DH says I'm being unreasonable?

[Goojiboo]

DH usually swamps the family calender in December with Christmas pub crawls, golfing days, overnight city breaks for himself with his friends.
He doesnt at all consider any family activities over the Christmas period, any couple time. Just himself.
This year is obviously different but I thought he might find a way around this. We both have 2 weeks off for Christmas with the DCs.
I thought he might find a way "around" things so scheduled in a bit of time for myself before he got to the calender. I've taken one measley day of the holidays to finish wrapping gifts, finish buying if I haven't finished yet, to meet a friend and do my hobby. Just one day.
He has seen this and is telling me that his group of friends are planning something for this day and that I need to swap my plans for another day.
I've said no, that I'm sticking to this day and that we have tickets to a National Trust Christmas walk, plans to see friends etc around this one day before Christmas. I've suggested 8 alternative dates over the Christmas break that he could try to rearrange this with his friends but he's bow sulking with me, sleeping in the spare room and calling me selfish qnd unreasonable for not rearranging my plans.
I have arranged everything over Christmas, done all the Christmas shopping, wrapped gifts etc and I feel utterly taken for granted that he's behaving like this. I just want this one day which fits in well with other plans. I've told him he doesn't need to join us on the few family days out that I've planned and can go and have a day with his friends on those days.
He still says I'm unreasonable.
He's killing the love tbh. He's behaving like a teenager.

Well it sounds like this is the straw that broke the camels back really. Why doesn't he want to spend time with you as a couple or you as a family over Christmas? This would be a bigger issue for me

@Goojiboo

We are past the point of making plans for Christmas over coffee unfortunately. I've tried involving him, asking his advice, sitting together with the calender on an evening, but he treats me like a rival. He's always planning something or thinking about doing something that he's not being honest and open about. So we created the "whoever gets to the calender first" rule. Because I felt like I was being taken for a mug prioritising all the family stiff whilst he thought only of himself. I am already in the process of getting ducks in a row.

That's a very sad way to live OP, you and your kids deserve better than that

Is your AIBU...to still be married to him?

Why do you like him? I mean, as a person?

dear god it gets worse

his mummy cleaned his house for him and bails him out? he never really grew up did he

Imagine when he has to do his own wife work, and buy and wrap presents for the kids himself.
He's a pure dickhead. Do not back down.

@Goojiboo

If he had broached the conversation with "this wrapping you have to do, is there a time that we can do it together, or a time when I can do it? The lads really want to get together on this day and there isn't another day available. Is there anything else I can do to help to make it possible that we both get a bit of time off? Let's take a look at the calender together." I definitely would have tried to be more accommodating. But this is actually how the conversation began: "Do you need this ENTIRE day for wrapping presents? Can you not just swap this to another day and swim on Sunday?" I say no and explain why "Well, I think you're selfish and unreasonable. You could easily change your plans if you wanted to."

See taken on its own, I would agree with him that wrapping presents doesn’t need to go on the calendar for a specific day and surely it would be easier for you to wrap a different time than for an outing to be reorganised. Likewise I read that you could not move your swim because the alternative time was when you planned to clean. So as I say, looking solely at this conversation, it could be argued that you are being inflexible.

However, not taking it in isolation, no you are definitely not unreasonable. He is selfish, he thinks he is more important than you are and has no interest in family life. I’m glad to read you are lining up your ducks.

But surely you could wrap your presents one of the 8 other days you’ve suggested? If it’s a group of friends that wanted to do something I can see his point of view.

I'm guessing that if you felt he usually respected you and your time, you would have accommodated him. But you said right in the first post that you thought he might 'try to get around it'. The day with the friends popped up so conveniently that I did wonder whether it actually exists - or whether he's just claiming it does because he has a massive problem with you taking planned, protected time for you, because if you do that the whole premise of your relationship and his role in it collapses. It wouldn't surprise me. He sounds very 'strategic' in his thinking and actions (putting on a show of domesticity until you were pregnant aka trapped).

This idea that she can just rearrange her present-wrapping time is fantastical bollocks though, isn't it.

She has no other child-free, free time, to swap it into.

She might if he did his share of cleaning but he won't.

She's made plans for the family for other days (well herself and the DC, depending on whether the DH can be arsed spending time with them).

The rest of the time, she's either busy with the DC, or sleeping.

The only way she could 'swap' would be if he offered a day when he'd look after the DCs. He hasn't.

He expects her to fit her wrapping, swimming and socialising into the middle of the night, or into a parallel dimension that does not actually exist. He wants her to 'rearrange it' away.

I'm guessing that if you felt he usually respected you and your time, you would have accommodated him.

Yeah agree, this is thing with threads like this, if we apply it to our own/a reasonable relationship where couples try to work together and help each other out then she may be being a little unreasonable but this is not that type of relationship clearly and her DH wants all take and no give, he isn't trying to help this relationship work as it should work

Normally I would say YABU, but given the background the perfect phrase is You reap what you sow!

It is interesting that the other wives are friends and you have never met them. And the way that he is viewed in the friendship doesnt seem to be how he comes across here. Almost as if he doesnt want you to meet them because he knows that you being there will change the way they see him

Yes @lottiegarbanzo he does want me to do it in the middle of the night. He said so.
"Most people just do it late at night. Why can't you do that?"
Because I'm knackered and have a chronic medical condition that exasperates when I'm sleep deprived. Which he knows all about and chooses to ignore.

Behaving like a child. Stick to your guns.

Jeezo. DO NOT back down. DO consider if you really want to remain married to such an utterly selfish, entitled man-child..... You have made a rod for your own back putting up with this shit - make 2021 the year you make some changes.....

it's always a shock when you suddenly start enforcing boundaries with someone you've previously given free rein too. You would think you'd have 'credit in the bank' from all the times you've accommodated them in the past. But they don't see it that way because they've got used to the idea the favours only run one way

Brilliantly summarised @Butterymuffin
7This happens to me on occasion - I can still remember vividly about 30 years ago, being very late for something, and how angry others were with me. The fact that I was previously unfailingly punctual (indeed, often early) meant absolutely nothing. It changed my view of the people involved.

But they were not my husband! I really feel for you OP - you sound emotionally exhausted. Good luck

OP,

What a prick.

Glad you are getting organised to get away from him.

@Goojiboo why on earth did you have DC2 when ‘the truth came out’ during your pregnancy with DC1????

Why do you stay? Do you still love him?

Love it when people suggest getting divorced over stuff like this 🤣

@Waspnest

Women everywhere need to just stop putting up with men who behave like this.

This. Why do so many women on MN have children with so many pricks? I don't see it in real life, only on here.

I know what you mean but I suspect that most of this is hidden in plain sight in our friends' and families' relationships.

Saying that, I have known two couples who had Hs who were utterly charming and we always had the best time with them socially but just underneath the surface, it actually wasn't that difficult to notice the constant snipes at the W, the constant belittlement, something simmering away always. DH and I were not surprised when those divorces turned out the most acrimonious.

What would happen if you said to him 'ok I'll swap but only if you do all the wrapping and food shopping for Xmas before you go? Plus I'm going to move my day to another where you'll be responsible for the dc all day

Be glad he's in the spare room - and don't waste your precious day off wrapping anything for him.

I would agree with him in “normal” circumstances that your plans are easier to change and in a caring relationship, that’s exactly what I would do. So on the face of it, YABU.

But, it’s not about these plans is it? It’s about the fact that he doesn’t consider you at all.

@lemonsquashie

Love it when people suggest getting divorced over stuff like this 🤣

Really? Stuff like this? Habitual total selfishness and sulking? I'm surprised when people have such low standards that they accept being treated like that.