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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

God this is depressing

29 replies

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 19:24

So this is a boyfriend rant but I need advice too!

How can I get my DP to actually DO STUFF?
We lived together as housemates and boyfriend/girlfriend for 4 years and now we live together alone and he just never ever does anything and its getting me so so down. He never ever washes up/cleans/strips the bed/puts laundry in etc of his own accord. EVER. I have to ask him and ask him and then pester him until he shouts and gives in. I hate nagging him but he is 22 and should be perfectly capable of seeing a big stack of plates next to the sink and realising they need washing up and doing it. I asked him on Wednesday night to help me wash up a dirty baking tray, its still sitting there. The laundry basket can be full and he won't empty it and put it in the washer which involves carrying it downstairs from our bedroom to the kitchen and turning on the machine. Even after I fell down our steep stairs carrying the heavy basket he has still never brought the washing down. If I ask him he will, eventually, but why should I have to ask and pester? I am not his mum!

We have talked time after time about him taking the initiative and he just doesn't. I find it so depressing constantly washing up/tidying up. And leaving it does nothing, if I stopped washing up he would just use very single thing in the kitchen until we had nothing left and then only wash what he needed. I actually feel like a downtrodden housewife He never even moves his dirty plates from our living room to the kitchen (about 10 steps away).

I don't know what to do, I take it personally because we have talked and talked about this, he has seen me cry with frustration at his general cleaning laziness. I am back working f/t next week and I am so scared because I just feel like all I will do is work all day and then have to come home and tidy, make dinner, clean, wash up and put laundry on.

Even with our meals he never cooks from scratch, he will put a frozen pizza on but I make decent proper dinners probably 5 days out of the 7. And when he cooks the frozen pizza he leaves the packaging on the side and when he cuts it he leaves crumbs everywhere so frankly I may as well cook it and save myself the time cleaning later on. He is cooking me a meal for my birthday but I don't even want him to because he will insist on doing the washing up and cleaning the kitchen afterwards which means it will all sit there looking filthy for 3 days until I pester him enough to clean it, or get tired enough of pestering to clean it. Whats the point? And I will probably have to plan the meal and buy the ingredients anyway.

Honestly I am scared his complete lack of motivation will break us up. He is not depressed or busy, and he finds time to do all the stuff HE wants to do (ie his computer room is sorted out!)

I know we are young and students (well I am!) but we are also adults and having spent a year living with the messiest housemates ever he kept saying how he couldn't wait to live in our nice tidy house and now it seems he would be happy to live in filth again

OP posts:

Wantthatone · 07/07/2006 19:34

Do you both work?

LadyTophamHatt · 07/07/2006 19:38

Buy your own washing baskets and plates and just do your own stuff. leave his to fester and he'll soon learn.

I ahve to say Smurfgirl....it doesn't sound good so early into you engagment.

fuzzywuzzy · 07/07/2006 19:39

Would a rota system work, ie if all the things he had to do were written down, would he then do them because he would see it's written down that today he must do xyz. ..... With regards laundry, how about you do just yours????

Poor you I'm not surprised it's getting you down.

Pennies · 07/07/2006 19:45

Tell him that if he doesn't start helping then you're going to hire a cleaner and he's got to pay for it.

Carmenere · 07/07/2006 19:45

Well he sounds like a typical bloke who is getting away with behaving like a pig. Here is the thing - they don't mind the nagging as long as they don't have to do the housework!
LTH is dead right stop doing his housework now!!The good news is that he is only 22, he can be retrained but it is up to you to do it. Good luck.

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 20:01

LTH you are right about this being so worrying, I am sitting crying. He has ALWAYS been like this v.last minute/lazy. I hate it it feels like he just does not value me at all, I have spent the past year living between 2 houses for him etc he promised me this would be my beautiful clean dream house and it just isn't. I know its silly to be so upset but I feel so so disrespected, he knows this matters to me and he just doesn't give a shit.

I am going to stop doing his laundry, but its mutual stuff like our bedding/towels etc that gets me. Why should I have to do it all, we both use them?

OP posts:

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 20:02

To add he would do anything for me he loves me to bits and in all other areas treats me v.v.well thats why I find this so hard.

OP posts:

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 20:09

Sit him down and tell him, and then tell him you are no longer going to XYZ! and don't.

Also say during this talk that you would like to review the situation in 2 weeks.

Then do nothing!
if he has managed to meet your expactions - great sex. If not a stern talking to!

They are like puppies, praise praise praise for good behaviour, and stern talking if not!

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 20:11

And I realise he loves you to bits and you him, but he is not being realistic in expecting the mess to evaporate. and cleaning up behind him will not teach him either!! unfortunately

PinkTulips · 07/07/2006 20:11

wow, is my dp leading a double life?!

seriously though, some men are just like this, adopt the marge simpson systom of gentle nagging, it takes forever but it does gradually sink in. my dp admits himself if i didn't nag him he wouldn't do it.

case in point; we've been living together 4 years, 2 weeks ago he started rinsing his toothpaste out of the sink so its not all stuck on for me to clean and i've been complaining about it form day 1!

it takes years but you can train them to be decent human beings. my dp was 22 when we met and he was exactly the same as yours. he's still not great but he does almost his fair share now... although he still calims he 'doesn't understand' the washing machine!

fuzzywuzzy · 07/07/2006 20:16

My husbands friends wife went on holiday with the kids....Her Dh managed to shrink a pair of Jeans ffs because he didn't understand the washing machine.......so maybe perhaps your husband is telling the truth pinklips, but he can still load the machine can he not???

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 20:19

Its a bit sad though isn't it that I have to treat him like a puppy, it took me a WEEK of pestering him to get him to clean our (tiny) kitchen floor. I don't understand why I can cope with cleaning and managing a not very big house when he can't!!

Thanks for the advice, I am going to have a chat with him when he comes back from work. I am not cooking tonight like I usually would when he works late, I was out all this afternoon and spent 2 hours cleaning up and sorting out after him when I came home so why should I make more of an effort when he clearly couldn't be arsed to for me.

OP posts:

PinkTulips · 07/07/2006 20:23

lol, he can load it but even under supervision can't cope with seperating lights and darks.... apparently theres too many 'in between' colours! also has difficulty with normal and non-bio.... sigh

foxinsocks · 07/07/2006 20:24

poor you smurfgirl - I totally blame their mothers. My dh is dreadfully lazy around the house (must say, I am not brilliant either!) - his flat was like something from the living dead when I met him (even though he had a cleaner). When I met his parents, it became totally clear that dh had never been made to lift a finger!

Are there other things that you hate doing that you could get him to do? I think it is time for a sit down - tell him you love him very much but were not born to be his slave and you expect some help or you will seriously have to rethink the living arrangements.

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 21:03

I just talked to him and he said he thinks maybe we should break up. I don't understand he loves me and I love him, why can't we work on this. I am so upset and I don't have anyone to talk to.

OP posts:

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 21:03

Let us know how it goes!

Although I don't advocate you treating him like a puppy, most men don't understand what you want as far as cleanliness goes unless you SPELL it out!

I have the opposite problem, I'm a slattern, he is a cleaning demigod . So I do understand!

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 21:04

He wants to break up over this . SORRY he is being irrational

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 21:06

I said I couldn't live like this ahymore because it wasn't fair on me, he just kept rolling his eyes and then he said that maybe we should break up if I can;t live with him. I love him so much and he is such a good person I don't understand why this is happening.

OP posts:

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 21:10

SG, sorry now going to ask ?'s

How old is he?
How long have you being going out? Ithing since MAy 2005 - could be wrong
Before digs where did he live?
What's his mum and d relationship like?

Don't give up on this yet, coz from other posting you have a good thing going with this guy. I think that he thinks he is backed into a corner so is trying to finish things rather than be adult about it!

SherlockLGJ · 07/07/2006 21:12

It is the end of the academic year, you are both tired.

Some men need to be nagged, sad but true, it has taken years of ritual humilation, for DH to figure out how to use a toilet brush.

He will do lots and lots around the house but the toilet really got to me..........

One evening, we had guests, I went to the bathroom, the toilet had skid marks..........I shouted down..............DH you have left skid marks...............again..........

That was 6 years ago.........he hasn't done it since.

Original poster

Smurfgirl · 07/07/2006 21:15

Peregrine he is 22, we have been going out for 15mths and lived together as housemates since Aug 2003. Before we shared a house we lived in halls together and before that he lived at home (as did i). His mum doesn't work, never has so I think she has always done a lot for him and his brother and dad. When she comes here she is always washing up etc.

OP posts:

Perigrine · 07/07/2006 21:32

So he is not really used to fending for himself.
You need 2 speak alot about your expectations.!

Going to bed, speak later, I really ghope you sort this out, he is young and is used to hismothers care, yOU need to explain, tjhat he is not at his mothers, not in digs but living in a home that is not sielf cleaing!!!!!!!

Caligula · 07/07/2006 21:36

I think if you explain to him that being treated like a skivvy feels like a lack of love, it might shock him into wanting not to treat you like this.

You also need to establish what your idea of tidyness and his is. I don't know what this selective blindness men have is, but they can be re-programmed. However, you need to work out together what needs to be done in the house as a minimum standard of tidyness/ cleanliness. The other thing is to make it clear to him that it is not your job to keep the house in order, it is both your jobs because you both live there and neither of you is the other one's skivvy.

Nearly forty years of feminism and young men are still like this, eh. How depressing. I feel depressed reading about it, I can imagine how depressed you must feel living it.

Caligula · 07/07/2006 21:42

Don't ask him for "help" btw. You don't want help to tidy up the house - it's not your responsibility. It's down to both of you, not one or the other with some help thrown in from time to time. Imagine it the other way round - you offer to "help" him clean up occasionally, but basically imagine that he should spend far more time than you do cleaning up, while you sit there and do your nails. Imagine his response. What would he think that said about your attitude to him? Is it a loving way to treat someone?

heavenis · 07/07/2006 21:52

This used to get on my nerves with DH,he wouldn't see that things needed doing. He asked me to tell him. I still do, like if we have people coming round and I want the place tidy. I tell him what needs to be done and to do it now.
You could try giving him the choice of two jobs and you do the other one.
I don't think you'll split up over house work,it's just that he must understand how you feel.
Slam a few doors it always makes me feel better.

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