Is this normal or is he a drama queen?

[nomedoit]

Long time since I've posted but DH has driven me to it. I really need some perspective. My DH is a builder, own business, gets gloomy when he doesn't have much work and turns into a complete drama queen when he does. So this week he is working with two guys at a farm, doing barn repairs and fencing. No pressure, nice lady to work for.
When he comes home tonight you would think that he was in charge of the Olympic stadium. Announces he has a splitting headache - I get him painkillers after which he retreats to the sofa for a nap, too exhausted apparently to shower. I do dinner and deal with DD, get him up. We eat in total silence, at least I talk, he says nothing.Finally he mutters about some problem with the roof tiles. I've cooked a great dinner but no comment about that. Then he starts more sighing, staring into space, tragic silences. I clear up, run bath, do his washing etc etc while he stares comatose at the TV. He agrees to sit with DD while she is in the bath, doesn't once speak to her.
It is like this all the time. He takes no interest whatsoever in my work or the things I have done for him today (I do all his paperwork, advertising and I am building him a website - spent a lot of time today sorting photos for that, he shows no interest whatsoever).
I feel as though I am doing too much for him, that if I was more of a bitch or at least less nice I would be treated better. Does that make sense?
Anyway, tonight I snapped at him and told him that I was tired of the drama and now he is off sulking somewhere. Good, I feel sick of dealing with him.
Advice?

He sounds like a twat to me and I would have kicked him into touch long ago. I work bloody hard and for longer hours than your DH does, Nomedoit, and sometimes I'm so knackered that I need to go to bed at around 9pm. I would never, ever treat DH or DD like this though.

Oh God, where do I start? Just got up, I am in the US, thank you for the replies.
Yes, I definitely have got into mothering mode with him. Part of this is because my work, I am in a freelance creative occupation, has been v. quiet the last year. So I have done more and more around he house. To be fair, he is very supportive when I am working and he's not! I went to the UK in January for ten days and he managed perfectly well (of course I left everything ready for him and he had bugger all to do).
It is more that when he is working he develops total tunnel vision. He becomes totally obsessed with whatever project he is working on. And lately totally self-absorbed. Last night wasn't a one-off. He literally doesn't hear us. It is as though he has left planet Earth and gone to planet DH.
I do think I have to take action. I have told him I feel like the maid and it makes no difference. Last night when I snapped at him he went off downstairs and never came back. It was a relief TBH.
I think I keep making excuses for him. He's tired, he's stressed, he's bad at multi-tasking, it is the way he was brought up, he's a perfectionist. I make a lot of excuses for him now I come to think of it. Yes, the intimacy has gone to hell...

He's an adult, nome. He's a grown man who chose to get married and have a family. Now, every single time he works, and well, people have to work in life, he gets twattish.

It's not on. Adults are capable of learning to 'multi-task' or to put aside their feelings for their nearest and dearest, because, well, people like children don't understand. We all have to work, it's all a balancing act. It's part of life and being an adult with children and a partner or spouse.

So this needs to be spelled out to him very clearly that it is causing serious problems.

I'd show him this thread, even.

Expat, you are right. He CAN multi-task because he does that at work. He just finished a big project refitting a whole house with three people working for him.
When he gets home I think he has the attitude that he is done for the day.
Honestly, you would not believe the self-pity. I have pointed out that he is not building the space shuttle/airbus and the response is... "There is a team to do that. I have to everything myself."

'When he gets home I think he has the attitude that he is done for the day.'

Well, tough. When you chose to get married and have a family, it means you have to buck up a lot.

I worked FT and DH was SAHD and when I got home we shared out what needed doing, because that's how it works unless you can afford to hire out all the chores and childcare.

If he finds his job too stressful then he needs to change jobs, so in the way of 'support', I'd suggest this to him along with you're going salaried again and drawing up a realistic rota of chores and tasks to share out between the two of you.

But the days of kicking back after work and doing FA are over when you have young children.

If he went somewhere for 10 days, would he ensure meals were frozen, enough clothes were cleaned and ironed, for you while you were away?

No?

So why would you do that for him?

Does he have unrealised ambitions and dreams? Do you think he's really okay with being a builder, or is it something he's 'settled' for, in his mind?

One of DH's colleagues always wanted to open his own restaurant, but was stuck being an assistant chef. He always made what he was doing seem so much more important and exhausting than it was, because he wanted to be as important and exhausted as a head chef, if you see what I mean.

Replace 'drama queen' for 'twat'.

Ooh that sounds familiar - man goes to work man thinks that's it I don't have to do any more and woman can do everything else.

Mine's the same. He wants to talk to you about roof tiles, you want talk to him about websites. Sorry I have no answers to that, other than you find other people to talk to about websites and he finds a good pub or a good mate.

Fact he's not engaging with dd might be telling that it's not about you so I wouldn't take it personally. I assume he's just exhausted, physically. Working manually all day must take it out of you. Perhaps you could write off the weekdays and focus on good weekends?

zikes you said "I don't think letting people walk over you makes them happy (or grateful to you), it just gives them a sense of entitlement over you and leads to contemptuous treatment."

Brilliant. Couldn't agree more.

Bohemian, you are right, I do think that he has settled in some ways but on the other hand he could have a really good business (which he would like) if he got his act together on the marketing. Really I have seen over the years that he can't/won't do that promotional side - it's a bit of both - and I've taken it on with great results in a short period of time. If he wants to do something else he would have to go back to uni and that is actually really easy here in the US, there are many flexible study options for people who are older and working including lots of online courses and classes in the evening. So that is really totally his choice to be a builder.
To be honest, I think he would moan whatever he was doing. He is the type of person who goes out to a restaurant and always finds something wrong. He is a bit of a black hole, as someone else said!
I know he's not depressed but he does have this personality that focuses on little things and obsesses about them e.g. roof tiles! But if it wasn't that it would be something else.
I think I have definitely enabled this behaviour and the opting out of helping in the evening. The more I do, the more he expects and there is without doubt an entitlement/contempt dynamic going on.

In answer to Whenwill's question about the meals, really I did that for my DD so she didn't live on pizza and hotdogs for ten days!

But Barbie, it was HIS website she was talking about, which she was making for him along with doing HIS paperwork and HIS advertising. You'd think he might be able to at least fake a little interest even if gratitude is too much to ask.

Basically he thinks the household revolves around him, because he is the only inhabitant with a penis. What kind of message is this sending to your DD as she grows up? 'Men are more important than women, Daddy is the Head of the Household so his needs always have to come first'.

well, the household does currently revolve around him, so he continues to get a pay-off for his juvenile attention-seeking

OP, just cut off his supply

his am-dram behaviour will soon stop, if it doesn't have an audience

You prepared meals for your DD to eat, you say. But what I asked was whether it would have occurred to him to do that for you if he was going away. It's obviously a rhetorical question, because of course you will say "no" and that's because he assumes and knows that you're an adult quite capable of cooking a nutritious meal. You therefore need to make the same assumptions about him. The message you sent to your DD while you were away was that women are responsible for meal preparation (and everything else it sounds) and that her father cannot be trusted to put one foot in front of the other without a map.

You say that your sex life is poor and I'm not surprised. Who wants different or more sex, you or him? If it's him, is there a chance that you are trying to enact power struggles that are going on elsewhere, in your sex-life? Assuming that you are a sexual woman, that can be such a self-defeating thing to do, but on the other hand it is very hard to find an infantilised man sexually attractive.

Reading your posts then, it sounds that what you've signed up to is a mother-child relationship, a life full of chores, paid work, childcare, ghastly conversations about roof tiles and a shit sex life.

Assuming he wants a better sex life, apart from that there is absolutely no incentive to change, because he gets everything done for him. It's essential that you stop nannying him and literally force him to take responsibility for things - and he needs to take equal responsibility for your romantic relationship.

I think he's depressed, and that you have ended up 'enabling' him to not do anything about it.
The being exhausted bit, not having a shower, focusing on his minor ailments etc. all ring a bell with me - all consuming work stress which leads to episodes of depression.

Ultimately he has to do something about it because he's making your life miserable with his selfishness.

You need to think about why it's ok for you to put up with this crap.

Should clarify - I'm the one that gets depressed. But now take meds etc.

Not even talking to his DD while she bathed is a very bad sign. DH and I both take our little trips to Martyrsville, via Resentment Boulevard, when we're tired and frazzled and there is too much to do. But neither of us would ever just switch off and ignore DS. He cheers us both up, and we don't take things out on him.

That suggests to me selfishness and self-pity that has reached a fairly worrying level. Hard work outside the home is not a licence to act like a twerp when you get back.

Yes, EC, you are right and I think it was the bath behaviour that prompted me to post. I spoke to him last night and out what I wanted/expected and top of the list was engaging with both of us. He did listen and whilst making loads of excuses I am hopeful the message got through.
I think I need to set out precisely what I want from him. As someone posted, approach him in the manner of a business meeting rather than moaning myself. He does respond to very precise instructions...
As far as leaving the meals when I went away, at the risk of opening a feminist can of worms, that was my choice. He didn't ask me to do that. When he goes away he gets a mate to mow the grass because I won't do that even though I am perfectly capable. Likewise, he does a lot of practical house things that I could learn to do but I chose not to do. I don't think an agreed division of labour is a problem. The problem is what occured the other night when the division wasn't agreed, fair or reasonable. My DD sees me do all our accounts and most of the business organization and I have my own business so I don't think there is a role model problem there.

Hmm. On the one hand, DH may be a self-centred twunt who's got too used to you looking after him, requiring a severe kick up the arse (or ass, seeing as you're in America). On the other hand ... I'm like this, and it's because I have chronic fatigue & depression. I wouldn't enjoy being married to me.

So. Since you're a kind and competent person, how about taking the view that he can't help it because there's something wrong with him? Explain this, and send him off to the doctor's for some tests. He could be anaemic, diabetic, have some other nutrient imbalance, or indeed depression. Either there's something treatable behind his non-cooperation or he's taking the piss. I'm sure you'd like to know which!

I am with GarlicButter ( quite often). WHY is he behaving like this needs to be looked at

Aside from anything else, he couldn't engage with your DD while she in in the bath?? Either something is wrong or he's a selfish moron.