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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

How do you dispose of sanitary protection?

139 replies

BinkBear · 21/11/2018 01:17

Wondering what people do when it’s their time of the month and they need to dispose of protection? DH is complaining about me wrapping mine in loo roll then in one of those little scented plastic bags and popping it in the kitchen bin (indoors). He insists it has to go straight in the outdoor bin. Even if I’m naked and it’s 1am and it’s raining. I think he’s batshit and there’s no reason I can’t pop it in the indoor bin and take the bin bag out in the morning. AIBU?

OP posts:
RiverTam · 21/11/2018 09:55

another one saying that he is the problem. I don't think I could live with someone who screamed at me about things like this. You know he'll scream at your DC too, don't you?

I would give him an ultimatum - either he seeks treatment for this or you and the baby go. You need to protect yourself and your child.

Verbena87 · 21/11/2018 09:56

He insists it has to go straight in the outdoor bin. Even if I’m naked and it’s 1am and it’s raining.

Ummm, roll them up and stick them up his nose?! He’s been deeply unreasonable.

gamerchick · 21/11/2018 10:05

So much plastic waste. Use a mooncup

No Hmm and the OP if you had read the thread has already explained why she's not using her mooncup ATM.

3WildOnes · 21/11/2018 10:06

I forgot to say, I wrap mine in tissue, no bag, and then into the bathroom or kitchen bin.

Babdoc · 21/11/2018 10:11

My sympathy, OP. It must be grim living with an undiagnosed OCD who insists it’s all your problem, instead of accepting he needs treatment.
You could get him to do an online diagnostic quiz for it, to show him that it’s him who has the problem, not you.
Or you could issue an ultimatum- either he sees the doctor or an OCD counsellor, or you leave.
This is not going to get better on its own. It will very likely get much worse, when your baby starts crawling and sticking grubby objects in its mouth, or smearing food in its hair.
I’ve known OCD patients who made their families’ lives hell over cleaning obsessions. One poor chap had to virtually strip naked in his garage every time he got home from work, then shower before he was allowed in the sitting room - where the suite still wore its plastic wrapping from delivery, so nobody touched the fabric and made it dirty.
In your DH’s case, it may have been triggered by the birth of your baby. He worries it might get ill from germs or dirt, as all parents do, but in his case this has been magnified into an obsession and a terror.
He really needs professional help, and you’re best placed to know how to persuade him. Perhaps you could get the health visitor to talk to him?
Good luck, OP. Try to catch this early before it becomes too entrenched.

TheWiseWomansFear · 21/11/2018 10:25

He's mental... I shove it in the bathroom bin.
DP has washed my period pants before 😂

He sounds v misogynist and frankly I couldn't be with a man like that...

Lunalula · 21/11/2018 10:27

Used to flush then down the loo Blush
Now will wrap in loo paper, then nappy sack and into the bin. Dp doesn't complain at all.

TheWiseWomansFear · 21/11/2018 10:31

Ah didn't see the OCD part - is get him to see a therapist rather than leave him- he's not allowed to make you feel disgusting because of his issue

lifetothefull · 21/11/2018 10:34

Echoing pps who have said he needs help. You sound like you are actually very patient with him and will be able to help him through if he wants to change, but he has to realise that this is his problem. I don't know how you can get him to do that.

paap1975 · 21/11/2018 10:39

I suggest you go together to the GP, but he sounds like he needs help. I couldn't live with someone like that.

I am lucky in that my DH never bats an eyelid at things like that. In fact I sometimes things he's more comfortable than I am. Probably comes from growing up on a farm.

BinkBear · 21/11/2018 18:05

This isn’t a new development. He’s been like this for years, although previously not as bad. When we moved in together his mother told me it’s easier to just let him clean if he wants to. Apparently he used to take the hoover off her and do it himself because she wasn’t hoovering in parallel lines. She had taken photographs of how he’d arranged the ornaments so when she moved them she could put them back in the same spot, otherwise he’d notice they’d been rearranged and would get annoyed. I should have realised then that he was going to be a problem.

I don’t feel that I can leave him. He’ll be granted unsupervised contact and I won’t be there to stop him screaming at my DC. It’s safer if I stay put, so when he starts yelling and being ridiculous I’m present to protect my DC.

OP posts:
mathanxiety · 21/11/2018 18:29

He won't necessarily be granted unsupervised contact.

If you have proof in some form of the raging, then you can insist on contact in a contact centre or none at all.

You can petition for the appointment of a guardian ad litem for your child, who will argue on her behalf for the form of contact that is in her best interest. Or for no contact, if in her best interests.
It's important that the raging/screaming/abuse can be documented.

Contact has to be in the child's best interest. It's not a matter of the rights of the parents.

To my shame, I once believed I could protect my children from the effects of abuse, but this was a fallacy.

If anything, staying and hoping to control the situation confuses the children and gives them a really bad example of how to deal with intolerable situations. The bottom line is that they are still exposed to abuse, still expected to accept it on some level, and the role of protector is always going to be tiptoeing around the abuser or performing heroic moping up efforts, salvaging situations, putting on a brave face.
Result in my family - one child of mine diagnosed with PTSD. That is my fault as much as it is exH's.

The children may not be safe with unsupervised contact with him but they are not safer at home with you if he is there.

If you are going to stay together the abuse must stop.

This means he must get help and he must commit to seeing himself as others see him, and accepting that their experience of him is their truth that he must accept and respect.

Aquamarine1029 · 21/11/2018 18:38

Staying with him is NOT protecting your children! How can you possibly believe that? Giving cuddles after their father has abused and terrorized them won't make up for the trauma they suffer. Stay with him and your children will grow up in a miserable, grossly dysfunctional home. That will cause damage which will never be undone.

Omzlas · 21/11/2018 18:40

You keep using the word 'allow' OP, you're an adult and you live in the house too. I understand that your partner may struggle but it sounds like he's incredibly controlling of SO many aspects of your life. Some I can understand, but far more than is normal

I'd strongly urge you to beef him towards some form of Dr's appointment or counselling, this will in turn affect your child and you even more deeply than it already has

YANBU but you probably already know that

bertielab · 21/11/2018 18:42

He needs counselling.

LoniceraJaponica · 21/11/2018 18:45

"Apparently he used to take the hoover off her and do it himself because she wasn’t hoovering in parallel lines."

This sounds a bit more than OCD. Do you think he might be on the autism spectrum?

gotmybigbootson · 21/11/2018 19:12

From your update it doesn't actually sound like you want to be with him or like him that much.

In which case, I'd just leave.

reallyjustreally · 21/11/2018 19:14

It sounds like you’re married to my ex-husband.

lisasimpsonssaxophone · 21/11/2018 19:35

I use washable cloth pads and I bloody love them (no pun intended). My partner sees me rinsing them in the sink sometimes, and then they hang on the clothes rack to dry after I’ve washed them in the machine, and he has never once freaked out about any of this being ‘unhygienic’ (although he does sometimes grab one off the rack and do a hilarious routine of pretending it’s some kind of flying animal attacking him Hmm) Anyway, my point is that if I can wash my pads in the sink with no one dying, then you can definitely throw yours in the bin. So no, YADNBU.

I agree that it sounds very much like OCD. I grew up with a father who had pretty severe OCD and although my parents tried to hide it from me, I knew from a very very early age that there was something not quite right. I know you think you can protect your kids from it but you really can’t, and it will only be more confusing for them when they grow up knowing that Daddy sometimes has these strange rages but no one ever talks about it. Please, please urge him to get help with this, because you cannot commit to a lifetime of trying to manage this situation for him.

Thurmanmurman · 21/11/2018 21:05

This isn't normal OP, he needs to seek help.

HoppingPavlova · 21/11/2018 21:15

I don’t feel that I can leave him. He’ll be granted unsupervised contact and I won’t be there to stop him screaming at my DC. It’s safer if I stay put, so when he starts yelling and being ridiculous I’m present to protect my DC.

That's an uncomfortable conversation you will have to have with them when they are grown up and have been traumatised from living with the mental abuse they will sustain full-time in your household. That's trauma you don't come back from. They may thank you for it, they may well not.

The crux is, your DH is mentally unwell. It's not his fault. He can't help having this. What is his fault though is his refusal to seek help to address this, his preference being to damage his family. Your fault is putting up with it if there are no steps to change the situation and inflicting it on your children full-time.

IJustLostTheGame · 21/11/2018 21:40

My DF was an overly controlling person who would use me as a verbal punchbag in order to ease his own frustrations. But he would blame me.
My DM was and still is frightened of him. She would 'cuddle me better' after he'd had a terrifying screaming rant. She never stopped it.
She's still with him and complains about him but will she ever leave?
Nope.
I barely see them. She should have left. Now I have depression and my sister has an eating disorder.
I don't just blame him. I also blame her.

Graphista · 21/11/2018 21:48

What I do absolutely agree with is that matters cannot continue as they are - as much for OP'S dh as op & child.

He likely needs medication as well as good quality therapy with someone experienced in dealing with OCD as entrenched and severe as this is.

Unfortunately the bad news is OCD is incurable. Mainly because it's not purely a mental illness but has its believed by many a neurophysiological/genetic component. But it can be treated so that it's manageable.

Although dx almost 13 years ago, with hindsight I believe and hcps and my parents & siblings agree, I've always had it and mum has it to a degree as do a couple of her siblings and when I thought about it gran probably too. I was never a kid that liked playing in a messy way or even with things like sand or play doh.

But it first flared up really badly after dd was born and I was exhausting myself trying to keep everything clean and tidy while recovering from an emcs and looking after dd inc bf.

Hv noticed home was ALWAYS spotless even if she turned up unannounced. She was lovely about it but in hindsight should have been more assertive in getting me to go and see a dr.

As dd got older and reached those stages where they're naturally messy/dirty I did relax a bit. I certainly didn't react how I actually wanted to as I knew that was wrong but for me it was incredibly hard dealing with the thoughts & feelings. As a pp said while the rituals are the obvious things to others, the most difficult aspect for sufferers are the thoughts and feelings.

So many people have said "just don't think about X" I WISH it were that simple.

When it next flared was after I was in a serious car accident which resulted in me being left physically disabled (though that wasn't immediately obvious), car was written off and it was an old banger anyway so actually even with the insurance payout I couldn't afford to get another and I was out in the sticks so this made life very hard both practically and financially and the timing meant this was an incredibly stressful time in other ways.

I ended up having a full on breakdown and crisis team were called in and they were seeing me daily for weeks.

I've since had periods of wellness, and periods of where I'm really ill again but not quite as ill as then.

I've had several different medications - some have helped some have made things worse (but often you're urged to persevere - and some do take several weeks to start working) it's very much trial and error unfortunately.

I've also had several courses of therapy and at one point got to being quite well again - unfortunately that therapist has now moved out of area. That's just life and bad luck.

I'm currently housebound agoraphobic because of it, trying yet more new meds, cpn seeing me fortnightly (would be more but cuts mean local Cmht is understaffed and has been for some time now) and honestly I'm so sick of feeling like this.

I'm not at all saying that raging at op and certainly at the child is at all acceptable and if op feels the need to leave as a result of this behaviour that's understandable.

But there's a sense on this thread and on others regarding mental illness that somehow the person who is ill is choosing to be the way they are.

Nobody chooses to feel constantly anxious, to question every action they're about to do or have done repeatedly, to fear simple acts of everyday life like putting something in the bin to going to the toilet to making a drink.

Most people have a fear if not a phobia of something. Try and imagine if the cause of your phobia was something you had to encounter every time you had to the simplest of daily tasks.

Eg if it's spiders imagine every time you had to turn on a tap, or sit on the loo or put something in the bin you had to touch a massive spider. That I hope gives some idea of what it's like.

Most people can avoid their phobia to a degree. It's much harder when the thing you fear is basically everywhere.

Op I'm so sorry you're dealing with this, you sound very kind and understanding but also absolutely understandably frustrated and concerned for the effect on yourself and your child.

Has his mum never tried to get him to see a dr about this?

I wonder if an intervention by not just you but also others like his mum, maybe your hv, might make it harder for him to deny the issue if 2 or more people are saying to him "this isn't right you HAVE to get help".

While medication is not the only thing that should be used or that will help it can, if he's lucky enough to find one quickly that works for him, be very effective in much reducing the anxiety.

I am more than happy to discuss further via PM if you wish.

McTufty · 21/11/2018 21:51

A few people have said they do this - please don’t put sanitary protection in plastic bags only to go in the bin. It’s really unnecessary and wasteful at a time when our single use plastic is critical.

OP I don’t have anything to add save to say that if part of your reason for staying with him is concern for the children if he has them unsupervised then that’s really tough for you. I hope you work it out for the best Flowers

masterandmargarita · 21/11/2018 21:56

If its wrapped in tissue and binned how does he even know what is in the bin. Does he check it?

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