to not want my DH at my birthday party

[ParisLondonTokyoSlough]

It's my birthday coming up - just a standard one (not a milestone). I just want a girls night and don't want my husband there or any of their husbands/partners. After being stuck in a man/boy house all this pandemic, I only like the company of my female friends and family members to be honest. Hanging out socially with my husband feels like a chore and changes the dynamic of all-female gatherings. And I want to actually have a fun birthday this year (after not celebrating the past 3 years (including my 30th) due to being in labour on my 30th and covid the past 2 years.

Would this be weird? Would you think it's strange if you were invited to a friends birthday and her husband wasn't there and she said no (male) partners allowed?

YABU - yes it's weird, your DH should be there and husbands should be welcome
YANBU - no it's completely fine, men are boring

Nothing wrong with a girls night out but your marriage sounds dead in the water sorry. Why on earth did you marry such a drain? Fil is negative I can’t bear being around him more than 2 days max.

The only friend that had a single sec birthday announced her divorce a few months after it. No one was surprised.

I think to have a party without your DH is wrong, to have a girly night out is ok as long as you celebrate with DH ( and kids) as well. However it’s all in principle and implies that you are in loving relationship.
@AnnaK163 is right, it feels like you don’t love your husband any more and tbh I’m not surprised reading your updates.
My relationship with my husband is not 100% perfect atm. I spent 2 years stuck in the house with him, I feel frustrated and exhausted, I absolutely want him back to the office, I’m really excited that he’s not wfh all the time any more but I completely recognise that it’s about Covid not about him. I still enjoy his company and would love to go out/spend time with him. We went for a half day out 2 weeks ago and it’s lovely.

He sounds awful - I was you and my DH was really negative and would not join in with family time. I stopped asking him to do things and in the end actually told him not to come because like yours he would be looking at his watch , asking if we could leave and spoiling it.
I decided that I deserved to be happy, And gave him an ultimatum, he got antidepressants, counselling and changed massively. I now have a husband I like and love again and a much better life. Recommend it highly….

@ParisLondonTokyoSlough

You don't even sound cross with him or contemptuous of him - you just don't care anymore and want to be with other people.

Ohh, perhaps that's why even though I know we have issues, I didn't think they were that serious. I remember after my fist child I had PND and actively hated my husband. So now I no longer hate him it doesn't seem as problematic.

Your relationship sounds lovely. I wonder if most marriages are like yours? At this point I feel like I relate with Prince Charles' - "whatever love means" - that probably best describes how I feel about DH at the moment.

I think that this is not normal at all. Sure, having kids is a busy time but you need to work on a relationship too. Sounds like you are not plussed at all. Im not sure about him, is he more engaged, wants to make it work? Once your kids get older what will you do? Do you have sex? Hang out without kids?

I think couples should be together for birthdays personally.
That said he has been stuck in for two years with you plus your other issues, maybe he needs reminding that his glass is half full, that he has reasons to be happy and not live in fear that things are going tits up, and maybe you could tell him what changes you want to see to make you smile more too. You can make an effort to work things out or .....

It's not the babysitting he'd be upset by, but the fact of not being invited - we had arguments over this when we were dating as I wouldn't invite him to some events I hosted (in the end I caved)

God. Your poor friends. With the mood-hoover sitting there on the fringes, sucking the fun out of your get-togethers.

This was dumpable, red flag territory.

@olympicsrock

He sounds awful - I was you and my DH was really negative and would not join in with family time. I stopped asking him to do things and in the end actually told him not to come because like yours he would be looking at his watch , asking if we could leave and spoiling it. I decided that I deserved to be happy, And gave him an ultimatum, he got antidepressants, counselling and changed massively. I now have a husband I like and love again and a much better life. Recommend it highly….

That's really encouraging to hear that you turned things around! Was your husband always like that or was his negativity a new development when you gave him the ultimatum?

What scares me is that my DH's dad and brother are exactly the same as him but worse (I think I just have less tolerance than my FIL and BIL's wives so reign DH in more). And when I am with the in laws it's like staring into the great abyss of my future. Everything is his mothers' fault, she's the butt of all the jokes - just 3 grumpy old men who are so "clever" in their own minds, and the only ones who can see through all the bullshit (conspiracy theories galore), and my MIL just trying to make the best of it.

I don't want to be my MIL - I don't want that future. So I wonder if he's changeable since it seems his negativity is learned family dynamics.

Sounds like it has been difficult for many reasons the last few years, yet still you are together, a cause for hope at least

God. Your poor friends. With the mood-hoover sitting there on the fringes, sucking the fun out of your get-togethers.

Mood hoover!! Thanks for the laugh! You know what it's so true because he also dominates the conversation so he really does change the dynamics of a gathering (think speaking 90% of the time).

I used to get so embarrassed and cringe at having him there, but now I see gatherings with other people as respite for me (so they get to listen to his rants and eternal wisdom rather than me being on the receiving end for a change). I've never admitted that before and written down this is really bad

God, it gets worse.

He doesn’t even have the decency to sit on the fringes….? He dominates the convo…?! 😱

FML. Have none of your friends ever said anything?

Is he more engaged, wants to make it work? He's agreed he wants to do counselling but neither of us has made any serious attempt to book anything. Actually the suggestion of counselling arose over our clashes with parenting styles/values. I definitely think he loves me though - not too sure how I feel about him.
Once your kids get older what will you do? Don't know - dreading it. But hopefully will have more time to work on things.
Do you have sex? Not much - maybe a few days a month where we're affectionate and then will go weeks without any affection.
Hang out without kids? No, don't really have any childcare except for school/nursery as one of our children has medical needs requiring specific care. But we both work from home and don't even go for lunch together or hang out then.

He doesn’t even have the decency to sit on the fringes….? He dominates the convo…?!

FML. Have none of your friends ever said anything?

My friends are mostly polite but one of them confided in me that she thought I could do better and was wasting my life - and always refers to him as "the grinch" in texts to me. My sister admitted to me recently when I was complaining about something he had said to me, that she finds him really negative and that her and my other sister play bingo on his grumpy old man catchphrases to entertain themselves when they're speaking with him

But actually it's HIS friends that have said stuff to him - told him off about always interrupting me when I'm talking, one told him that they love him but he talks way too much. But he gets upset by their comments and thinks they're just being rude/

If you don't like your husband's company at all, then the birthday do is just a red herring. You sound like you have marriage problems, you should be thinking about that rather than asking if it's unreasonable to go out with your friends without him.

It doesn't need to be either/or, but the drip feed is you don't want him at all, so there's your answer.

You are young, so you need to ask yourself if:

You really want to spend the next thirty years living like this?

You want your sons to think this family dynamic is okay?

@ParisLondonTokyoSlough he sounds awful. He talks over you, dominates conversations when out with friends, constantly hounds you if you go out without him and is like living with a dementor.

As PP have said, your birthday is a red herring.

Remember, life is NOT a dress rehearsal.

Personally, I would go counselling yourself to unpick your feelings more, as I am certain if you thought about it more he’s probably does more to erode you.

I feel like the grumpy old wretch always banging the same drum around MN but… life is too short, I promise you. I’m dying. I’m also living in a bit of a non-traditional household at the moment. BUT, my DH still makes me laugh almost every day. Last week, he took me in my wheelchair over to the end of the outdoor light festival, even though he hates being out in cold weather, and I know he didn’t really give a shite about the light festival itself. But he knew how much it meant to me, and he never said anything negative while we were there, and when I said, “Thank you for bringing me; I know you don’t enjoy this, but…” He interrupted me and said, “No, just stop at the thanks part. You don’t need to say the rest of it.” When we do things for each other, we don’t then cancel that out by being negative and allowing that negativity to suck any enjoyment out of the activity. That’s not really “being there” with each other.

Your husband sounds like he’s very negative, yes, but he also sounds selfish and self-centred. Someone else mentioned their relationship getting back on track after their DH got help for depression. It sounds like your husband wouldn’t even admit he needs help. And depression isn’t what causes him to dominate conversations and interrupt you so much that his own friends tell him he’s being rude; and then he ignored those comments because he thinks THEY’RE rude? Honestly, you can try counseling, but I’ll be brutally honest - if you have someone who already won’t listen to opinions that don’t agree with theirs, even from their friends, then I’m not sure how successful it will be.

Your birthday is a single day. But you deserve a happy life, a life where you laugh every day, 365 days a year. Even though DH and I sometimes have tense moments, sometimes don’t agree with each other, I think he makes me laugh, probably 29 days a month. If that’s what you want, then there’s no reason you should accept not having it.

If his family are the same negative Nancys
Then you're fighting against the likelihood that you will turn into his parents
The only way through this I can see
Is if you start poking fun at him & calling him by his Dad's name everytime he makes a sour comment
Make it a funny game just like your friends/family already do so that they can cope
It's better to laugh than cry, right?
You sound lighthearted
People like him will just drag you down in life
Being embarrassed & cringing for your partner is never a good sign

Also calling him by his Dad's name
Is the only lighthearted way to help him see how he comes across
& that he is acting like a mopey old man just like his Dad
Hopefully that will shake him up a bit
You are at risk of meeting someone else who is fun to be around & who makes you laugh
& getting caught up in an emotional affair
You will likely meet someone better
Who makes you realise this marriage is not working

The girls night out is fine. You do what you want for your birthday.

But it sounds like there are real issues in your relationship with your husband.

I've been in a similar situation in that my DH and I massively disconnected over lockdown and the stresses of wfh with young children. He was working long hours in the office while I was left trying to balance everything to do with our DS, my own job, finishing my degree and most of the house stuff. It took me a long time to forgive him for making having a young child at home mostly my problem, even though he was working 16 hour days at that time and was also super-stressed. I would go to bed early to avoid being in the same room as him and would take my DC out of the house early at weekends so I didn't have to spend time with him. At one point, I would happily have set things in motion for a divorce if I'd had the energy to start filling in the forms.

Things only started to get better after a family member offered to babysit our DS so we could have a couple of days away just the two of us. It did give us a chance to talk and work things out together and realise that we do actually enjoy each other's company, even if there is still a lot to work on.

I'm not saying that it will be the same for you - it may be that actually you do find your husband boring and he does suck the joy from your life, in which case life is too short. But in my own experience, it is possible to confuse hurt and disconnection with dislike and boredom.

I'd take your sister up on her offer to babysit. Maybe you and your husband will find some common ground and some activities you enjoy doing together. Maybe it will make your decision clearer. I'd also set some boundaries for your husband while you're out with friends...you'll tell him what time you will be home, but he is absolutely not to call or message in the meantime. That would drive me mad!

Agree with PPs that you should do whatever you wish for your birthday, then reflect on your relationship.

It also sounds like the issues go beyond the usual challenges of parenting young DC, one with additional health needs.

Some of your H’s behaviour sounds emotionally abusive: making a fuss or sulking when you want to do something he doesn’t (for yourself or with the DC), numerous texts disrupting your time with friends/family. ‘Grumpiness’ and ‘being shouty’.

@ParisLondonTokyoSlough

Is it just that the two of you have been locked up (or locked down) together for the most part of the last two years, cabin fever is hitting hard and you want some time in someone else's company? (Anyone else's company wink) or do you genuinely not find any joy in each others company? Having young kids is hard, and relentless, there's less time to be a couple, just the two of you. So this could be just temporary burn out. Only the two of you can know the answer to that

I don't think I would enjoy his company even if we had "couple" time. It's hard to get time alone together as one of our children has a condition that requires constant medical supervision. My sister has offered to learn how to take care of that child's needs so that me and my DH can have date nights but I feel like I'd rather go out with her and leave DH at home (it would feel like a waste of a child free night). A date night with him would probably consist of him ranting about politics how the country's going to shit. I'd rather not.

In what way has the country gone to shit? He’s not by any chance a conspiracy theorist?

Constant texting and contacting friends/family on a night out isn’t ‘neediness’, it’s control - abuse.

It doesn’t sound like there’s any point in being married to him anymore

[quote Midlifemusings]@Bananarama21

I assumed this was a post to see if a woman would get the same responses. As one might expect, they are the complete opposite.

Where are all the posters from that thread who feel you must spend your birthday with your spouse or else you are a horrible person? I am sure they will be along soon![/quote]
The only thing this and that thread really have in common are people wanting to spend their birthday with their friends not families. The differences are:
On the earlier thread there was no discussion.The man made his arrangements and told the OP. Here the OP is considering his feelings prior to her decision.
In the first the OP had made suggestions and wanted to make it special for him herself. In this situation the OPs H is negative in general, and is part of a household where OPs interests are sidelined.
Thirdly it is so often the case that men prioritise their own needs and behave as though they are entitled to do as they please, and have their families facilitate them. Women, particularly mothers, rarely do this, so the OPs suggestion here is likely to be the exception rather than the other where it would be more the norm.
Given these differences I would expect responses to be different on the two threads.

‘Girls’ night out is fine, quite normal. A party would be weird.

You do sound as though you have much wider issue in the relate that the party though.

@SalonSharon

‘Girls’ night out is fine, quite normal. A party would be weird.

You do sound as though you have much wider issue in the relate that the party though.

Relationship not relate