To just want my DH to answer the question he's been asked?

[Zintox]

This drives me mad.

Just now he said there was no melon left. I said "who ate it?" He replied "there were only three pieces left."

He does this all the time. I ask a question and he answers a completely different one.

How can I make him stop? Does anyone else's DH do this?

@LizzieSiddal

Thank you for the flowers!

I think it's a compromise though. My DP is very understanding but I also think I need to try to unlearn the behaviour, because it doesn't help for good, honest communication. Therapy has helped me quite a bit. I can occasionally say a straight 'no' now and express what I want directly. But it's an effort!!

Even just reading this has made me curious with DH, which is a tad unfair considering he's not even here.

Ours is a slight reverse though, because every time he asks me a question, every fucking time, I always respond clearly with a direct answer Which. He. Then. Repeats. Back. To. Me. Slowly.

Then, if I don't immediately respond with a direct affirmative that he has correctly repeated my answer back to me He. Will. Repeat. My. Answer. To. Me. A fucking Gain.

I don't know when this nightmare started, because obviously he didn't do it when we met else I wouldn't have married him.

Not curious, FURIOUS.

Betty are you married to Moss from "The IT Crowd"?:o

Come to think of it they are both IT techies

I have the reverse and it gives me the rage! I'll answer the question DH asks and he gets annoyed because he wanted me to answer the question he really meant and not the one he actually asked. He says I'm being arsey on purpose. WTAF!! THEN ASK THE QUESTION YOU WANT ANSWERED!!

Hilarious that people think "who ate it"? Is somehow the wrong question or confusing in some way.

"Who ate it"?
"I did"
"He did"
"She did"
"Nobody did, I threw it away"

Really?

I always respond clearly with a direct answer Which. He. Then. Repeats. Back. To. Me. Slowly.

I had a supervisor who did that every time anyone spoke to her. No one could tell if she was genuinely thick or using it as a way of putting you down.

Well, I see OP's point but I find loaded questions like that annoying. My answer would have been "the cat".

Roll it's not that it's the "wrong" question but that it's a loaded question. OP says herself she thinks that he thinks she'll "accuse him of eating it" suggesting that she's had a go at him for eating things in the past.

OP says herself she thinks that he thinks she'll "accuse him of eating it" suggesting that she's had a go at him for eating things in the past.

I can't see where the OP says anything of the sort.

DH does this too. It's a weird sort of power play. I have become like a dog with a bone and no longer accept his answer, so I keep asking as he gets crosser and crosser trying not to answer. In the end he will actually answer the question I'm asking and I say something like "so the answer is X then." Making it clear that he could have said that in the first place.

It's not nice I know, and I don't do it all the time, on fact mostly I don't because it's just too exhausting. I have noticed that in the last few months he is answering the actual question more often, so we don't have to do the stupid dance.

20 years, though.

What do you want for tea?
I dunno. Not sure.

Do you know what you want for tea yet?
I dunno. Not sure.

What have you made for tea?
Lasagne.
I don't want that.
Then what DO you want?
I dunno. Not sure...

"My DH does this and it is so fecking annoying.

He is anticipating what he thinks I need to know and answering that question rather than answering the question I actually ask."

YES!

See also: times I didn't hear the whole sentence he said.

DH: "mumble mumble at the shop."
Me: "sorry, what was the first half of that sentence?" (because at this point I know he will answer with 'the shop')
DH: "The SHOP"
Me: "...right, but what about the shop?"

We often bicker over this, the best he's been able to explain is that he thinks nouns are the only important bits of a sentence, all the other words are just filler.

"it's a loaded question. OP says herself she thinks that he thinks she'll "accuse him of eating it" suggesting that she's had a go at him for eating things in the past."

Not necessarily true.

My DH also has form for being touchy over things that HIS MOTHER would give him a hard time about.

Things I have never had a go at him about. Because I genuinely don't give a shit.

So I have to tiptoe around issues that someone else made for him. They have nothing to do with me and the OP's husband's problems could well have nothing to do with her.

I rhink a lot of the examplea on here could be avoided possibly if people asked the questikn they actually wanted the answer to. Op didnt want to know who Te the melon. She wanted to know what happened to the melon.

If her dp answered the question properly it still wouldnt have answered the ops unasked question.

Op: did you eat the melon?
Dp: no i didnt.

It should have been a more open question that requires an answer more than yea or No.
Op: what happened to the melon?
Dp: i threw it away.

You cant change your dp but you can change how you phrase the questions.

My DP is exactly the same. He was privately educated and even has a PhD. It is infuriating!

It usually goes along the lines of

Me: "do you want a or b?"
DP: "I'm worried about c. I think If we do c it might cause a problem blah blah blah. A is expensive and so is b but they are very good. D is interesting and Billy says he likes it...... blah blah blah...."
Me: "we have already discussed several times why we can't have c or d, so please tell me whether you prefer a or b"
DP: "I've thought a lot about it and I also like e"
Me: "we ruled out e too. A or b? Just tell me your choice."
DP: "I don't know"
Me: "I think a. Shall we choose that?"
DP: "OK"

In his case, I think it is not liking/inability to make decisions and when he does have to make a decision, he wants to consider every single last tiny detail.

*If her dp answered the question properly it still wouldnt have answered the ops unasked question.

Op: did you eat the melon?
Dp: no i didnt.*

She didn't ask if her husband ate it, she asked who had eaten it, to which an easy answer would have been 'Nobody, I threw it away.'

I am astonished at how many people are trying to paint OP in the wrong for assuming that some melon had been eaten by one of the the other people in the house. It must be exhausting to have to converse with someone who will only provide an accurate or helpful answer if asked exactly the right question.

I do this, it’s really not intentional, I think I’m just trying to provide helpful detail and somehow the actual answer gets lost on the way

The problem is, that the OP wants to change her DH - that rarely works. With people like this, you need to give additional information so they know what it is you actually need to know!

The OP didn't need to know exactly who ate the melon or if it was thrown away or anything else, she needed to know if DS had eaten the melon as she'd saved it for him. So a better question would be "who ate the melon? Because if it wasn't DS I need to get him some more."

It's draining, but so is having regular arguments because you keep expecting him to be a different person than he is.

I have this all the time.

Along with ‘did you leave/eat/drink/take xyz’ knowing full well he did but not wanting to accuse.
‘No’
WE’RE THE ONLY TWO PEOPLE IN THE HOUSE CAPABLE OF XYZ
‘Well it certainly wasn’t me’
And repeat. Forever.

"I am astonished at how many people are trying to paint OP in the wrong for assuming that some melon had been eaten by one of the the other people in the house. It must be exhausting to have to converse with someone who will only provide an accurate or helpful answer if asked exactly the right question."

Exactly!!

Someone asks you a a clear question, answer the fucking question!? How are we justifying his nonsensical answer by saying she asked the question wrongly?

If you ask a question and the question doesn't lead the the answer once asked then you ask further questions but you don't expect to get an answer that's completely unrelated. If he felt it was loaded then that's his issue and he still gave a silly answer that doesn't make sense.

Haven't RTFT yet, but mine does it too. Also an IT person.

Reading this is hilarious! I'm very interested in how I'm a controlling harpy who communicates unclearly.

Actually I ask very specific questions to which I do want to know the answer.

I am loathe to go too far down the melon rabbit hole, but I wanted to know who ate it (and I assumed it had been eaten because why throw away good fresh melon?) because:

If ds then good, it was his, all is well.

If dd, I might need to do some damage limitation with ds who is small and likely to get territorial over his melon. But also, if dd then yay! She ate fruit! Maybe she'd like more and I should get two melons.

If DH that's fine, but see point the first from the preceding paragraph.

For the record, DH is not from an abusive family nor has he ever been in an abusive relationship.

He is, however, monumentally shite at communicating and this is one of the more irritating aspects of this.

Oh and yes he mumbles, and is an IT person.