To worry I’m becoming an abusive wife?

[prettyhibiscusflowers]

This makes my dh sound awful but he is a good, kind man who provides well for us. He’s supported me through mental health problems and he has been there for me when I need him.

We have a dd who is 9 months and I returned to work part time when she was 3 months old.
He’s a great dad and does help out around the house, usually has to be asked.

However, I feel like I’m constantly nagging but how do I get things done if I don’t repeatedly mention it?

For example, he got up with dd last night as per our arrangement across the week with who’s working/day off etc. I got up at 6am (he had gone to the gym) to see to dd and I noticed he’d left her wet nappy laying open on her bedroom floor.
Yes, not the end of the world but this is just one of many things.

I feel like I’m always moaning about something.

Other examples include bringing smelly old lunch boxes in to the house with old food in (that have been forgotten about) and leaving them ‘to soak’ for ages. I end up washing them.

Leaving clothes on the bathroom floor and sodding off to work. I pick them up because they are in the way.

Breakfast bowl and mug beside the sofa.

Crumbs/ coffee granules/ other mess on kitchen work top.

Gym clothes dumped where he empties his bag. I could go on and on.

He will end up clearing up but this can be days later if I don’t do it.
Do I just tidy up and keep my mouth shut and forever put up with this or say something and feel like my nagging is becoming too much? Abusive?

I resent that he just rolls out of bed showers and goes to work, meanwhile I’m juggling getting myself and dd ready, dropped off to childcare and myself to work.
Then come the evening i feed dd he baths her. I then cook and spend the evening tidying up, washing etc and rarely to get to sit down much before 9 whilst he’s usually asleep on the sofa. I know he’s tired but so am I. The only break I get is to go to work. This week has been particularly tough with a teething dd and I feel drained.

We’ve had a big argument tonight and I fear my nagging is driving him away.

I don't think you're abusive, but you have a mismatch of expectations with him.

It might help if you can come to a clear agreement with him on who does what when, and what behavior is taking the piss. Like leaving dirty clothes lying around or dishes in the sink. Make actually written lists and get him to agree to them. Compromise where it makes sense.

Some men grew up with mums who would pick up after them and have trouble getting out of that mindset.

You have a 9 month old. That's really stressful. Could you get someone to come in once a week and clean?

If he doesn't like you nagging, maybe he could pick his shit up?

This sounds scarily similar to my set-up and I have found myself wondering if I am just a joyless fun sponge more and more recently. But I, too, am fed up of being the only one who rinses the bath down, who scrubs the draining board, who sees the things on the stairs waiting to go up, who clears out the kids' drawers when they are bursting with too-small clothes and all the other jobs that only take a few minutes, but it always seems to be MY few minutes that have to be spent on it.

I try to mention things in a lighthearted way and not make too big a thing of it, but it does grate on me and I do worry that either I find myself drifting into a relationship where I have to be the 'manager' and assign him tasks or build up some resentment that ends up bubbling over. We have talked about it and I genuinely don't think he is aware how annoying I find it on a day-to-day basis because I don't want to be constantly having these kinds of interactions.

I wish I had an answer, but if it makes you feel any better to know that you're not alone in wondering where the line is between wanting to preserve a reasonably tidy environment and being a controlling harridan who's constantly complaining.

miss I think one of the main issues is he was waited on hand and foot by his mum and she would still bend over backwards now to do his washing and cleaning.

arethere you’re absolutely right!
I’ve just turned into such a nag and needed a reality check as to whether I’ve taken it too far. I would hate to stray into abusive territory.

dojo I’m sorry that you have nag as much as I do, it’s utterly boring isn’t it!
I feel like I’m pecking away at him. Maybe I should try keeping my mouth zipped for a week or so and see what happens. I’m afraid of turning into my mum who’s run around for my dad for years.

I don't think it's abusive to expect an adult to clean up after themselves. You wouldn't have to nag is he didn't leave a mess. In my house me and DH are both responsible for keeping the house tidy. If I come home and it's a mess I'll tell DH I am not happy and we will clean together.

It's not abusive to expect your partner to stop treating you like a servant.

You're not a drudge.

Everything you have to pickup, everything you have to move because he's just left it, everthing goes in a box which lives on his chair. Those mank lunchboxes? Into the box - up to you whether you emty the wter out first, but do leavethe rotting food in them. His manky kit? Into the box, to bad if they get rotting food all over them. Mess on the work top? Sure, sweep it off, but sweep it into his box.

It is NOT abusive to communicate something completely reasonable that your partner doesn't happen to want to hear. Even to communicate it again and again if it's not resolved and you haven't been able to have a decent talk about it.

I think a good principle is that both parents should have approximately equal leisure time. It's totally unfair that he sleeps on the sofa while you have to finish all the evening tidying. Sometimes people think they have to do more than they really do, cleaning-wise, (in my opinion we don't need ironing or clean towels every day or daily hoovering of the whole flat etc etc) but getting food-covered dishes and used nappies off the floor is really a bare, bare minimum; you'll get rats or roaches otherwise!

What does he say if you sit down and try to have one conversation about equalising the work? Does he think leaving a nappy out for 2 days (even 1, eww!) is OK, or the crumbs on the counter? What does he think should happen? Is he actually aware that fairies don't collect his clothes from near his gym bag?
That said, you probably do have different tidyness standards - might have to agree on essentials (nappies!) vs areas he can sprawl into with the expectation that you aren't going to pick up after him so his manky gym stuff will still be dumped in that box next time...

My Dh is still like that after 25 years.

I don't do his washing and haven't since we moved in together. He sits up very late on a Sunday night to wash his work clothes and get them dried!

If he leaves a mess I will ignore it for a while, but I won't always clean it up. He has his chair in our study so I'll often just pile up the stuff he leaves lying around on top of the chair, including dirty dishes. I've also been known to put his mess on the driving seat of his car.

Unfortunately neither of us are naturally tidy, but I do enough every day to keep the house ticking over and I always looked after the feeding and clothing of the DC, as well as the household textiles.

Dh tends to do the big clear-outs when they're due and will spend a whole day doing stuff I hate to do so I guess there's some justice.

Can you find some justice somewhere OP and save your relationship?

Have you (and DoJo) talked to your DH about mental load as a general idea? A couple of years ago when that comic about it went viral, there were a few articles by men saying that they hadn't understood about it before and now were starting to. It seemed to get through to quite a few people.

Understanding is part of it but there's also getting into the habit of doing things and checking what needs to be done, if it wasn't a habit before. And as this stuff is repetitive and boring it takes effort as he needs to get used to doing it when he doesn't feel like it.
I didn't grow up with pets, and I was surprised how much drudgework they entailed and it took a while to get used to it. It is the same with this kind of thing.

I think your title is misleading and offensive to anyone who has been abused by a partner, You don't actually think you're an abusive wife; you think that your partner doesn't pick up the slack and you'd like other people to agree with you. Nothing wrong with that, but ffs say it like it is.

Do you ever leave anything on the floor, does it kill anyone if it’s left for a few hours? Does he work and is maybe exhausted? Sorry but it does sound like you are nagging a bit. Yes he could do more maybe, but maybe he’s also as exhausted as you are. Are you so perfect you never leave a sock on the floor?

You are most definitely not abusive to have a problem with slobbish behaviour. Does he really think this is ok? Are you supposed to be his servant. It's very disrespectful of him to behave like this and if he was capable of acting like an adult, you wouldn't need to "nag" him

I used to say in a very matter of fact way. It's not right that you expect me to clean up after you. You're an adult and so am I, where does it say that I'm the one to clean up. Not nagging but an expectation that he is a grown up who is capable of cleaning and tidying up

No you're not an abusive wife, and "nagging" is such a misogynistic term it makes me grind my teeth when I hear it.

If DH tells me to stop nagging I tell him it's entirely his own fault - if he'd done stuff the first time he was asked, I wouldn't have to ask him again (and again, and again) so the solution is in his own hands - do it the first time you're asked, OR (better still but sadly unlikely) do it without needing to be asked!

He was also raised by a mother who did everything for them - and when they hit their teens, she ran out of any kind of energy to battle with them (their father was pretty unwell) and decided to leave it all to their future partners to deal with - gee, thanks.

He has improved enormously but still has to be asked to put stuff INTO the dishwasher instead of leaving it above, or to get stuff from this office to go into the dishwasher - but not nearly so much.

You are not his skivvy, nor his housemaid. He's a grown-arsed adult who should be perfectly capable of clearing up his own dishes/clothes/ mess without having a "Mum" to do it for him, the idle arse.

I don't care how hard he works - you work too, and you still have to clear up all his mess as well as your own - nope. Not a team player.

Not this again :(. Not a poke at you, OP, but at the number of lazy arse men who think it's okay to not clean up after themselves. Or leave things to you until you've become a stressed out nag, or just done it yourself. Because you do it better, apparently.

It's social conditioning, and men taking advantage (yes, I know some women are like this, but it's primarily a male trait). Don't just nag, go all out and bombard him with the research about mental load, how it's disrespectful to expect your partner to clean up your shit, leave the crap he should have tidied up in his space. Dirty nappy in your TV watching seat? Maybe you should have put it in the bin then. If you're nice, you might warn him you'll be doing that.

I think my marriage is on its last legs, (because of his cheating and lying behavior), and it's taken it to this point for him to up his game and contribute properly, instead of continuing to be a lazy git. Not sure it outweighs the cheating/lying crap I now know about though.

You are not abusive.

You are NOT abusive. He is lazy. He is not pulling his weight and doing things that make your life harder.

Have a chat and clear the air. If he carries on like this suggest that he looks after dd for 24 hours while you go to a spa (if he is safe to be left with baby) and see if he realises how much you do.

He should be worried that being a slob and treating you like a maid is driving you away, not the other way round.

Have you actually TALKED to him about this? Why don't you tell him that from now on you are throwing away ANYTHING he leaves lying about? That's what I would do. Then again, I didn't marry a fucking useless man child.

I would just outright refuse to pick up after him, even if it meant living in a mess until he gets the cause and effect.

Hmmm. All of this sounds eerily familiar. I would take care of the children, take care of the household and go to work full-time and my husband would . . . go to work full-time.

YADNBU. Or abusive.

I love cordeliavorkosigan’s box idea. All of his shit goes into the box. I wish I’d thought of that. Instead, it was me nagging for years for him to do the basics because these kids and this house belonged to the both of us, and we both worked, and he’d complain that I was nagging, and then I’d say if you’d just do SOMETHING, I wouldn’t nag. And then he’d retreat, because he didn’t WANT to do anything. He’d worked all day, for God’s sake! This was HIS time!

I tried to be sympathetic. Unlike others on here who have said their husbands’ mothers did everything for them, always, my husband grew up with a stay-at-home mom who did the bare minimum and then watched TV all day, so his working father had to pick up the slack. You’d think this would make my husband sympathetic, but no. I believe he saw the unfairness of his dad working all day and then coming home to chores, and he decided he didn’t want that for himself. So he made himself scarce or laid low and hoped I wouldn’t ask anything of him and just take care of it all myself.

Which of course I didn’t, and I put up a fight. So I was the bad guy, always “nagging.”

In his quest to not be like his father, he became his mother, and he turned me into his father.

It’s been a few years, though, and I have to say, somewhere along the way, he’s improved. Without my nagging. A couple of weeks ago, I was sick for the first time in several years. I had a nasty stomach virus. Maybe he saw the wisdom of not letting a vomiting woman handle the family’s food and dishes, but he jumped right in and cooked and cleaned up and never once played the martyr like he used to when I was sick and he was forced to take over. He also cleans up after himself much better than he did, and if I ask him to do something, he does it. The kids have chores and he helps enforce them. He’s not perfect, but then again, neither am I.

Sorry. I realize this wasn’t helpful. It is me venting. But you should do cordeliavorkosigan’s box idea. And remind him that this child belongs to the both of you, this house belongs to the both of you, you both work, and he’s a grown man, not a teenager. And you are not his Mommy.

Eventually, your hubby might learn how to adult better. It may just take some time. Mine finally figured it out and he’s almost 50.

I worry that you actually think your behaviour is abusive,when it's actually very normal under the circumstances. Why would you think that? Has your husband somehow planted that seed in your mind? Or do you just naturally have some sort of guilt complex?
You are not abusive.You nag because your husband is a thoughtless slob,and if he doesn't like the nagging he is the one who needs to change his behaviour,not you

Welcome to my world. DH of 20 plus years is like this. I’ve nagged relentlessly over the years. He is never going to change. I just got cleaners that are also fantastic tidiers in the end!

"Nag" is a loaded word. Does your DH ever "nag" you? No, because it's a word used against women to make sure men can carry on lording it up.

If he had cleaned up after himself and continued to clean up after himself you wouldn't have to say something again.

Reference the previous exchanges. No more groundhog day! Tell him to get a grip, even children known to put rubbish in a bin and dirty clothes in a laundry basket.

I get your frustration but I think you are unwittingly enabling him by tidying up after him whilst silently seething.

Agree with the box idea, have one in the kitchen, one upstairs. The tupperware boxes don't get washed up they get chucked in a box, as do the dirty clothes with the dirty nappy.

And he shouldn't be asleep on the sofa whilst you clear up the kitchen just get him. Up and tell him to help every time.