I haven't given up, just been busy socialising over New Year and feeling a lot less tired and stressed now. Many thanks to the posters who have remained sane and posted useful advice. I can't reply to all of you but I have read them. Probably shouldn't post due to feeding the trolls etc but you can only laugh at some of it, its so over-wrought, so try to take this tongue-in-cheek if you can if you develop an aversion to something in it.
MaybeDoctor Is it also the case that he was never taught/shown how to be organised as a child? There was a very useful thread a few years ago about lateness, containing a lot of useful points about exactly how to be on time
Absolutely I think that has a lot to do with it. I hope I can find that thread.
My apologies for Miscellaneous Assortment for failing to provide a medical diagnosis of either neurological disorder or ASD. I think its better left to the medical professionals. Of whom I am not one.
I have asked him if he would consider going to his GP and he is adamant that he won't and says there is nothing wrong with him. But his GP is really not that open minded anyway and I don't think would assist much. I do think I might be able to persuade him to go along to CBT though, if I frame it as being about improving time keeping and organisational skills.
This thread has me realise that while he has his faults, he could have a personality an awful, awful lot worse. I'm not sure whether we will stay together or not. I feel a lot calmer now that we are not together 24/7 as when on holiday. There are obviously some people with a very specific agenda to push on here they make a big song and dance about being feminism but that actually is some pseudo oddball version of their own, that seems to involve competing with each other as to who can be the most offended in order to justify their own level of abuse. I'd hate so much to be a person that can spout that sort of stuff.
By all means say you are offended by the use of the word "girly" (which I stupidly used as a phrase that could equally refer to men and women and clarified that "ditzy" as suggested by one of the ranters would also do, country bumpkin that I am), but nine or ten times the same thing is more about getting a kick out of getting into a virtual fight. Poor little Arsenic's venom must be nearly depleted, so many times has they posted that it is a wind up. I'm actually tempted to suggest they are an abusive man getting off on this, but I'm not interested enough. Although no doubt they will chastise me for using the M word. And WalterMitty too, whom I didn't even have time to report before someone else did, with their lovely comment that he was going elsewhere with his anatomy and to check his porn usage. Be assured that if that were the case, I would deal with it appropriately, but Other Things Also Happen.
I forget who got all worked up about me using the word "man" to refer to my heterosexual relationship. That was taking the outrage a little too far I think. I don't really think there is a single word, phrase or sentence that wouldn't set off the "gang"? Or maybe I will get a little lecture or told to attend classes in good behaviour or further prescribed worthy reading material - do you find many willing to sit in your naughty corner?
In answer to those who posted more politely about my own deficiencies, I agree, and I do try to be chilled. That is what I would do the night I left him to arrange where we stayed, but when you have been driving around for 2 1/2 hours in the dark, its 9.00pm and you are faced with spending the night in your car, sometimes you do have to take matters into your own hands.
In answer to the very good question, why don't we try Relate? We actually did, a few years back. It was awful. Well, actually it was very good for DH because the counsellor was one of those very worthy types, full of very rigid views about how exactly a woman in a relationship should behave. Her advice was that DH only should be listened to, because he had trouble expressing his views and just in case he walked out on me (everything in fact was based on the premise he might leave). This then meant he took this as justification to pick up on every little thing that had ever annoyed him (such as my not taking time off work to let him in the house after one of his jacket thefts). Her advice to me was that I was to make sure I got his meal on the table each night (seriously) and to spend time together every night preparing it. I wasn't to let work get in the way. I was just to sit there and not say anything (I don't even talk that much) and take all the insults from both of them, because apparently he "might go elsewhere".
In the end I got a bit fed up and said I might also go elsewhere, which didn't go down well with her, as she clearly a relic from a past century. DH took her "advice" as an excuse to start behaving really quite badly and I left him. He then really worked hard to get me back and believe it or not, improved quite a bit, but lately since I have been away with work in particular, he seems to have regressed. I appreciate I got the worst counsellor on earth, but I won't be doing it again. In the time we were apart, I tried online dating and that really opened my eyes as to how fussy I am about men. Nothing about having to have a man in your life, but how many oddballs can there be in one place and who on earth would actually want to date them?