Would you find this demeaning coming from your husband ?

[lighbulber]

We recently returned from holiday and were talking about how expensive it was to rent a flat while we were away. I said something like, ' perhaps we could think about buying a second property there and then we would always have somewhere to go on holiday each year and a base for our family and it would work out long term for us all'.. also, properties in this country are cheap and we have local knowledge of the language/ family there etc etc ( this isn't about the ins and out to buying a holiday home ).

Anyway, he turns around and says ' you can't even manage this house ( our family home ) is properly.. let alone a holiday home '.. this really annoyed me.

I recently went away with work. I have a good job with a lot of responsibility. I used to travel all the time for work and he always thinks it's ' stupid ' and a ' waste of time '. He asked how my trip went. I explained that it was challenging and we are hoping it will be worth it in the end and we can get some new contracts from all this work we've put in. So he said ' oh, just another waste of time then '. I said no. These things just take time. I then mentioned that I'll need to go away again in a couple of months for a couple of nights and he again commented it was going to be a complete waste of time. I got annoyed and feel like he has absolutely no respect for what I do.

He is being very disrespectful to you (though he’s not wrong about shitty corporations). That doesn’t excuse his bad attitude towards you though. He needs to separate his thoughts on corporations and you, his wife.

He may have come from a more traditional home where the mother did not work but managed the house. He might wish that for you guys.

I am not a very efficient house manager, it isn’t something I get much please Yee or satisfaction from so I prefer to focus my attention on paid work too.

it sounds like there is something bubbling away under the surface and you should have a come to Jesus meeting.

Knob

He sounds very negative and derogatory towards you.

He sounds very ignorant also.

He sounds resentful of your job and income status and the opportunities that they bring for you, but also your family. He is disrespecting you as a means to bring you down a peg so he feels less inadequate. What mean cunt.

Uhmm depends on the tone I guess. I always say I want a bigger house and then my husband reminds me that our current one is always messy. And I feel like that's constructive criticism. I've now made it my mission to prove I can keep this house clean and it will help me to put strategies in place for the next house.
Aren't partners there to point out things we're struggling with?are they allowed to have an opinion on the cleanliness of their own homes. I don't see the problem with, 'you struggle to manage the current one'.
Fair point, imho. If you can't handle one, you wont be able to handle two.

In this case, seems you and dh have marital problems and the statement he made is part of larger problems. Cause the statement in itself is not necessarily problematic.

As a side note tongue in the check, I also feel most of these corporate jobs are bogus. Have worked in consultancy and if a company wants you to consult on x, you become an expert on x overnight, doesn't matter if you know zilch. Consult you'll consult. It's daylight robbery what we do haha.
And I mean lost of jobs are not essential to companies. If they fell away, company would still survive, like they did for many years before these jobs suddenly became a thing

Ahh good point. True about stupid jobs but he needs to separate that from you. E can attack the job without attacking you

This sounds common for people who don’t work in the corporate world.

I come from a family of doctors and pharmacists and they simply can’t comprehend why my firm lets me spend thousands of pounds a year taking clients out to fancy lunches and the like. And why they spunk 10k pp flying staff business class to Singapore for a meeting. “And this is on top of your salary and bonus??” etc. etc.

I don’t have any advice other than to not let it get it to you. It could just be envy. Keep smashing your career. 💪

He just thinks the house is ' always a shit hole '. It's not true. It's not good enough for him ever. Nothing really is.

He sounds awful OP.

Op you didn’t mention what his job is or whether you have dc - and how much he does around the house.
as others have said, it does sound like he is both jealous of the money you bring in and resentful of the fact that you have a good job. It also sounds like he expects you to do everything around the house with minimal input from him.

fid you ever have a discussion when you moved in together about who did what? Or update that discussion as you became married and/or had kids? Quite often it seems that some dh expect their dw to take over looking after everything in the house when they are at home with a baby during maternity leave as they (conveniently!) think that that’s all you need to do as you don’t have anything else (conveniently forgetting that looking after a baby can be very time consuming). And then they expect their wife to carry on doing everything when they go back to work They may well do one or two small defined jobs (taking rubbish out, moving the lawn etc) and claim that that means they are doing their ‘half’ - but still expect you to do pretty much everything and have the mental load of doing it all too.

sounds like you need to have a long talk and point out that you’re really disappointed in his attitude and his lack of help doing anything and that now it’s his turn to do it - and see what happens!

Does your husband help keep the place tidy or does he just whinge about it? Why should it just be your job?

It’s depressing how subservient women come across on MN sometimes. I pray it’s because we only hear one side of the story and the men actually do more than is reported in a MN post.

Our house isn't always a shit hole at all and I manage pretty well to be honest. Nothing is ever good enough for him though.

I have a cleaner to help, as I work full time and look after two preschool kids pretty much on my own, as husband travels for work a lot and has long hours out of the house because of his business.

The only shit hole in our house is his cupboard, because he's unable to keep it tidy and I refuse to maintain it for him. I do laundry and fold it for him and leave it in baskets.

I guess he means that because I need a cleaner now and the house is a ' shit hole ', it means I don't manage. But it's not true. I just refuse to be his maid completely. He expects it to be like a hotel. So he would want to get up in the morning, leave his clothes everywhere and have someone pick up all his shit and tidy it all away. Because I don't do that, his clothes are a shit hole. The rest of the house is actually ok. Sometimes the cupboards aren't that tidy in the kitchen and he complains he can't find stuff. Same with the fridge. Again, the person that causes the mess there is him, because he just chucks everything around.

Forgot to mention the house is messiest when he is home because he is unable to tidy away his stuff. He also often leaves cupboards open in the kitchen.

He then complains it's messy because again, I refuse to run around after him. When it's just me and the kids, it's a lot easier !

I would saying to him, when he starts helping with the tidying, cleaning etc, he can then give you his opinion ..... until that time - shut the fuck up.

Not sure why you'd want to enmesh yourself further with an arse like this. If you can afford a second property, rather think about buying him out of your current place. Presumably as he thinks it's such a shithole he'll accept a low price for his share of it?

He sounds horrible and doesn’t respect YOU as a person. I think he weighs you down.

there's a lot going on here in these two comments

The 'you can't even manage this house" is rude and undermining - and also abrogates his own responsibility. It is not THIS house it is OUR house (to him). So why is it your responsbility alone.

On one level the travel being a waste of time/some corporate jobs being bullshit could be legitimate opinion objectively. It is true that a huge amount of time is wasted in meetings that contain rumination and paper shuffling but achieve nothing. I've certainly been there and my guess is that (subject to exactly what your job is) that you've probably had this sort of experience too.

The bigger issue is that he articulates it to you and why he does so because again in context its rude and undermining. There could be 'positive' reasons for this as well as 'negative' reasons by which I mean

it could be that on some core level he doesn't really like you anymore and wants to bring you down by demeaning your job or he is jealous that you get to travel and he doesn't and wants to stop it (negative reasons because it's about hurting you)

on the other hand, it could be that he really misses you and doesn't want you to travel but is unable to articulate that so goes about it in a misguided way. (positive reasons because its about missing you). I doubt that is the case here.

But putting both of these together leaves an impression to me as a stranger that this is someone who doesn't really like you, doesn't really respect you and is saying things to you designed to hurt you.

I think you need to tackle the reasons for this head on because it could be reflective of a bigger underlying problem that is curable or it could mean it's time to split up.

Even if he were the equivalent of Adonis, brought home a minimum of £300k per annum, had a brain the size of a planet, and was just the best lover, he'd still be a shit for saying it. Nevertheless I bet he isn't or doesn't do any of the foregoing.

Yes, he's being demeaning and unkind.

@BritAirwaysgirl nailed it.

Sounds like you’ve got an interesting and challenging career and he feels inadequate about it.

I'd suggest that perhaps I could stay at home and "look after the house properly" and that he can pay for everything

Some men live their lives in absolute fear and terror of their wives waking up one morning and realising how little their husbands actually do for them and the family they've created. That their husbands are in effect dead-weights. These men hate to see their wives succeeding in the workplace among other areas and will not stop until their wives are so insecure they worry they wouldn't manage to switch on the kettle in the absence of their husbands.

I would not find it demeaning if my DH said those things, I’d find it dismissive and bluntly rude. He has points in both cases, but he’s worded things in the most needling way possible.

How disrespectful He doesn't see you as an equal
Do not let him chip away at your confident
IMO once he's started, his opinion won't change