To be utterly sick of sport

[checkedcloth]

DH will literally watch it all on the TV

By the time we have taken the kids to all their weekend sports (they are 12 and 10) there are not many hours left at the weekend. Then it’s football, snooker of whatever on the TV. DH just happy to sit and watch this.

unfortunately we don’t have much disposable income at the moment so not really got much cash to go anywhere. We don’t have any access to babysitters.

so given we can’t go anywhere Aibu to feel absolutely sick of sport being in the TV - but knowing there isn’t anything else we can do anyhow?

If your husband is watching sport why can't you do your own thing? You don't have to watch it too

Seems to be a lot of people in this thread who can't lead their own lives. Get a hobby, do some gardening, go for a walk, see a friend. Are you joined at the hip?

Thanks to all of those that replied.

I have no desire to further my interest in sport at all nor watch TV anymore than we do.

I think what I’m trying to say is that the constant sport watching impacts on us doing things as a family, as we always have to ‘be back for the game’. However with finances feeling tight it’s hard for me to counteract that with suggesting we could be doing something else!

It is the 'business end' of the season in both sports you mention though? Crunch matches, big semi finals etc in the football - especially if you have any Liverpool/Man City fans in the house. It'll all be over by end of this month and won't be back until late August.

The snooker I suspect was mainly because of the amazing line-up for the semi finals and final that anyone with a passing interest would want to watch it. If it had been less exciting players, it probably wouldn't have been on as much on the telly (appreciate many think that it's boring but there are some professionals who make it a much nicer watch than others!). Again, it's all over now and next BBC tournament isn't until November.

I'm hoping my DS gains an interest in sport and I'd look forward to watching them with him. Unpopular opinion but I still remember being allowed to stay up late watching Jimmy White v Stephen Hendry with my Nan, way more than I ever remember us going on walks.

From what I've observed, it only gets worse as they get older, anything with a ball/dart/wheel will do. It's obsessive behaviour that impacts others.

Can't you do / watch something else?

DH would watch any sport, football fanatic, would watch anything though, rolling Sky Sports News. I can't stand it.

When we were dating many many years ago we would go to his mum's for lunch and she would time Sunday lunch for when the football was on, the 'boys' would sit on one side of the table so they could see into the living room and the 'girls' would sit on the other side, bored senseless.

I made it a thing then that if we had kids we wouldn't have Sunday lunch like that. I don't mind timing it around the football, but I'm not cooking for you to be waited on by me and watch football. To be fair we stuck with it since the kids have arrived.

Obsessive sport watching is surely learned in childhood, maybe it needs to stop being enabled, putting mens/boys needs first

There's a difference between watching 'the big games/tournaments' and obsessive sports watching.

I know some people for whom sport is never off the telly all year round. Football season, 6 Nations, darts at Christmas, snooker and golf majors, tennis and rugby league in the summer... and I agree that's not healthy.

Nor should a live match take precedence over, say, Sunday dinner as one poster has described. Although I would say, as an example, if someone organises a family dinner at the same time as the once-a-year Champions League final, you're asking for trouble! If they're missing Sunday dinner to watch any old match with nothing really riding on it (eg the random Sky Sports Sunday matches in mid season), then that's unacceptable and I agree something needs to change.

But letting your children watch the big games with their Dad when they are between about 9-16 is fair enough. I watched boatloads of sports as a child but am not glued to them now, it isn't a slippery slope!

DH watches US YouTube videos of how to build/ repair your boat/ truck/ some random engine. So annoying. We will both watch some old comedies eg Blackadder but that doesn't fill an evening. Start a jigsaw.

A once a year event such as Wimbledon or indeed world snooker I can accept. What I would not in your shoes is the scale you describe, and regardless of income.

As for Liverpool or Man City fans, if you are from or have a connection to the area, perhaps OK, but not if you are just glory seeker. Though most in my experience are Manchester United fans who could not even tell you how to get to their ground, never mind have ever been there.

The snooker has finished now anyway.

Presumably you knew your husband was keen on following sport when you married him?

I wonder why all these threads follow the assumption that men follow sport and women don't? I'm going to my friend's house tonight to watch the football. She and I are both massive lifelong Manchester City fans.

Yes OP where you're going wrong is in having any of your own interests and opinions. Life is much easier when you moult yourself around their mind-numbing and obsessional hobbies. Rookie error.

No it hasn't @ilovesooty Seniors 🎱 starts tonight ❤️❤️❤️ I'll be double streaming that and the Man C match (and I'm a 👩🏼)

I grew up in a household that revolved around my dad's and brothers sport viewing. It was so dull. It's something I didn't want in a partner. Not to say we rule out all sport. We like combat sports and running, but to participate in rather than sitting down watching on a screen.

My OH is borderline obsessive about a particular football team and I have very firm boundaries about it.

It would be a fool's errand to ban or try to disincentivise his interest in it and I have been known to watch matches with him but I've been very clear that I won't have it taking up all my weekends and evenings. That was a red line from day one.

There's nothing more soul destroying that having to endlessly feign interest in something you find utterly dull.

@nearlyspringyay I want us to use this time as a family. I am at work for 45 hours a week at least, plus 2 hours in the car daily.

I spend a lot of time either at work or alone.

It's the world championship / 17 days.

Are you saying that that's way too much or 'only' two and a half weeks?!

I couldn't care less about any sport, but Eurovision is my thing - and we only get approx. eight hours of that on TV every year.

Apropos the frequent disruption to the other programming whenever there's some big tournament or other on (rather than the enormous amount shown full stop), I remember the BBC was mooting a dedicated sports channel some time ago, but they decided against it on the grounds that it was unfair to licence-payers who were not interested in sport. No: point spectacularly missed; we want it just as much as the sports nuts, so that we don't keep getting all other telly interrupted all the time.

Some people get utterly sick of soap operas, cookery programmes and talent shows. Jus' sayin'.

Try out some of your own hobbies. Do them whilst he watches tv. Then realise you are fine without him. Then tell him to stop watching so much TV. Then, if he doesn't stop,leave him.

You dont seem to have a relationship anymore. You are just room mates at this point. And he has checked out

Though most in my experience are Manchester United fans who could not even tell you how to get to their ground, never mind have ever been there

Yawn, such a tired old trope. And one that has been disproved by countless surveys into who are actually fans of that club.

I have zero interest in Strictly or Bake Off but I know lots of people love them so I don't bang on about it, I just go off and do something else. Go on MN, for a walk, read a book etc.

This 100% I am soo glad my dh is a doer of sport and not a watcher!

It’s amazing how many people (mostly men) are crazy about watching sports on tv, but don’t actually take part in any themselves

I have zero interest in Strictly or Bake Off but I know lots of people love them so I don't bang on about it, I just go off and do something else. Go on MN, for a walk, read a book etc.

Neither do I, but at least programmes like that seem to have an end to them. They're usually on once (possibly twice) a week for a maximum of an hour and a half; and they don't tend to overrun, often to the point that later-scheduled programmes are completely dropped.

Last summer (I was sad enough to record the Sky listing), the 'BBC News at Six' was on BBC1 at 3:30pm, because there was Wimbledon before and Match of the Day afterwards. Meanwhile, there was more Wimbledon on BBC2 throughout, starting earlier whilst the Wimbledon was already on BBC1.

I think a lot of mega sports fans are also a little dishonest, because they will point out that one particular sport is 'only' on once a year and/or 'only' for however many weeks; but of course, after that there's another sports tournament that lasts the same amount of time again, and then another and then another.

Tedious things like soaps are on a lot throughout the week, but they have their place in amongst everything else on the menu and, when they're not on, they disappear to let other things take their own fair turn.

If the whole of TV were one big party, sport would be the one grabbing the introverts sitting down and chatting at the edge and forcing them to 'get on the dancefloor and properly enjoy yourself' and seizing the Coke or orange juice from the non-drinkers' hands and demanding that they 'have a proper drink' instead.

It’s amazing how many people (mostly men) are crazy about watching sports on tv, but don’t actually take part in any themselves

To be fair, there are plenty of women who enjoy their regular Eastenders fix but never actually routinely scream at other people down the pub or in the marketplace for no reason at all themselves

I agree with you, though. As somebody with no interest at all in sport, I do truly see the value and enjoyment that it gives many people - but the whole point of it is in doing it, or possibly watching and supporting your loved ones whilst they are doing it.

I love going out to restaurants for special occasions and stuffing my face gently savouring fine dining - but I don't have the slightest interest whatsoever in watching strangers enjoying eating food in restaurants and analysing every aspect of how they hold their cutlery, what they order from the menu and how they set up and tackle every mouthful; much less keeping track of it and discussing with others at length about that glorious time when Bert & Mavis devoured their pie 'n chips at the Red Lion in Cwmbran back in February 1964, before I was even born (no worry: it's all on YouTube)!

I also don't feel the need to dress identically to Bert and/or Mavis and then include myself in the whole event, referring to when 'we' showed that steak and kidney pie who was boss and the 'ludicrous display' that the lightweights eating the salad at the next table put on!

If you hate sport so much, why on earth did you marry a sports fanatic? He was like this before you married him, right?

I'm a football hater. A relationship with a football fan like this would have never worked out for me so I didn't pursue them. On the flipside, woe betide anyone in my life who arranges something for me on the day of the Wimbledon final. DP accepted that when he went out with me.

You don't have to share your partner's passions but you do have to respect them IMO.

If you hate sport so much, why on earth did you marry a sports fanatic? He was like this before you married him, right?

It's a very fair question - one I always wonder when people marry somebody from a hugely different culture, without even seriously discussing it beforehand, and then are surprised/upset when their spouse wants to follow their own culture.

The threads we get from people who are furious that their spouse wants to send large sums of their family money back 'home' to their relatives in much poorer countries; whilst, I'm sure, the spouses are equally horrified to discover that they've married somebody who would have them grossly disrespect their own loved ones by not sharing the wealth.

17 days for one sport for hours on end is very excessive.