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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

...to think DH is being selfish?

41 replies

HerrenaHandbasket · 04/05/2013 18:32

We've spent the day en famille at a big beer festival and have had a lovely time with friends. I was mostly hanging out with my friends and our 2 DC, him mostly with his friends (although there was some crossover and he did a bit of child-wrangling).

A few hours before we left, he said that he wanted to go out in the evening with his mates. I said I'd rather he didn't, because the DC would be knackered and hellish to put to bed. He suggested coming back to help put the kids to bed and then going out again. I agreed to this as a compromise although I'd rather he actually wanted to stay home (and said so).

On our way back home we got into an argument about how he seems to think that if he wants to do something fun, he should just get to do it, even if I've asked him not to (and I don't usually veto without a good reason). He gets drunker than me and frankly I don't like him when he's drunk, because he turns into a pedantic arse. He was drunker than me today, I was relatively sober.

Finally in exasperation I told him that I'd rather he just buggered off out because he was annoying me. He jumped at the chance and ran off, even whilst conceding that it didn't seem fair on me.

So now I'm quietly seething about how selfish he is. AIBU?

OP posts:
complexnumber · 04/05/2013 18:36

You are being the grown up, no doubt.

But unless this is a regular thing, let him have his laugh.

You can claim back as and when.

samandi · 04/05/2013 18:49

Yes, he is.

attheendoftheday · 04/05/2013 18:51

Every time he goes out check when he's going to facilitate you having an equal period of leisure time.

Xales · 04/05/2013 18:52

So he deliberately engineered a fight so you would tell him to bugger off and he would get what he wanted in the first place. Leaving you upset/angry over it and to do everything alone.

Well played to a selfish, manipulative git.

Recognise it and don't fall for it again.

LindyHemming · 04/05/2013 18:52

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Gossipmonster · 04/05/2013 18:54

What Xales said.

INeedThatForkOff · 04/05/2013 18:55

I'm not sure why it was that much of a problem, given that he was going to do bedtime. Is it because you don't get spontaneous nights out?

MortifiedAdams · 04/05/2013 18:55

Dear me. So he asks if he can have a night out, you say no as the kids will be hard to settle for bed....he then says he will stay for bedtime and go out after and you still say no? YABspectacularlyU.

If id spent all day at a fanily event nd dh wanted to go out after that would ve totally fine. The fact that he offered to come home and do bedtime first is a bonus (thatI wouldnt have took.him up on but each to their own).

It would have been the same the other way round too if I had decided to go out after. What response would you have wnted or got from.DH if the tables were turned?

MortifiedAdams · 04/05/2013 18:56

He didnt engineer an argument - he disagreed with her viewpoint and it developed into an argument. Dear god - men get a fucking bad rep on here sometimes (n.b I am a woman)

WinkyWinkola · 04/05/2013 18:57

He actually doesn't give a tiny ray's arse how you feel, does he?

So, fine, he'll get pissed, have a laugh with his pals but how will he be tomorrow? Will it mean he needs the day off tomorrow?

I think you should have an impromptu spa day tomorrow. Leave him to cope with the dcs all day. A hellish bedtime is worth double normal daytime behaviour! Grin

Don't berate him about this just get some R+R yourself at the next opportunity.

WinkyWinkola · 04/05/2013 18:57

That is rat's arse

Xales · 04/05/2013 18:57

Eh? Did you misread she agreed to the compromise of him going out after.

He decided to argue and go out without helping do the bed time.

WorraLiberty · 04/05/2013 18:59

OMG someone actually mentioned spa dayz and only 11 months in

Could this be a record? Grin

OP I don't know why you wanted him to stay in with you after the kids went to bed, if you don't like him being drunk and pedantic?

Surely you'd rather he kept out of your way?

WorraLiberty · 04/05/2013 18:59

Posts - not months Blush

Machli · 04/05/2013 19:01

I'd be extremely pissed off if my partner said "no!" to me going out after I had said I would only go after kids were sorted. Too right I would still go out and I wouldn't give a fig what he thought of it especially if it didn't happen often.

Is there anything more to this? Because right now you do appear very unreasonable.

MortifiedAdams · 04/05/2013 19:01

She agreed but said she would rather he stayed home (and told him so). So she would have felt like this regardless.

Sorry but if I think I am right and DH is wrong I will defend that opinion. If I had asked to go out with friends one evening and he said no, then, on compromise agreed I 'could go after bathtime' (control freakery), id argue the toss. I imagine the thread on here would have made for altogether different reading too.

thebody · 04/05/2013 19:02

Why is bedtime 'hellish'.??

If your kids are old enough to take to a beer festival then they will be knackered. Tea bath and bed.

You relax with a glass and remote.

Why is it a big deal? Make sure you go out next with your mates and he does the bed time stuff.

Compromise.

LimitedEditionLady · 04/05/2013 19:04

I understand why youre mad.my oh is the same.
If it was me id think well we have had a nice day out together with friends and kids so lets go home together.
I think this way though because my oh always seems to have to go too far and im the one always left sorting child out.

Original poster
HerrenaHandbasket · 04/05/2013 19:23

Alright, some more detail (or it might be called drip-feeding; I find it hard to spot the difference sometimes).

He suggested the compromise solution, not me. Usually when he wants to do something and I say I'd prefer he didn't, he tries to explain how it's actually fine that he's doing it and then when I don't fall for it he just does it anyway Hmm so having a compromise offered is very novel.

Admittedly I probably would have found him a bit hard going as company for the evening whilst drunk, but it felt like we'd had a fun day altogether and I would have liked to chew it over with him on the walk home and then have had dinner together. Instead he'd prefer to head off to the pub with his mates, which stings a bit. And then he'll roll into bed at midnight smelling of beer, sweating and snoring. And then he'll be below-par tomorrow morning which means I get extra helpings of childcare. I'm a SAHM, I look forward to my weekend breaks.

I may be being a bit U but my feelings are a little hurt.

I don't think he engineered an argument btw, I was trying to explain my position and he was defending his.

Oh and I agree entirely with what limitededitionlady said - spot on.

OP posts:
LemonPeculiarJones · 04/05/2013 19:46

He sounds really selfish. And obviously he feels he is entitled to do whatever he wants.

Doesn't sound good.

YummyCalpol · 04/05/2013 19:54

Yet another case of a man thinking he can do as he pleases, and assuming that the woman doing the childcare is the default setting in the relationship.

OP, I'd do as suggested by another poster and go out for the day tomorrow. Nice and early, so that he has to get up and look after his children, hangover or no hangover.

MortifiedAdams · 04/05/2013 20:08

OP - I am curious, how would he have reacted had you been the one to want to go out? And how would you have wanted him to react.

It is not unreasonable for a parent to want a night out. OP has never said this is a regular thing.

Original poster
HerrenaHandbasket · 04/05/2013 20:21

Mortified - he'd have probably been fine with it as long as he didn't want to go out himself. When it's a choice between the two of us then he tends to get to go, mostly because it's my habit to try to make things easier for other people. He doesn't seem to do that when there's a competing event of his own.

I don't mind him going out, I just wish he wouldn't ask whether it's ok to do so and then ignore the answer. We've argued over that as well and he's agreed I have a point; I'd rather not have the illusion of choice dangled in front of me when in fact I don't have any.

He does go out regularly - once a week - with these same people. My friends live all over the place and seeing them takes more organisition whereas he just has to go to the pub.

OP posts:
WorraLiberty · 04/05/2013 20:37

OP, I'd do as suggested by another poster and go out for the day tomorrow. Nice and early, so that he has to get up and look after his children, hangover or no hangover.

I don't think that's fair on the kids really.

They've already been to a beer festival where neither parent was sober, they argued argued on the way home, and again right before the kids went to bed.

Do they really deserve a possibly hungover grumpy person to care for them in the morning?

Original poster
HerrenaHandbasket · 04/05/2013 21:02

We're not as terrible as you make us sound worra! We were at the festival for 5 hours and I had a grand total of 2 pints in that time, which were carefully nursed. We were there with a big group of people, some of whom we knew wouldn't drink more than 1 pint and who had agreed to tag-team in for childcare. And they were both asleep in the pram for the homeward argument.

I agree with your point that it wouldn't be fair if I buggered off for the day though.

OP posts:
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