DH is antagonsing me to the point I'm going mad.

[Clemetipops]

I am organised and like to plan, DH is the opposite, which is fine. We have 2 young children who aren't sleeping so we are trying to work in shifts all managed and organised by me of course. I am trying to protect everyones sleep, but giving DH a larger chunk of unbroken sleep than myself as he has a full-time, demanding job.

Sometimes, if the baby is up a lot more during my shift and his bigger chunk of sleep, I might wake him 20 minutes or so earlier than usual to take over, particularly if he's had a chunk of 7-8 hours sleep, which he does sometimes get if the baby doesn't wake during his shift. The most ever I get in one chunk is 4-5 hours of sleep as I feed the baby myself.

I am however despairing now as he will not organise/plan our sleeping shifts but is constantly finding fault in what I'm doing. Last night he woke me to say
"it's your turn to go in to the baby"
I said "not for half an hour yet."
"You woke me 20 mins earlier than my time this morning."
I just want to cry.
Wtf?!
He always gets much more sleep than me which I'm trying to protect but he behaves like a rebellious teenager over the slightest adjustment.

This is telling of our lives full stop.
I organise and plan everything whilst he finds snags/short-cuts/loop holes with everything I do. I plan our meals/do the food shop and order online for ease and he will find fault and criticise what I buy/how much I spend etc and tells me I need to find time in the day to shop at Aldi with the baby who never stops crying. I tell him I can't face it and I get disapproving looks. He says he is happy to do the food shop at weekends but always comes home without shampoo/toothpaste/ cleaning products but will brag about how little he spends in a food shop.
I do all the correspondence with our eldest child's nursery, but he will intervene if he doesnt agree with something. I feel hes watching my every move like a hawk, whilst taking on nothing himself. He refuses to clean the house and says it is not necesary to clean (wtf!) So I hired a cleaner to do it instead and he harps on about how much money I am wasting on her. He never says he expects me to do it, but this is obvious. I tell him I can't manage it myself, the house is too large for me to keep clean all by myself and yet he refuses to downsize.

I try to leave the planning to him and he does nothing or tells me he needs direction. I think he is subtly and antagonistically trying to control every thing. I feel like I'm actually losing my mind.
I want to punch him so hard at times. I am trying so hard to make family life work as smoothly as possible but he wants to criticise/question or even just do his own thing. I always feel he has his own hidden agenda.

I can't live like this anymore and my anger is bubbling away so much so that I'm actually worried I might lash out and hurt him.

I know some posters will tell me to give him more responsibility over stuff but it's genuinely more hassle than it's worth. I have tried this so many times. We would all end up eating chips at every meal with no vegetables on our plates and washing our hair with hand soap.

What do I do?

Tbh it sounds like you're treating him as one of your children.

Blueberry, I really am just trying my best.

I can sympathise with a lot of this, OP. Couple's counselling might be an idea.

How old are the children? Are you on maternity leave?

I see you're trying your best OP, buy I'm just wondering if your DH feels as if he's being controlled by your constant 'organisation' of him? , hence the way he acts.

Because he is acting like a bloody child that's why.

I feel for you OP. You sound tired and overwhelmed and angry, which you should be.

You would be happier alone. He either needs to realise shit just doesn't sort itself and bloody take some responsibility or shut the fuck up and let you organise it.

I get you when you say he doesn't do the things that need doing right, like not buying half the shopping but let him suffer the consequences. If he has no shower gel and he's done the shopping then tough shit. If it's something you or the dcs need then back he goes.

I used to send DH with a list. If he bought the wrong things or forgot something I would ask him how I am going to cook a sunday lunch without potatoes? Or spag bol with pasta? Or clean our teeth with no toothpaste? He would stand looking at me, then get his shoes back on and go back out.

The cleaner needs to stay unless he does it himself. Or has the dcs while you do it.

But he sounds like such a fucking teenager I would seriously sit him down, tell him to shape up or fuck off.

Yes I'm on maternity leave. They are 6 months and 3.

You sound knackered

I don't know. It sounds like a bad combination to me - he sounds lazy, you sound like you need plans & order.

How has this worked up til now? Have things suddenly got worse?

I have a 5, 3 and 5 month old with a really disorganised husband so I do sympathise however if he's working and you are not I dont think the shifts work. Sounds like you need to go with the flow a bit more and be a bit more relaxed. Have you considered online shopping or click and collect? I'd just tell him you are keeping the cleaner and tell him not to moan about the cost

I get where you're coming from op but it does sound like you are micro managing the whole set up. Forget the shirts and just take it in turns?

He sounds awful OP, what a selfish lazy bastard. It’s all very well for him to say things like cleaning don’t need doing - that’s clearly just an excuse for him to get out of it, knowing you will pick up the slack. You sound exhausted and overwhelmed.

If he won’t listen to you or try to help I truly think you have to ask if he is actually enhancing your life?

Things have gotten much worse.
He is well known for his dis-organisation and lack of thinking by family and friends... all a big joke until you're the one living with him and raising a family together. My father had OCD, so I'll be honest his laid back manner attracted me greatly at first. I don't have OCD. I have counselling regularly and it has been agreed I dont have it, I have just endeavoured to marry someone not like my father but maybe gone a little too extreme. I wrote DH a letter whilst pregnant with DC2 explaining what I need help with this time to avoid having pnd like I did with DC1 but I now genuinely think he has some sort of disorder where he likes to do the opposite of what you ask, or atleast a need to be incomplete control, hence why he avoids and dismisses deadlines. He has always done this according to his family. They say he enjoys working under pressure, I think it is more a demand avoidance personality trait.
For me, this is making family life and team work impossible.

Have you considered online shopping or click and collect?

FFS actually read the post! OP said she shops online but gets criticised for not dragging her screaming baby round cheaper shops.

Don’t know why everyone is rushing to make excuses for this lazy and unhelpful arsehole...

Christ, you've have PND, wrote him a list and he's still acting like a teenager? Time for a family intervention I think.

Do you actually have money problems which necessitate spending less?

What does your counselor think?

Sorry misread the bit that you already do the online shop.

If both contribute to the online list then surely he can't get cross?

I think if someone micro-managed me to that extent I would resist too. He's an adult and you're treating him like a child.

If you're not incompatible then you need to either accept each other's differences and work around them, or maybe have a real think about whether your marriage can work long-term, because this can't go on forever. You'll resent him and he'll resist your attempts at control and it'll all blow up one day.

Agree with pp he needs CONSEQUENCES. You writing a list or verbally reminding him isn't consequences.

He doesn't want shop online - off you fuck to Aldi darling! When he comes back minus items from the list, off you fuck back there darling!

With the sleep. Is he aware you are not dividing the baby night care 50/50? Does he know he gets 7h unbroken sleep? Does he know you get 4? Or have you singlehandedly decided to be "nice" to him and he is oblivious? I suggest making him fully aware of where you are sacrificing sleep so that he can have it.

I think you're scared of him OP and what he might do if you actually told him enough is enough.

I have absolutely no desire to micromanage him. I have never micromanaged anyone before him if that is what I am doing. He says he WANTS and NEEDS direction. Then does his own thing. He asks me to TELL him what to do.

I hate managing him, I dont want to manage him, but I do want to manage my own life and my own sleep.

How much correspondence do you need to do with the nursery? I've never corresponded with my child's nursery once in her entire time there.

Shifts? Seriously?

You sound like you're a very controlling person. He's working. You're at home all day. Let him get some sleep!

Why are the kids not sleeping? Surely at 3 they should be sleeping through the night? At 6 months dd was also sleeping 8 hours through (sometimes 10 hours) at night. Sounds like you're pandering to the kids throughout the night, so they wake up for that one on one time. You're making a rod for your own back there. But hey ho, don't bother taking that advice.

If my home was ran like an army barracks, with me being told when to wake, when to sleep, I'd be pissed off too.

Sort yourself out before you start on him.

Like Della was going to ask you about the finances OP. If you can afford to shop online/have a cleaner, it looks like controlling behaviour from him to me. Have you tried writing to him to explain how exhausted you are? It just is not fair for him to treat you like this and wake you early when you already have much less sleep.
Is he really confrontational? I’m wondering if you find it hard to communicate with him, or are scared of saying eg. I am keeping the cleaner, or I am going to shop online until the baby is a bit older, because of how he will react?
So sorry, sounds really tough.

As for the shopping, arm him with a pen and list and send him off to Aldi at the weekend. If he forgets something, he can pop back there to get whatever he has forgotten, or you could nip out for 5 minutes to grab whatever it is.

Rednax... I am scared. Not scares he might hurt me but scared at just how trapped I am.
He would never leave and never allow me to. I havs nowhere to go. He does. But he would never leave.
He watches my every move.
He even watches me reverse my car out of the drive everytime I go out from the window upstairs. I can see him. I have bad dreams about him standing over me staring at me. I know in face value it seema I am the control freak here. But I'm not so sure.

Cyberworrier. If that sounds tough, try being a single mother with no cleaner.

I think this man is abusive. Everything he is doing is calculated to worry, upset and inconvenience you, with the aim being for you to submit and acknowledge that you are his servant and should therefore do everything with a grateful smile.
He interrupts your sleep on the grounds that it is 'fair' for you to be disturbed unnecessarily if he was previously woken necessarily.
He won't do the food shopping properly but criticizes how you do it - and wants you to do it in a way that is more difficult and inconvenient for you.
He expects you to do all the nursery admin but has appointed himself supervisor with the right to override you at any point he fancies.
He refuses to do domestic work but objects to you getting a cleaner - you are supposed to do everything, because that's what women are for.

(Unless the thing you have missed out from your post is that he is working very long hours for little money and that his objection to online shopping and paying for a cleaner is that the household budget can't cope, then he is the problem.)