Husband always late, can't take much more

[Dazedandfrazzled]

My husband is ALWAYS late. He's always been like this, but I'm sure it's getting worse, we now have a 2yo and quite frankly I am sick of it. I've talked to him about it over and over, he says he will change, but seems incapable. It's causing a huge strain on our relationship, not one week has gone by that he has managed to be 'on time'. Its actually starting to make me hate him and want to leave because every morning starts off with me feeling this huge stress and disappointment over it, which then impacts my whole mood and day. I'm in a negative rut and can't seem to get out of it. There are other things going on as well so far from a perfect relationship, but this is the core issue which then impacts everything else. I basically spend hours waiting for him (which then by default means I will be doing housework and looking after LO while he faffs around adding to the frustration).

I'm not even sure what I am asking, it seems like a stupid reason to break up a family but I truly feel that I can't take much more. WWYD?

OP I've read your posts and felt I had to comment. From what you've posted I truly think your dh had ADHD. Much of what you've written rings true for me and my dh.

DH was always ' a dreamer', a 'bit scatty', a 'bit forgetful' and ALWAYS late for everything and always stressed trying to get out of the house. Even if he was ready to go on time, he would inevitably discover his keys / wallet / phone etc were then missing.

We argued about it and laughed about it depending. He's self employed & very successful at what he does but he really struggled with the business side of being self employed. What I mean is let's say his job was making rocking chairs (it's not!) he's REALLY good at making them and they're in high demand and he has lots of orders but he struggled with delivering on time and keeping on top of the emails etc.

To the outside world he appeared super successful, winning awards for the products etc but behind the scenes the wheels regularly fell off.

As he got older I noticed a sharp decline in his situation. It was getting worse and worse and long story short but he really, really messed up a couple of huge opportunities including a contract for 100K. It was a very low point and he cried very sad tears and said he thought there was something wrong with him. It was the first time he'd admitted it out loud.

He went for assessment and was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 49. Honestly I was not surprised but what I was not expecting was how the diagnoses changed thing for the better.

I was far less impatient & worked up about him being disorganised, I realised that he was struggling. He worked with the psychiatrist to work out coping mechanisms and strategies and really worked at implementing them. It's not prefect and when he's tired he slips back again.

I realised that I could help him with the planning side of his work and I do this now and it's helping enormously.

Our relationship is 100% back on track. He's handsome, funny, incredibly loving and kind and a really engaged dad to our teens and I can see all that again now that I am not spending my time allowing myself to get wound up over his faffing at times.

I urge you to speak to him. See if you can get him to open up about what's really going on with him. He's potentially doing his best to mask things, unsuccessfully, but that in itself is exhausting for you both.

I wish you all the best and hope that you can both work it out.

An update, I spoke to him about taking 3 hours to get ready/ not being able to leave the house by 9.30 as he agreed. What pushed me to post this is that he agreed to this as I said I really needed this yet he just can't do it. I thought it was worth raising again after reading these comments. He's said to me that he's not a morning person and that's just how long it takes him to do all the things he needs to do (he does use lists) that I knew this when I met him, and that he can't live up to my ridiculous demands. So I know where he's at and where I stand. I'm going to look into getting some therapy for myself and antidepressants.

I don't think he can change, and if I'm honest I don't think he should. If he's rushing trying to please me, it will just cause him stress and it won't be sustainable anyway. I don't know if it's my problem or his, but we probably aren't compatible or have grown apart or something. Marriage counselling might also be an option, I do think as some people have said it's possible I now have a version of the ick.

I think I said in the first post, I'm in a negative head space and can't seem to get out of the rut so I really need to work on that. Thank you again everyone, it really has meant so much to read all of the comments even those that hurt I have taken them all on board.

OP i think if you got a part-time job or volunteered but create a life outside of the home might help

Also leaving DH to do 2 days of pick up drop off and doing something for yourself on one of the morning evenings might help.

A lot of your feeling seems to revolve around being hemmed in at home but your trying to spend more time there?

stop waiting for your DH, stop adjusting for his lateness do, if you need him to do things for the LO ask him to make sure their done the night before so your not waiting around and then do things on time, catch your flight, make dinner, visit family. if he makes it good, if he doesn't it's not your problem.

Is it because you have to pick little up at noon? So you leave to drop off and want a couple hours to yourself when you get back but don’t get it because he is home?

you want to relax and have abit of privacy to wax your legs or simply just breath a bit?

I get that.

looking at it with how I dealt with my kids…. They wake up to early faff about in their pyjamas and end up late.

so now we make them go from bedroom to bathroom. get showered and dressed and then breakfast and then out the door when the time comes.

maybe try that? No coffee for him until he is dressed and maybe let him take little one to nursery or you go together?

Your update is so sad.

You’re thinking of going on anti depressants because you’ve spelt out how his behaviour is affecting your mental health and his response is “Im not a morning person” and that he will not change.

Please do go and get some therapy for yourself.x

So leaving you to deal with your lo and leaving you feeling stressed because of his lack of timekeeping and then him blaming it on him ‘not being a morning person’ is just not good enough as far as I’m concerned!
It seems to me like he just doesn’t care if I’m honest. It seems as if he doesn’t see or care about your feelings op.

Personally I couldn’t be with someone like this.

OP that’s a very balanced view and the counselling and the therapy might both be worth pursuing. I really hope it works out. Ultimately you are probably both exactly what most of us are: just normal people with our own strengths, quirks and weaknesses trying to do the best we can and sometimes failing. Bon courage!

Do not misquote me.

I've never said anything of the sort about the OP so your assumptions make you look foolish.

Completely agree!!! What he is doing to op is emotional abuse, whether he can help it or not! NOBODY should have to go on antidepressants because of their partner causing them stress and making them feel so down in the dumps because they are just ‘not a morning person’!

Thank you. I do think adults need to learn coping mechanisms as best they can. People like the husband here need to communicate and be very open to trying new approaches. It isn't acceptable to let the other partner pick up all the slack. But inconsistency is literally a hallmark of ADHD. Home might be his safe place. That doesn't make it ok to be late for things in the domestic sphere, but he might be using all his energy to keep on top of work and have little left over after that. I am pretty time blind and it's exhausting sticking to the routines of modern work and life. I'm constantly overwhelmed. And on top of that I've been told my whole life that I'm lazy, selfish and stupid for not finding it easier to organise myself. I don't see much evidence OP and her husband have really communicated about all her resentments and they should probably do that before separating or writing him off as just another useless man.

You’ve been perfectly happy to let all the abuse of the op go by without comment while you pick everything else up though eh @Willyoujustbequiet ? You know your snippy tone just makes you look foolish don’t you? Anyway, I hope the op can ignore your squabbling and find some help on her thread.

I think the problem is he is trying, he wants to, he just can't. He's also selfish and stuck in his ways. I'm torn between hating him and feeling terrible guilt about wishing he was different. If I feel bad that he feels bad, is that love or is that just being a human being and having compassion? I sometimes feel like I don't love or even like him anymore, but then why do I feel so bad about it? God, I really do need professional help.

You have your child in nursery for 3.5/4 full days a week, you don’t work, he does 50:50 at weekends. He works 10-7. It doesn’t sound like you’re the one ‘picking up the slack’ why isnt the allowed to be in his own house until 9.45 if it causes no problems with work? Why can’t he have 3 hours to slowly get ready when you are allowed time alone? It’s ok to go off someone and find them irritating and not want them around. I think you have to be honest and not blame him though

He is selfish.

Assuming you are female - you've been socialised to feel guilt. To always put someone else's needs before your own. It's absolutely awful that women still have to endure this societal and personal pressure to sacrifice themselves. Look at some of the comments on this thread - weird posters who want you to live a rubbish life and feel guilty for wanting to break free.

OP, reading your posts and not the rest of the bunfight, I think you sound like you're done with your relationship.

Perhaps it's time to consider leaving, and see if your mood lifts at the thought of it.
I think life is too short to stay in a relationship that makes you so clearly unhappy.

You need professional help only because your DH is really shite. Look at what you just wrote: "He is trying, he wants to, he just can't" "He is selfish and stuck in his ways". Those two things contradict each other. Which one is it? He's either trying and wants to, or he doesn't want to because he's selfish. There's no such thing as "he just can't" - is he a baby?

What exactly do you mean by "he feels bad"?

You feel bad because he feels bad? You're being guilt-tripped.
There's nothing wrong with you; you're just married to a jerk.

OP it's really sad that he just comes and say that "I am not a morning person" and you have to think about taking antidepressants because all the stress he is putting on you. If he cannot share childcare responsibilities during the week, it's better to leave him OP so that atleast your mental health is not impacted. You are trying your best to think about even going for couple counselling but it seems like he is not ready to take any initiative to make any changes in his life so that the pressure is less on you. I am upset for you that he has just disregarded all your feelings, it's very unfair considering you are one who is taking care of the child most of the time. The thing which concerns me is that he is not worried about your mental health and also the impact it will have on your child. Your daughter will feel that you are stressed no matter how young they are. It's just so unfair.

So if you split, how will he cope with getting himself and your DC to wherever they all need to be? Plus caring for them as well

I agree and it’s the first thing I thought when op said she is feeling bad because her DH feels bad. He is obviously aware of what he is doing because he has told op he ‘feels bad’. But he doesn’t feel bad at all otherwise he would be trying his best to rectify it - even seek therapy if needed! Op says he is “selfish and set in his ways” which tells me he’s basically saying “well things will get done when I want to do them, even if it’s at the expense of other people, I don’t care about their feelings, it’s either my way or the highway” which says it all really!!

The phrase “I feel bad but I’m not a morning person” - what he’s basically told you op is “I feel bad, but it’s just tough so suck it up buttercup”. He is dismissing all your feelings!!

Not caught up with thread since earlier so I apologise but was assuming the OP was looking after the kids in the day hence wanting some quiet time before this starts?

Yes I thought it was a disappointing response from him. Personally I suspect he does need some help with it and both of you would feel better as a result. But if he won’t, start with some help for yourself and see where that gets you. Your feelings sound understandably conflicted and you need to get to the bottom of that. If you could ( for a moment!) imagine him more organised, how would you feel on the ick factor front? It may be that the incompatibility is deeper and, as he said, he always was that way and that itself didn’t bother you until other aspects came into play. You don’t have to put up with suffering because you are a woman, nor do you have to knee-jerk a response just to prove that.

I have sons like this. I am like this too. We are neurodivergent. I don’t think I am quite as bad as your husband and the last time I was in a relationship he got annoyed because I didn’t want to get up early to go anywhere and it took me ages to get ready. I doubt he is capable of changing if this is the case with him too.
I think your irritation is a sign of a bigger issue. If you were still in love with him you would be better able to tolerate his shortcomings, we all have them. Try to imagine life without him and if you can, there’s your answer.

I think he would bow out, except for the odd weekend, Nanny.

My ExH ended up 'managing' one Saturday night a month, despite having a court order for far much more! He used the court process to punish me - but it sounds like the OP's husband would be late for hearing anyway and all the mediation meeting(s) and so she could ask for what she feels reasonable in his absence.

The fantasy (and threat) of '50:50' versus the reality of what then actually happens in real life may be starkly different. I'd really like to see some statistics on it - but I know lots of divorced/separated people and I don't know a single couple/family who actually have a 50:50 arrangement, irrespective of what's in the child arrangements order.

Fear of 50:50 is not exactly a red herring but I would say is over-magnified.

I sometimes wonder what will happen when I go back to work. If he helped with a nappy or nursery drop off I'm sure that would add another half hour or hour to his morning. I do almost all of the the housework, so if that was shared I don't even understand how that would work. Maybe this is part of what is stressing me out subconsciously, it's safe to assume it will mostly default to me

I am ND, so are my children, so I get that. However children's services aren't full of parents who have ADHD. The OP's DH isn't doing anything in terms of running the house, parenting or his relationship. There's very few, if any parents who are losing residency because of ADHD, without moderate LD's being present. Maintaining a relationship can be difficult, but he did so during the early days.
This sounds like a man who thinks that he's knocked his wife up, so she's were he wants her. He gets to places when it suits him. He's doing what he wants.