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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

lettuce for fifth birthday

325 replies

Franklyfrost · 03/09/2021 20:29

I asked my partner to pay for and pick up some party food for ds 5th birthday and gave him a list on his phone. He calls me from the supermarket to ask what to buy and I end up reading out the list and adding it all to the online shop and buying it myself to save him from carrying it home. I do this nicely. After reminding him about the list on his phone. He doesn't thank me. We agree he should pick up cake ingredients to save me looking up the recipe.

I'm at home looking after four kids under 11 this week, and he asks me if I've done all my work. He's asked me this every day this week and I've told him every day that I can't do my (academic) work while looking after four children, plus doing house work and cooking. I got annoyed today and said that him asking me makes me feel like I'm failing and I've explained to him it's impossible.

So he's come home with four, brown at the bottom, reduced because the best before date is today, gem lettuces from Tescos. For the party on Sunday. He has to go put again now because he's forgotten to buy the cake ingredients. I can't mention to hime that it's a very weird thing to buy for a fifth birthday party as he would be very offended and I'd be a terrible nag. He's no health freak and they weren't on the list. AIBU to think he's losing the plot?

OP posts:

LBirch02 · 04/09/2021 13:07

Although I’m pregnant with our first child - me and my boyfriend have no other children whatsoever between us so no childcare responsibilities. However, even in our situation I would’ve be happy with my boyfriend now announcing he’d be out til the early hours!

LBirch02 · 04/09/2021 13:13

Would not** be happy I should say!

Original poster

Franklyfrost · 04/09/2021 13:17

He has made cake!

Also he offered to go out an hour later (he’s out now), so I could get some work done but I said no because I don’t wouldn't feel comfortable changing his plans. If I’d planned to go out I wouldn’t want him to stop me so I’ll extend the same courtesy (although writing this I realise that I was having friends to visit this evening but then had to cancel because he made plans to go out despite my visitors being in the calendar for months so maybe it is all messed up but I don’t want to be unkind, to anyone).

OP posts:

liveforsummer · 04/09/2021 13:18

Why can't your friend visit because he is out?

WizardOfAus · 04/09/2021 13:22

Why did you have to cancel? Your friends can still come tonight, can’t they? Does your partner know you cancelled your friends because of him? I can’t understand why you’re not communicating any of this to him and just accepting whatever he says or does.

Horehound · 04/09/2021 13:25

Wtf is going on? What do you mean don't want to be unkind to anyone...who do you mean?

And why did you cancel?

Original poster

Franklyfrost · 04/09/2021 13:25

Can someone not tell me how they had a few years when the kids were young and there was lots of work to be done and their relationship struggled but you got through it and now it’s all peachy?

OP posts:

Original poster

Franklyfrost · 04/09/2021 13:28

I cancelled because my friends were coming from a long way off, I don’t see them often and I’d need to give them some attention not be putting the kids to bed etc. So even if they’d be fine staying in it does take some time feeding everyone and getting them into bed and I wouldn’t want my visitors waiting around though all that having come a long way. So I cancelled.

OP posts:

Original poster

Franklyfrost · 04/09/2021 13:31

I’m not sure what else I could have done? If dp is going out then he’s going out. He knew my plans, made his anyway, so that’s that. He’s an adult. I’m not his boss. Although he does say I’m very controlling, I’m not sure. The more I write the less I feel I know up from down. This was about lettuces.

OP posts:

ChargingBuck · 04/09/2021 13:32

@Franklyfrost

He has made cake!

This is so, so sad OP.

He knew damn well this was your social evening.
He trampled all over it. What a nasty, selfish piece of work.

What were you saying again, about feeling isolated?
Are you starting to see how deliberate his treatment of you is?

& here you are, tying yourself in knots because you "wouldn't feel comfortable" with having a HOUR of His Lordship's time given to parenting.

When did these feelings of discomfort with accepting 'help' start? (it's not 'help' btw, it's the bare minimum a decent partner could offer).
Did you have them before you met this prince amongst men?
How does the discomfort manifest itself?
Do you think it came out of the blue, or do you think it is connected to living with someone who must always be right, & who cannot be "told" what to do?
The type of person who "tells you off" about his unreasonable territorial entitlements (the confusing hairdresser/HIS side of the room thing)?

You don't want to be unkind, yet accept an awful lot of unkindness from this man.
May I ask - have you ever had individual counselling? Is that something you would feel able to talk to a GP about, to get access to some support?
Along with increasing your assertiveness (see book link upthread), I suspect some talking therapy would be really beneficial for you.
The amount of unequal treatment & downright abuse you are experiencing is enough to rock anybody's self-esteem, & I am concerned that keeping this man in your life is doing nothing for you but making your life, & you as a person, smaller & smaller.

ChargingBuck · 04/09/2021 13:35

@Franklyfrost

Can someone not tell me how they had a few years when the kids were young and there was lots of work to be done and their relationship struggled but you got through it and now it’s all peachy?

Of course they can Frosty. There's a simple trick to it though. It entails not being partnered with an arsehole.

You, I am sorry to say, are partnered with an arsehole.

Things will never be peachy with a man who treats you as a domestic appliance, financially abuses you, deliberately scuppers your studies, & refuses to step up for his own kids.

Goldbar · 04/09/2021 13:36

Can someone not tell me how they had a few years when the kids were young and there was lots of work to be done and their relationship struggled but you got through it and now it’s all peachy?

You're right, lots of couples go through tough periods (young kids, not much money, one parent studying). The way they get through it is to work as a team - support each other, show each other affection, give each other a break.

Where one person is disproportionately bearing the load and doing all the work, I don't think the relationship ever really recovers even when the kids are older and things become easier. Because you've discovered that the person who should have had your back and been looking out for you only ever really cared about themselves. And when you discover that, there's no way back. They're deadweight in your relationship and you wonder why you're wasting time pussy-footing around them.

whynotwhatknot · 04/09/2021 13:37

It just get worse with every update op

you dont want to upset anyone you had made plans first!

Ninkanink · 04/09/2021 13:37

This is honestly really awful. Do you not realise that??

You didn’t feel able to say to him, ‘hang on, have you forgotten that my friends are coming? It doesn’t work for you to be out tonight as I need you to look after the children so I can see my friends.’ You weren’t kind. You were rude to your friends because he doesn’t give one fuck about you and your needs, and you’re too frightened to stand up for yourself.

He’s not a good man. He’s not a good father. He’s not a thoughtful and kind partner to you.

You absolutely cannot marry him. You will be trapped forever if you do. Do not waver on that.

You need to think very carefully about why you’re unable to speak honestly and assert your expectations and boundaries. And also consider very carefully what kind of relationship you’re modelling to your children.

I know it’s frightening, I know you think it’s easier to live like this for 5 years, but it will break you.

Goldbar · 04/09/2021 13:38

I’m not sure what else I could have done? If dp is going out then he’s going out.

What would your DP have done if you had gone out before him to meet your friends and left him with the children (as he's done to you)?

KaycePollard · 04/09/2021 13:45

He knew my plans, made his anyway, so that’s that. He’s an adult. I’m not his boss

He’s an adult, so you can judge him as one.

He deliberately did something which interfered with and spoiled your plans.

You’re not his boss, but he seems to be yours.

I’m getting angry just reading your posts. He’s increasingly sounding passive-aggressive at the best, and deliberately nasty to you, at the worst.

ChargingBuck · 04/09/2021 13:45

@Franklyfrost

This just gets worse & worse.

Let me tell you about another classic technique used by manipulators the world over. It's called DARVO -

www.banyantherapy.com/darvo/
He is projecting his own controlling nature back onto you.

He lives for free in your house (paying utilities, whoop de doo, like he wouldn't have to pay those no matter where he lived), makes you pay for all the food, engineers his & your time so that you are unable to study, orders you out of your home accompanied by his mother, does no childcare, deliberately fucks up your social life, keeps you isolated & "told off", can never be wrong ...

... & you are the controlling one?
Sheesh, OP.
You are living with a coercive controller who is financially abusing you & undermining your academic work. It could not be more clear. Never, NEVER, allow yourself to believe that you are the controlling one here.

Horehound · 04/09/2021 13:47

But he's controlling you.

So you are kind and tell him not to change plans but he's already over ridden your plans putting himself first and therefor you now need to cancel your night with your friends.
can you not see how bad that is?
He puts himself, his wants, his needs and what he chooses to do first and foremost and fuck whatever you want.

herbaceous · 04/09/2021 13:50

Oh OP, this is not good.

I have a DP with some tendencies of yours - has to be right, 'sad face' at the slightest criticism, control via just not answering anything he doesn't want to hear, etc - which has meant that 'boiling frog' style, I'm in a precarious financial position.

I'd like to think, tho, that it would never get as obviously abusive as your relationship before I got out, but it is easy to just let the odd thing go, and before you know it the balance is totally towards him and away from you, and it seems impossible to redress.

I've just ordered the assertiveness book, while hoping DP doesn't see it! ( I realise how ridiculous this is).

WizardOfAus · 04/09/2021 13:52

@Franklyfrost

Can someone not tell me how they had a few years when the kids were young and there was lots of work to be done and their relationship struggled but you got through it and now it’s all peachy?

Yes. We got through those difficult years with an equal 50-50 split of childcare, housework and downtime.

The ratio you’re currently working on is 90-10. In his favour.

Life won’t turn out peachy if you keep going like this. You will end up burnt out, exhausted and on antidepressants within the next five years.

If your health, sanity, study, social life, sleep, work, or self-esteem are suffering because YOU are the one doing everything, whilst your DP leverages your exhaustion into his free time — he is abusing you.

Like other forms of abuse, it will not get better on its own. It's not an accident.

So please, please stop laughing it off as "just men" buying four lettuces for a child’s birthday party.

It's not just men. It's purposeful.

It might not be consciously purposeful, but it is still purposeful. Your DP knows he can get away with it.

Your husband is not helping raise the children he fathered. There are only two things that will fix this - therapy, or leaving.

I’m sorry.

ChargingBuck · 04/09/2021 13:54

@herbaceous

The fact that you are concerned that your DP might see the assertiveness books is a sad indicator of how bad it's got, isn't it?

Any decent man would be delighted to see his partner taking steps to improve herself.

Enjoy the book, & learning how to stick up for yourself :) xx

liveforsummer · 04/09/2021 13:55

Any decent man would be delighted to see his partner taking steps to improve herself.

Think about this point also when considering the study sabotage.

ChargingBuck · 04/09/2021 13:55

@WizardOfAus has it in a nutshell -

There are only two things that will fix this - therapy, or leaving.

orchardgirl4 · 04/09/2021 14:02

Sounds innocent to me, I don't think there's any intentions of being manipulative so that you won't ask again, he simply is not thinking. I laugh about there being a memory wiper in supermarket doorways. Ever walk into the store and buy everything but what you intended? Anyway, just ask him to prep the lettuce. I'd be interested to see what he does with it.

Brollypackedforscottishholiday · 04/09/2021 14:02

Op you are clearly in an abusive relationship.. Staying in one for 5 years will have a massive negative effect on your dc..
And you.
Do not marry him.
Never ever...

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