Did I overreact?

[MrsSailor]

Disagreement with DH so want to know if I’m being UR and he has a point, or if I was right to get annoyed.

DH cooked dinner tonight and when he cooks, he makes a huge mess. After dinner and with DC in bed, he was exhausted, so I told him I’ll clear up.

It took me 1.5 hours to clean the kitchen, scrub the cooker, clean up the floor and high chair from DC’s mess, clean the table and put a load of washing in. At the very end, I made myself a cup of tea in DH’s favourite mug and I noticed it was cracked as boiling water was leaking out.

Cleaned up and took the mug to DH to tell him it’s broken but he couldn’t see a crack, so he came to the kitchen to check for himself. He put it on the counter, and got ready to pour in squash and I asked him to do it in the sink because I just wiped the surface down. He said no, he wants to do it on the counter so he can see it properly. I told him it will leak everywhere and make a mess but again he said no.

He asked why I’m so annoyed and I told him that I had just finished cleaning up and he was going to
make a mess, surely he can see that’s frustrating. He said not really, no. I just said ok.

He poured the squash in, and no leak, so told me the mug is fine and put it in the dishwasher. So I told him I’m not making it up, and I’ll show him. My body language was stroppy at this point as I took the mug out. I poured boiling water in and the crack appeared and water leaked. I told him see, I’m not making it up.

He asked why I’m getting so defensive over it and I told him it’s not about the mug, it’s that I had just finished tidying up when he was going to make a mess and when I asked him not to, he ignored me. He told me I’m overreacting and it’s not a big deal and he doesn’t understand why I’m getting so annoyed over it.

An issue I have with DH is that he accuses me of overreacting to everything and it drives me mad. The second my tone changes in a conversation, he claims I’m getting annoyed, but most of the time I’m not, my tone has simply changed. I am much more expressive than him so a tone change means nothing. However, I did get annoyed and frustrated today, which is why I am actually wondering if he has a point or he was a tad disrespectful.

Sorry, I didn’t expect it to be so long.

Hmmm

On reflection, yanbu

I think it was unnecessary to prove your point but he insisted on doing it first so all's fair there....I don't know why you needed to take him the mug in the first place, I'd have just binned it. Would he have got stroppy with you? In which case you are definitely not being unreasonable and he sounds like hard work.

Holy shit, what did he make that took 1.5 hours to clean up? I'd expect a five-course haute cuisine tasting menu at least for that.

Gently, do you think you might have over-reacted a bit? It does seem like a fairly minor thing to stress over.

The entire senario sounds exhausting. Is there always so much bickering and nonsense? How can he possibly make that much of a disaster cooking dinner?

Particularly given this is your side of the story, I would say you are overreacting. Sorry!

I don't know why you needed to take him the mug in the first place, I'd have just binned it

No he wouldn’t have got stroppy. Any other mug I would have simply thrown it away but this one was his favourite. When it broke last year, he ordered a replacement one.

Crikey life’s too short for this kind of aggravation - a mug has a crack in it you just bin it and get a different mug not make a song and dance about it .

Yes you over reacted.
I also can't fathom how it takes 1.5 hours to clean the kitchen after one meal

Does he make a huge mess every time he cooks then seems too tired to clean up so you end up doing it? Which means you usually do the cooking?

Tbf if I'd spent 1.5 hours cleaning the kitchen after dinner I'd be inclined to be stroppy too.

Honestly, you both sound equally to blame to me and on that basis yanbu.

Just clear the air and start tomorrow afresh.

Re the 1.5 hours, it wasn’t just the kitchen. He does make an absolute mess when he cooks - pots and pans everywhere, grease all over the cooker, food on the floor, etc, so it does take a while to make it clean. But it was also tidying up after DC’s mess at the dining table, getting things ready for tomorrow. My point was after doing everything for 1.5 hours, he should have been more considerate at making a mess.

Absolutely agree with that point op.

Also he should learn to not be so messy when cooking.

AND - no matter who cooks, if its going to take that long to clear up then it's a joint effort.

I'm still on your side here (as much as this is a storm in a teacup!)

You both made a big performance about a very simple thing. In your position I'd have just said "I've had to bin your cow-in-a-tutu mug, it's got a crack and it leaks", rather than keeping it, showing him etc. as though he needs to say goodbye to it for closure. And if I had for some reason decided DP needed to be shown it, he might have asked "are you sure it's leaking? I can't see a crack" or something, but wouldn't have insisted on a live reenactment.

On the whole I'm on your side in this (based only on your point of view, of course) because the whole palaver shows that he doesn't trust your judgement and accuses you of defensiveness when you try to show that your judgement was right, doesn't care about spoiling something you've worked on (clean countertops in this case), and creates excessive mess when cooking (just like my DP 😑) but I didn't hear your tone of voice so he may have had a point with that.

One and a half hours to clean up the kitchen after one meal is ridiculous. Yes, messy cooking is annoying, but you’re either exaggerating or inefficient, or it was the first time the kitchen had been cleaned properly in a month.

Putting a wash on was unrelated to his cooking and takes a couple of minutes.

He was irritating not believing you about the mug and not complying with your request to experiment in the sink.

You were irritating taking the mug out of the dishwasher to prove your point.

This a completely normal marital argument which happens when two people are tired and narky and have been together long enough to be fed up with each other’s irritating ways, which we all have.

Just forget about it. You’re both being silly. Get some sleep.

I am with you OP. My OH cooks and I love the food but dread going into the kitchen. I find grease in dirt in places where you would not imagine. It takes ages to clean up and if he was then going to ‘test’ the crack in the much like that- I would not be happy. Overacting (as some have called it) or what ever it is. Having spent time doing something for it be undone in mere minutes would irritate me!

I don’t understand why you went through a big performance of going and telling him the mug was cracked and then him coming and testing it. You are both a bit over dramatic

If that was me I would have got a different mug, went and sat down and when/if my DP was there say oh by the way your mug is cracked. Guarantee his response would be ok and we would move on with our night

Out of interest, what did he make for dinner that made such a mess?

Did he realise that you don't just clean the kitchen but tidy up after the kids, do laundry etc?

Or does he see it that as he cooked dinner for his own family, he's some kind of man god?

I wouldn't care that he was about to make a bit of a mess. It would only be a bit of squash or a bit of hot water which he would have to wipe up. But I'd be annoyed he checked that it was leaking because it implies that he thought I was lying or too thick to know when a mug is leaking or not. It's ridiculous that he checked.