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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Anyone else get annoyed by… the question.. doesn’t your husband mind ?

67 replies

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 16:00

most recent one is because I doing away with a female friend for a few nights

I mean even by asking this question, your surely implying he should mind

this is the most recent one

but it’s also been asked regarding work thjngs etc too

OP posts:
Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 20:23

GCAcademic · 16/04/2025 20:21

I have a cleaner. I have done for the last two years. I have not told my mother and don't intend to.

Even though I often work 50-60 hours a week, she would think that I should be cleaning my house myself, because that's what she did (she worked part-time, and retired at 50).

I geypt they you can't be arsed to tell her, but don't you think it's a bit sad you have to kinda keep it secret

I mean I get it, I perhaps would too, my ,other would try and make out I was so some of incompetent person if I had a cleaner, even if I worked 60 hours a week

OP posts:
TheCurious0range · 16/04/2025 20:24

I've never been asked this and I do plenty without him

meganorks · 16/04/2025 20:28

No, I wouldn't be offended because it is absolutely a reflection of them/their DH. So I'd be tempted to say something completely cutting like:
"No, because he's not a useless, controlling twat" and just leave that hanging in the air...

GCAcademic · 16/04/2025 20:29

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 20:23

I geypt they you can't be arsed to tell her, but don't you think it's a bit sad you have to kinda keep it secret

I mean I get it, I perhaps would too, my ,other would try and make out I was so some of incompetent person if I had a cleaner, even if I worked 60 hours a week

Yes, I kind of feel like I'm having an affair! It's wrong, but I just can't be arsed with the judgement. No one does judgement like my mother.

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 20:29

meganorks · 16/04/2025 20:28

No, I wouldn't be offended because it is absolutely a reflection of them/their DH. So I'd be tempted to say something completely cutting like:
"No, because he's not a useless, controlling twat" and just leave that hanging in the air...

I'm learning from you !

OP posts:
MyIvyGrows · 16/04/2025 20:31

Yep. The CEO of my company has a child a few months younger than mine and NO ONE asks him whether doing overnights or long meetings or corporate dinners and award ceremonies is hard on his wife. but if I stay at work late or start early, when I’m busy, I pretty much always get asked who’s looking after DS.

(It probably is hard on his wife even though they have plenty of money for nannies and cleaners and all of that… but no one asks, because he is a man.)

BoredZelda · 16/04/2025 20:32

“No, because he married an adult who can make their own decisions”

LikeWhoUsesTypewritersAnyway · 16/04/2025 21:01

I have been with DH for more than 35 years, and married for 30+ years (since the early 1990s,) and I've had it all. From random men bumping into me and DH, (and his friends bumping into us,) and completely ignoring me like I'm not even there, to salesmen coming to the door asking if my husband is in. And family and acquaintances being shocked that DH is 'helping' around the house, and being gobsmacked when he 'helped' with OUR children, and 'babysat' them while I went out with friends.

Then there's the (usually female) shop assistants who act shocked and say I have got DH 'well trained' because he packs the shopping away. (Ya know like it's MY job. Hmm) Then when I pay with my debit card, they say 'you should make him pay!' I just say 'it's a joint account. It makes no difference which one of us pays.' I really want to say 'what the fuck has it got to do with you - you nosey cunt,' but I manage to refrain. One day I will snap though!

My favourite one from the past few years though. DH and I have shared a car for many years (never really needed 2,) and we got a new-ish car 4 years ago in 2021 (a 2018 car.) We bumped into a couple we know at the pub, and I mentioned that I'd been to see my DC in the car today. And SHE said to my DH 'you let her drive it?! You let HER drive your new car?' I was like Hmm DH said 'it's OUR car, and my wife doesn't need permission from ME to drive it.' She was like Shock

This was a woman a couple of years older than us. Not someone raised in the first half of the 20th century! She was a teen and young adult in the 1980s and 1990s!

Stupid cow.

Even now, when I am driving, we occasionally get someone saying 'oooh you let her drive do you?!' Sometimes a man, sometimes a woman.

Oh, and yeah, I have had 'doesn't your husband mind?' LOADS of times over the years, when I have had the audacity to do something without him!

It's 2025 FFS!

Pisses me right off. Feels like women haven't gone forward a single fucking inch in the past century sometimes!

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 21:01

Going to use all these collective examples, to fuel the fire in my belly

OP posts:
LikeWhoUsesTypewritersAnyway · 16/04/2025 21:56

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 21:01

Going to use all these collective examples, to fuel the fire in my belly

Flowers
Cedrabbage · 16/04/2025 21:59

I'd be annoyed if it were from a close friend, other than that I'd struggle to not laugh

marmaladeandpeanutbutter · 16/04/2025 22:58

No, it’s only said by people with difficult husbands. It’s an opportunity to discuss women’s rights in this respect.

JudasTree · 16/04/2025 23:01

nomas · 16/04/2025 16:20

I think women are just conditioned to care more. DH has always been encouraging of me going away (whether for work or leisure), but I do feel a pang when I do go away as I know he sometimes gets lonely whilst I’m away.

I don’t know if he thinks the same when he goes away. I just imagine him happily about going about his business, though he does call twice a day minimum.

Well, I’m a woman and I definitely don’t ‘care more’. I love DH and DS, but go away by myself or, less often, with friends, a lot. Not a pang in sight. Surely your DH’s social life is his own concern?

Mikart · 17/04/2025 07:04

My inlaws are appalled I never make a traditional Sunday lunch or Xmas dinner, that dh does most of the cleaning and we share the cooking, we have separate holidays as well as lots together and that we don't do childcare for his grandchildren.
They'd combust if they knew I own the house.
Luckily we never see them.

MrsJJ84 · 17/04/2025 07:10

once discussing a hypothetical situation with a family member and had the response ‘what if your husband dosent let you .’
erm …

hamptonedge · 17/04/2025 08:53

I’m retiring soon and am already fed up with people commenting that hubby, already retired, will have to stop all of his current activities ‘as you will be home as well.’ He is also receiving numerous comments such as ‘you will have to stop this’ or ‘she will know what you are up to now.’ He isn't UP to anything untoward 🤣meeting up with his mates, cutting wood, gardening, helping an elderly friend with his vehicle etc. Why do people assume we will want to be joined at the hip??😤

Takeoutyourhen · 17/04/2025 09:16

Daydreamingforever · 16/04/2025 20:06

Do you think it's because she thinks she suffered so you should too?

I think so. But then again, it’s as if she is engineered to make comments without consideration for the recipient. She sees her children as an extension of herself and if you don’t reflect her, it annoys her. Can’t keep up with the Jones’s with that!
I think mums like this take things as a personal slight. I reckon if I was to retaliate to the original question in your thread title with a suggested “no, because he’s not a useless, controlling twat” it would unfortunately be showing up their marriage and my dad. But I do generally need quick fire quips in my toolkit!

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