To think DH is taking the piss with his hobbies and activities at weekends?

[Prinny1]

Both of us work full time. We co-own our own business. Two DC, ages 9 and 15.

Every Friday evening DH goes to the pub to meet friends at about 4pm. Gets home anytime between 8 and 11, tipsy. Is snoring on sofa within 5 minutes of getting in. Leaves all making dinner/clearing away/sorting younger DC out/sorting dogs out to me. Won't chat or communicate when he gets home.

Every Saturday; goes off to do one of several hobbies as early as 7.30 am. Today was clay pigeon shooting with friends followed by a long hike with same friends. Gets in anytime from 5pm onwards. Moans about how tired he is, then falls asleep on the sofa. Has no interaction with any of us when he gets home. Tonight he's been snoring away on the sofa, mouth open, since 7pm. All chores/sorting dogs out/ferrying DC to activities are left to me all day.

On Sundays he spends the day lounging around, moaning about how tired he is from the previous day.

AIBU to think he's taking the piss? He thinks I'm being unreasonable!

You and the kids would be better off living on your own. I can't see what this lazy shit adds to your lives. Just dump him and then you won't have to listen to his moaning any more.

Have you thought about dropping pingpong balls down his open neck while his snoring on the sofa and blaming the kids?

Yeah, not the kind of husband, nor relationship/life I'd be putting up with.

Having a stinking dead pig on the sofa every weekend evening, isn't too appealing.

What are Mon-Thur evenings like?

Divorce is the only reasonable solution here.
His actions show that he doesn't love you or his kids anyway, so you may as well call it a day.

Give him a shock of Booking a weekend break with the kids , and go alone . Say the kids need your full attention for a few days because all you do is housework and they and yourself are far more important.

Let him get on with it . Don't do any washing or shopping before you go ! He is big enough to shop , and Google how to use a washing machine.

IF he doesn't care that you are all going without him then he doesn't care ! And you will have your answer .

Alternatively wake up sort the kids so they won't be hungry for the day etc and just say " I have got to pop out to the shops for something for myself and it cannot wait" let him wonder where you are going. " then treat yourself to some me time!
If he also doesn't care where you have been / going then he isn't worth your time xx

I would just stop including him and enjoy your time with the kids they will grow up resenting him not you. Xx

What exactly does he bring to your family? You know you don’t have to get him to agree he is a selfish shitty husband and selfish shitty father to ask him to leave?
What are you doing for him? I would suggest sweet fuck all, or exactly the same as he does for his family. No washing, meals...

Of course he’s unreasonable. He sounds like a bit of a pointless family member. What do you children think about this?

We have a rule in our house it’s fine to go out and have too many wines or go and being out all day on a hobby as long as when you’re home you don’t lounge around tired from hobby or drinking. If you’re out that’s fine have a great time but when you’re home you engage in family life otherwise you can’t do the hobby/go drinking as if impacts the family and that’s not fair.

Even if it wasn't bloody unfair on you, it's incredibly mean to the kids. What the fuck is the point of him having a family when he doesn't even interact with you all?

Do you do all the graft in your shared business, too?
You both work 'full time', yet he is in the pub from 4pm every Friday?
Is one of you more full time than the other?

TinklyLittleLaugh:
Well my Dad was like this. Not a nasty man, I mean I think he loved us. But he basically did his own thing throughout my childhood. As an adult I had no real bond with him, nothing to say to him and worst of all, no particular sense of loss when he passed away.

Ask him if this is what he wants his DCs to write about him in the future.

Tell him that all his DCs see of him is a drunken snoring lump on the sofa. That will be how his DCs will remember him from theirchildhood.

What is it that you like about him?

Course he wants you to feel you’re unreasonable because then you’ll stop interfering with his agenda of all the things he wants to do! He sounds utterly selfish. There are four of you in the house and he’s meeting the needs of one. Himself.

If your home and financial affairs are closely tied up together then I think it would be a good idea to see a solicitor anyway even just so you know what the options are if you were to split. If he's been like this for a decade and a half it's going to be hard to change.

Oh heck no! I have a wicked streak so I wouldn't do his laundry, cook his dinner or wash up what he has used and just keep going down that line until the penny drops. Do what you need to for you, dc, the dog etc but do nothing for him whatsoever.

Get another job, preferably one that involves away travel so he is forced to step up.

My dad was and is also like this. He had an overwhelming hobby - gliding - which took up every summer weekend and holiday - all family holidays were tiptoeing round his moods in a caravan while he had a tantrum if he couldn't fly and stressed if he could.

We mostly run along amicably but I don't think I'll have a lot of contact with him when mum dies and if she had had any self esteem she would have left him years ago.

@doxxed read the first sentence in the OP.

He cannot be interested in your relationship. I couldn’t live like that op, it would have to change or I’d have to leave him. What a way to live.

What is he like during the week? Are you still expected to do everything then?

What would he say/do if you announced you were going out on Friday night or having a weekend away?

YANBU OP.
I was in a relationship with someone like this for 6 years. No DC thank goodness.
BUT he was out all the time doing his hobbies, coming in late drunk. ON days he was actually at home he was lying around on the sofa "exhausted" from his very important job and his hobbies.
I talked to him about this many times - to no avail and he'd whinge and moan at me and give me filthy looks anytime I told him to do some jobs around the house.
He was a self-entitled knob and I enabled his lifestyle while he was living the life of a single man, doing what he liked when he liked.

It's a type OP and they don't change. It's even worse when you've got children. Everyone should be able to have free time to do whatever hobbies they like or to meet friends etc. But that means EVERYONE in the relationship and it also means that one person shouldn't be spending the whole weekend either out or rolling around the sofa "exhausted".

Have one last discussion with him about this. He needs to be in a fit state on Sundays for family time and therefore something will have to give. Which of the activities does he want to give up? How much individual time is each person in the relationship entitled to? How and when will this be organized? How are chores split and organized?
When is ring-fenced time for the whole family to do something fun together?
etcetc.
Make a list of the points you want to bring up.
Make clear you are very serious that a change needs to happen now.

If he does not want to get onboard with this and starts saying you are being unfair then I would suggest he does not really want to be in the marriage. You would be better off on your own. At least you would get some time off when he has care of the kids.

Honestly it sounds easier being a single parent sometimes without that to deal with on top of it! I'd just stop cooking/cleaning/washing for HIM and enabling him.

Why do people think that men like this suddenly change after separation?

Why do you think he'll suddenly become a parent? He won't.

I definitely think the OP would be better off without him, but she'll still be a full time parent, she just won't have him moaning in her ear and causing her more work/stress.

Ok, what's he like in your workplace?