To feel pissed off at my husbands attitide towards our home?!

[Dumbo412]

Today was the final straw, he took his car to get scrapped, walked home and trod oil onto the hallway carpet. It's so far been me and only me who has tried to get it out and I'm quietly fuming about it. I have anxiety about dirty carpets. No idea why but I do.

This all rests on other things.

The house hasn't been standing very long, in fact I've lived here for less than five months.

But still, in this time the kitchen cupboard has come off in my hand, he refuses to fix it.

The hallway is all dinged from when he tried to move the sofa through the hall and up the stairs.

Every bloody toilet seat in the house is broken.

The radiator in the hall was also knocked off the wall in the process of moving the sofa.

I also have only two sets of curtains up in the house (8 more sets to go) and not one solitary light shade.

Stuff that needed to go in the loft when we moved in was never moved up so the spare room that I intended on having as a dressing room is a junk room, and I have toolboxes is both the office and my bedroom.

Oh and I also have no mirrors up in the house either.

It doesn't feel homely and I'm pissed off with feeling like we've still just moved in.

Fwiw and so I don't drip feed, every issue he could sort. He's a builder and actually oversaw the build of the house we live in so it's not like he doesn't have the ability to do these things, and in fact would lose his shit if I saw it as something I wanted to do.

Maybe I'm being a cow, but I want a house to look nice and feel like home, but it doesn't. I fucking hate this house. I hate it.

Do these things yourself?????

What the fuck?????

Yes, the OP could do these things if she had to. I am fully confident in her ability to You Tube her way out of the situation. However, why the hell should she? She is not alone. It is not up to her to fix everything in the home, when there is a fully capable builder on-site daily. It is his house. It is his home. They are a team, and it is not up to her to try to cobble together skills, when he has them, but refuses to use them.

It is completely shitty of him to behave in a way that suggests that their home isn't worth not only maintaining, but also not willfully damaging.

I love DIY. But - if that was isn't the ops "specialization" in the relationship but his, and not only that but it's actually something he does for a living then shes completely right to be pissed of. That said - having a go at doing it yourself might not be a bad idea, if only if it shows him up a bit ;) . Start with the easier jobs and build up. It is immensely satisfying to put shelves up for example (even if it takes half a day) and you get a little self esteem boost each time you see them (unlike cooking, cleaning which is constantly being undone). Just use you tube etc to check you are doing it properly. And if he comments that it isn't done very well/that he could do better just say yes, but you didn't.

I have one arm and one leg and managed to fit a whole kitchen

Actually, I am joking. Yanbu. I think he should do most of the jobs if you are anything like me which it sounds like if it takes him 20 mins to do something you spend all day on. I see no point in not playing to one another's strengths. Mine is admin and technology, certainly not diy

Oh, and if you don't have any time to do any cooking, cleaning, other tasks because you've spent the day fixing up the house then that's a pity for him (sorry I know it seems sexist assuming that you do those things, but your comment about the oil on the carpet, and the fact he doesn't care about the house makes me think it probably is you). Just make sure you have a sandwich/takeaway for yourself

Yanbu.
He's a builder. It'd be a lot quicker for him to do it and he wouldn't need to research on bloody YouTube.
Does he do 50/50 housework etc?

It would be quicker for me to do the ironing as DH is useless at it. I'm still not ironing his bloody work shirts though.

Move out - live separately.

Get a handy man in to sort it?

Dumbo412 I feel your pain. Husband is not at all houseproud (don't think he's ever bought more than a tea towel) and doesn't see when things need fixing and doing. If I start to do it, he'll do the 'oh, I'll do it myself' thing and of course it doesn't get done.

He gets annoyed if I go to change a lightbulb, insists that he will do it, and days later, it's still not done, and when it does finally get changed, it's as if he's just built a space rocket. He'll even tell his mum that he's changed a light bulb during their conversations.
What he won't so readily tell him mum is that he disregarded my advice to take the old lightbulb to the store with him so that he gets the right replacement, and he didn't bother to do so, and then repeated the same thing - twice more.

This is why I generally buy our household supplies in bulk.

He has a real 'thing' about having tradesmen (or women) in our house and used to get irate when I called in the boiler repair man or the plumber. But I eventually got fed up and employed a handyperson to do the jobs that I couldn't do (I'm cack-handed at most DIY type things and know my limits). As well, I was working full-time (doing a weekly commute) and when at home, doing just about everything else - washing, cooking, shopping, and gardening - he would forget that plants needed watering, even as they withered and died in front of him).

After a couple times of having handypersons in the house, he called in his brother who works in the trades and was then unemployed, and his brother has since become our very own maintenance/handyperson.
Sorted.
This probably won't help you, but I'd suggest as others have that you get a handyperson to do the jobs you can't or are too busy to do (and it does sound as if you have a lot on your hands).

As for the complaints, I'd just get on and make them to the relevant persons myself...husband doesn't like complaining even when he is in the right, and if I didn't take charge, writing emails, letters, or phone-calls, it wouldn't get done.

Good luck with it....

I do ALL the DIY in our house. Annoys me sometimes but atleast it gets done

We'd still have unpacked boxes from 2.5 year ago otherwise!

I'd be annoyed too.
The attititude of "do it yourself" so often leads to the aggrieved person taken yet even more on their shoulders, while the other spouse/partner just gets less to do. Or at least that's what happens in my house. Yes, there are things I could do myself that my husband hasn't done when he said he would/should have. But why should I? If he was meant to do it, he should do it!

I imagine that's how the OP feels. Her husband is a builder, he oversaw the building work. Why is it now her job to sort out stuff that shouldn't be a problem in the first place or to do DIY he's meant to be doing. I doubt the OP is sat around twiddling her thumbs.

Make a list of the things that bug you the most OP and then you and your husband should agree who will do what and by when. Write it down and pin it up somewhere!

Yes, the OP could do these things if she had to. I am fully confident in her ability to You Tube her way out of the situation. However, why the hell should she? She is not alone. It is not up to her to fix everything in the home, when there is a fully capable builder on-site daily. It is his house. It is his home. They are a team, and it is not up to her to try to cobble together skills, when he has them, but refuses to use them

It takes no skill to fit a light shade or hang a mirror or polyfilla over a ding, or lug stuff to the loft, it certainly doesn't need a builder. It's both their home, they should both do stuff, it's not "his" house, or "his " home, as far as I'm aware it's both their house and home. They are a team and that means they both do their share or do it together,

so bluntness he gets oil on the carpet and walks away and OP should deal with it? He damages the walls but again not his problem?

You see no lack of respect or accountability there? How odd.

Sure, the OP can do all this DIY herself. And her DH can cook his own dinner, do his own laundry, etc. Bet he doesn't.

I already said the carpet would have annoyed me. But yes if my husband damaged the wall moving the sofa, I'd happily fix it. That's team work.

However it's not the point. The op hates her home because of some simple jobs she could easily do. Why, live in a way you hate rather than fit a light shade. I honestly don't get that, it's a two second job.

Sure, the OP can do all this DIY herself. And her DH can cook his own dinner, do his own laundry, etc. Bet he doesn't.

WTAF? What is this the 1950s?

My husband must be a very unique specimen clearly as his penis doesn't prevent him from cooking and similar domestic jobs. Just as my beef curtains don't render me unable to do some DIY/go up the loft ladder

Bluntness, I think you may have missed my point that I do all of the housework, I do all the cooking, ironing,washing and shopping on top of a paid job.

It's not all one sided. I know it may seem like that, but honestly it isn't. The DIY jobs that were allocated to him were supposed to be done when I virtually moved us out of the last house on my own as "his part"

If his part of the deal is to hang a few sets of curtains and a few mirrors and deal with the maintenance on the house, I think he's got off quite lightly.

If I were to add up the time that it would take him to fulfill these tasks it would be less than the time I spend doing chores for both of our benefit.

It's "our" home, "our" curtains, "our light shades" "our" mirrors, "our" radiator that he has been expected to sort,
But it's also "our" dinner that I cook, "our" washing that I do, "our"toilets that I scrub, "our" carpets that I hoover, "our" shopping that I do, "our" bills that I pay.

I will go further and explain things that are solely his that I do, his ironing, when he needs a new job, it's me that applies for them for him- DH wouldn't have an idea what his CV actually says about him, more often than not if he needs to write a letter, it is I that writes it.

I do a lot for him that I shouldn't necessarily have to do, but I do it because it makes his life easier.

Maybe we have an unconventional relationship, but if there was anything that I could do to make his life easier, I wouldn't just let him get on with it. And there are skills I have, and skills he has. I think If he did some of the household DIY it would be equal.

That's my point, not that because I'm a woman I shouldn't have to do any of these things. I can fill holes, I could do the cupboard, I could do the radiator, I could do the light shades, but why should I when there's a perfectly capable man who is also capable of taking care of many things, but that I do as his wife, and because they are "my" skills?

As others have said, it depends a lot what hours you both work, and what the share of domestic chores is. Very few of those jobs are things you'd get builder in to do - they're things anyone can learn...personally, I'd feel weird waiting for someone else to put up curtains for me, and a bit insulted if someone suggested that would be too hard for me. If you're dead set on not doing those things, tell him you're going to get someone in to do the jobs - that may prompt him to do it rather than have some bloke in doing them instead!
The oil on the carpet is a bit different, but some people just don't see those things as important (I avoid getting my OH to do some jobs such as painting, because he'll get paint on the floor, skirtings etc, but to him it's good enough, he just doesn't see why it would matter!).
OP, you either have to explain how much mess and dirt bugs you if you think he'd care enough to be more careful then, or accept that he doesn't see it.

I get the feeling the oil on the carpet was the 'last straw' of her DH basically not caring about their home. Of course he should do some of the DIY jobs, he's a builder and it's his home too.

I get the feeling from the OP that all the 'home' stuff is left to her - whilst he treads oil along the carpet, and knocks radiators off the wall without a worry. That would piss me off.

Brass brass, exactly!

Mundane! Exactly, he can cook, but I cook better. Therefore it's my job.

Ah, so you feel there are wife soils and husband skills! Does he know about these lists? Did he agree to that plan? All sounds a bit 1950's, but I guess if you agree to live like that, he should honour his side of it...
... But if the list is just your view, you may need to explain all the things that you exclusively do, and he doesn't, to show why you think its fair that he should do this list of jobs.

Squigglegirl - nailed it.

There's a real issue here about the division of labour that seems to me is being overlooked. The OP has said that she also works, which probably leaves her little time for learning to fix radiators (which is really a job for a skilled plumber). As well as doing all the cooking and washing all the other domestic stuff, and all the work that goes into making a house a comfortable home, which her husband benefits from.

Why others feel that she should simply learn DIY is beyond me, especially when her husband is in the trades. He has the skillsets, she doesn't and no doubt she brings her own particular skills to making their home. They both moved into the house together, they live in it together, and he needs to do his fair share.

I'd be pissed off too if my husband tracked oil into the house and didn't even think to clear it up or even offer to help.

My husband would think nothing of walking all over a floor that I'd just mopped which pissed me off no end, until I snapped and let him know just how disrespectful of me and my labour he was being. I realised later that it was something that he, his brother and father would do in their family home and my MIL tolerated it - as well as being their general dogsbody.

I know exactly how the OP feels, living with someone who doesn't realise and appreciate that shower curtains need washing occasionally, that the shower tiles need cleaning, that the entire toilet including the pedestal (or the toilet brush) doesn't magically clean itself, and that having a self-cleaning oven doesn't mean that it never has to be cleaned by human hands, that mirrors have to be cleaned, that wooden floors have to be maintained, that curtains have to be changed and washed every so often. There is no magic fairy that changes the bedding weekly, turns the mattress every so often, polishes the furniture, waters the house plants, replaces broken appliances, decrumbs the toaster, and the 1001 small and larger things that have to be done to keep the home clean and comfortable.

So much of what we do is hidden work, and so much gets taken-for-granted and is unappreciated.

Even if the OP was skilled at or felt inclined to learn DIY skills, there's no reason why her DH can't and shouldn't do his fair share.

Telling the OP that she needs to watch a YOUTUBE vid and learn to do things herself just enables her DH to evade his responsibilities to her and to their home. And sets a poor example for any children they have.

Sorry 'skills', not 'soils'!

How do toilet seats break in less than 5 months? What are you doing to them?!

My OH is a tradesman, the reason I don't do any DIY is because all of the tools are in vans half way round the county, not at home when I need them! Although he did buy me my own screwdriver set a few months ago, I'd been assembling flat pack for years with a Leatherman! :D