Asking your permission then ignoring your answer?

[Boomerwang]

My DP wanted to buy some 'herbs' last night and asked my permission because he knows I don't like him using it and I've told him he can never use our money to purchase it. We are lucky to have a little money this month and he wanted to spend some of it on this stuff. He asked, I said no. Then he stayed there and I could see his cogs whirring, thinking of ways to change my mind. My answer stayed the same the whole way through his attempt to 'reason with' me. In the end I said 'you're going to buy it anyway aren't you? Even though I said no?' I wanted to know what my opinion was worth if he would ignore an answer that he didn't like.

He didn't buy it in the end, or so he says. We already have trust issues so it's tricky to work out if he's telling the truth sometimes. I told him to never ask my permission on something again unless he's willing to accept my answer. However, not asking permission means he will suffer my wrath if I find out he's done something I wouldn't ordinarily let him do. I sound controlling, but it's with good reason as he cannot handle money responsibly and we have a toddler to think about.

How should I realistically deal with this, though?

This doesn't really sound like an adult-adult relationship, it sounds parent-child.

You mean cannabis, yes?

I am not a drug user and wouldn't have a relationship with someone who was. No judgement, it just wouldn't work.

Do you have children?

Realistically I would be waving goodbye to him, but its your choice.

He's such a weak, useless man that you have to take responsibility for your child, your finances, and now decision-making as if he's a child?

Time to change things, or soon you'll end up as his surrogate mother - watching him as he grow up to be a teenager and starts dating girls (online first).

I speak from bitter experience.

I think there are 2 issues here- the financial part, and the drug part.

Do you both have your own spending money?

It seems wrong to me that you're framing the issue in terms of asking and giving 'permission'. Either you don't have the money to spare, in which case of course he can't spend it, or you do have it to spare, in which case you each get to choose how you spend your share.

As far as the issue of smoking 'herbs' ad you call it, that too is his choice. You don't get to give 'permission' to an adult. What you do get to choose is your response- you can choose not to be around/share your home with someone who uses drugs. You can choose to ignore it. Decide where you stand on the issue, tell him, and stick to it. But do so as an equal, don't take on the adult role and treat him as a child.

We don't have individual amounts of spending money. Once a month we do the big shop, pay off the bills and whatever is left amounts to a few bottles of milk a week. I think it's a massive waste to spend money on weed when we could spend it on our daughter, put it into a savings fund or at least spend it on doing up the house. He likens his usage of weed as being the same as me drinking diet coke or eating crisps, both of which he doesn't do. I said I don't eat macaroni either, but should we be writing down the cost of each of our individual meals to prove that I 'owe' him some weed as compensation?

He isn't smoking weed tonight. Just because he doesn't buy it doesn't mean he doesn't have it, as he visits our friends for some. I think he's trying to prove a point, that he isn't addicted and doesn't need it. I'm rather glad, but one night out of many isn't proving a point imo.

If you don't have individual amounts of spending money, I think you should. Everyone needs some small bit of independence, even if it's the ability to buy some hair conditioner or whatnot without having to OK it with the other person every time.

Withdrawing your "permission" isn't going to solve his want to smoke weed. He's just going to end up resentful of you and just hide it. He's an adult and he deserves to be treated like one, even if that means he makes decisions you don't necessarily agree with.

You are not his Mum, so don't turn into her.

So what if he decided to blow cash on something else we don't need? Should I be ok with it in order to let him be an adult?

It's not that you let him be an adult, it is that is he is an adult.

BitterAndOnlySlightlyTwisted is right, you should each have some mad money. And if you turn yourself into his mother, don't be surpised at some of the consequences of that.

You both need some money of your own.

I think it is the same as diet coke. Macaroni is a meal and you have to eat meals. You don't have to drink coke. It's a luxury item really whereas macaroni is not.

You sound controlling because you are controlling. I get why you think you have to behave the way you do, as it solves the immediate problem (reckless spending) but it is a short term fix.

The problem with treating a grown man like a child is that he'll act like one and the tools for parenting a child (discipline, reward charts, taking away consoles, docking pocket money etc ) aren't really effective on the man child.

I'm afraid, the consequence of being in a relationship with someone who smokes weed and is reckless with money is that that they'll smoke weed and fritter money away. Is the issue him spending money on weed or him smoking weed? If it's him spending money on weed, then you are being unreasonable and if it's him smoking weed, then you're being ineffectual given that you know his friends will let him have a tab.

I am assuming that your DP hasn't just developed these traits ? He haste just started smoking weed and being hopeless with money ? yet you decided this was a man you wanted to raise a child with. I am constantly amazed when posts go on in this vein.. Surely some responsibility must lie with you OP , you knew what he was like but decided you wanted a relationship and baby but now expect him to change his whole personality by treating him like a child who needs your permission to buy anything..a teenie bit controlling me thinks..

he will suffer my wrath if I find out he's done something I wouldn't ordinarily let him do

If a guy wrote this, posters would be telling him that his partner should leave him because he is controlling, regardless of the rest of the info in the post.

he isn't going to learn to take responsibility if you are constantly controlling him. Even with children you need to let go at some point.

Sassyb0703 I agree. I wonder if it is down to the op (or other women) thinking that a baby & relationship will change the guy, so they blindly go ahead thinking it will be OK & live to regret it.

My dh used to smoke weed occasionally, the difference is with him, is that he has always been fairly mature & after a while he grew out of needing to smoke it. He also didn't prioritise it. Other things came first & only then would he smoke it socially (never actually buying it out right, but putting into a 'pot' (bad pun) with said friends who had already made the purchase) So really, not wasting what little money he might have had on it. If he didn't have the money, he didn't smoke it.

I didn't need to make a choice as to whether to have a family with him because of it, as he stopped doing it as we became more serious.

Why on earth do you want to be in a relationship with someone who you don't trust, don't respect and who has very different priorities? It's a mistake to get into a relationship with someone thinking you can change them. Recipe for frustration and resentment all round. Find a way to relate to each other as equal adults or it's not looking good.

Hi, thanks for the responses.

When I met him, he didn't smoke weed or do anything illegal at all as he was on some kind of three year probation period for being caught intoxicated at the wheel and he had to leave urine samples regularly. When he was caught, his family found out and he was disowned. He decided he'd never do it again and it was when he met me and started to raise a family, do up the house and generally become more responsible that his family opened up to him again, and we all have a great relationship with one another.

When his probation period ended he wanted to smoke weed, he'd told me for ages and I agreed that he could, but that he can't make a habit of it. Lately it's becoming a habit and now I want to put on the brakes. I do not want to live with someone who gets high frequently, even if he does wait until our daughter is in bed (something I demanded and we argued over)

Up until this point I had rarely told him he can or can't do something, in fact I can count on one hand the number of times I have done so. We tell each other of our plans in case there's an issue with childcare, but other than that we do whatever we like separately of one another. He's bought numerous things which I think were a waste of money, or perhaps not high on a list of priority. When you are living on very little cash, every purchase is scary to me.

I don't think he bought any and stashed it somewhere as he hasn't been out for the past two nights. He doesn't have the willpower to ignore it for that long if it's sitting somewhere. He is not acting resentful toward me either, so I hope it just means that he sees my point of view and agrees with it rather than biding his time.

what do you see in this Loser ?

I do not want to live with someone who gets high frequently, even if he does wait until our daughter is in bed

But that is exactly what you are living with.

This is so fucked up.

He sounds like a real catch.

I understand what you're saying about him not smoking weed when you first met, but this...

When I met him, he didn't smoke weed or do anything illegal at all as he was on some kind of three year probation period for being caught intoxicated at the wheel and he had to leave urine samples regularly

is the point at which most women would have raised an eyebrow and walked away.

Believe me, once in a relationship, I find it as hard as anyone to know if it's right or not for sure, and then to walk away if not... but come on, at this stage of the game, when you met him, this is the stage at which you walk away.

Yes I admit I was hasty when I met him. You see, he lived in Sweden, I lived in England (we met online) and after visiting each other once each and finding it cost too much to keep travelling I weighed up some pros and cons and decided to move there. I'd lost my fiance four years previously, I had no chance of meeting anyone new in England and I was getting on a bit (32 at the time). I bit the bullet and moved over and it wasn't until AFTER I had sold my car, bought the ticket and had my parents send the rest of my stuff over to me that he admitted the offence he had committed. Since he didn't touch any drugs at that time or for the next two years I wasn't concerned.

At this point in time, where the use of soft drugs is becoming an issue, we have a two and a half year old daughter and a home together in Sweden. I'm not taking my daughter away, I'm going to force him to be responsible. In every other way, he's a good guy. We have our arguments but they are resolved very quickly, and he's a wonderful father. Lack of trust is a dealbreaker for most, and it might end up being that way for me, but right now I'm concentrating on stopping things before they become a real problem.

What is the point, you don't trust him, he acts like a child and you sound like his mother having to check up on him, sounds awful.

I don't know anyone who smokes the herbs now and again, it usually always ends up a regular habit.

I don't think it's the smoking of Hash that is the issue here. Personally I don't like it but I have friends who are good earners, good parents and generally responsible, who grow it and smoke it. What is an issue, is that you don't feel comfortable with him doing it. It is also not something that you are doing together. You are never going to share this activity with him are you? I think that would be my argument. If he refuses to stop an activity that distresses you and that you don't want to share it with him, then it will become a deal breaker.

I'm going to force him to be responsible

You know, that's not actually possible. You cannot control his behaviour, only your own. Your only options are to decide what you are going to do.

For example, if he continues to do something that you are not prepared to put up with, you leave. If he wants you back, he has to decide what he wants more - you or the weed.

Then it becomes his decision and he knows that if he goes back to it you will leave again and, this time, you won't return because you cannot trust him to keep his promises.

Alternatively, he refuses to give it up and you decide what you want more - a life away from him and the weed, or a life with him and the weed.