Exhausted from DH talking my ear off!

[Puffinella]

I'm a relatively quiet person. I enjoy my own company, and am happy in silence. When I've been quiet all day, it takes a while to adjust to conversation. Currently I'm at home all day with DS, who's 1, and not talking; therefore I spend most of the day talking to him but not really having conversation. Then DH comes home from work, and he talks incessantly! I've told him lots of times that I can't cope with full-blown chat immediately, but he just can't help himself!

As soon as he comes in, he interrogates me about my day - what did I do, who did I talk to, did I talk to my mum at all, what did I have for lunch etc etc. If something has moved in the house it's "Oh, you moved that, why did you move that?". If I buy different milk from usual I get " How come you bought that milk and not the usual milk? ". He's not being accusing as such (though it feels that way); he's just really really nosey about everything! Half the time he doesn't even listen to what I say; he just hits me with 4 questions in a route, and then asks 2 of them again a minute later.

Then he talks about his day in painful detail. Literally, practically every conversation he had. With the best will in the world, I really don't care that much about the people he works with - I don't know them, and I don't even really know who's who. It doesn't help that he's bad at telling stories - he'll either give way too much detail (recently described an entire episode of a tv show, when the point of the story was that his friend's son had learned a swear word from it), or he'll not give enough (" I had to move a load of boxes, so I phoned downstairs to see if someone could help, and they sent Janice!" (name changed, obviously), and then he'll go off laughing his head off while I try to work out what's funny, before he eventually calms down, and I ask, and he says "Janice has a broken arm!" as if I'm meant to know that!).

So within 10 minutes of him getting home I'm generally exhausted, annoyed, and can't be bothered! Does anyone else have a similar problem? What can I do? I know he just wants to tell me his news, but I feel like he doesn't care how exhausted it makes me!

at the ear defenders.

I understand you've tried to explain this before, and it's fallen on deaf ears. But maybe it's time for a proper, firm chat about it - where you sit down and tell him that you simply can't cope with this behaviour and that it has to change. You can do that assertively, and without being aggressive, by prefacing it with 'I know you're being nice, but you have to understand that I'm not from a big family and I find this impossible to handle.'

Try to work out a strategy or timetable that would work for you - e.g. 'We will have a cup of tea when you get in and not talk about work, but just be quiet - then, when I've adjusted, you have 10 minutes to tell me about your day. And then we'll discuss other things. If you can try to avoid asking more than one question at once, too, that'd be really helpful. In return, I will try to listen to you properly because I do care about your life at work and you being happy, I just don't want to hear it all evening'.

One of the reasons why I'm never living with anyone ever again.

I find it quite sad reading this. He sounds happy to see you and wanting to share his life/day with you. Suddenly it's abuse?? Some men can't do right for doing wrong on here! If there was a thread about a woman coming home and sharing her day with her husband, and he was walking away and disinterested he'd be slated for abuse too.. You could equally say you're not being nice by not wanting to listen to him. (You're not, you're just different. You sound a bit of a mismatched couple really!)

SGB was clearly (to me, anyway) focusing on the OP's own words about her anxiety and the fact that she has a problem with her husband's behaviour. That's why the OP posted. She is finding it unbearable and her husband for some reason isn't listening.

You only to have to read the OP's description of it to realise that isn't just ordinary 'coming home from work' chat. Her husband repeats the same questions. I'd find it exhausting - and that's an understatement.

I suppose I'd call it annoying. To the OP it's unbearable and she wants him to stop it. That's her reality. It would be nice if he would listen to his wife.

He's not abusive, just seems to be completely unable to read body language and tell when someone isn't interested, and gets himself all excited when he has something to say (which is always). But it is exhausting.

In most other ways he's lovely, by the way! And once he's wound down a bit he slows up and the stories are easier to follow and more interesting. AndAnd then he listens when I talk, without interrupting. It's just that initial blast!

I like shove's idea. I'll try something like that. Or the ear defenders!

honey, sharing is communication between people, this sounds like a one-way verbal bombardment.

This would drive me demented. One of the things I love about DP is he never talks about work and we both enjoy quiet. If I meet up with my Mum and she spends 5 hours telling me every intricate boring detail of every conversation she has had over the last week I feel like I'm losing my mind. You have my upmost sympathy.

My take is, Person A asks Person B not to do something as it upsets Person A. Person B does it anyway. I don't think it makes Person B an entirely nice person.

Puffinella I suggest that you lay down a 'do not talk to me until you have calmed down and if I say I need space you have to let me have it' boundary. You have a right to not have avoidable panic attacks.

Your DH has been at work all day, you've been at home with no-one to talk to but when he comes in you need him to be quiet so you can adjust.

Could you not start adjusting before he gets home so he can have a conversation with you when he gets in?

I'm trying to understand your POV but I would find that really rude. Then again, I hate to sit in silence. Never understood people who just walk in from work and say nothing much at all. My DH does tell me to reign it in a bit sometimes but he laughs and it's done in a nice way. He can be the same sometimes and I just roll my eyes and tell him to slow down - we laugh about it.

If it's this much of a problem you don't sound very well matched.

Sorry that reads as far more aggressive than i meant it - no offence intended.

I have heard that people find it controlling to be asked questions, this is why kids don't like it when you ask them what they did at school. So this may be why you hate the feeling of being questioned about your day, even if he doesn't mean it that way.

I think you need to come to.a compromise over it, he needs to talk and its fair enough I think you should try to let him talk a bit, but he doesn't need to bounce in like a demented tigger and not shut up for 45minutes.

Marmaladybird, he comes home at different times every day, so I'm never quite sure when he'll appear! I do want to hear his stories, just not at 3000 words per minute, and not making any sense. He jumbles up the order of events etc because he's so keen to get all the words out! It's really hard to follow. It's not even conversation; it's just him talking at me and then bombarding me with questions and not listening to the answers!

I think Laundry is right - you both need to reach a compromise. You can't just 'tell' a chatterbox to stop talking, that's the same as someone 'telling' a wallflower to pipe up.

You can tell a blabbermouth to stop talking. Unless it's someone who is not NT in some way, they can learn to shut the fuck up when told. No one needs to bombard other people with yap despite the others' obvious distress.,
If he won't take a telling, walk out of the room into another and shut the door in his face. He does not have any kind of right or 'need' to talk incessantly at you when it does your head in. The fact that his talking has caused you to have anxiety attacks more than once means it's entirely justifiable to get a bit harsh with him about it. His behaviour is selfish, even if he's 'otherwise lovely'.

Puffinella - I think you need to wait until your DH is more likely to hear you and be clear that this is affecting you. I think you need to find out where this huge heap of words is coming from - is he not being heard at work? Is he not getting any social interaction for long periods? If he is willing to work out why this is happening then between you it can be sorted.

The way you describe it - jumbled up and not waiting for answers - sounds like there is something that needs to be let out. It just needs to be in a way that leaves both of you in a good state. Good luck.

SGB, would it be acceptable for her DH to 'tell' OP to talk more because it's making him feel isolated and causing him anxiety, then (just for example, hypothetically?)

We have invisible remote controls that we press fast forward on. Makes us laugh, whichever one of us is wittering on about nothing.

My DH is the same
However, he has learnt after 8 years together that I need him to ease into all the talking. When he gets in I either get to work on dinner or he does, and he has a few things he likes to do to settle in to being home. We've got a system now, because it's only fair that we are both comfortable during our conversations.

Oh my god my DH is living a double life . He does this too. He used to do this in public with stories that went on and on ad infinitium until I started kicking his shins when everyone had heard enough of his stories. In his defence he is actually a great guy and has the world's cutest ass so he has to have his bad points. I go for long runs in the evening for peace.

Lorelei your red dragon story made me laugh!! Yes OP it sounds exhausting, perhaps a tactic such as cool-down time when he gets home or having a set time to talk about work might help.

Thanks all! I think the "calm down" time when he gets home is our best option. Even if he nips in to say hello, and then goes up to get changed while I put the kettle on - that would give me 5 minutes or so to adjust to him being home, and also give him time to maybe filter the stories a bit so they're easier to follow!

The thing is, he's actually normally very quiet! It's just this initial blast when he gets home from work! Then he calms down and has proper conversation, and then we're fine the rest of the evening.

SlightlyAshamed makes a good point - I do wonder whether he doesn't talk much to his colleagues. As I say, he's fairly quiet, and probably just gets on with his work all day. So it's fair enough that he wants to chat when he gets home. It just needs to be at a manageable pace.

I think the anxiety attacks are something I need to talk to him about. He genuinely thinks he's helping by talking to me when I'm trying to calm down, because that's what he needs if he's anxious - he needs to be distracted. The problem is that I need quiet. I'll try to find a good moment to bring it up. I think this thread has given me a better understanding of how the dynamic between us works, so I can use that, I hope!