Every bloody week it's the same

[countrygirl99]

I have a system for planning my weekly shop. It's been the same for years. There is a notepad in the kitchen and during the weeks if you notice a store cupboard item or toiletries etc are getting low you are supposed to write it on the pad. Friday I plan the meals for the week. I go through each meal and make sure we have the ingredients in the cupboard or on the shopping list then add anything else that is on the notepad. That way we should have everything we need. Every bloody week I'll be working my way through the meal plan checking the ingredients and DH will randomly ask for his shower gel or marmite or whatever meaning I loose my train of thought. I've taken to refusing to put it on the shopping lit unless he has written it on the notepad to try and train him. Apparently it is totally unreasonable to expect him to remember to use the system but not unreasonable for him to disrupt my train of thought.

YABU - bless, he's a man it's too complicated for his simple mind.
YANBU - make him go without if he doesn't floor hge system.

After 40 odd years we've long ago shared the shopping hence the list we both add to. We also share the cooking to an extent, we have lunches out to save cooking, have a takeaway of some kind once a week.

Raised three boys two can cook, one just won't.

I told the family I'm DONE with cooking, shopping, bored until death. So it's a shared chore

I couldn’t live like this. If DH refused to put something in the shopping basket because I’d asked verbally rather than write it in a certain piece of paper I’d feel like a child and would find it very controlling.

@bagelsandoranges

Are you his boss or partner? Sorry. Just seems a little..... harsh

If she was his boss, she wouldn’t be the one running round planning his meals and buying his shower gel for him, would she?

We have the same system here but even I sometimes forget something and tell my DP to write it down for me. If he reacted the same way as you, I don't think we'd be together.
But I also check in the cupboard for his shower gels and other toiletries when I check the loo rolls and nappies, I would find it petulant not to look on the shower gel shelf just because it's my DP's shower gel and not mine or the kids.

Could you just do it when he's not there? Then you have the surface to do it with a clear head. I'd be irritated too if someone did simmering every week that is asked them not to do.

I also like the "tell Alexa" idea. It's almost like he thinks writing things on the list is beneath him and he wants you to do it for him, so it would be interesting to see if he still tries to avoid it.

Space, not surface! 😳

@IceCreamAndCandyfloss

I couldn’t live like this. If DH refused to put something in the shopping basket because I’d asked verbally rather than write it in a certain piece of paper I’d feel like a child and would find it very controlling.

How is it controlling? It's not like it's happened a few times, it's every week. That's either incompetence or a lack of respect for the system the OP has put in place to make her life easier.

We have a similar system - it's incredibly annoying to check out the shopping online, following the shopping list, and then DH pipes up "oh did you get my shampoo?" well no, because you didn't add it to the list and I didn't know you'd run out.

It works both ways. He's in charge of laundry. If I put clothes in the basket then they get washed. If I leave them on the floor I don't expect him to know that they need washing and I don't ask him after he's put the wash on to add stuff that's missing, because it was my fault it was missing.

If it's a one off for something important then it would be fine, but every single time is really bloody infuriating.

" I'm about to go through the shopping list, anything you want to add to it before I do?"
Stuff gets added, you do whatever it is you do.
See no need for all the drama.

@HollyGrail

This has gone on for years ? Oh, poor little DH can't remember to do what his busy DW asks for years - pure pa behaviour on his part. Tell him to put it on next weeks list.

I have shopped and cooked and planned all the meals for near on 40 years - 40 bluddy years - if someone is an ah and makes that more of a chore than it already is they get extremely short shrift from me. Deservedly so. Of course they're welcome to take over from me any time what mug would do that .

Don't be such a martyr and hand it over to someone else! 40 years is more than long enough.

It's better to use the note pad system as items can easily be forgotten, your partner needs to improve his skills.

If your train of thought is that fragile, maybe consider getting more sleep or some multivitamins.
How patronising. My train of thought is shot to hell because of the menopause and happens no matter how much sleep I get or what multivitamins I take. Try to be a bit more understanding @mathanxiety

Why can't he just add stuff to the virtual basket after you've finished? Sod the paper list. He can go on the app and add it there himself.

I do the list. There are certain things I don’t bother adding because I just automatically buy like milk and bananas. This is also includes yogurts.
If you ask DH if he wants to add anything to the list he will always say ‘yogurts’. Even if you say ‘do you want anything apart from yogurts’ he will say ‘yogurts’. Then he will forget to tell me actual things he needs.
Drives me potty.

I do the weekly online shop. We have a blackboard in the kitchen where dh and the dcs can write anything they need or want. I do generally ask in case they've forgotten but I do have the saying "if it's not on the board it doesn't get bought". That's my get out clause😀

@EinAugenblickBitte - I'm 56 and very familiar with the menopause, thank you.

I write a list for my supermarket trip and I ask everyone who lives with me to text while I'm shopping if they think of anything that mightn't be on my list. This is an efficient way of getting shopping done in one trip, as opposed to one that's unreasonably inflexible, petty, and runs the risk of not getting stuff the family needs.

I keep a stocked pantry so that meal planning and production isn't the massive effort it seems to be for the OP.

I also try to get a good night's sleep and I take vitamins. This is because life is too short to be biting people's heads off for very, very minor annoyances. The sort of anger that causes the OP's response is both very corrosive to a relationship and completely preventable.

It's grocery shopping, not sending a man to the Moon.

WTAF are you cooking that takes that much focus you can't add a few things to a shopping list?
What's your day job?

I want to know this too.

Also, if you're a parent, how did you function with small children buzzing about underfoot?

It's the randomly telling me stuff when I'm in the middle of checking whether we have the ingredients for a particular meal that gets my goat.

But why?
How much checking and concentration does it take to make sure you have components of a meal?
Do you cook 365 different exotic meals per year?
Do you cook seven meals per week?

Because I have been telling him.tbat for decades and he still does it. It doesn't work.

This is the definition of insanity, isn't it? Keeping on doing the same thing but expecting different results.

Meh. Just get him to do the shopping. The phrase "nothing is stopping you going to the shops darling" has crossed my lips. Why own a process that's not yours to own?

You sound a bit highly strung. You're not in the army. Just write shower gel on your list of je asks.

Shared Google keep list.

If you don't put it on the list, it doesn't get bought by whoever is at the shop next.

No asking, no reminding.

If your train of thought is that fragile, maybe consider getting more sleep or some multivitamins.

That.

And maybe try and loosen up a bit - it sounds like a very uptight system.

YANBU

Small incidents like this exemplify why men get a much better deal from the whole marriage situation. There's a system in place, it's been in place for years, but that doesn't apply to him. You do the drudge work and he wafts past saying 'can you get me some Coconut Surprise shower gel?'. I see this dynamic play out in so many marriages. God forbid the wife/mum forgets to buy a birthday present for the DD1's friend's birthday party, or post off all the Christmas cards (to husband's relatives). It's the wife work shit, the assumption she'll pick up the slack. Every week.

Pah.

We use alexa for our shopping list- we have echoes all over the house so wherever you are when you realise you're low on something, you can add it to the list. DH would definitely be too lazy to go to the kitchen, find a pen and write something on a paper list.
The only problem is when the 5yo adds stuff so you find 'big sausages, small sausages, lots of sausages, new house' on the list

I use exactly the same plan as you to do the shopping OP .
Except when I have finished I text my husband and sons ( when they moved back in during lockdown) and ask them for ‘ last orders ‘ , often as I’m getting into the car .
Works perfectly. If it wasn’t on the list and they don’t answer then it’s hard luck , they go without. If they reply it’s added to the list . Simple .

Wow, the way some people live, this anal sticking to a process just to get the shopping. And your voting is a win win for you. So I didn’t vote because quite frankly you’re behaving oddly. It’s you that’s the issue. Not him.