To refuse to agree to a visit from husband’s female friend

[Namechangedforthis222]

I just need to check if I’m being unreasonable here. Happy to be told I am. I have changed my username, but am a regular user.

My DH and I have 2 children. The youngest is 4 months old. All is going well. We have the occasional row, but mostly care for the kids 50:50.
Most family members have met the new baby, except my DH’s grandmother (kid’s great grandmother). She’s frail and we worry that she hasn’t got long to go.
This week, I randomly thought that we should really go visit the great grandma as it has been 4 months now. She lives 2.5 hours away by car and I’ll be doing all the driving as DH has a driving phobia (even though he has a licence). The whole thing was my plan and I knew I’d be doing all the driving and was happy to.

Here’s the issue. After agreeing to the trip today, yesterday husband suddenly remembered that his friend is visiting from Canada and staying in London for a week roughly. It seems he has made plans for her to visit the house this evening, after I would have spent 5 hours driving to see his grandma.
From the moment he mentioned it, I’ve said no, not on Saturday after that huge drive. The friend can visit any other day that’s not today. I want to come home from the drive and sit and watch some TV in peace. Full disclosure, I also don’t like this friend. We’re civil, but she’s one of those really extreme right wing Canadians, so we have very little in common.

DH has now woken up feeling angry that I won’t let his friend visit today. Apparently she’s only free today and DH doesn’t want to go meet her for dinner/drinks instead (he gets anxious with commuting).

Am I being unreasonable to say she cannot visit today after my 5 hour drive??

Oh goodness no. Womens’ mental health issues require the utmost support from partners, family and friends, whereas men are all faking it to take control and gaslight us into believing they’re not well. They then go on to commit suicide at four times the rate of women, just to bring the point home!!

I'm sorry if my previous post seemed harsh, but I've lived through being controlled + restricted by a partner's anxiety and I always regret not taking a stand sooner, for his sake and mine.
I could have put that more tactfully.

I hope his MH continues to improve OP

YANBU - At all! Your DH is being selfish. There are other options open to him, he's just refusing to entertain any other option than what he wants

Unless you live in a small box, just be cordial and say hello and retire to another room.

So he has a driving phobia AND a public transport phobia? Could you have dropped him at a local town on the way home so they could have dinner and then he get a taxi home so you could relax at home? Or does he have a taxi phobia too?

FFS have a think about what you're saying. She has two children including a 4 month old baby, and he expects her to drive for 5 hours? She's looking after for all intent and purposes a newborn baby plus another child. Will he look after the children while he is entertaining for hours after his wife drove for 5 hours? I doubt it. It will all be on OP. He's a selfish pig of 'man'.

Don't be so ignorant and naive, some men DO use mental health issues as an excuse to control. This is well-known. Read Relationships and you'll see this. Hundreds of threads on it.

Exactly. Ignore the ignorant, naive and gullible fools attacking you. It is more than clear to anyone with an analytical and rational mind that he is controlling the OP and using mental health as an excuse. By doing so he makes it worse for genuine cases. Even if he seriously does have issues, that doesn't mean he isn't capable of using it to his advantage, as men (and sometimes women) do. If he was being fair to the OP, he'd recognise that his issues adversely impact his wife and he'd be eager to help her and not put more stress on her unnecessarily. His anger when waking is an example of him taking the piss.

There is mental health issues, and then there is using mental health issues to check out of family responsibility.

I'm on the fence on this one. He's at fault for forgetting he'd made arrangements (and also presumably not running them by you). I think it's a bit unfair on the friend to cancel if this is the only 'slot' she has and its been arranged, and she's hardly up the road, so here's a few options
He takes her out. He can get a taxi, bus or go to the local
You go out. Do you have a friend or relatives home you are OK to just 'flop' at?
You rearrange grandma's....that sounds best option
Or you just suck it up, moan at him a bit and let him know he owes you one!

The thing that stands out here to me is it sounds as if your husband is scared to drive and scared to go out. I'd find that more concerning than the visiting friend but assuming this isn't a recent thing, (as you've got a family together) lm imagining you've accepted it.

Madness that anyone with two kids can’t drive, yet is clearly in situations where they need to be driven. What would have happened if he had kids with someone else who couldn’t drive?

I'm in that situation unfortunately. In my case I spent 7 years on and off having lessons and failed 7 tests so in the end decided to stop chucking good money after bad. I hate being so reliant on DH for journeys I can't do by walking or public transport, and not being able to share the driving etc, but it is what it is.

I have hemiplegia. I don't think that alone has affected by ability to drive or pass my test (plenty of people with the same condition do, with steering balls or other adaptations), but I was also a very nervous driver and my anxiety around roundabouts etc was unreal. I was 27 or 28 when I started learning. I do wish I'd started earlier when I was younger and more confident.

i said yanbu until i read she is only free then
so i guess you will have to suck it up

A four month old baby and a huge commute?!

I'm honestly shocked that anyone would think you are being unreasonable! Honestly shocked!

I think your suggestion of him going out is entirely fair. Surely there is a local pub they can meet?

I've already acknowledged that I missed OP's updates.

I don't think I was patronising her and it is not my intention to do so. If I did I apologise, to her.
She posted asking if she was unreasonable. I was saying that I didn't think she was. This may be one event, but as I said in my post

"that doesn't mean that his behaviour is helpful or considerate, particularly waking up "angry" with the woman who has been supporting and helping him."

He's not behaving fairly by being angry with the OP. That's just my opinion, it is not stated to patronise the OP, nor is pointing out that in the light of this "one" event and his reaction to it, this is unfair on the OP, and given they now have two DC, this needs to be worked out and made sustainable.

why cant you visit granny another day? if seems odd you suddenly decide to visit when his friend is visiting for 1 day.

Did you read OP's post? The visit with the granny had been planned long ago, the granny doesn't have long to live, OP didn't just decide on the visit. In fact she didn't even know husband's friend was visiting, until the last minute.

Oh, hadn't even occurred to me that after a long day of driving for the OP, she'll get to be in charge of the baby and toddler when they get home, too, as he will have a (n unwanted, bigoted, right wing) friend round to visit. That she'll no doubt not be allowed to disappear from helping entertain when she's not shushing the children.

@Ducksinthebath It’s absolutely unhinged to fake a very transmissible illness to avoid spending time with someone if it might also jeopardise your husband seeing her. She might not want to hang out with someone who’s been spending 5 hours in a tin can with a sick person and is probably ill themselves.

I have no idea sometimes why people can’t just be adult and say they’ve had a long drive, aren’t up to an evening of socialising so can they just say hello and duck out or the other half goes out somewhere with their friend. Far better than behaving like a child over it and making up a stupid story.
Unhinged???? Really? You have a weird idea of what unhinged means
And people do this because there are to many ridiculously self important people who have a problem with being told that they are less important than someone else's rest is. People get all uppity and feel insulted. People can't deal with that shit and it's easier to say they aren't well than deal with the inevitable fall out and sniping

Did you miss the part where his anxiety covered travel in general or did you chose to overlook that?

Then omit taxi. But he surely could walk somewhere.

OP had clearly said he helps with the housework and will be doing mornings for the next few days to make up for it

He's not a selfish pig

And how exactly, will that help the OP on the night, when after 5 hours driving, she has to watch the kids too, while he is downstairs pissing it up?

He is a fucking selfish pig!

OP - it was shitty of him to forget his friend was coming but I'll admit I've done similar before, mind has too much going on and it slips through until its happening. Make sure you have a calendar and "if it's not on the calendar it's not happening" as the motto in our house goes.

He's clearly got deep issues and it's good he's working on them.

It's one night, you say he does his fair share and he'll do extra to make up this inconvenience so just taking yourself off upstairs is the best thing to do.

So what if she's not your political sway, its inconsequential tbh

I think you’ve done the right thing, and the advantage to you of her coming today is that you have the perfect excuse for avoiding her as much as possible, as having had such a big day, you are understandably tired, and have a good reason to want to tuck yourself up in bed, and cuddle your baby!

@curliegirlie that was my comment and from reading your post I hope it didn’t upset you. My point was that there is a segment of people who can’t/won’t drive and also make it everyone else’s problem and become super complacent about it, by default putting the burden on their partner/friends/anyone else around them. Not everyone, and as someone else said, there’s generally a bit of over indexing in other areas in a healthy relationship (which it doesn’t sound like the OP is experiencing in this example).

It sounds very frustrating for you in your specific case. Tangentially, I hope you live somewhere with decent transport infrastructure, as it’s absolutely shocking the way public transport has been systematically dismantled in many (most?) areas of the U.K, making it almost impossible not to drive. But that’s a whole other thread! Apologies again if my comment came across as too much of an over generalisation x