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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU or is DP - wine!!!

139 replies

BostonIvy · 14/11/2014 16:27

I am divorced, but during my marriage I got into the habit of drinking a large glass of wine a night during the week, and half a bottle on a friday then again on a saturday...

I realise this was too much and it was a habit I wanted to break.

DP and I have been together for 6 months, he drinks very little, a bottle of beer at the weekends.

It gradually came about that he laid down the law, until I was only 'allowed' to drink wine on a friday. I can share a beer with him on a saturday and sunday.

Last weekend we fell out about it, I said I thought he was being controlling, he said that he has never asked anything of me, only that I don't drink wine as he feels I change after just one glass (he is massively overreacting) and that it's not too much to ask that I don't drink around him. I said if he felt that strongly then I wouldn't... It's now the weekend I I fancy a glass of wine! He says I'm going back on my word.

His mother had an alcohol problem as does his best friend so he is oversensitive to the issue.

I'm in my thrities and feel I am being treated like a naughty child for wanting a glass or two of wine at the weekends, aibu?

OP posts:

sunflower49 · 14/11/2014 20:14

I think he's in the wrong. You're an adult. You're not an addict, you just want a glass of wine and you're allowed to have one. I'm with the camp that says if someone tells me I can't have something (or someTHING, like a diet!) I'll want it more-and in the case of a DP/DH telling me, I'd take great objection to being told what to do.
He is being controlling. And he shouldn't be-you're in a new relationship which makes it worse!

Tell him if you want a glass of wine, you'll have one. And if he has an issue with that small amount, then he needs to look into why. If It's his past, then he needs to learn about the differences between substance abuse, and relaxing with a glass of wine of an evening-there are vast ones!

I'd be worried about the future if he's this controlling this early on.

Roussette · 14/11/2014 20:14

Why on earth "follow his guidelines"? Who the hell is he to set down guidelines?

I get Gelf that you are saying this to test him but to be honest I couldn't be arsed. He should accept her for her.

Chunderella · 14/11/2014 20:36

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

girlygeekette · 14/11/2014 20:42

Unfortunately in relationships, you have to compromise :(

lomega · 14/11/2014 20:45

If my DH told me I couldn't have a glass of wine when I wanted, I'd laugh, and then have a whole bottle just to piss him off.

Janethegirl · 14/11/2014 20:48

If you think there's any long term future for your relationship, I'd find a drink you enjoy that could contain alcohol or may not be alcoholic and watch his responses. Ensure he doesn't know when alcohol is involved or not, and monitor his comments....something like vodka n orange(with or without the vodka) or gin n tonic (gin optional) and see if he can tell the difference.
My guess is he is just controlling...

Janethegirl · 14/11/2014 20:53

Iomega me too

cerealqueen · 14/11/2014 20:55

It gradually came about that he laid down the law, until I was only 'allowed' to drink wine on a friday. I can share a beer with him on a saturday and sunday.

He is transferring all his issues with alcohol onto you.

BarbarianMum · 14/11/2014 20:56

Ultimately if you like to drink and he doesn't like to be around you when you do, you are not compatible and should split up. I'm teetotal and my tolerance for being around people relaxing their way through a bottle of wine is limited. Dh gets this and has cut back since we've been together. That was his choice - he prefers to be w me.

run2 · 14/11/2014 21:11

Sounds like he's putting his own hang ups before your relationship. You're drinking sounded regular but not excessive to me.

ThatDamnedBitch · 14/11/2014 21:23

He likes to be head of the house.

Head of the fucking house! You've only been together for 6 months! I'd be hitting him over the head with the fucking house! Who in this day and age talks like that? Oh right, sexist controlling wankers that's who.

Get rid of him OP. You'll get far more pleasure out of your glass of wine than you will out of him, all he'll give you is grief, heartache and low self esteem.

ThatDamnedBitch · 14/11/2014 21:26

girlygeekette there's compromising and there's being told what to do. Compromising is one person doing the dishes whilst the other hoovers. Being told what to do is being told you can't do something by your supposed partner (or in this case "head of the house" ) and then being worried about the consequences if you don't obey. Or in other words being controlled by an abusive man.

BadLad · 14/11/2014 21:56

There isn't going to be any pleasure in drinking wine for you in this relationship.

Get rid. Life's too short to deprive yourself of enjoying pleasures in moderation.

Minerves · 14/11/2014 22:37

Even your drinking before didn'ts eem excessive to me

controlling and manipulative is right.

if this was me i'd be rethinking that relationship.

sunflower49 · 15/11/2014 16:34

janethegirl 's idea is genius.

clam · 15/11/2014 16:41

Head of the house??!!!!

Is he stuck in the 1950s or something?!

Bulbasaur · 15/11/2014 17:02

It gradually came about that he laid down the law, until I was only 'allowed' to drink wine on a friday. I can share a beer with him on a saturday and sunday.

It's obviously not about his hang up on alcohol then if you can drink beer with him. He's being controlling. I'd get rid. It's one thing to express discomfort and ask a partner to stop something. It's another entirely to decide when they are allowed to drink.

mrspremise · 15/11/2014 17:49

I would entirely put wine before a dickhead like this... Then again, I would probably put ironing, sweeping the chimney and putting an octopus into a string bag before a dickhead like this...

Bulbasaur · 15/11/2014 17:59

putting an octopus into a string bag

I have never heard this expression before.

Are do you literally just put an octopus in a string bag to prepare for cooking, or does this a common saying for something else?

mrspremise · 15/11/2014 18:09

it's perhaps a family saying then... It means to do something impossible

Bogeyface · 15/11/2014 18:15

We have a similar one "nailing fog to the floor"!

riverboat1 · 15/11/2014 18:23

Hmm. I identify with you in so far as I enjoy a large glass of wine most nights, and more at the weekends. I also have been trying to cut back. And I also have a DP who drinks much less.

However, DP has never been bothered by my drinking habits so that's where the similarity ends between us.

I am trying to think how I would have felt/reacted if he had brought up the issue as your DP has had, when we were 6 months into our relationship. I'm not sure if I'd have felt defensive and judged or worried that he had a point and I needed to cut way back.

I do think it seems OTT to say you 'change' after one large glass of wine. I can't think of anyone I know who would significantly change after one glass, though I suppose you'd be more attuned to it in a partner you spent every night with.

I definitely think he IBU to insist you only drink certain things at certain times and only with him. This is crossing the boundary from concerned to controlling, as far as I see it. I wouldnt be having that.

I think the trick will be finding a compromise that you can both live with, given that he obviously is uncomfortable around alcohol, but you enjoy wine and don't want to have 'rules' about when you can drink it. There is validity in both sides, but his proposal is U as I see it.

PetiteRaleuse · 15/11/2014 18:31

My head says yanbu.

But my heart says that as the daughter of an alcoholic, who died from drink, I empathise with him. It's really really hard to gain perspective on alcohol when you have been brought up by an alcoholic. Really hard.

I won't have spirits or beer in the house for example, only wine and fortified wine such as port. I also loathe any sign of drunkeness.

It's the way my childhood has made me. My DH loves a drink and I regularly have to not accuse him of drinking too much as having seen what it does, for me getting drunk is the worst thing possible. But he isn't actually drinking too much, except on occasion.

So yanbu, but don't underestimate the impact of being scared to your bones of alcoholism.

PetiteRaleuse · 15/11/2014 18:33

Oh. And I know that my only wine rule is unreasonable. But my alcoholic parent didn't drink it, so it doesn't have the connotations that beer and whisky do, for example.

carlsonrichards · 15/11/2014 18:33

Compromise? He is a boyfriend of 6 months with issues and a controller.

Dump.

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