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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Dp and sofa seating (with a diagram)

169 replies

SofaSaga · 10/08/2019 20:39

So I bought the sofa before dp and I where even together.
I love it. Its my favourite colour and fits the room theme.
I have sever anxiety from a past emotionally abusive and controlling relationship.And I don't like to feel trapped.

This is the AIBU.
dp and I are forever fighting about how he sits on the sofa.
He puts his feet up so no matter where I sit I am trapped by his legs or his feet.
This means I need to ask for him to move his legs every single time before I can leave the sofa.
Or I need to clamber over the top of them.

I am 16 weeks pregnant and I have 2 other dc so I am up and down all the time.
I feel like I am always asking permission to move wherever I want to go.
Plus it's like he is facing me observing me. It's strange.

I have asked him repeatedly to get a footstool or just sit normally. We have discussed how trapped I feel with the way he sits and he acknowledges that's is how I feel.
He will stop for a few days the go back to his old ways.
I hormonal, exhasted and sore today and yet again we have had the same argument as for the 5th time in 3 hours I have had to ask permission to leave the sofa.

Now he is in a huff and I am the bad guy. AIBU?

Dp and sofa seating (with a diagram)
Dp and sofa seating (with a diagram)
OP posts:
Butterymuffin · 10/08/2019 23:34

Not great that the kids end up sitting on the floor or that you seem to always be the person who's constantly up and down to them.

PickAChew · 10/08/2019 23:37

next time he invades your personal space with his feet, rip one of his socks off. Just one. It's worse than two.

Fruitbatdancer · 10/08/2019 23:51

You need a poof.

theunrivalledjoysofparenting · 10/08/2019 23:56

I would hate dh sitting like that. Wtf is he thinking?

Why do dc sit on the floor??

It’s not his house. It’s yours. You sit where you want. Or he knows what he can do...

Polestar50 · 11/08/2019 00:01

Completely off topic but you are my handwriting doppelgänger OP!
Even down to the McDonalds arch M.
Looks spooky seeing 'my' handwriting on someone else's diagram!

MiniMum97 · 11/08/2019 00:20

Just buy the footstool.

WishingILivedOnAnIsland · 11/08/2019 00:34

Is he selfish and inflexible in general? Or is this just one weird eccentricity...

Jamiefraserskilt · 11/08/2019 00:42

Flip the sofa round so that his extended bit runs down the bottom wall and the longest part is along the right wall. Slightly adjust the tv angle and Bob's your auntie Joan. Either that or get him to swap feet and arse so he is sitting alongside you.

Guessmydog · 11/08/2019 01:04

I voted yanbu even though I am guilty of this myself. My partner blocks my legs so I end up having to get sneaky to get my webs on. Things he does that piss me off and stops me: holds my ankle and tickles my foot, pulls my sock down so it's just covering from the ball of my foot, pushes my sock in between my toes and stops me from removing it, removes my sock and threads it between my toes, holds my toes like he's holding my hand, thrusts his finger in between my toes rigorously. I'm sure there's more. He can be pretty annoying when he wants to be Grin Basically you have to teach him the hard way that it's in his best interests not to do it. If he doesn't respond to any of that then (apart from him being a psychopath) you need pull out the big guns and give his toes a wet willy.

BlackCatSleeping · 11/08/2019 02:04

I hope the footstool works. It would drive me mad too!

NothingElse · 11/08/2019 03:14

What's a train table? Does it have trains on it? Is it shaped like a train? Need answers

allthegins · 11/08/2019 07:25

Can’t believe someone suggested kicking him when you get up from the sofa. Would you give a man that advice?

Mileysmiley · 11/08/2019 07:28

Throw a bucket of water over him, that will make him move!

Just joking lol

Just tell him to moveand if he doesn't his life will be made a living hell.

bluegirlgreen · 11/08/2019 10:14

YANBU @SofaSaga

We moved into a new house, (some 10 years ago,) and we had a 3-piece suite. We put the 2 armchairs side by side, (along one wall,) and the couch along another wall. In the previous house, the armchairs were 3-4 feet away from each other, with a stereo in the middle (in a cabinet.)

In the new house, it was not possible to put them 3-4 feet apart,, because of the design of the lounge. So we had to sit the armchairs side by side, with no 3-4 foot -gap. (Just a gap of a couple of inches.) DH sat on the chair to to my left.

He sat on the chair, facing me slightly (and in the direction of the TV,) and EVERY. FUCKING. DAY! he put his feet up on the right arm of his chair, but it hung over the (left) arm of MY chair. His feet were literally 10 to 12 inches from my FACE, with either his sweaty socks under my nose, OR his fucking bare feet.

I kept saying 'PLEASE move your feet!' He would say (begrudgingly) 'where am I meant to put them?' I said 'how about on the pissing floor?!!' 'But I am comfortable with them hanging over the arm!' he retorted. He also said he could not point them in the other direction because he would not be facing the TV then!

It pissed me off so much, that when I got my first laptop (back around 2011, and about a year and a half after we moved in, (and after about a year and a half of tolerating this,) I started putting my laptop on the left arm of my chair when I was using it.

THAT stopped him putting his feet over the left arm of my chair. He got so annoyed though, and kept asking me when I would be done, so he could put his feet up, as he was 'uncomfortable' with his feet down. I just stayed on the laptop for ages (to stop him!)

When I DID finish what I was doing on the laptop, and put it on the floor at the side of me, his feet were in my face within SECONDS! Straight up onto the right arm of his chair they went, (and hanging over the left arm of my chair!) Angry

Anyway, after 3 years in that house, we moved again, and had a lounge (in the next house,) where we could have the armchairs apart again. THANK FUCK! They are 10 feet apart now. BLISS!

What is it with men, wanting to invade your personal space? Hmm He could literally see NOTHING wrong with his fucking FEET being 10-12 inches from my FACE.

fedup21 · 11/08/2019 10:21

You’re pregnant. I would use that as an excuse to lie down with my feet up every evening for months (I actually did do a fair amount of this when pregnant!).

If I sit where he sits he says your in my seat.

I wouldn’t be having kids or even sex with someone who said this to me!

bluebeck · 11/08/2019 10:27

If I sit where he sits he says your in my seat

He says this to his pregnant partner,knowing how much it annoys you to be hemmed in? Not exactly a Prince among men is he?

Why do the DC have to sit on the floor?

This whole situation sounds really weird to me.

Original poster
SofaSaga · 11/08/2019 12:41

To all who asked, yes the train table is a low table where dc2 plays with his trains and builds a wooden track for them.

OP posts:
gingerbiscuits · 11/08/2019 12:59

OMG he's being a total twat! He's taking up nearly all of a large sofa & your kids have to sit on the floor because of him?? That's ridiculous!! And as for telling you "you're in my seat" ?? How utterly childish & selfish! It's YOUR sofa, for a start!! You need to tell him to get a footstool or sit in the corner bit of the sofa & put his legs along one of the side pieces if he's that bloody insistent at putting his feet up. At least that would then leave the other piece of sofa for other people to bloody sit down. What a dick.

Bahhhhhumbug · 11/08/2019 20:18

I've asked this already as have other pp but how are you trapped in diagram two, you can just stand straight up to get up from seat.

Original poster
SofaSaga · 11/08/2019 21:44

Sorry I missed that.
The couch isnt just as long as i drew. So in Diagram 2 when I sit there I have his feet right beside me, which isn't ideal but I am fine with that.
But that is usually dc1's seat though, so
What I don't like with diagram 2 is because he is sitting selfishly, he is taking up 4/5th of the sofa, i am using dc1's 1/5th of the sofa while both children have to sit on the floor.

OP posts:
JoxerGoesToStuttgart · 11/08/2019 21:53

I would put a stop to all this “that’s his seat and that’s DS1s seat” bullshit. Because what it is meaning in reality is that DPs seat actually means he has that whole part of the sofa plus as far as his feet reach on the other part. And then if it’s your “DSes seat” no one else in your (soon to be) family of 5 gets to sit on the sofa. A sofa that presumably accommodates at least 4 people. It’s ridiculous. Sit wherever you want in the sofa. Don’t let anyone have their own seat. They aren’t fucking royalty. Everyone is equal and gets a spot on the couch wherever there is an empty spot.

73Sunglasslover · 12/08/2019 00:05

I think you need to move where you are sitting on the sofa so he can sit with his feet up without 'trapping you'. The issue seems to be about keeping everyone comfortable rather than anything else and 'sitting normally' is not that comfortable for him I think. Can you sit where he does instead? then he can out his legs along the left of the sofa and everyone should be happy.

Butterymuffin · 12/08/2019 00:15

both children have to sit on the floor.

I absolutely would not have this. I would be telling him to move as the kids get to sit on the sofa too and he is stopping them. I would do this right now and when he moans say 'well, when your footstool arrives it'll be how you want it again. Now MOVE'

justilou1 · 12/08/2019 00:19

Carry a fork with you at all times... one of those tiny, sharp ones. Stab the top of his feet every... single...time. If he is putting his feet up in an effort to get comfy, make damn sure he isn’t.

Euclid · 12/08/2019 00:24

I am so sorry that you have such a miserable relationship. If you loved him, you would not mind, and, if he loved you, he would not annoy you . Ask him to leave and make sure that you have a contract in writing with your next partner about the sofa.