zone. He hates small talk and I know he doesn't do this at work - I hear him on work calls and it is zero chat, all work. He does not socialise with work people and avoids things like the Christmas party.
The more he avoids things the worse he is when he goes out. Mute.

I try not organising things - the whole of November is blank apart from a couple of kids parties (which I have to take DC to). I am going to leave it like that. It's hard though because I want to do things, especially for the DC. I am actually starting to resent the fact that we don't get invited to things because of his refusal to socialise.

He sulks if I go out and leave him with the DC at weekends- I tend to meet friends in the evening once they are bed or for a coffee on my day off. I see my mum and sister on my days off or go alone with my DC at weekends because he doesn't want to interact with them. He has seen my mum twice this year and that is because she babysat for us.

His mum is the same. She is refusing to come over at Christmas because my mum will be here 🤷🏻‍♀️ she would rather sit in her house alone on Christmas Day than have to see someone outside her limited circle.
Btw there is nothing wrong with my mum, it is definitely their problem.

It sounds like you are The Mother, while you're rushing around being everyone's mum, where do you get your support? Who mothers you?

Stop being his mum and tell him to step up as a husband. It's supposed to be an equal partnership, instead he's handed over his responsibility for himself and his parental responsibility to you. Has he always been like this?