...just by ironing my shirt is not being supportive

[Katyloo77]

My DH works long hours, he is away from home all week. We have DS whom is 7. When he comes home on a weekend he always falls asleep early and is a real grump. I have to understand his work pressures and appreciate he is working to provide for all of us. However, in return I run the home, the house is always spotless when he comes home and welcoming as he would be worse if things just weren't so. I look after all the finances, do the cooking, cleaning, gardening, Washing, ironing, everything related to the home. I don't think he has ever read with DS and if on the rare occasion I have asked for help with his homework 5 minutes in he will start been frustrated with DS and then tell me he doesn't want to do it. I leave him in bed when he is home and get up early with DS ...even take him a coffee up. I have seen this as my role in the relationship to make things work together, although I do feel quite neglected but just get on with it. However this morning DH said to me "you don't support me, you think because you iron a shirt for me it's support!" I feel very hurt by this and quite a mug ...AIBU?

He is a dick.

He is right about one thing though. You do need counselling. Go and get it.

The things you are doing, the things you are scared of not doing, the things you are scared of saying, the things you are putting up with him saying and doing, well, let's just say that your head isn't a place of normality. He has said you need help, go and get it, I doubt it will end well for him but frankly hopefully through the counselling the MUG tattoo will be gone and you'll laugh at his The Big I Am, bully treatment.

Yes, talk to others. Why would that be disloyal? You aren't planning on telling barefaced lies are you?

Cleaning the house isn't support.

If roles were reversed and you did those long hours away from home, had your wages controlled by him whilst he had every school day alone to himself (let's face it housework doesn't take that long) would you not be resentful in any way?

It sounds like he needs to work less and you more. A more even keel may help him feel more supported and you less in need of validation.

I think, presuming that you want your marriage to work, you're being given very bad advice here which is looking at this in a very one sided way.

It sounds like for whatever reason you have got into a situation where both of you feel that the other does not appreciate your role in the family. As a poster above said, support is not just practical but emotional. We can't really tell what it is from your post, as it's about what you feel and you do, but there are plenty of good reasons he might feel this way. I know in my family my husband complains that I have a tendency to treat work commitments as some sort of optional inconvenience when he actually doesn't have much of a choice about staying late or working overtime sometimes. Or perhaps he feels you're uninterested in his life outside the home?

On the flip side of the coin obviously you feel that he has no idea how much you are doing and he's not valuing it as much as he should do. So actually it sounds like both of you are feeling very much the same thing.

You need to sit down and talk about this and both get off your chests how you're feeling and decide what both of you need to feel more supported and valued. Possibly this is a case where counselling would be valued.

You're going to get lots of advice telling you he's a complete bastard and you should read him the riot act and tell him you're perfect and he's a piece of shit because that's what people do on Mumsnet. But in reality that's not going to solve any of your problems and will just make them worse. It won't make him appreciate how much you're doing and how undervalued you feel. And it will just confirm his feelings about being unsupported. It sounds like you're both in a rut of not communicating and resenting one another. It could probably be fairly easily solved if you're prepared to listen to one another's point of view and work on it.

It doesn't sound like he IS willing to listen though:

He doesn't want OP to work (read wants her to be dependant on him)

She tries to talk with him and he puts all the onus of their relationship problems onto her by telling her she needs 'help'.

That sounds pretty controlling to me.

OP - I'm in a similar-ish position to you in that my DH is extremely work focused and always has been. He definitely takes his self-appointed "provider" role very seriously, but tbh, I don't think he would be any different if he was a single man. I don't think he knows how to stop and no amount of money or success is ever going to be enough, it seems. It's very hard to think about going back to work when you're with someone like this because you can't change them and everything else falls to you. In our case we have 4 DC and I've been a SAHM for about 13 years.

I think your DH is being very grumpy and rude, quite frankly, but when he says you're not supporting him, he is probably saying that he feels the intimacy between you is lacking, or that he's missing a connection with you.

Where couples have very distinct roles, it's so easy to feel like you're in separate worlds and resentment / loneliness can build up if you're not very careful. Do you go anything as a couple? I guess it's very difficult if he's not there at all during the week. You feel like you've given up everything to facilitate him, while he probably feels as if he's on the periphery of the family.

Supporting him should not mean you're a dustbin for him to offload on. If he wants to feel more appreciated, he needs to realise it's a two way street. I do pretty much everything for DH too when he's here, but more importantly, we prioritise going out as a couple every week for dinner, or even just for a run, because it all means nothing if you lose that connection and start taking each other for granted.

Of course cleaning the house is support, any domestic work a SAHP does is support and a massive contribution to family life.
My exH was like this - passive aggressive huffing and puffing and sighing and complaining and then whenever I tried to explore or probe deeper to find out what the problem was he would deny there was a problem. Grrrrr! Drove me nuts. In the end I just ignored him and got on with my own life cheerfully. I did everything I was expected to do in terms of the domestic work and raising our children but I stopped seeking an emotional life with him. I treated him like s rather bad tempered flat mate which he was really. It was the only way to survive but in the long run it was of course unsustainable.
It takes two to make an emotional life - your DH is allowing you to do all the emotional work and not giving anything back, refusing to engage with you and being critical of the work you are doing - well, minimising what you do at least. That's emotionally cruel and ultimately unsustainable.

I think I remember a previous thread of the OPs actually and just refreshed my memory on it. The DH is actually working two jobs, one full and one part time. Sorry, but by comparison keeping house with a 7 year old who is at school most of the time is a walk in the park. Plus the OP is suffering from what sounds like pretty bad MH issues.

I really do sympathise with the OP. But I have to say I also sympathise with a man who is working two jobs and supporting a partner with MH difficulties then coming home to be told he's not doing enough. It doesn't sound like this is a very easy situation for anybody.

BillSykes, did you read the part where the DH just shuts his eyes and ignores the OP when she tries to talk to him?