To make awful demands of DH

[jonesonscam]

DH likes to stuff all my clothes in my drawer in a mildly aggressive manner as he doesn’t like that I sometimes leave small piles of folded clothes on top of my chest of drawers. This evening I brought my laundry up, had a shower, got my pjs on and DH came up in a huff, saw my unhung/sorted pile of laundry and started stuffing it into drawers - think drawers with clothes spilling out of the top, rolled into balls etc. I said, calmly and not unkindly ‘I haven’t got around to hanging them yet, please can you not stuff them in like that as you crease them and sometimes rip them?’

This was, apparently, V V U. ‘God I can’t do anything right today CAN I?!’ husband huffs, alluding I assume to a conversation this morning where I asked him if he could turn off his reading light after midnight in future because he had it on until 2am last night and I couldn’t get off to sleep properly (I did ask at the time and was told ‘yes I am just finishing this book’).

That too, was apparently V V U.

I 100% believe in rejection sensitivity dysphoria as a thing but this is just effing ridiculous. I feel like I can’t say ‘What the hell DH?!’ because that will make him even WORSE.

What if I want to read in bed to help me fall asleep?

Absolutely no fucker would be keeping me up with a light on til 2am.

I cant wear an eye mask and why should I? The bedroom is for sleeping. You don't need to be in bed to read, so go elsewhere.

Read till you are sleepy and then go to bed, its hardly rocket science.

You go up early ..you certainly don't keep your partner awake until 2am ..there are serious ill health effects from that

No we compromise, because we're adults.

A small reading light is very different to a main light, eye masks exist, kindles exist. If I'm having a bout of insomnia and reading will help then my husband sucks it up for a night, if he had work early the next day I would suck it up.

I’m not talking about a reading light, I’m talking about his bedside lamp, just a regular lamp that you can angle, that he angles facing right outward, like a searchlight.

A bedside lamp is completely different to a reading light in my defense.

@jonesonscam so you pick up his stuff off the bathroom floor and stuff it in one of his drawers. (But I can be childish!) The reading light angled towards you ‘like the Gestapo’ ?? Is he doing this on purpose do you think? Whichever - he sounds extremely irritating and I’d echo the pp and say if he’s reading til 2am he should read elsewhere and come to bed when he’s ready to sleep. Always assuming he can do that without waking you!

If you have space and spare rooms, then definitely this^. Problem solved!

RSD -massive pinch of salt. And I live in a house full of NDs (I'm NT). DP goes into a tailspin at the merest whiff of perceived criticism or disappointment and fires off every equalising strategy in the book, but even he wouldn't for a moment try to hide behind RSD. 100% learnt behaviour arising from childhood trauma that he's totally aware of but hasn't got his shit together to resolve in therapy. DC1(16) has no filter and responds instantaneously, on the attack. It isn't RSD, she's working on social stories to learn more appropriate ways of responding. We use pre-rehearsed sentence stems to 'programme' a more appropriate response -the last^ thing she wants is to be a dick: "It seems we remember things differently. Shall we talk about what happened?" / "I thought we agreed X, but this is Y. Let's check what we both said." / "When you say that, I feel so upset / embarrassed / blamed. Can you try saying it in a different way?" You might suggest a few of these with your BF

I've only ever seen RSD used to explain the behaviour of people acting out indiscriminately, never cited by those who may be just as sensitive to rejection and criticism, but who are not in the habit of acting out and upsetting other people in the process.

When you start to feel like this about each other there is no coming back from it. The resentment is real.

Does he have some kind of a compulsion or anxiety that dictates that everything be put away before he goes to sleep? Otherwise it's unreasonable for him to put your stuff away if you normally do it yourself and have said you prefer that, and especially if he is not being very careful. He could also ask you to move it.

I said, calmly and not unkindly ‘I haven’t got around to hanging them yet, please can you not stuff them in like that as you crease them and sometimes rip them?’

Does he disagree with your description - maybe he thinks he is putting your things away very carefully and is actually helping you, and you are being dishonest in saying he is doing damage and only saying that to criticise him unfairly? Or does he acknowledge that he crumples and rips your things but thinks that you are unreasonable to object to his doing so?

‘God I can’t do anything right today CAN I?!’ husband huffs

The "oh poor me" routine can be a way of shutting down ANY criticism by making it difficult for you to voice your needs for fear of his reaction, or by making you think you are wrong to speak up or unreasonable in your requests.

I feel like I can’t say ‘What the hell DH?!’ because that will make him even WORSE.

I don't know if "what the hell" is the way to go but the two of you should be able to have a conversation about issues and figure out a compromise. Again, if he's making such a fuss when you criticise him or speak up about your needs, it may be intentional to shut you up and even intimidate you into doing what you SUSPECT he wants, in order to keep the peace. I may be way off base, just something to consider if this is a pattern.

DH leaves piles of clothes lying around and it drives me mad, so I have to be on your husbands side for that - it only takes a few minutes to put your clothes away.

But YADNBU about the light. Tell him to go downstairs if wants to read.

OMG If anyone wants to read in bed until 2am they can do it in the spare room !!

I 100% believe in rejection sensitivity dysphoria.

I've heard everything now.

I like to read at night and my husband doesn't. You know what I did? Bought a backlit kindle, because I share a room with him and it's not fair to keep him awake because I want to be comfy in bed.

We're both messy when it comes to clothes, so it all gets lobbed on a chair and put away when we can be arsed.

LTB. Honestly, the best solution. He's a selfish - and aggressive - dick.

"Rejection sensitivity disorder". Another one of those modern spellings for 'selfish prick'.

Get a kindle with a dim light. Or make sure you’re in bed and asleep before the other person comes up.

I read myself to sleep and wouldn’t dream of disturbing my husband.

My df would have done something like that - roughly handling things we had left lying around, shoving them away, and my first thought was that your dh wbu for treating you like a child.

And then I thought, that isn’t an acceptable way to treat anyone.

Sometimes it takes me an extra couple of beats to see abuse because of what was normalised in my childhood.

Damaging your belongings to the point of ripping your clothes, is abusive, and the DARVO reaction is fairly classic.

I bet you have more examples @jonesonscam

At 2am?

Why not put away your laundry before having the shower ?
and is it your chest or our chest - as you refer to both in your replies.

Rejection sensitivity dysphoria? I’ve heard it all now.

Maybe he could concentrate on putting his own stuff away

@sittingonabeach

The thread was about her laundry not his.

Some times I'm glad I can't live with my boyfriend. He's disabled and lives in a semi supported flat.
If we'd live together for the last eight years, we'd have driven each other crackers. So not to hurt him, I normally sleep on a double mattress layout in his front room when I stay over.
He'll sleep on the fold down bed chair at my place most of the time so we both get good sleep - only sharing my double when we've nothing going on the next day.

As for the clothes stuffing thing, that's just odd. OCD in overdrive perhaps? 🤔