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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

DP is very bright but SO lazy

63 replies

FeelingMisled · 08/09/2013 23:17

DP graduated 3 months ago (with a 2:1 from Oxbridge) and has done bugger all since. He's applied for ONE job. He can easily spend all day online. He does stuff for me - cooking, cleaning etc - which I appreciate as I'm out of the house (including my commute) 13 hours a day, 6 days a week. But apart from that, he doesn't do anything unless I slave-drive him to do it on pain of breaking up. I'm fed up of feeling like his mother. His parents are far too indulgent and give him an easy life. What more can I do?!

OP posts:

Squitten · 09/09/2013 14:44

This is all fine while you're just dating and you don't share any kind of resources with him.

You would be exceptionally foolish to move in with him or anything like that while he is completely financially unstable. You want a partner, not a child that you have to mother constantly

Original poster

FeelingMisled · 12/09/2013 07:33

I still feel like I'm mothering! After applying for 2 jobs a day every day this week, he announced he was going to take today off to go out for the day. I got angry with him. He has tried hard this week but fundamentally he is very lazy and un-driven and I'm not sure if I can live with that long-term. His applications weren't very good but he won't let me proofread them. He also gets very defensive whenever I talk about it - but I'm the only person who is telling him to apply for jobs! I'm feeling frustrated right now - and exhausted from trying to manage my own busy schedule with slave-driving him at the same time.

OP posts:

NothingsLeft · 12/09/2013 07:46

Honestly dump him. You are mothering him....nagging him to apply for jobs, insisting on proof reading applications. He's an Oxbridge grad FFS. He's perfectly capable, he just can't be arsed.

Is this what you want for your life?

exoticfruits · 12/09/2013 08:06

He has a huge advantage - but he has to make a lot of effort because it doesn't matter who he is, the world is not going to come knocking on his door. I would at least have a break- tell him you might be interested when he grows up a bit.

KatyTheCleaningLady · 12/09/2013 08:43

Proof reading his applications is a mistake. It's not your job, and it's really not a job you want.

expatinscotland · 12/09/2013 08:52

Never EVER settle for a lazy partner.

burberryqueen · 12/09/2013 08:56

also could i question your use of the word 'bright' - it is how mothers talk about their little kids u know that?

AttilaTheMeerkat · 12/09/2013 09:02

He is not your project to rescue and or save, stop acting like he is your project. Your actions are only enabling this sorry charade to continue.

GrandstandingBlueTit · 12/09/2013 09:06

There are better men out there, than this man. Plenty of them.

Cut him loose and either be single, or open yourself up to the possibility of meeting one of the myriad better men. :)

Squitten · 12/09/2013 09:10

Time to face facts OP. This is who he is. This is who he will be no matter what responsibilities of home and family are put upon him.

Is this how you want to live? I think not. Don't waste any more time on this one.

GiveItYourBestShot · 12/09/2013 09:25

Is he even in touch with his Uni careers service? They would help him as much as possible as "graduates into employment" is one of their performance indicators.

expatinscotland · 12/09/2013 09:31

Forget getting him to careers service, proofreading, nagging him, getting him to recruitment, etc.

FFS, he is an adult.

Look, I've been with lazy partners, a lot of us have. They do not change. You wind up doing everything.

He needs to go back and live with Mum and Dad.

MadBusLady · 12/09/2013 09:53

Loving your posh new name "Impereale"...

FeelingMisled You slave-driving him is the worst possible thing for your relationship - who can respect someone they have to slave-drive? Who can love someone who slave-drives them? So that has to stop. You say you're fed up with mothering him - so stop it. Much as I agree it's his fault that he needs mothering, I also think, in the gentlest possible way, you have a choice about how you react to him and you are choosing wrongly. Stop being concerned about his future like this - he isn't! Rid yourself right now of the temptation to be a martyr to other people's needs; your life will be better for it, trust me.

But I don't think you need to break up with him necessarily, unless you want to. It depends what's important to you. If he has a ten inch solid gold dick, or really loves the same nineteenth-century French poetry you do, or whatever, he can still be a boyfriend, he just can't be a partner. If your priority in life at this point is to forge a successful future with a partner, he ain't it.

You're about to get your own place, great, you'll move onwards and upwards. As you say, don't let him move in rent-free. He has to understand that there are consequences to him not taking his place in the adult world. That might make him get off his arse. Or he might carry on drifting in the doldrums and you'll finally get fed up and the dick/poetry will no longer be enough and you'll move on to more grown up men.

Just one thing I have to flag up - this sounds like me after I graduated, and I wasn't lazy, I was very, very depressed and underconfident and I hid it very, very well (and I also got extremely defensive if people tackled me about it). I'm throwing this in just in case it makes a light bulb go on for you. TBH he probably is just lazy. Even if he is depressed, I don't think it changes my advice.

Dahlen · 12/09/2013 10:28

If there is one single piece of relationship advice I will give my DC it is to remember that love is not enough to make a relationship work. The world is full of people who are downright miserable because of their partners but won't leave them "because I love him/her."

Sometimes people can be lazy through immaturity. If they don't grow up in their early 20s, they never do IME.

People don't change unless they want to. The quickest way to reach that point is to experience the consequences of whatever they are (or aren't) doing.

GrandstandingBlueTit · 12/09/2013 10:55

You love him?

So what?

So bloody what?

Here's a zillion useless wasters out there to love. And just as many worthwhile blokes. Why land on him?

Lazyjaney · 12/09/2013 11:52

It's perfectly normal for people who have just graduated to take time out to decide what they want to do next, many go travelling etc - I think the label lazy is a bit hasty, you dont get an Oxbridge 2:1 being lazy

He has extremely good future prospects, if his parents are happy to support him it really doesn't impact his future prospects if he doesn't put himself under the yoke quite yet.

You are perfectly entitled to want a place of your own, and want him to help pay for it if he moves in with you.

IMO though, you think he should want what you want - which looks like a fast track to settling down and a partner - and by his actions he doesnt want that. I don't think "slave driving" him down your chosen path is going to work.

MadBusLady · 12/09/2013 11:59

Hm, think you make a good point there actually Lazyjaney.

He has tried hard this week but fundamentally he is very lazy is in fact a slightly confusing statement.

exoticfruits · 12/09/2013 12:03

It isn't really confusing- she had pushed so he tried ,but he will now probably relax until she pushes again.
I would have a break and find out whether you want the same things- I suspect not.

MadBusLady · 12/09/2013 12:12

Well, it's confusing in that lazy is as lazy does. He isn't (this week at least) behaving lazily. So I'm just wondering if the OP has a bit of a picture in her head of his being a Lazy Person, and what he would have to do to dispel that label. Maybe she does, as others have suggested, need a "project" and gets something out of him being in that role.

frogslegs35 · 12/09/2013 12:26

You shouldn't have to 'slave drive' beg or coerce him into doing anything.
Lay it out in simple terms -
'If you won't get off your arse and get a job then unfortunately we can't be together'

If it's a case of him wanting some time out after studying then he should just be upfront and honest with you about it instead of going through the motions of applying for jobs to keep you quiet.

Dahlen · 12/09/2013 12:55

if his parents are happy to support him it really doesn't impact his future prospects if he doesn't put himself under the yoke quite yet.

Maybe not, but any self-respecting individual who will display characteristics of independence, resilience and get-up-and-go will be itching to untie the apron strings at this point.

Without exception, the people I know who have got ahead in life (career wise) are, and always have been, quite driven and independent. Good qualifications help and are important, but personal characteristics and networking take you further.

Maybe this is what business leaders are on about when they say today's graduates aren't very employable.

Dahlen · 12/09/2013 12:56

Which isn't to say that a driven career is what everyone should aspire to, of course.

specialsubject · 12/09/2013 13:02

is he interesting company? Does he respect you? Does he enjoy your company? Is he doing anything to pull his weight beyond the housework which doesn't really take that long?

no? So why are you bothering?

MadBusLady · 12/09/2013 13:07

Maybe not, but any self-respecting individual who will display characteristics of independence, resilience and get-up-and-go will be itching to untie the apron strings at this point.

I'm not sure that's really true, Dahlen.

IME a few people are like that at that age (and they do tend to be quick to contrast themselves to others who they perceive as less driven), lots more people are secretly terrified but just shut their eyes and jump in and hope for the best (and then later rewrite their emotional history so that the doubts were never there), and yet more people are terrified (like I was) and get completely paralysed by it.

I had other reasons for the depression as well, but I don't think they made all the difference. And it's plenty hard enough being in that position without everyone around you gabbing on about resilience and self-respect, as if you must be some kind of unperson because you're scared. It is scary. Some people get stuck.

I don't know whether this applies to this bloke. I'm just saying this really as a bit of a smoke signal to any graduate reading this who's in his position for the same reasons I was.

Lazyjaney · 12/09/2013 13:16

I've known quite a few people who drifted for a while after graduation, and then find what they want to do and get to it. I've also known quite a few who continue to drift. 3 months after graduation is way too soon to tell.

What I do know is that an Oxbridge 2:1 can virtually name their price when they do sort out what they want even if they sit around for a few years pushing lint round their navels.

IMO the OP is on a mission to get him settled down now he has graduated, but her partner isn't on the same page.

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