To divorce him over cookies?!?!

[Thecookiecrazylady]

This has happened this morning and is tbh he norm if I ever ask him to get me stuff. Last time he told me they didn’t have wholemeal bread in Sainsbury’s so I jumped in the car and ofc they had an entire end aisle he’d just not looked.

Me: can you grab me some of the chocolate chip cookies in a brownish yellow bag from the free from section while you’re at Sainsburys. If they don’t have them that’s fine but if they do 👍🏻
Him: yeah no problem

Me:… what are those?
Him: your cookies
Me: No they’re not. I said brown/yellow bag these are in a bright purple box.
Him: they didn’t have the others
Me: but these ones aren’t dairy free
Him: yes they are
Me: it says ‘all butter’ on the box they’re just gluten free
Him: give them to the kids 🤷‍♀️ (kids won’t eat them)
Me: You just don’t even care do you? Can’t even make a basic effort to listen, give me a ring to check…or at least read the damn box to check whatever alternative you’re buying is safe for me.
Him: YOU SAID BROWN AND PURPLE BAG
Me: PURPLE NEVER LEFT MY MOUTH ONCE NEVER STOP GAS LIGHTING ME YOU ALWAYS DO THIS!
Him: I thought I had the right bloody ones!
Me: No you didn’t you literally answered ‘they didn’t have them’ when I asked about the brown bag ones. You knew you were buying an alternative and you didn’t even bother to check it was safe or check with me I wanted it. I didn’t even care about the cookies that much it’s just the way you behave. You are never wrong, you don’t give a crap and you turn everything around on me and it’s always my problem.

Ok it’s not just over cookies it’s a very ingrained pattern of ‘IDGAF’ behaviour that always gets turned around on me. Words put in my mouth, him claiming I said or did things I didn’t. For context I do all our shopping and make a huge effort to meet his very particular requirements, even going to multiple supermarkets for items. I care if he’s happy. The only reason I wasn’t doing this supermarket run myself was because I’m poorly.

He’s a very capable man professionally. I mean, lots of lives depend directly on his ability to pay attention to detail so I just do not believe for a second that he misunderstands very clear instructions or isn’t capable of reading a packet for allergens. I just honestly don’t think he cares at all.

I think YANBU having read in particular your final paragraph re the effort you make for his requirements

Have you seen that thing about a man complaining that his wife left him because he left a dirty cup next to the dishwasher? Of course, she didn’t leave him because of that; it was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back. And these cookies might just be your straw.

At a minimum, he needs to agree to attend marriage counselling with you. Maybe that will make him understand he’s about to lose his wife.
💐

@GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing

thank you

I genuinely feel like im a crazy d* so much with him. The narrative has so strongly become ‘you’re emotionally unstable and treat me terribly and I shouldn’t have to live like this’ but the level of incompetence, lack of effort and nonchalance from him just kills me and he changes what’s supposedly been said and moves the goal posts constantly.

He can not apologise or even just seem like he feels bad it’s just not a thing. We’ve been married for 5 years and have two very small children and I can count on one hand the number of times he’s said sorry.

Your happiness is not a priority for him. Not unreasonable to rethink sharing your life with him.

I don't know if you'll find this useful @Thecookiecrazylady , but you've reminded me of this article
https://matthewfray.com/2016/01/14/she-divorced-me-because-i-left-dishes-by-the-sink/

The husband who wrote this article finally understood why his wife was upset by him.leaving his dishes next to the dishwasher, albeit too late. (He explains it really well in the article)

Its not about leaving dishes next to the dishwasher, or even about cookies. It's about the "I dont give a fuck about you or care about the things you care about" attitude.
When you ask your partner for help, no matter how small, you should expect they will care about it.

Essentially his attitude is, "this doesn't matter to me, I dont care which cookies I pick up, this means nothing to me, therefore you shouldn't care either"

As a one off, it probably wouldn't matter to you. And yiu would shrug it off as him being daft.
But from your Op, this seems to be all the time. I can fully understand why you will eventually start to feel that nothing you care about matters to him, you dont matter, he doesn't care and you mean nothing to him.

I was also put in mind of the Matthew Fray article.
You don't seem important to him unfortunately.

It's this. Could he be punishing you for being ill and having to go to the shops? As in she will not ask in future because I use weaponised incompetence. Like you are an appliance that has inconveniently broken down by being ill.

Even Ds2 who is at sixth form will facetime me from the supermarket he walks past on his way home and I often ask him to grab things. If he is unsure he will ring me or facetime so I can see the options. He is 17.

As above, it isn't the cookies, this is just the final straw in the list of he doesn't give a shit about me.

He sounds like a knob, he’s thought at least bringing something back is proof he looked for them but missing the point entirely. If this keeps coming up where he is denying what you told him then I would follow up any instruction like this with a text message so he can’t claim you’ve told him otherwise!

I think the message is that all this food differentiation is women’s work and beneath him.

It sounds uncaring behaviour and like he is only interested in what he wants. E.g. getting out of the supermarket as quickly as possible.
This isn’t a new relationship though as you have obviously married this man, had two children and say you want him to be happy. He doesn’t sound very socially intelligent. Has the behaviour developed or maybe always been there?

Yes divorce him. And it’s not because of cookies. It’s because he doesn’t care about you.

Just to show that it’s gaslighting you could text him a photo of the package in these situations

It looks like he is not going to change, so your next move is having a hard thought about what you want your future to look like.

When one of our babies was about six weeks old and was clusterfeeding DH and I had a memorable exchange. He couldn’t have got it more wrong if he tried and then said to me ‘I don’t think I’ll go to the supermarket any more because I’m not very good at it’ (he’s a degree educated professional with a very responsible job where attention to detail is crucial. I mention this only as proof that he can definitely read/differentiate/process information).

I said ‘that’s fine, grow some breasts and start lactating then.’ He got a shock cos it was the first time in about seven years I’d said very clearly this is not good enough and it’s not going to wash. This was with DC2 in our case and I definitely noticed an increase in this sort of bullshit when I was ‘vulnerable.’ Maybe it’s a coincidence (the more they’re asked to do the more opportunity there is to fuck it up) but I dunno, I got the feeling it was more ‘this is not my job.’

So I totally agree with @wohlarra. It sounds like a form of punishment, at the most unpleasant, and is definitely thoughtless entitlement and indifference. Your DH has specialist dietary needs of his own so must know what it means when there are things a person can and can’t eat, so he hasn’t a leg to stand on there.

It’s not a healthy dynamic and it’s not going to lead to a happy life. Also him excusing his behaviour by accusing you of mental instability isn’t the answer. You don’t want to have to put it all in writing, he’s not HMRC, it shouldn’t be about I showed you, and I can prove it.

Have you considered counselling? If (and I mean if) this is behaviour that can be changed I think it would be good to address it sooner rather than later.

Yes I’ve just read the Matthew fray article and that is exactly it!!

so quick update. Husband went back to Sainsbury’s post argument and has returned with the correct cookies.

Me: so they did have them then?
Him: (SCOWLING) yes
Me: do you not see why I get frustrated?
Him: you just never let anything go! See even now you’re not letting it go!
Me: because next time the exact same thing will happen and we’ll go through this whole argument again with you acting like I’m the problem!

Galaxy..
The light bulb moment I knew for a fact my dh didn't care about me.. Been together 8 years and 3 x dc. .. Now know he was a narcissist (no mn to tell me Back In The Day). Only ever ate Cadbury chocolate.. Ever..
Apparently he thought I might like it.
I actually cried..
And divorced him over a much bigger issue.. But such a straw was that bar of Galaxy...

@noooooooo

Your DH has specialist dietary needs of his own
Hmmm, he doesn’t have any allergies he’s just extremely particular and fussy. Which tbh annoys me even more because I go to that effort purely for his enjoyment whereas he won’t even read some packaging to ensure an item is allergy safe for me 🤦‍♀️

My husband's useless with supermarket shopping, I need to photograph the exact item's packaging and state weights, where it is in the supermarket.

The last time I sent him out for a chicken for dinner (on a sunday, when we have had roast every sunday since we got married 18 years ago), I specify A chicken - either free range or organic, from the fridge section, medium or large. I got 4 chicken breasts, which to be fair, were fresh and organic, but not A chicken.

He basically CBA doing stuff like that.

Cookie,
He can not apologise or even just seem like he feels bad it’s just not a thing. We’ve been married for 5 years and have two very small children and I can count on one hand the number of times he’s said sorry.

Read this through a couple of times.

Can you not see that this guy is verbally abusive and is gaslighting you?

Trust me it won't get any better. My advice is to start making plans to leave.

I'm sorry you are in this situation.

Okay, but as you say - you inconvenience yourself to accommodate his preferences. He may be a great guy but he has a habit of giving an excellent impression of someone who cannot be arsed thinking about your needs and makes excuses and gets ratty when challenged.

You could start reciprocating by not accommodating him, see how he likes it, but the thing is, then it becomes a race to the bottom of who can show their contempt for the other’s needs more. I don’t recommend that.

As a couple, today, you have a problem you didn’t need to have. He couldn’t be arsed trying the first time, he had to go back, you’re still arguing. Over a lifetime this shit really takes a toll.

Perhaps it’s already so ingrained in your dynamic that your DH cannot listen to your POV without getting defensive, perhaps this is how you interact but he’s otherwise a decent fella and shops are just his blind spot. Perhaps you’re both a bit stressed. We don’t know, you do, but unless you do actually want to divorce him, stuff like this needs to be addressed calmly and respectfully and not left to burgeon. As the much-quoted article explores, it’s not about the cup/the cookies.

Why don’t you send it to him? Maybe he’ll listen to someone else.

This isn’t useless or CBA, this is active sabotage. There’s no way any adult human with basic capacity could mistake you asking for a full chicken to roast for a pack of four chicken breasts. No way. He eats the damn stuff. He’s seen chickens ffs.

That is weaponised incompetence - if he fucks it up a few times you won't bother asking him to do it again.

That's exactly it. It's the light bulb moment.

Not a husband,but my long term boyfriend.- I dumped him.over a packet of biscuits.

Of course, I ended the relationship over much bigger issues, but the packet of biscuits was the final straw.

I had a really shitty week at work, which he knew. I bought myself a packet of oreo biscuits, which I love and was looking forward to having a cup of tea and the oreos- just as a little treat to cheer myself up.
I specifically asked him not to eat them.

Of course, I came home and he had ate all of them. Not a crumb left.
No apology, no running out to replace them - just full of excuses and "it's not a big deal, it's just biscuits" bullshit.

The light bulb moment just zinged and the realisation that this man really didn't care about me. My feelings, things I cared about meant nothing to him.