Fed up of nagging DH to just be a functioning adult!!!!

[Youngatheart00]

It’s making me miserable and it’s affecting our relationship. We’ve been together year and my share of the ‘domestic labour’ is just rising. We don’t yet have children and I’m worried for that day!!

Examples of what I keep reminding him to do - pay his credit card bill (he’s had 2 late payments in the last 6 months - given I pay half of this and the money is always in his bank account way ahead of the due date winds me up even more), send a lovely Xmas card to his grandpa who’s in a nursing home (been nagging on this for a week - even bought the card!!!), it would take him 5 mins to write it and I don’t even mind posting it. That’s just a couple of examples - there are more - like getting a haircut or booking medical appointments which are a similar battle.

He will do the jobs around the house he ‘wants’ to do (he does 75% of the cooking for eg as he enjoys it) but other things seem to left to me or it becomes so painful reminding him I just end up doing them myself.

I don’t want to be a nag 😫 but it’s getting me down. Any advice?

I think some women enjoy the mothering role and become their DP/DH's mother. Sure, they'll complain and get stressed with being responsible for an adult but they won't do anything about it. The DH shows no respect and the woman says "it's like having another child, oh what's he like"

Nothing changes, they have more children. Woman turns into a stereotypical nagging wife. Husband becomes increasing infantilised and claims to be incapable of the most basic household tasks.

Eventually, they either get divorced or carry on as they are with the wife having the odd moan about it every now and then.

Sorry to hear about your ectopic, OP. I missed that post. It can feel bleak but need not impact on conception if you have one tube. It will be complicated given your posts but, depending on your age, you might want to look at timing for IVF too.

Good luck.

You'd be bonkers to have a child with a man-child, please don't! He probably will never changes, just get more "selectively helpless". If you are happy to end up doing everything and taking all responsibility then fine.. but it's relentless and very tiring I believe! Consider finding someone less helpless, more responsible and who is an equal partner maybe?

You’ve been together a year and you’re basically parenting this man child. A year into a relationship should be fun, plenty of sex and still getting to know each other, not reminding him to do basic shit he should know to do already. Bollocks to that.

I agree actually - i prefer cleaning bathrooms to cooking meals!! Know some will find that strange.

Living under each others feet has excaserbated (sp??!) the situation. Our worlds have shrunk and this has placed way more emphasis on these little irritants than I would have previously done.

Re the DD - I KNOW!! This is just a prime example. Anyone logically would know it takes 5 mins to do. But he just won’t sort it. It’s like it’s a special kind of procrastination. And the more I ask the more he rallies against it.

I think people are right about the ‘leave him to his own devices’ when it comes to haircuts, dental appts etc. But if he continues to not take care of himself (without my ‘nagging’) we will have a real problem if I then no longer find him sexually attractive.

I think for someone just to be competent and capable of their own self care along with life admin is something I value hugely in a partner. I’m not about to make any rash decisions but you’re right, I shouldn’t rush to bring a child into this environment which is fraught with niggly snapping.

Don’t mean to be rude, but you really are stupid if you link your credit with his and he can’t be relied on to pay his bills. This can have such a detrimental effect on your future life.

Also stop using the word nag and apologising to him for expecting him to be an adult. You know this won’t change and you will be his “mum” forever.

I think if my dh started making hair appointments for me so that I remained sexually attractive enough for him I'd find that weird and controlling tbh.

He's not the person for you OP give it up.

Read some other threads on this kind of thing.

You're getting ample warning here.

The trouble is when someone heaps the shitwork on you, one day 'all the lovely things' about them suddenly aren't enough any more. That day usually comes when you realise that even seeing you on your knees with tiredness and stress, post-children, isn't enough to make them do their share because they simply care more about their comfort than your welfare.

Then it's too late of course, because you have babies, and your choice is now live a quite shitty life in which your resentment of your husband eventually overtakes anything, or divorce.

THINK HARD - this will not change.

But if he continues to not take care of himself (without my ‘nagging’) we will have a real problem if I then no longer find him sexually attractive

Surely he is equally unattractive if he neglects himself or if you have to nag him to the barbers/dentists? So tell him it turns you off and it's likely to stop you wanting to have sex with him, and leave it at that.

Currently he does what he wants, and the only consequence is your voice in his ear, and it sounds like you mind that set up more than he does. Things might change if there are consequences for him. And if not, you'll have a clear signal on how important the relationship is(n't) to him.

Stop doing things for him, just stop it. You’re his wife, not his Mother or PA.

If he forgets to write cards to people then so be it, if he gets into lots of debt with the credit card company then let him. He needs to grow up and take responsibility for himself. Don’t have children with him until he learns to do this.

@Eckhart

You're incompatible. He has every right not to get his hair cut, or pay his credit card bill, or to send a card to his grandfather.

You not liking it doesn't give you the right to tell him what to do.

The not paying of the CC bill could directly affect the OP. So she does have a right to push about that.

And she clearly is being thoughtful regarding the grandfather. Nothing wrong with that.

oh advice?

Stop. Doing. The. Things. And unjoin your bank account.
And don't have children with him.
And stop reminding him. Tell him once. Then ignore and carry on with your things. His family are his responsibility.

But definitely decouple your finances now.

Strategic incompetence google it its manipulation. Let his "balls" drop and by that I mean you are juggling everything let him feel the consequences of his own inactivity while you keep yours in the air, having a vagina doesn't make you automatically responsible for his life. That's your choice when you do that if he's not pulling his weight you bear the full responsibility. Partner is always better than a project

If the card is in his name and buying things for him, it won't affect OP.

And yes, she's being thoughtful regarding the grandfather, and no, there is nothing wrong with that. Except she is choosing to do it, and it's pissing her off. If she thinks Pops is lonely, she could send a card from herself with engaging questions, and be his pen pal, he might love that. But that doesn't mean she should take responsibility for her husbands actions in a relationship with a member of his own family.

You made a good point about the bathroom cleaning/cooking. I hate cooking and don't particularly like bathroom cleaning, but i do that one out of the two. It's once a week more-or-less but cooking is every freaking day. Exhausting.

I've been married a L-o-o-n-g time. First year i did all the christmas cards. 2nd year i said "we both have massive families, you do yours, I'll do mine and we'll do friends as and when". And of course he didn't get it done and the fallout was... frankly, i had a good laugh at the sisters-in-law puffing up to have a go at me. I just told them to fuck off and speak to their brother if it bothered them so much.

You can't do that with everything, but you have to make it work somehow, for both of you.

I'm with pp: if the grandpa is someone you care about send him the card. From you.

Leave him. I fell into this trap and ended up basically being his mother. It's destroyed our marriage.

My DH is also selectively helpless. I long ago gave up micro-managing him and let him screw up. It was often painful and there are still some sticky moments but he has improved considerably.

My mantra is “I’m his wife not his nanny’ and it has made my life much happier.

I'm never in favour of enabling a pathetic man but I do think you are creating some of this by expecting him to do things your way and to your timescale rather than leaving him to do his own thing.

Examples where you should leave it include Drs, hairdressers etc. Plus it's really early to send Christmas cards IMO, he doesn't need nagging about that.

Why not experiment being more relaxed for a couple of months and see how it goes?

I think people are right about the ‘leave him to his own devices’ when it comes to haircuts, dental appts etc. But if he continues to not take care of himself (without my ‘nagging’) we will have a real problem if I then no longer find him sexually attractive.

^^ I couldn't find someone who I have to mother to sort out dental appointments sexually attractive

We now have a Whiteboard (DHs idea) in the kitchen. We write down each week what needs to be done and who is doing it. It takes some of the mental load off me, has made him keep on top of things more and it's quite obvious the next week if he's not done stuff. But you also need to stop doing anything that doesn't have a direct impact on you, don't get his family presents, don't arrange his haircuts or get a card for grandpa.

Since you married him in the first place, presumably he managed to maintain his health, personal hygiene and haircuts to an acceptable standard before he met you and without your help. Stop mothering him. Just as you find his apparent incapability unattractive. No-one finds being infantilised attractive either.
There are lots of issues in your posts eg about his job being more 'important'. Now either you believe that or you don't. But you need to dig deeper than snarky asides. You have fundamentally different world views if he thinks 'saving the world' is more important than being financially secure; and you think the opposite. You both need to respect each other's choices including career decisions. If you don't, then there is more wrong here than a missed DD.

Hi OP. I had one of those incompetent men. Mine didn't even know what salary he was on. He also liked to cook.

I enabled him, for years. We were married for just short of 11 years with two children. I have aged about 20 years in that time. There were other things going on in the marriage too but I can assure you that if you are frustrated now, wait until children come along. The anger, resentment and bitterness will become more and more apparent. You will be exhausted with nothing left to give.

It is not your job to parent him. You either sort it now or I promise you, you will live to regret it. xx

You have been together 10 years.
He is not going to change!

You suffering stress about it all ('nagging') isn't going to help. Can you live with the stress and get on with things as they are? It is that - or leave him really.

Are you willing to be mother to him AND any children you have? If so - it is fine to go ahead.

It's not your job to mother him and I don't know how you can have any respect for him in that situation.

You should definitely decouple your finances if he can't pay bills on time.

I think his very important job is just a wider symptom of him thinking that he is a VERY IMPORTANT PERSON. And very important people are above such trivia as paying bills (shouldn't the credit card company know that he is a very important person and therefore not expect to be paid on time???). And you shouldn't feel that his personal hygiene is a problem for you, because don't you know how lucky you are to be married to such a VERY IMPORTANT PERSON. If his family get shit gifts, they should be amazed and thankful that they get anything from such an important person. Doing the cooking makes him feel important, cleaning the loo definitely doesn't. That's way beneath His Importantness.

If he's of that mindset, then reminding him of jobs that most people would expect to be done are an affront to his idea of himself as a...I won't write it again. And you are failing in your duty to acknowledge what a Very Important Person he is.

He will therefore always behave in such a way as to reinforce his own self image, and that means ignoring anything you ask him to do. If he actually did it, then he wouldn't be so important, you would have taken away a little bit of it and been more important than him.

This is a difficult one to crack, but the best option is probably to leave him to it until being important means something happens that bites him on the backside. But keep your finances as separate as you can, and stop doing anything for him that he should be doing for himself. Don't feed his behaviour.