to be unbelievably fed up with constantly asking/reminding DH?

[CrazyChristmasLady]

DH is a good man and from what my friends say, men in general are no different with the things that bug me but I am fed up to the back teeth of having to ask or remind him to do things all the bloody time.

Eg, he gets a sore throat, out come the throat sweets, cue days of me finding the wrappers left everywhere. I have asked him to put them in bin before (I shouldn't have to really) but you can guarantee there will be some left somewhere that I will end up picking up. I have tried just leaving rubbish around that he leaves, but it will just stay there until I deal with it.

I have been waiting for a certain box to go to the charity shop, it has been in our bedroom for months. Finally he is making 2 trips (that I have had to again, remind him about more than once), but as he couldn't carry this box and didn't have time this morning to nip back upstairs and pick it up (despite having been up for an hour and a half) he has said that he will take it to the tip. I usually have to remind him to go to the tip too. Last week we had cardboard boxes from flat pack furniture blocking half the kitchen for nearly 2 weeks.

We use reusable carrier bags, we keep them in the boot of the car as we have no where else to store them. He goes shopping, brings the bags in and will go in and out several times over the following days, but until I actually say "can you take them out to the car please" or get fed up and do it myself, which he will then say "I was going to do that" they will sit in the middle of the kitchen floor. I once put them in the doorway when I knew he was in and out and he just stepped right over them.

I always ask, nicey, I don't scream and shout, I get exasperated and I have told him that it is bad enough I am picking up after a toddler and I shouldn't have to after him all the time but he still does it, and gets huffy with me when I ask him! Things will improve for a few days, then it will go back to normal. I have M.E. and I am 7 months pregnant. I feel like all I do it try and keep things tidy by picking up after others. If I don't do it, the house very quickly ends up in a complete state where it will take me ages to get sorted and DH will say "just leave it" .

These are just a few examples but it is doing my fucking nut in!!!

My dh's favourite saying is "its not hurting anyone is it?" This is about paint brushes in jars when painting finished weeks ago,gym clothes on utilty room floor,recycling taking up whole kitchen,coats on back of kitchen chairs.
He has said it abit less as i am now 32 wks pg and am suffering from "pregnancy related rage" last time he said it i replied very rationally "neither is a big shit in the middle of the dining table but i wouldnt do it!!"

baking trays left to "soak" in my beautiful white ceramic sink,leaves rust marks,mail opened then chucked on the stairs.

Parenting book called how to talk so your kids will listen and listen so they will talk.
Substitute kids for men.
We have both read this book so when there are socks on the floor and I say "there are socks on the floor" he knows what I mean.
When there are wrappers left and I say "there are wrappers on the table" he knows what I mean.
I rarely have to get to the second stage of saying "the socks won't get washed if they aren't in the basket" or "SOCKS!"

We are He is still learning and should be fine when we reach 56.

I hate the word "nag" it seems to be way of controling women not to have an opinion or ask for something to be done.
My dh is also very slow to react,eg spilt drink just watched,getting on with atask,he aslo gets distracted by pretty much everything-tv pc papers etc, with no self disclipline to leave them.All bad enough now but not going to be so bearable with new baby.
"can you get a bottle/nappy please?" delayed response whilst baby screams arrrrgh

i nag.....i get an earful for nagging.

i don't nag.....it doesn't get done and i get more and more resentment building up inside until it ALL COMES ROARING OUT IN A MASSIVE TUMULT of RAGE!!!

[ repeat indefinitely ]

i think you dh is a bigamist...... iam married to him too

I have learned, after nearly 14 years, that NAGGING WORKS!

It seems you have little choice if they dont do stuff you have to ask/nag. I have spd at the mo so cant do some things so have no choice but to do it,the look on his face sometimes tells the story of a spoilt little boy who Mummy did everything for.

yes, totally agree with emmylou and welshbyrd bout the MIL's - mine still irons his shirts unbidden (as if to imply his wife should have done them) when she visits. grrr.

ginbob - I hope you say "that's very nice of you, MiL, here's a couple of mine too".

Actually I am the slob in our house. Apparently.

But if I am really that something is not done, I do it myself. And I don't fall for the "I was going to do that", I just say "well it needs doing" and set my jawline appropriately.

I read a very funny book about "taming" your man. For cases where he leaves lots of little items lying about instead of cleaning them away (their example was beard-hairs in the sink), they recommend you collect them up and put them in his drinking glass. When he queries this, you say, "Oh! I thought you were saving those." Could work for the cough-sweet wrappers, OP.

DH has looked after DS EVERY sunday morning since he was 2 weeks old - while I take DD and DS1 to swimming lessons. When I was BFing I'd feed right before I went out and as I was only out for under 2 hours he didn't have to fed him any EBM.

When DS2 was 6 months old I stopped breastfeeding so he could have his bottle at the normal time of 10.30am even when I was at the pool.

Week 1 - I made the bottle up, said DS2 needed it at 10.30am

Week 2 - same as week 1, showed him where bottle was. Said that DS2 always had 10.30am bottle.

Week 3 - made bottle up but didn't mention it. When I got back from gym DS2 is crying, DH said - he has been crying since 10.30am I don't know whats wrong - I said - did he drink his milk - to which DH said, milk what milk.

Week 4 - I made bottle and reminded him

Week 5 - Similar to week three. Bottle undrunk in fridge.

Week 6- as week 4

Week 7 - as week 3

Argh!

Oh God, DH could probably level a lot of this stuff at me - the boxes to the charity shop certainly rings true - but then he'd just put it all in the bin.

I put it down to the fact that his family of 4 lived in a 2 bedroom tenement flat. He didn't have his own bedroom till he was 18 AND his Mum childminded his cousin aswell. If stuff were left lying around it would be tripped over.

Re: next generation - 2 of our DSs tidy up without being asked, 2 don't. We raised them the same.

Oh these have really cheered me up. I know I am not alone at all.

Like the idea of putting the wrappers in his glass, going to try that one.

I do the 'jaw set' thing when I go marching past with something that has been sat around for days and then he says "I was going to do that."

The post about painting the front room ceiling made me laugh. We are trying to get stuff done in the house before DC2 arrives in 2 months and recently I kept asking him to do something (I can't remember what it was now). He proudly came in one day tell me that he had done something else, in a completely different room and didn't understand when I just looked incredulous and said "but thats not what needed doing right now" I gave up and just done a fake cry.

What is it about ripping open envelopes and leaving them on the side with the post? I bought a letter rack, he leaves it on the side board, in front of the letter rack. I have made a shoe box, he leaves his shoes in front of it!! Until DS started telling him off about that (with no prompting from me ), he puts his shoes away now. He will listen to his 2.10 DS but not his wife. At least I am getting DS trained early.

Ledk "its not hurting anyone" thats a favourite of DH's too. Are we all married to the same man, loads of bigamists on here.

I love "neither is a big shit in the middle of the dining table but i wouldnt do it!!"

I am so going to use that one.

MrM - what is nagging?

It is the repeated asking that a task be completed.

please put your rubbish in the bin

please put your rubbish in the bin

please put your rubbish in the bin

please put your rubbish in the bin

You haven't put your rubbish in the bin

Why won't you put your rubbish in the bin

If a woman has to nag - for nag read beg and plead - who is at fault here?

A woman shouldn't have to plead with her husband for him to put his dirty clothes in the washing basket, pick his dirty tissues off the floor, take some rubbish out...

But often we do have to beg and plead because what? we don't matter? Leaving crap all over the place because we'll go round picking it all up doesn't matter? Not doing something you've promised you'll do doesn't matter?

And then we are nags. We are nags because we end up begging for just a little consideration.

Nice.

Hmm, now it depends you see. YANBU apparently to state something once, but more than that is nagging. Note this only applies in the female tense (and let's face it we are tense because they are lazy feckers). For example for a man to remind you to iron his shirt that is not, apparently nagging. But purely an observation that you are much better at the task than him.

YABU to constantly remind him. I find setting fire to anything which is annoying the shit out of you because he hasn't moved it brings his attention gently to it without the accusation of nagging (though you may be accused or several other things, including arson ).

HTHWBOH it was a response to classydiva's comment: 'Sounds like a typical man'.

And that does sound like nagging. Frequent and repetitive 'reminders' that some menial job needs doing. If it was important, do it yourself!

Either the majority of men are useless or we're all married to the same man. I'm not in great health at present, having had a fairly serious illness recently. I thought seeing me carted off in an ambulance may have been the wake up call DH needed to realise I have too much on my plate. Wrong. I am still running round like an idiot doing everything while he saunters about doing bugger all.

Like picking up the dirty underpants your husband leaves on the floor. or picking up the dirty tissues he leaves on the floor, or washing his dirty pots or moving his shoes from where he's just kicked them into the middle of the room or...or...or...

At what point does it stop being acceptable for a woman to walk behind a man picking up his discarded dirty stuff and washing and cleaning his stuff?

It is important.

It's not our job to pick up stuff that our husbands think it's ok to throw onto the floor.

If they lived alone, would they be knee deep in dirty underpants and used tissues?

Not many!

So they do it because they think it's ok to leave it all for us.

Well it's not ok. Not at all. I am a wife, not a servant. If my husband treated me like the maid I'd be sporting a nice new pair of big round hairy earrings.

I had the same problem but it's not as bad now. I have a large box and throw everything of his into it - letters, things to mend, bags, wrappers, pants, trainers, reciepts etc ...

My DH is the same.

So what I do is focus on one thing at a time, and whenever he does do the thing, I praise him effusively.

E.g. the space between his side of the bed and the wall was a Stygian horror. I told him I wasn't going to tidy it up any more, and that it was up to him. Every time he cleaned it up, I noticed it and thanked him. Now it's not perfect but the ground doesn't crunch underfoot. He also now puts dirty clothes in the laundry basket.

Um. I got the technique from Supernanny but it does work.

I've also given up ironing. He wears the crumpled stuff anyway.

OMG!, reading this has made me realize that actually my DP is really quite good (not that I will let him know this of course {smile}.

He has been getting up extra early in the morning to clear the drive of snow and de-ices my car as well as turning the engine on 10 mins before I go to work to warm the car up for me and DD.

I think I must be quite lucky as he is generally quite tidy, (although the garage is a shit pit, but thats his domain!). He does put the washing on etc and looks after our daughter when I am away on business.

maybe I should appreciate him more?! {grin}

"If they lived alone, would they be knee deep in dirty underpants and used tissues?"

Yep.

He was before I moved in with him and freely admits he'd be like that if I moved out.

that's bloody disgusting.

I lived with someone who had far higher standards than me and I found it pretty soul destroying.

Now I'm on my own (apart from the children) it is a lot more relaxing. The house hasn't fallen down and the world hasn't ended because I do a lot less cleaning and no ironing whatsoever. But then again I don't think I could live with an adult again unless they had the same level of housework standards as me.

As in it'll get done when it gets done.

DH is the same. The only thing that works with him is to make it so inconvenient for him that he'll do it.

If he leaves rubbish lying around I will have a blitz, pick it all up and put it on his armchair or his place at the table, for instance. Sometimes he'll try the "what on earth is this?" tack, but I'll say "It's yours, I assume you want it as it's been lying around for weeks. Could you put it somewhere else please." He might huff and puff but he'll have been shamed into disposing of it.

If I'm particularly fed up with it then I might dump it in front of him when a friend's round. He'll be thoroughly pissed off then, but I smile blandly and he doesn't make a fuss in front of anyone else.

And MrM, you're just being silly with your last comment.