Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
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

Original poster

Unreasonable - I ask you the Mumsnet Jury??

46 replies

VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 13:16

Sigh. I have great difficulty organising anything because DH works away a lot so everything revolves round his commitments. Anyway, after months of it never happening, I finally invited another couple over for lunch with their kids (these people were his friends initially before we met). This is happening on Sunday which was fine by DH until his work changed at the last minute and now he has to extend his trip by a couple of days. He will still be back on Sunday by lunchtime but says he can't be bothered with lunch. I said that he didn't have to do anything and it's nothing fancy anyway, just some soup and sandwiches and a chance to catch up for a natter but he's still not interested. I can understand to a degree that he'll be tired but he just emailed me his itinerary with a note saying that he's been upgraded to first class so can have a nice sleep all the way back!

Hey I won't be tired either because I manage to function on fresh air looking after his kids (aged 2 + 3) all the time he's away. But it's nice to make an effort to see people else I'd never have any fecking adult conversation.

Why can't he make more of an effort just to be sociable for a change?

OP posts:
Carmenere · 04/12/2006 13:18

Tell him he can stay in bed whilst you entertain. He is being an arse.

hana · 04/12/2006 13:18

yup
he is unreasonable

PinkTinsel · 04/12/2006 13:19

invite them anyway, not much he can say if they're there when he gets in.

LittleSarah · 04/12/2006 13:22

You are in the right, it is clearly a one-off, tell him to make an effort for you, it is only for a couple of hours!

mumatuks · 04/12/2006 13:23

I'd carry on as planned, he's behaving like a kid wanting everything his own way.

You have a lovely time and enjoy Sunday with your friends, let him sulk in the bedroom or come and be sociable, but just prove to him it's no skin off your nose if he decides to strop!

MerryChristmasfromQV · 04/12/2006 13:25

Go ahead with it anyway.

Original poster
VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 13:26

I could just go ahead but I don't know if I can be bothered with the flak - I had thought of just cancelling but be totally honest about why ...."Poor DH he gets in at 1050 after a long first class flight and he just can't be arsed seeing you all, bless him"

OP posts:
mumblechum · 04/12/2006 13:28

It's a tricky one, even when they come back 1st class they're usually knackered because jet lag is worse from US (I'm presuming that's where he's coming from?) and I know my dh wouldn't be best pleased to find guests in the house when all he wants to do is shower and bed.

Maybe you can invent some mechanism for the guests to go after maybe 2and a half hours? Then your dh would feel like he could handle small talk etc because he could relax within a short time?

MerryChristmasfromQV · 04/12/2006 13:31

If you get flak - he will just look like a nob -thats his look out really.

MerryChristmasfromQV · 04/12/2006 13:31

Or, you could ring them and explain the situation, but saying that the invitation is still very much open, the difference being that your DH may or may not be there. Let them decide.

Original poster
VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 13:33

Mumblechum, he's coming back from the Far East.

I just feel that life is too short to waste and if we don't see them now then it'll be waaay into next year. Strangely enough I'm sure if it was some footie or boy thing that had been arranged he'd make a colossal effort.

Actually I'm a bit fed up with him generally. I'm trying to find something really positive about us just now but I can't say that I'm ecstatically happy. Things have changed somewhat in that when he used to go on his long trips I'd be sad and upset but now I look forward to them. When he calls home I used to look forward to hearing his voice but now I couldn't care less and even get irritated as it's interupting something I'm doing.

Hmmmm, not a good sign.

OP posts:
Rhubarb · 04/12/2006 13:37

Personally I would not have arranged anything. They are HIS friends and if he doesn't at least offer to help with it all, then I wouldn't bother.

Who's idea was it to invite them in the first place? He might not be that interested in them as friends anymore. In any case, it's not up to you to run his social life for him. If he can't go I would tell him to call his friends up and explain to them. You are not his secretary, don't do his running about for him.

LittleSarah · 04/12/2006 13:40

'Strangely enough I'm sure if it was some footie or boy thing that had been arranged he'd make a colossal effort.'

Ha ha, yes, I remember that feeling!

choosyfloosy · 04/12/2006 13:41

I'd say go out to lunch, if you didn't have such small children - then you get some social life and he gets some rest.

Or invite them to supper? I find kid-style tea and communal bathing/stories followed by the visiting children going home in their pyjamas quite entertaining, but perhaps I'm just insane. It is really nice to have other adults around and getting stuck into the wine while doing the hideous bedtime routine, particularly if you've been doing it on your own for a while.

beckybrastraps · 04/12/2006 13:41

My dh is flying back in two weeks time (from the US)and coming with me to a party that evening. I know he'll be knackered and we'll have to come home really early but I love him for making the effort.

Original poster
VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 13:48

Rhubarb, it was me who invited them initially - I do really like them and enjoy their company and consider them to be my friends now too. What annoys me the most is that DH is making excuses on their behalf by saying that X probably wouldn't have wanted to come anyway!!! Erm usually if people don't want to come they make their own excuses! Aaaand, what's more, this couple's hospitality has been very generous in that the woman's mother lives on a remote farm and we have all been up to stay for a long weekend with the mother putting us all up and doing all the cooking. DH keeps dropping hints that he'd like to go up again! If I was that couple I'd not ask him as the last time he fell asleep in front of the fire reading the newspaper whilst everyone else was chatting round the table. Ooooh I'm getting really worked up about this now

OP posts:
PortAndLemonaid · 04/12/2006 13:49

This had been planned for a while and it's unreasonable of him to expect you to cancel a social engagement because he just doesn't feel like it.

My DH travels a lot with work and will often fly in from a long flight and go straight on to a social event (for both of us or just for him). Granted he often falls asleep at some point in the course of it, but he makes the effort. In this case the amount of effort required from your DH is as close to zero as you can get (have lunch in his own home... hardly something excessive) and he's behaving like a git.

tribpot · 04/12/2006 13:54

It sounds like you have to put your life on hold whenever he goes away. That sounds awfully lonely and unsustainable. If I were you, I would make an early New Year's resolution: in 2007 I will have my own social life, regardless of whether dh can be there or not.

And start as you mean to go on by having these people over for lunch.

Rhubarb · 04/12/2006 13:58

Fine, then you have a good time without him! I think changing it to an evening do is a good idea and if he acts like an ignorant twat I really wouldn't make excuses for him, I would just say "sorry x is being a prat this evening, it's a wonder that he has such nice friends!"

Embarrass him and let him see what a twonk he is being.

fedupwife · 04/12/2006 13:59

I can sympathise. My DH never wants to do anything with any of my friends. I hate it. I'm so fed up that I'm considering divorce. I can't live like this much longer.

My DH also works aways. And I can so relate to this statement:
"Actually I'm a bit fed up with him generally. I'm trying to find something really positive about us just now but I can't say that I'm ecstatically happy. Things have changed somewhat in that when he used to go on his long trips I'd be sad and upset but now I look forward to them. When he calls home I used to look forward to hearing his voice but now I couldn't care less and even get irritated as it's interupting something I'm doing. "

Yes, I've changed my name for this post.

fedupwife · 04/12/2006 14:02

I did exactly what Tribpot suggested about a year ago. I now have a social life. DH is still not interested in it, and I am still unhappy... in fact more unhappy.

Anyway, it sounds like perhaps your DH has a social life and he is just being selfish on this one occassion so maybe you aren't really where I am.

Original poster
VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 14:04

Unfortunately evening doesn't suit the other couple and I'm sure DH would still be a miserable sod about it anyway. Strangely enough, many of my female friends say that their DH's are exactly the same and have become very ingorant and anti-social.

OP posts:
DonnerDasherDancerDior · 04/12/2006 14:05

Mine's unsociable too. He definitely would not want people to lunch when he had just flown home from somewhere. Mind you, he's usually a miserable git then anyway, so I would never ask anyone!

Original poster
VoluptuaGoodshag · 04/12/2006 14:07

Fedupwife - I do still keep in touch with most of my pals. Unfortunately it's hard for me to see them as much as I'd like as babysitters are hard to come by. I did go out on Friday with a pal and I am trying to arrange another night out with other friends next week. It's just much easier to organise if I know he is here to take over with the kids (he is a really good dad). But he doesn't put that much of an effort in to seeing his own pals either TBH. Yeah if there was a footie thing on that someone else had organised and thought to ask him, he'd go but for him to actually meet up with his pals - nah, he's falling asleep by 10ish so he's not interested.

OP posts:
mumblechum · 04/12/2006 14:09

Glad to hear I'm not the only one! If I didn't organise anything, we'd never see anyone.

My dh works such long hours he just wants to chill at weekends, and if it was up to him we'd stay in every night of the year.

Fortunately, he does go along with things when I organise them and is really quite jolly, but I wouldn't organise more than 1 or 2 dinner parties/whatever per month, or he moans that he can never relax!