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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to ask why do some very capable men sometimes act so incapable at home?

131 replies

Topseyt · 21/07/2015 22:50

DH tried to tell me this evening that he had no idea how to press the pager button on the base unit of our landline phone so that it would beep and he could locate it to listen to a message. He does know how. He has done it before. Hmm Suddenly though, with me out collecting DD1 from her friend's house, he isn't able any more. ConfusedHmm

Once he had it in his paw, he then tried to claim that he had no idea how to listen to messages on it. Again, something he has done many times before, it isn't a new phone.

I'd bet that he wouldn't do it at work - telling the boss that he hasn't done something he was asked because he suddenly became inexplicably incapable of listening to his voicemail or reading his emails.

He wonders why I looked askance at him.

OP posts:
ollieplimsoles · 21/07/2015 22:54

Its almost like my dh looses his senses at home! He's a software developer and works in a team all day, but when I ask him to take our cups downstairs and wash them, he takes only his cup...then leaves it by a sink full of water!

He cant work the washing machine and doesn't seem to know where things in the house are kept (even thought its his house too) and he won't look for anything before he has asked me where it might be- like I'm some oracle of where everything is...

sharonthewaspandthewineywall · 21/07/2015 22:55

Yesterday we got back off holiday so I'd unplugged all electrical appliances. He was moaning I was watching emmerdale and he couldn't possibly miss the golf so off he went upstairs. 30 seconds later 'Sharon the telly isn't working' so I shout up I've unplugged everything plug all the plugs back in. I hear clattering and then 'no it's not working'
I go upstairs and the stand by button is flashing on and off and not working at all. In all of 10 seconds with a quick unplug and plug back in of a cable at the back it's fine.
I honestly despair at his lack of problem solving skills

sharonthewaspandthewineywall · 21/07/2015 22:56

Oh Ollie that drives me mad. It's like they expect you to have a grid reference of where everything in the sodding house is

AskBasil · 21/07/2015 22:59

They're not incapable.

They're lazy and selfish.

They pretend to be incapable so that you'll do it.

Read Wifwork it gives you a whole list of all the strategies men use not to do their fair share of housework and why.

AdoraBell · 21/07/2015 23:07

Mine called me To "help" him chop a pepper at the IL's last weekend. I was Dashing To the loo, FIL accidentely glútened meHmm, so I told him To wait. When I arrived in the kitchen he had somehow managed To wrestle the vegetable into submission all by himselfGrin he knows better than To be useless at home but seems To revert To type at Mummy's house, FFS.

EatShitDerek · 21/07/2015 23:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

drudgetrudy · 21/07/2015 23:09

Because it suits them and someone else takes the responsibility.

Imustgodowntotheseaagain · 21/07/2015 23:11

Because they're lazy.

Original poster
Topseyt · 21/07/2015 23:12

At least it appears I am in good company.

Yes, he also thinks I must magically know where everything in the whole house is. He is the most chaotic and disorganised person in this house. His study (if you can call it that) is a total bombsite. He isn't allowed to let it spill over into the rest of the house.

OP posts:
reni1 · 21/07/2015 23:15

I know some very capable women acting very incapable around flat pack furniture or punctured tyres. I imagine it's the same thing, some helpful angel/ knight will come to the rescue.

AskBasil · 21/07/2015 23:20

How often does the average person have to put together flat pack furniture?

it's not daily, is it?

HerRoyalNotness · 21/07/2015 23:22

It's because

a) they don't have the room in their massive brains for such trivial stuff;

b) they are not practical; or

c) they know you know and can just ask you instead of putting in the effort themselves

reni1 · 21/07/2015 23:23

True, the workload lands on women. But damsel in distress is the other side of that.

CassieBearRawr · 21/07/2015 23:24

Because they can.

drudgetrudy · 21/07/2015 23:26

Agree with reni too-people of both genders can act incapable if they don't want to do something.

reni1 · 21/07/2015 23:30

The first thing we can all do is stop rescuing, especially children. Show 12yo ds how to iron his uniform and dd how to fix her bike. And don't rescue our grown up dps either.

SallyRie · 21/07/2015 23:30

LTBs

Destinysdaughter · 21/07/2015 23:39

I had a boyfriend at uni who, when I asked him to cook would invariably ruin the meal, turned out later he did it on purpose, just didn't want to do it. Fortunately most guys I've been with since have been excellent cooks but what I'm trying to say is like Cassie says, because they can! Wifework is also an excellent and eye opening book about how, once many men get married, the marriage becomes like something out of the 1950s.

Original poster
Topseyt · 21/07/2015 23:45

I have put together flat pack furniture. Not often, granted, and it isn't always made easy by the instructions, but I have. I also fairly regularly do the engine fluids and screen wash in my car. Likewise the tyre pressures. DH remembers to do his once in a blue moon.

Hubby likes his bicycle. He fixes punctures on that. I have nothing to do with the bike. It is his baby, I keep my distance

OP posts:
Innermagic · 21/07/2015 23:46

It's their mothers fault!

avocadotoast · 21/07/2015 23:46

It starts young though, doesn't it?

DH and BIL rarely had to do anything at home afaik. MIL is lovely but did everything. DH left home at 18 and learned to fend for himself. BIL went straight from PIL's house to living with his now-fiancé.

Guess whose house has the fairer split of chores and general householdy stuff.

(I'm not saying our house is perfect; it's not, far from it. But BIL's fiancé recently started working full time after being a SAHP for a few years and he still expects her to do all the house stuff. It's bullshit.)

Postchildrenpregranny · 21/07/2015 23:49

I once asked DH to write a note for the milkman.He said ' oh darling ,you do it .You're so much better at that sort of thing...' DDs have never let him live it down
I agree it's because it's boring and if they know how to do it they'll have to do it .i've solved (!) it by making DH solely responsible for some jobs .I genuinely don't know how our dishwasher works ,for example (I know where the instruction manual is though) And bins are his area of responsibility, as is putting clean bed linen on the bed, hoovering ,pumping car tyres(it's my car) ..You get the idea .
I sometimes wonder how DH managed a large team ,a mahoosive budget and met a weekly deadline and achieved various awards for his work .In 33 years of marriage I don't think he has ever run out of clean socks but it never occurs to him to check the airing cupboard before asking plaintively .....And if I stood around waiting for flat pack furniture to be put together I'd wait forever .(We did manage to put an Ikea table together recently without swearing or tears or anyone flouncing off though .A first)
I have made every friend I have with DSs promise to bring them up to be capable on the domestic front.I thought it was a generational
Thing though .Cerainly my DDs wouldn't put up with it

Original poster
Topseyt · 21/07/2015 23:50

He isn't Mr. Practical though.

OP posts:
sharonthewaspandthewineywall · 21/07/2015 23:52

I have a son who will certainly not turn out like this. He willingly does chores and shows an active interest in how domestic appliances operate so he can contribute to the household he lives in

coffeeisnectar · 21/07/2015 23:58

Dp was in the forces for years and before I moved in had been living alone for three years.

Yet I ask him to cook dinner (he can cook) and he can't make a decision on what to cook.

Today we were blitzing the house and in the time he did the bathroom I did the kitchen, living room and dining room because he kept showing me stuff or asking why there was an empty shampoo bottle on the shelf. I don't know...because kids live here? Just throw it away ffs!! Then there was the bloody shoe rack with his whining about there being too many shoes on it. Yes including shoes belonging to his dc who hasn't been here for months and they are two sizes too small. God, it was exhausting!

At least he does the ironing without needing any help.