He can't seem to change his habits...what to do?

[wonderwoman21]

My OH and I had a very stressful weekend last weekend and this weekend decided to have a 'special' weekend. Only it didn't turn out that way.
And I shouldn't have expected or hoped it to really, I am beginning to realise.
We were going to spend the day out but on the Friday (as usual) OH has to drink and go to bed late. I said about going to bed earlier so that we could have our 'special' day but he wouldn't go to bed till 2am and he didn't wake up till close to 11am.
I lost heart about our special day in the end. And then again, last night, he drinks and goes to bed late. He says he has to let his hair down after a working week of having to get up early but he also says that I deserve better and that he is always letting me down. He just can't seem to change a habit of a lifetime.
He was the same as this with his ex wife who he was with for 28 years. Yet when he wanted to do something, like get fit and go cycling, he would get up early to do that and he did that for a couple of years! That pissed her off and I can't say I blame her in many ways.
He says he sees how much effort I put into the relationship and feels bad that he can't get up in the mornings at the weekends. I spend a lot of time alone in the mornings. It feels like such a waste.
I have paid for weekends away for us at least six times and he hasn't once. He has habits he can't seem to break. He is 49 years old now.
To me, it is quite simple...make the effort, go to bed just a little bit earlier (he always falls asleep straight away, often before me) and enjoy the day together. I can think of a lot harder things to do and to me, this is no deal breaker of a compromise.
He says he'd love it if I was with him in the mornings when he wakes up, then he would bring me a cup of tea in bed but obviously, it is always too late and I am up already. He is a night owl.
It would be nice to go to bed at a reasonable time and make love but even this is affected now as well. I am always too tired and I am perimenopausal too which doesn't help. So you'd think you'd make love at the weekend and it isn't happening.
The best advice I can give myself is get a life really at the weekends and leave him to it if he won't change. It depends on how important the relationship is to him after all.
Any advice from you lovely girls would help :-)

Oh for crying out loud op, he's spent 28yrs driving his poor ex wife up the freaking wall with all this crap. Now he's latched on to you a classic rescuer of baby birds down on their luck with a broken wing.

He doesn't need to change because suckers like you put up with his emotional blackmail and low self worth act. He's sucking the life and soul out of you and will continue to do so until you have had enough. He is another poor choice in as you say a long line of rubbish and abusive relationships, he is abusive but in a more insidious way, one that gets under your skin and makes you feel sorry for them and look after them, thus they get to feel secure and carry on as normal rinse and repeat.

Your self worth is on the floor lovely, you feel he is the best you can get he's the best of the whole bad bunch. My advise to you? Get rid and get in to some therapy and unlearn all these negative lessons you've learnt in your life time, people will only value you as much as you value yourself.

Altruism doesn't come in to it if I really wants to be blunt, maybe she is using him as an excuse not to look too closely at herself and her own issues. It's always easier to look after another damaged soul than heal your own.

"He is the best man I have ever known in my life.
Yet...he has these habits such as drinking and staying up late. And me being quite lonely as a result.
I can't imagine my life without him as I love him too.
But he is stuck in his ways..."

This above is really sad.

It may well be a good idea now for you to read "Women who love too much" by Robin Norwood.

I do not think you love him because you do not really know what an emotionally healthy relationship actually is. No-one's ever bothered to show you what that is so you really have no idea. I would also think your love for him is really a combination of chronic low self esteem and co-dependency, not love. Love is not like this at all.

I asked you what you get out of this relationship now and your silence on that spoke volumes.

Your own neglectful childhood and subsequent poor relationships (as partly a result of said childhood as well) have done and still continue to do you an awful lot of damage and all this now needs to be unlearnt through counselling. You're not happy and are lonely within this relationship. If this drinker is really the best man you have ever known in your life, it does not say an awful lot for the other men you have had relationships with. You are probably pathetically grateful on some level that he does not for instance cheat or hit you on a regular basis. That still does not make him less of a time wasting and now alcohol abusing person.

No-one is indeed perfect but really Wonderwoman you are truly selling yourself short by remaining with a drinker with his own dysfunctional family of origin which I have also advised you on. Perhaps this is why you were drawn to him. His primary relationship is and always has been with drink; you are but a poor second if that to this and alcohol is truly a cruel mistress.

I would also think Wonderwoman you have very pronounced rescuer and or saving tendencies which also now need to be addressed by you. Being a rescuer and or a saviour in a relationship never works.

Hello Wonder

I have been thinking over the last few weeks

Talbot is correct, nobody is perfect !

So the key to happiness is to decide what are the top say 5 things you would like in a person to have a relationship (everyone will have a different list)

Then top 5 things you dont want in a relationship

Then 5 things you dont like, but will compromise & put up with

----

Life is too short to be unhappy !

You dont like the drinking, so you have a choice stay with him or find someone who wants to spend time with you at weekends

I know what I would choose...

I had a lovely day out yesterday (saturday) you could have the same

Be brave

Good luck

a lovely man who loves you and is kind to you, works hard all week and his chosen method of relaxation at the weekend is to stay home with you, sit up late enjoying a drink and lie in the following morning.

what an utter abusive bastard

Mumsnet relationship advice ( which is bloody excellent in real cases of abuse ) at its worst.

and why can't a special day start at 11 am?

What would prefer jasper ? Posters encouraging op to stay with some one she feels incompatable with ? Some one who drinks so much it ruins plans the next day? Some one that she feels lonely with ? Some one that she feels tells her what she wants to hear to get her to STFU?

Yeah you keep quiet op

Jasper there's lots of definitions of abuse some worse than others dare I say when someone slaps or punches you, that's an obvious one. The type of abuse where the recipient is chipped away at under the radar is just as bad. It's the type that you can't quite put your finger on, will drive you mad keep you off balance and have you believe your stronger than them and have to look after them.

I've been on the receiving end of both, personally the 2nd one caused me more damage and took me longer to recognise and recover from, I still now have to be on my guard as these types are drawn to me because I have a need to help and they can sniff me out like sharks scent blood in the water.

joyful I would likeOP to be in a relationship where :

"he is the most attentive and thoughtful man I have ever met. He is not abusive. He is loving and very caring. He never gets angry and admits to responsibility for all of this. He shows his love for me and doesn't have a problem doing so. He is the best man I have ever known in my life."

oh whoops that's OPs own words.

the drinking/ sleeping in pisses her off. I get that. It would piss me off too. Her DP even recognises this is not a good thing.

But you have to take the bad with the good.

If it bugs OP so much it outweighs all the good stuff/ best man she has ever met...... bin him. Mumsnet can rejoice ! Result !

and good luck in the search for mr 100% perfect.

guilty I've been in the receiving end of the second one too.
I see no evidence of same in OP 's posts.
Lots of extrapolation /projection in others' though .

and herein lies the problem with MN relationship advice

The definition of madness ?

Keep doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome.

Jasper the op by her own admission was coming to a sad conclusion about the state of her better than any other relationship, she doesn't have to stay around for what ever little crumbs he throws out for her, sometimes biased or even unbiased thoughts from those who are uninvolved or known to us, can cut through the fog and save some people am,or of wasted time.

And to echo AF same shit different day that's transference for Ya

"Crumbs " he throws her way ??
Think you're on the wrong thread. This is Mr 90% perfect.

OP don't expect him to change. If the weekend him spoils everything else , FOR YOU, then end it.

If all the good stuff outweighs the bad , suck up the bad and enjoy the good.

It's quite simple really

Agree with not expecting a different outcome.
Accept
Or reject

OP don't expect him to change. If the weekend him spoils everything else , FOR YOU, then end it

Your advice seems pretty much what everyone else is saying to me.

jasper I don't really understand why I see you on threads trying to pick apart other poster's contributions

you've done it to me elsewhere recently and you've done it here....then gone on to say pretty much the same thing

just give your opinion like everyone else and let them take care of their own

If this is ongoing then I can see it's annoying but you still could've done something with your day?? 11am leaves loads of time still to have done whatever it is you wanted to do

I'll be honest Vivacia I'm not sure what to suggest, but I think leaving someone you love just because they don't live the way you want them to is a bit harsh. I understand if it makes someone unhappy then it's not a healthy relationship to be in.
Maybe I'm being a bit special but I've only ever been in love once

My DH was always a bit of a night owl too and I'm one of those annoying morning people

We're just people who do things differently.

So, while Dh was snoozing, I'd hop off out and do my hobby, and enjoy it all the more knowing I wasn't missing out on family time together. Quite often I'd be back and in the showe by the time he woke up, if not he'd call to say he'd just woken up and then I'd pack up and come home in time for him to have got out the shower for me to go in.

So night owls and early birds can be compatible

I'll be honest Vivacia I'm not sure what to suggest, but I think leaving someone you love just because they don't live the way you want them to is a bit harsh.

Bit harsh on her, or him?

I understand if it makes someone unhappy then it's not a healthy relationship to be in.

It does make her unhappy, she's started a thread asking for advice.

I don't know why people slag of the advice of others without being able to offer some advice in its place.

"off"

The OP seems so sad. Is the take-away feeling from a relationship supposed to be sadness?

The problem is he is putting the drink before you op.

I recently ended a relationship where the man behaved exactly as you described. He wanted to drink and stay up half the night every single weekend. The sex and intimacy didn't fit into that lifestyle. Boring, got rid.

It depends on what you will put up with. Do you feel second best? I did and that was what made me finish it. You should be first in his life.

People shouldn't be sad in relationships but I guess it depends on how you view things. In my case, my mornings are seen as an opportunity and afternoons and evenings are spent together. 2 afternoons and evenings equal a full day anyway.

Plenty of couples have hobbies, sports or work that take them out of the home for mornings or days over the weekend and one day out of the weekend spent together is enough if everything else is ok.

On the reverse side of this, there are plenty of night owls who would prefer it if their partners stayed up later and slept in but their partners don't do that either. Mine doesn't expect this of me anymore than I expect him to change to meet my habits.

I guess it's about how you view things and how the rest of the relationship stacks up as to where you draw the line.