I'm too boring for DH

[Wowserbowser88]

Not even sure where to start with this one

Dh has been off with me all week. Snappy, short answers to any questions and just not engaged at all.

He had a drink tonight and finally admitted that he thinks i'm too boring for him. Because I don't have many friends. Don't go out and when I do its usually with work friends.

He thinks I am a terrible friend because I don't have many so I must be.

I don't go to any clubs or activities etc and we don't go out at the weekend often.

Here's the thing.. we have 2 children (8 and 4.) Both work full time and up until a year ago he worked shifts (earlies/lates/nights) so I could never make plans as he was always on shift. Even now he often works shifts. tho less of them and has weeks where he is on call 24/7 so I can't do anything

He also goes to football most weekends all day on Saturday so i'm at home with kids and he may stay put in the pub after until late

He was away with work last week and said he sat in a hotel room just thinking how badly he'd messed up by marrying someone so boring

He seems to think people, even with young children are out socialising every weekend and we're not and the children will suffer because of it

I'm sure you have great fun, but honestly this isn't something I've ever considered fun (and I did do quite a lot of this in my uni days, never really look back at it as something I miss).

Fun is subjective. Different for everyone.

This shit is verbally abusive and will only get worse. You don’t need to put up with this. As they say on here, you need to get your ducks in a row. 💕

Did you ask him why he expects you to sort his social life out? If he wants to get together with his football mates and wives, then he could just as easily arrange that. If he wants kids to see their friends, he should be arranging it and finding time to take them. And you will then have plenty of free time to do exciting things for yourself while he is parenting.

What a fucking cheek

goes out all day Saturday and stays in the pub all evening, works shifts and then you stay home looking after his children. Not getting a chance to socialise or participate in hobbies or friendships due to his being out all the fucking time

nice one - he really is taking the piss

but what I really suspect is his life is boring, and he is projecting on you.

What a catch 🙄! Quite apart from the logistics of your life with young children and limited parenting from him, the arrogance of the man is just breathtaking. So, he's judging you from the pedestal of his "football and down to the pub" social life which sounds like he's expanding his horizons and pushing new frontiers of exploration (not)!

My whole career I’ve worked with nearly all men. My take is that he’s had his head turned. The number of times I’ve heard wives described as “boring” and “frigid” when you see the pathetic creatures try to justify a side piece!

Prepare to separate. Even if he hasn’t cheated, he has been exceptionally cruel to you! That is unforgivable to the person who your whole family life centres around.

I’d use this chance to glow up and tell him to fuck off.

Hes social because only one of you is an active parent. Start going out on Saturday mornings. Fuck his football

This stinks of another woman who he thinks is a better fit.

What a nasty man!

Also I don’t feel like being boring is measured on how often you go out and socialise. I mean that’s probably how I measured things when I was 14, but surely now as adults, it’s about personality? My boyfriend has a good group of friends but they don’t see that much of each other. Never go out drinking. Play football once a week, the odd game night or takeaway night/summer bbq. But he is the least boring person I know. He’s hilarious, witty, chatty, always up for doing fun things at home like escape room boxes, trying new recipes, making our own quizzes. Just because he doesnt go out drinking doesn’t mean he’s boring. Your husband needs to grow up!

So many people baying for blood but we only have the OP’s spin on things.
She presumably has some agency in her life and is not a prisoner in her own home.
Did either of you organise a babysitter ever, so that you could go out together as a couple? Do you have friends come over?
Or is it just that you are happy in your rut, at home with the kids? And he’s the excuse you need not to broaden your horizons …
At least own it!

Also thought this.. he’s not your partner xxx

Hi NoisyViewer, sorry to pick you out, as you are not by any means, the only Mumsnetter to be seemingly agreeing with @Wowserbowser88's Husband, that her apparent lack of friends
is the reason she is boring! I actually agree with most of what you said, which is maybe why I wanted to quote your comment? I truly believe that whether someone has friends or not, will not have any bearing as to whether a person has any interests outside of either their home, or workplace, environment.

I have several issues with that type of thinking. The first one being that I doubt very much that the OP is boring, and yet too many PPs are giving replies that appear to be taking that part of her OP for granted! Another problem I have is more like a rhetorical question, it is "who can accurately judge whether a particular person is interesting or not?" An example of what I mean, is:

When my DH, (who was an engineer before he retired), used to give a monologue talk aout his job, he could keep that up for at least 20 minutes, and I hate to admit it, but I'm quite sure that my eyes must have sometimes glazed over, and I might have even nodded off to sleep, occasionally. In my defence, I did use to make concerted efforts to listen, and to actually be interested in his work. But, unfortunately, I would grow bored after having listened to him for about 10 minutes, which I think was because it was all very technical, and I just couldn't understand most of it.

However, I am sure that his engineering colleagues will have found his recollections quite fascinating. So basically, what I am trying to say, in admittedly a very cackhanded and boring way, is that what one person finds boring, can be very different to another person, who may delightedly find it very interesting!

Therefore, I can catagorically reiterate, that my finding some 'explanations or stories' from my DH to be uninteresting - through lack of my ability to understand them - doesn't mean that my DH is boring. In fact, in my eyes, he is usually very interesting, which I think is probably because we both love so many similar things. Listening to music, and passively reading, are two of our favourite ways of spending time together. We also both love picturesque scenery, and very importantly I think, we both have almost identical beliefs when it comes to Politics, and hating Trump!

Do not message the wives of his football mates (unless you do actually get on with them).

He absolutely got talking to some woman at the hotel and it's turned his head.

Do find something, anything to get out of the house and leave him with the kids to sort out. Because I know this dance - you're too boring we never do anything - but when you do take the kids out he just walks out the door with his wallet, meanwhile it's you that's got the coats/snacks. He thinks you're making a meal out of it, you can just buy stuff when you're there, but he's never had to deal with 2 hungry kids waiting in the queue for a restaurant at Alton towers, then discovering there's nothing on the menu that one of them will eat anyway and it just cost a fortune for a terrible pizza and now everyone's still grumpy (and this would all have been mitigated by taking some snacks from home)

I go to a book club once a month just to get out of the house (my kids are older so can stay home for a bit in the evening alone). I'm not a naturally gregarious person - I have a couple of friends but I'm in my 40s with kids - we don't hang out like 14 year olds anymore. My kids don't really do playdates or afterschool clubs (why doesn't he take the kids to weekend football maybe?) because they're like me - but when younger we'd go to zoos and stuff in summer, or swimming or something at the weekend (all arranged by me - he'd never bother)

Basically - he's failing to understand the impact of children on an adults life, because he's still hanging out with his mates like a teenager. The only way to deal with that is to make the kids impact on his life by leaving him to it sometimes. Letting him arrange the childcare sometimes etc.

Edit. Of course that last will only work if he is a decent/reasonable person. It didn't work for me. The one time I went away for a weekend without him and the kids I came back to find them all eating frozen pizza in their pants watching him play playstation. He would complain that we never went out together without the kids but would never bother to look for a babysitter. Would complain I went to bed early, but played computer games until midnight snored all night, and lay in in the morning when I got up to get the kids to school. So yes. I was more tired than him - still got everything done though.

So he’s bored & instead of trying to do something about it he just blames you and makes it your problem.

And this from Noisy. He wants to do more fun things, but doesn't want to organise them. So he's saying it's your fault.

Does the dumb head realise that for you to be that fun socialising person he as to stay at home and be the “boring” one. What an idiot

Wow. A pub n’ football bloke berating his overworked wife for being boring. What a cliche of a man.

Op - please do something non-boring and see a solicitor to go over your options for divorcing this prick. You and your kids deserve better.

Wow he sounds nice!
So is he expecting you to get someone to have the kids so you can have date nights? Does he want to do more with you and the kids? Does he want you to go out and he has the kids?! I mean I’d be all for making my own plans and leaving him entirely with the kids for a few weeks! Horrible arse!

I’m tempted to think up joking responses to him, and I think it’s because it just feels so pathetic and juvenile a complaint to bring your spouse. What, are you going to be rendered fascinating because you have a catch up with his friends’ wives? I bet he’s not as interesting as he thinks he is, it’s just probably not something you’re measuring him by x years and 2 kids in to your relationship!

Your last post cements it though, he has nothing but contempt for you and I think you might need to consider your options. Please don’t allow him to grind you down.

He’s got someone else lined up

This, or he's a misogynistic arsehole who has inappropriate conduct with women at the football pub meets and the wives who are organising the pub meets (hello 1950's 😳) aren't inviting you because they're protecting you from seeing his behaviour.

Did you have friends and socialize before the kids?

Oi!
OP says this has only happened this week - he hasn’t been saying this to her for years.

The thing is he’s being cruel and nasty to you. He doesn’t need to say these things to you. I agree he’s had his head turned or has checked out of the marriage. In the meantime ask one of the school mums out for coffee or to an exercise class (yoga?) or see what your local area has going on and sign up for something. In our local Sainsburys there’s a notice board with all sorts there from dance classes to children’s extra curricular activities. Or join a site like Meet Up. Get yourself out there! He can babysit.

He'll be cheating or have had his head turned. He'll be trying to justify his behaviour by blaming you for being so X Y Z.It seems boring is the first thing he's blaming.

OP that's mean of your DH.

If you were to join a club/activity he'd complain because he'd need to look after the children while you were out!