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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be fed up about the rice pudding.

21 replies

HostofDaffodils · 21/12/2017 23:17

Retired husband has been at home this week. Daughter is home from university. Daughter's boyfriend is also with us - as he's been having some family difficulties. I've been at work.

My husband seems avoidant when it comes to difficult conversations so the work of getting my daughter and her boyfriend to tidy up and also to find out what he's doing about resolving his family difficulties has fallen to me. My daugher also seems to have been tired and unwell and it seemed to fall to me to find out that she was having bad period pains.

Today the plan was that my daughter and her boyfriend would cook. I was working late. The meal would include a home made rice pudding which I sometimes make and which my daughter wanted to try doing because her boyfriend likes rice pudding but has only eaten the tinned kind. At breakfast I showed my husband where the recipe was and also some of the ingredients. The pudding rice was near the front of the cupboard in a cellophane pack labelled 'pudding rice' so it seemed unnecessary to flag this up. Just before I left for work my daughter told me she was on her fifth day of cramps/breakthrough bleeding after having gone on the pill to try and deal with painful periods.

Then I went to work.

I got home to find my husband and daughter at loggerheads. He was cross that she'd not started cooking it at the time he thought it should have been started and also earlier neither of them could see the pudding rice so he'd gone to the supermarket to buy more. He'd then decided to make the rice pudding himself, which she was cross about because she'd wanted to do it and didn't see that the timing was that urgent. Meanwhile my husband was furious with her not only for not having started cooking earlier but for leaving the living room in a mess.

I just felt rather cross with everyone because I'd got in late and tired but everyone wanted to tell me how unreasonable everybody was. I felt perhaps particularly cross with my husband on the grounds that I thought he should have been more grown up and wasn't dealing with cramps. But he just wanted to moan at me and then accused me of being unsupportive.

Is it unreasonable of me to want to emigrate?

OP posts:

Crumbs1 · 21/12/2017 23:25

So your adult daughter has period pain but you expect your husband to sort it out? Is that not something she does for herself? It would bevkind to make her a hot water bottle but she could always ask, no?
The whole rice pudding thing is just nonsense. It’s rice pudding. It matters not a jot.
I’d be cross if she’d left the sitting room in a state too.

AdaColeman · 21/12/2017 23:31

Don't emigrate over a rice pudding.
Tomorrow open a tub of ice cream for pudding, all will be well with the world.

MyKingdomForBrie · 21/12/2017 23:31

crumbs I think you’ve read that wrong - as in he could have been nicer because he wasn’t having to deal with cramps whereas she was.

It is annoying to be nagged to start cooking on someone else’s schedule. Having a permanent house guest at this time of year must be tricky too.

Overall I think yes I’d be annoyed at your DH for not keeping the peace and leaving dd to it with the cooking. So what if dinner was a bit late.

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 21/12/2017 23:41

I think I was annoyed with people for not communicating with each other.

My daughter had only just confided in me this morning that going on the pill to deal with bad period pains seemed to have been making things worse - five days of cramps as opposed to the normal one. She is obviously feeling drained, but clearly hadn't really communicated this to her Dad yet. I wasn't able to pass this on before I left for work

I don't mind him getting annoyed because she can be a bit of a slob. But I'd rather he sorted it out with her, than wait till I got in from work and immediately start moaning at me.

I think he had this idea that dinner including the * pudding should be on the table for the minute I walked in from work. But his behaviour made my return from work quite stressful as he'd worked himself up into a state, riled our daughter and the tension had also communicated itself to her boyfriend. (I'd have been quite happy with a cup of tea and to be told when a meal was likely to appear.)

OP posts:

BackforGood · 21/12/2017 23:58

As both of my dc have come back from University, their meal timings are completely out of sync with those of us still living as a family at home.
ds - who quite likes cooking - would often say "I'll cook a {insert curry / chilli / whatever} tonight then we'd get in from work and he wouldn't have started thinking about it. At university, he wouldn't start cooking until about 8. At home (because all of us have things we go out to in the evenings) we don't eat any later than 6pm. Neither of us is 'wrong' it just takes a while to get used to living together, after they have had the freedom from other family constraints.
Your dh needs to recognise that - as he is the one home all day with her. If he needs the food to be ready by a certain time (as I would) then that needs to be explained to her.
The mess is a different matter.
Yes, if he is the one there, then he needs to deal with dd and not whine to you when you get in, like he is her sibling. With 3 adults in the house all day, you ought to be able to just come in and relax in the evening.

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 22/12/2017 03:15

I absolutely agree about the way in which student routines are different from those of their parents.
However, last night nobody was going out so there wasn't any need for the meal to be ready and served at a particular time. And although it was reasonable to think I might be hungry and want something to eat not long after I got back from work, there really wasn't any problem about having dessert rather later. (We normally just have one course and if we do have a second, have a pause before eating dessert.). So it just seemed as if my husband had got it into his head that we 'should' be eating at a particular time and when my daughter wanted to finish watching a film with her boyfriend - which was due to end in 20 minutes - my husband decide that he would 'have to' take over making the rice pudding. Which seemed to make everyone concerned very cross indeed.

OP posts:

Bubbaleo · 22/12/2017 06:41

The last of our brood left the nest a month ago (age 26) We're still celebrating! Sorry, not very helpful but can give you hope for future peace and harmony!

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 22/12/2017 07:51

I am not sure that I will totally celebrate my daughter's departure though of course I hope that she finds work and a place to live after she graduates.

At the moment I feel that being left with just one child who is at university much of the time has shed a spotlight on the those parts of my relationship with my husband that need adjusting.

With his stepchildren and our daughter he has - in many ways - been hopeless about expecting them to do chores or in talking to them about unsatisfactory behaviour. That has always been left up to me and/or he has assumed that as the parent with less paid work I would do all the tidying and tending myself. He would also sit happily/obliviously in the mess they had made. Since my daughter has gone to university the house has got tidier. But now when my daughter comes home - and regresses a bit as students do - he seems to become angry without being able to actually ask her (and boyfriend) to pick up stuff they've left lying around etc. I am vaguely wondering whether he is also finding it hard to accept she has a boyfriend. (There was somebody before but this seems to be a more important relationship.)

OP posts:

mickeysminnie · 22/12/2017 08:08

Bubbaleo

AdalindSchade · 22/12/2017 08:24

I think your daughter should have stopped her film to prepare dinner actually. I think he was right about that. But I'm sure this isn't about rice pudding at all!

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 23/12/2017 07:38

Rice Pudding Update.

My husband's version of the rice pudding was not very good because he'd decided to add more rice which meant it was so solid it virtually stood up by itself.

Have talked to my daughter who is now feeling better about helping out more.

Yesterday while sitting in the kitchen I noticed that a large plastic storage container - which appeared to be full of pudding rice had appeared on the highest shelf. Not seeing the almost full 500g container which was at the front of the cupboard in a cellophane bag marked 'pudding rice', my husband had gone off and bought a 2kg bag of the same product because it 'was the only one they had'. One batch of pudding rice requires 50g and it is not a dish we make very often. So we now have enough to make this dish over forty times.

Others may fret about being given the wrong present. With me it's rice problems.

OP posts:

Bubbaleo · 23/12/2017 08:27

Are there any other recipes besides rice pudding, in which you could use "pudding rice?" Hope your dd is feeling better with her stomach cramps.

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 23/12/2017 08:37

Well I think 1918 is going to be the year of rice pudding. I think there are a number of Indian recipes which involve pistachios/almonds/rose water etc.

Daughter seems better though I need to catch up with her when I return from my last stint of pre-Xmas work at lunchtime.

OP posts:

FrancisCrawford · 23/12/2017 09:05

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

PurpleWithRed · 23/12/2017 09:24

OP, you have my utmost sympathy. DD came home from Uni and moved back with me and her DSD as we were the better option than her DF and DSM. We also have my ancient mother over twice a week.

I quickly became sick to death of walking in from work to three diffferent people all tugging at my sleeve in one way or another. Either moaning about each other (she’s hogging the sofa again, he got arsey because I left the washing up on the draining board), or people doing a crap job of helping - “how many potatoes do you want peeled” “I can’t find the rice ” “I’ll do x if you just show me where it is, how you want it done, and which knife to use, and give me lots of praise afterwards”.

AARGH!

Happily DH and DS had a massive row over a frying pan and she flounced off to her dad. They are both much nicer people now, and so am I.

Bringmewineandcake · 23/12/2017 09:32

Host my dad makes rice pudding you can carve as well
It is horrible coming in from work to people stressing at you - I get it from my DH, DM and 5 year old too some nights. Is walking away to have a nice bath with a glass of wine and completely not engaging an option next time?

christmassanta · 23/12/2017 11:11

Teach DD how to make rice pudding, then give her some of the rice to take back to uni !

Bubbaleo · 23/12/2017 11:40

Yes Christmas, good idea. And dd could also give a bowl of her homemade rice pudding to her dad (at the correct time, of course)

Twitchingdog · 23/12/2017 13:54

Make sushi rolls with pudding rice

MsHomeSlice · 23/12/2017 14:01

you might be able to make a passable risotto with it... see if it says what type of rice it is. Maybe carnaroli or arborio?

pretty sure I have never seen a 2kilo packet of pudding rice!

Original poster

HostofDaffodils · 23/12/2017 14:08

groceries.asda.com/product/rice/laila-pudding-rice/910001381186

OP posts:

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