To have shouted at DP for weirdness / dopeyness?

[SmashedPumpkinz]

DP is incapable of thinking for himself. He has no initiative and it’s driving me crazy. Some of his behaviours are so odd and weird and it’s starting to really irritate me.

I’ve just bought a hard floor cleaner/vacuum. I was spending all day yesterday painting woodwork and DP was just sat there not knowing what to do. So I asked him to use the new floor cleaner for the first time. It’s cordless and I’d spent the previous day charging the battery (which only works for 45 mins). The whole house needed a floor clean. I heard him turn it on and it didn’t sound like it was actually moving so admittedly I thought he’d turned it on so I could hear it but had then just sat down. I was fuming. I went in to check and walked in to the cleaner on full blast stationary in the middle of the floor and DP just stood there looking at it suspiciously. I said “what are you doing???” He said “I’m just working it out”. I get mad and turned it off saying “what is there to work out?? You turn it on and move it across the floor!!! You don’t stand there watching it drain it’s battery!”

He decided that he didn’t like my attitude towards him at the point and refused to continue with it. He did fuck all yesterday ... everything he was supposed to do he literally spent the entire time “working it out” ... changing light bulbs, fixing the bed, cleaning the floors, fixing the fence ... none done as he was too busy “working it out”

this is 100% a man thing - mine loves to stare at rooms we're about to do up for ages working it out, to be fair though once he starts it's done really very well.

Although, I did phone him on my way home the other night to ask him to switch on the oven to cook some fish cakes which were in the fridge at home, he then phoned me back 10 mins later to ask me what temperature & how long to cook them for

this is 100% a man thing - mine loves to stare at rooms we're about to do up for ages working it out, to be fair though once he starts it's done really very well.

Um, so do I and I am 100% not a man.

I agree this bloke sounds like a dimwit of the 'Mummy will sort it all out, so I don't really need to try' school.

But, I would hate to live with someone who bought new appliances, learnt how to use them, presented them to me with no instructions, then immediately shouted at me for not 'using it right'.

Admittiedly, I would read the instructions before switching it on. But isn't ignoring instructions and 'learning by doing' supposed to be one of those classic 'man things' that all lovers of 'man thing' stereotypes love to latch on to?

this is 100% a man thing - mine loves to stare at rooms we're about to do up for ages working it out, to be fair though once he starts it's done really very well.

Just because you picked someone so useless, doesn't mean everyone else has!

Yep agree that he’s doing it deliberately so you do it all.

I couldn’t live with someone that lazy and manipulative.

My DH is not practical at all. He’s clever but has no common sense. His dad and brothers are all builders/joiners and imminently capable and when he was younger they would tease him for not being able to do things they found very simple. This lead to him losing confidence in himself and now he just panics when faced with any new practical task or piece of technology. His brain just seems to freeze. Left to his own devices he will think things through, study the instruction manual, maybe go on the Internet to research it and eventually work things out, but it’s a slow process and he has to do it on his own. I do find it incredibly frustrating but I’ve learned not to interfere or try and help, that just panics him more. He just needs to be left alone to get on with it. Shouting at him would make him much worse.

Mm, I guess it depends.

Mine isn’t naturally technically minded at all but he’s academically brilliant and he’s the furthest away from being lazy sod that you could possibly get. He never goes to the pub and isn’t interested in watching sport on tv so it’s definitely not a crap excuse to get out of doing stuff.

However, I hadn’t realised how domestically incompetent he was until I asked him to make fish fingers and chips for DS’s tea once as I was going to be out. I discovered he’d cooked the frozen chips first before putting the fish fingers in the oven. I wrongly assumed he’d just know how to do it.

However, if I spend a bit of time explaining how something works and give him clear instructions, he can manage. I had to set up his smart phone so he could do internet/phone banking and he just gets on with it now.

Luckily, I don’t need him to be a DIY fiend because I can do most stuff myself quite happily and he’ll happily pay a professional if it’s something more complicated.

There’s nothing worse than a DH who could do diy, chooses to fanny about and moans when you want to get someone in to finish the job properly. That was my dad and we lived with unfinished jobs for years!

My son is like this. He has autism and dyspraxia. Nice to know women will treat him like complete shit when he’s older...

If he is a different person at work, capable of getting on with things, it could be because his work boss doesn't undermine his self-confidence or shout at him. When people treat you like an idiot, at some point you start feeling like an idiot, and become slow, clumsy and helpless.

I hear you, OP.

Both of my abusive ex’s had no problem keeping their own house tidy, cleaning things like the bathroom properly...until I came along. Suddenly it all became a mystery to them (except when they walked in and the house was less than up to their perfect t standards). Mysteriously both of them didn’t seem able to wash clothes without ruining them (unless it was their clothes - with special measures needed to wash them. They they could do it, and instruct me on how to wash their clothes too...it was just mine and the children’s they couldn’t do)

@Scunnnnnered

Scunnnnnered

My son is like this. He has autism and dyspraxia. Nice to know women will treat him like complete shit when he’s older...

Oh give over

Now OP has to put up with a lazy twat because of some random’s son on the internet.

Strategic incompetence it’s called.
What’s the point in doing something if somebody else can do it?
Better to feign ignorance.

Unfortunately they don’t see the damage being done in long term- eventually partner has had enough and leaves them, cue another baffled question “what have I done?”

You’ve done nothing. Absolutely nothing, which they still don’t get as to them it means “nothing wrong”

And both of them held down jobs (one in particular) with a lot of responsibility. But could they cook, follow a recipe? Seems not, if it was because I’d asked them to because I was busy doing XYZ - or ill. Oh, if I was I’ll there’d be moping, and crashing around the house, and listing everything they’d done ‘for’ me to ‘help’ me, all with an air of indignation and expectations of some sort of medal and later complaints that I was a shit mother/partner/wife and couldn’t cope. but if THEY were ill...we’ll then...the expectation was to be waited on hand a foot...cause that was my place, you see.

I understand how you feel OP. It is passive aggressive bullshit.

My son is like this. He has autism and dyspraxia. Nice to know women will treat him like complete shit when he’s older...

Your son has diagnosed medical conditions. That's absolutely not the same thing at all and you know it.

Sounds like some, hate to say it but it is true, "men" I have known wiggling their way out of doing anything and me letting myself be ground down with all domestic duties and flouncing and shouting or doing things deliberately badly when asked to do anything. I did read somewhere that v conveniently there are some mental conditions that make domestic chores a very hard thing for the individual to to

And I should avoid having any sort of long term relationship with either the former lazy bastards or the latter ones who it is all too much for.

Was yours an arranged marriage or something? If not, you must have had some idea of his incompetence and/or laziness so why on earth would you marry him?

@Scunnnnnered my DS has dyspraxia too and this thread hit a nerve with me too. I really hope he's not seen as lazy, thick etc when he's older. I can see why it would come across like that to an outsider and it breaks my heart.

When I read the start of the OP I did think he might be taking the piss a bit but when she said he's like this with everything it reminded me so much of DS.

@adaline - at no point did I say he was useless!

How can you be with someone so devoid of intelligence? Laziness is something else, but what’s the attraction in terminal dimness?!

Newsflash: women don’t have to put up with lazy men even if they have dyspraxia or autism.

Nobody here is in a position to say that he is doing it deliberately or that this is manipulative behaviour. They know almost nothing about your dp.

Shouting at a partner to get them to change their behaviour is entirely counterproductive. Aside from that, you're supposed to be equals, neither of you should be shouting at each other.

You aren't being unreasonable to be annoyed at his seemingly poor ability to complete domestic tasks. If you have the patience, you can show him how these things are done then leave him to it.

If nothing changes or if you don't think you have the patience to deal with it constructively then perhaps think about whether, on balance, this is something that you can live with.

But children with autism and dyspraxia grow up to be adults. Yes this DH could be a lazy adult or his brain could be wired differently.

DH is very academic but rubbish at DIY and some other practical stuff. I am even worse. He would be rubbish in a manual job, as would I. Hence the reason we do jobs that involve numbers as they are what we are good at. DS is definitely a thinker and slow at doing things (I can see so much of me in him) but academically bright.

But children with autism and dyspraxia grow up to be adults. Yes this DH could be a lazy adult or his brain could be wired differently.

But even if he does have dyspraxia or autism, OP still doesn't have to stay in the relationship. If she's not happy, she can leave, regardless of what he is or isn't diagnosed with.

How can he not know that he had to move the cleaner for it to clean the floor?

Everything @Baboomtsk said

(Who genuinely struggles with light bulbs? I also have autism and dyspraxia and have slow processing, but light bulbs are not remotely complicated?)