Should he stay or should he go?

[Howbadistoobad]

My DH is just a bit too clueless on the adulting, parenting and domestic front. Our eldest is 12 and we have a house, two cars, 3 kids and 2 pets so really he should be into the swing of this by now!

Examples of things he can't really do:
Earning - he's literally the brainiest man on earth but has no clue about how to get on at work. Has had three jobs in his life and has been made redundant twice. Currently on a temporary contract. Will be interesting to see if they make him permanent. He is currently saying it is a certainty but I bet they will find plausible excuses and not. As a result I have stepped up my career to be primary earner, which would not be my preference as a mum of three with one still not yet at school tbh.

Cooking - needs to be told what to cook and left a recipe. If it's anything beyond basic he'll get v stressed and shout at the kids while he's doing it so I return home to miserable, stressed children (and increasingly DD12 will have stepped in to rescue him either from the cooking or the younger two but then she will blame me for leaving her to deal with it all)

Shopping - again needs spoon feeding with detailed list. Quicker to just go to supermarket myself. Can't take more than one kid with him because apparently too stressful. ???

Choosing lunch/snack for kids or even himself - I'll arrive home an hour after lunch or after school and they'll have had nothing because he was "waiting for me". They will be climbing the walls or helping themselves. Basically he just doesn't seem to know how to put a bit of lunch out from the fridge. Left to himself he just snacks on weird beige food like Weetabix several times in a day or toast and butter. If I didn't put fruit and veg on his plate I don't think it would occur to him to eat any.

Caring for the kids - Being at home with the kids just seems to make him and them stressed. Youngest one in particular hates being left with dad. At one time, he was our primary carer doing 2 days per week but he got really depressed. I was having to make sure he was awake and up before I could leave for work so had to stop that. I am not actually sure he has ever taken all 3 kids anywhere on his own. He would treat it as a military operation. He doesn't know what to do if the little one (DD) needs the toilet, basics like that.

He's not totally useless at everything btw. He is really v good at hobbies. He's taken a new big team sport up in the last couple of years and is clearly getting pretty good at it. And he has a hobby at home that he is a total perfectionist about, completely self taught. So he can learn when it interests him.

My question is: would my life be easier with this kind of annoying help from Slightly Clueless Husband or as a single parent of 3?

Also the cooking...order a couple of meals a week from hello fresh or similar. My DD14 who has ADHD can do those. Very clear instructions.

So basically this helpless little flower is being parented by a 12 yr old.

He'll never change and the question you need to ask yourself is whether it's worth going on. If nothing else, you need to lay it on the line how you feel and what you expect from him. He's more of a pet than a husband but are you prepared to accept that? Or do you want more - if so you may need to find it elsewhere.

I think that you're more than capable of going alone and would find it easier. Give him one last chance and tell him bluntly what it is you want from him. Ask him if he can deliver and take it from there.

What’s the longest he’s managed to hold down a job op?

It remind me of those American high school jocks that are the prom kings and Mr popular

but twenty years later achieved very little of note and still harping on about his high school glory days

I'm not sure it's really 'beyond him'. Sounds more like he doesn't want to do any parenting and his reactions of stress and anger are his ways of telling you that!

It's not because he can't do the things needed doing at home . It's because he can't be arsed to do them!
He doesn't excel at work because he doesn't want to!
You are taking the financial and home life burden so he doesn't have to.
He can however have a lovely time doing his hobbies 🙄
People treat you how you allow them to and your children will be watching this and taking notice!

No advice OP, I'm wondering the same thing 😅 would life be easier without a manchild to look after?
I reckon it would

Well loads of people will pile on and tell you he has Adhd

I hate this comment on MN, and it's seen on here far too much. The anti ADHD brigade always come put on posts like this, and from someone with ADHD I certainly hear similar things in your post.

For me with ADHD, I can go into a paralysis of being so overwhelmed with multiple tasks that none on them get done. I dont know if it's this way for others with ADHD or not, but I've learned to just get the fuck up and get the task done, so what if I find it overwhelming just get up and do it and you'll be happy you did. So I'm learning to ignore my brain telling me I can't do it, and just bloody get it done.

Redundancy is very rarely an individual's fault. If you've ever been through it you'd understand that.

Whilst I am sympathetic to OP about most of her post, blaming someone for being made redundant is shitty, particularly as it can be a traumatic experience.

It is really disappointing in the 21st century to see women with such negative attitudes to redundancy and the idea that they can't or shouldn't be the primary earners just because they have children.

This sadly. I mean, you chose this.

All your replies are about your pointless, misogynist bloke.
More importantly-you're teaching your kids that women are for serving men. To have low standards. That men shout when women don't serve them. There's no excuse for this.

Plan for what YOU want from life. Finalise this farcical, dead marriage. Enjoy life.

@Eleganz I understand your point about redundancy but in both cases they did have a choice about who they let go and who they didn't. The second time around there was performance management going on until a convenient round of redundancies came along and HR offered him a VR as an alternative. So I stand by my comment that his redundancies suggest he has been less successful at work than his academic performance would have led us all to expect.

(Adult me does realise that it was naive to assume that performance at uni would predict performance at work but this was the years when everyone told you that if you went to a good uni you could do anything)

DH was a little like this until he realised I wasn't going to pick up his slack! He has always been a great and hands on Dad though. His was more with housework and the mental load.
Kids try it too, I call it learned helplessness. If they don't do it or do it badly, someone will rescue them and do it for them. Its tougher for you though as its affecting the DC.

He is very very lucky to have found someone like you.
He sounds like the type who would have ended up returning to living with his parents if it weren’t for you.

Or one of those creepy men living in a dark smelly messy room somewhere, subsisting on porn and popcorn, and whatever else weird interests they’ve developed over a selfish isolated lifetime.

I suppose it’s women like you that keep them partly sane and normal - great for society as a whole, but not great for you.

It really is women society runs on with any sort of goodness in it.

I couldn’t do it, but thanks for keeping that kind off the streets inflicted on the rest of us.

And I suppose this post will have you feeling sorry for him and wondering what will happen to him without you. Do you think he has any such concerns?

OMG this is awful, def better off without him. Also for your poor kids, he is putting far too much responsibility on your 12 old, which will impact their development and likely need therapy when older. He is obviously capable when he wants to be. Your life would much less stressful and your children would be allowed to be kids, if you left him. Best of luck op.

@Blixem Mine's actually not too bad at housework. He looks after the kitchen in the evenings (in preference to wrangling 3 kids of differing ages to bed), does all ironing plus typical man tasks like bin, car, garden. He can also do quite a wide range of DIY... although that was more practical before kids.

We get it, he’s shit. More importantly-your kids will grow up and follow your awful example, they’ll think this is normal and acceptable

The fact the OP mentioned it would indicate that the detail behind the redundancy is perhaps something that is partly due to him. Otherwise why would it be mentioned

*Redundancy is very rarely an individual's fault. *any source for that @Eleganz ? Or just a feeling you have based on your own experience and those you know who have been made redundant?

Did he get decent payouts op? Presumably if he’d only ever had two jobs since uni (and before this current temp role), he’d been there many years?

How can he claim to love his kids if he doesn't bother feeding them? I'd feed random kids if they were hungry, never mind my own. It's a basic human instinct.

He only loves himself. I'd have binned him after he ignored the first one but you are where you are, so cut your losses. Better late than never.

@EvenBetta He isn't totally shit. He is quite shit at some - rather important on a day to day level for parents - things.

@cultureplanet Yes, payouts were reasonable. But he didn't just walk into a new role on either occasion, took a while.

You are already a single parent to 4 kids, him being one of them.

As a single parent myself, there is no way I’d take on a full grown adult who acts like a kid.
I’m not your mum and if you don’t know how to adult then it’s not my problem.

There are some men who want their wife to be a replacement mum.
They will act like they can’t do these things, yet expect their wife to be able to figure it out fine.

If he was quitting his jobs or perhaps kept messing up then I’d think that he may be ND and struggles on certain tasks but as he is being made redundant then it’s hard to tell.

Has he always been like this or is this a new thing?

When you first moved in together how quickly did you become his mum and how did that change when you had kids?

Yeah, obviously. What did you want from the thread? Just a moan? If you’re happy raising your kids to follow your example, go for it.