Is DH incapable of change or does he just not care?

[Superstar90]

My DH is driving me mad and we've just had a huge fight - he sat in with the toddler to get her to sleep despite us discussing it and agreeing so many times we would leave her to fall asleep on her own. She's a terrible sleeper and cos she fell asleep with him now she'll be up all night dustrubed and calling for him back when she wakes up - he'll sleep through so it'll be me that'll be up with her (we also have a 10 week old baby I'll be up with too).
He's so frustrating - so incapable of change. It's not just this issue - so many things we'll discuss and then he'll just do the opposite or 'forget'. It makes me feel so unheard and frustrated. I end up shouting so much because he drives me bananas. Does he not listen/change because he doesn't care? Surely if he did he'd put some effort into things?!
Other examples - I'm about to try and potty train dd1 I've asked him to put training seat back on toilet after using it to help me with this - he never does.
I'm scared of moths so I ask him not to leave Windows and doors fully open with lights on and curtains not closed - every single night he seems to have door open and light on
He sleeps in the spare room - supposedly because I tell him off for snoring if we share a bed (I do but only occasionally) - I've explained to him how much this hurts me and makes me feel rejected but he continues to sleep in spare room
He does the washing sometimes and ive asked him not to tumble dry but just leave my clothes as half of them shrink if not dried correctly - he keeps shoving all my clothes in, on hot for hours, shrinking all my fav clothes! This has happened so many times and ivf said I'd rather he didn't do washing thsn ruin everything!

I don't know if he can change. Maybe he kinda likes you feeling worried by the moth thing.

Perhaps show him this mustbethistalltoride.com/2016/01/14/she-divorced-me-because-i-left-dishes-by-the-sink/ blog entry.

I think if you explain to him that it's all getting to you and give specific examples of when you discuss and agree something, then he goes against that how it makes you feel.

List all the things and be very clear it's reached the point you cannot see yourself staying in the marriage, without changes because you're unhappy with the status quo.

That's not a threat of divorce and he should know it's not what you want, but it's getting way too much for you.

I have an enormous phobia of mice and my DH would never do anything that had them anywhere near me. I'd literally run out of the house... my phobia is that bad. He's witnessed it and knows how bad it is. I would be in hysterics over it. I can't even look at pictures or look at the TV if they show mice or rats.

I wonder if your DH doesn't take your phobia seriously.

It doesn't sound like there's any discussion or compromise. Instead it sounds like you get anxious if things aren't done your way.

I mean yes, it's crap that he shrank your clothes and I hope he apologised, and it sucks that he doesn't appear to have learned from that mistake.

But other things you list are not mistakes on his part, but just different preferences, which he is allowed to have. Why are you the one who gets to decide how much TV DD watches, for example? Why do you seem to believe that your way is the only way and that he must follow it too?

And you really do come across as anxious about all this in your posts, whereas from the outside it appears that what's needed is discussions as a team where compromises are reached on both sides.

Is discussion something that you both find difficult? The fact that he nods to you and then carries on suggests that he is avoiding discussion for a quiet life, which is a bit passive aggressive, while you have a difficulty with compromise from the outset (either feeling put upon but accepting when you are ignored, or adamant that that your way is how things need to be done).

I think the two of you need to work on communication and compromise, basically. Stop avoiding it, or seeing it as a battleground, but rather as a source of jointly-forged agreement.

Rice crispie - that's not the case. You would be a bit annoyed too if you were up every night with a toddler and the DH was sabotaging them sleeping through.
The inability to discuss comes from him not me. I don't have an inability to compromise

Sandy, I can't speak for the OP but I know that with my STBXH I tried all of that and it made no difference whatsoever. Nothing. Nada.

When you're a normal, rational, kind person it's hard to believe that someone who supposedly loves you can possibly treat you with so little respect or kindness. You spend months wondering if your requests are unreasonable, or if you've asked wrong, or he hadn't understood. But eventually you're forced to conclude that you weren't unreasonable and you asked in perfectly legible language and he understood fine - he just didn't care enough to bother.

Let me give you an example. My STBXH refused for years to take on childcare responsibilities, despite the fact that we bith worked FT (and, not the it should matter, in fact I earned more than him). He was perfectly willing to watch me wake at 4 each morning to get a couple if hours work done before the DCs woke, because he didn't want to set his alarm earlier than 7. He'd then swan around taking a bath and getting dressed, while I did everything for the DCs. Often he's leave the house at 7:50 when our nanny arrived at 8, or even after she arrived. I begged him to take the morning shifts but for years he refused. Because he isn't a morning person. He knew I was on my knees with exhaustion, he knew my career was stalling, but he didn't care enough to wake up at 6:30 so I could go into work early and beat the rush hour.

Similar was true for every aspect of our lives. He just wouldn't put himself out marginally to make my life massively better. Housework, holidays, homework, school, socialising - all on his terms.

Sometimes he would do exactly what OP's H had done and agree to a change but then never actually implement it. That was the most frustrating of all.

When I was contemplating leaving, so many people asked if I realised how hard it would be, being a single mum to 3 young DCs. But the honest truth is that it's a hundred times easier than living with STBXH because I'm not constantly undermined, there's less work to do around the house, and I'm gradually letting go of the seething resentment he engendered in me.

If he ever says his preference on things I do try to follow it or discuss if I don't agree.

Chacha - your ex sounds totally like my DH! You explain it perfectly. Sorry to hear you had to go through that. Glad it to hear it's easier now. I often feel that way too - it might be s bit more work around the house but surely so much easier without all the frustration and upset.

He's not listening because it doesn't matter to HIM.

This is passive aggressive behaviour at worst and just a basic lack of care at best.

It is disrespectful so if you think he needs to actually feel and suffer the consequences then you should do exactly as previous posters said and take the toddler in to And put the light on and wake him up
Not buy extras for him
Leave him with the the toddler for a few hours while you go somewhere with the baby to have a sleep.
I'm sure you can think of other things that would impact on him and make him think about him
Buy the book wife work and get him to read it too

If the OP's H is anything like my STBXH I'm not sure it will make any difference. My STBXH made my life low-grade unpleasant if I tried that sort of tactic (sulking, huffing, snide comments, etc) and it didn't make any lasting change.

I've concluded about my STBXH that he doesn't really see people as truly real - not in the same way as he is, anyway. We're all of us just minor players in his life and therefore our views and feelings can be disregarded - because they're not truly real either. I don't think he feels love quite like other people do, either.

Well, if there's no teamwork, why stay on the team?

ChaCha & OP

I recognise fully where you're coming from.
My marriage to a T.

Glad it's over. I drove myself mad trying to work out what I was doing wrong, was I being a cow.

I was as laid back as possible. I remember him calling me an anal psycho once. It was due to me asking if he would watch out when stacking bowls as large heavy ones ontop of lighter ones invariably made them chip.

Like wtf!?!?

I have similar problems with my DH. I often feeling like a raging lunatic when he repeats the same old ridiculous thing I've asked him to stop (like tumbling my clothes) and carries on regardless and I lose my rag.

I've been working alongside a life coach who is excellent and has taught me to allow him to suffer the consequences of his own mistakes. It's the only way he can learn. For example, DHs job is to get DD1 ready in the mornings that we're both at work. This morning he awoke late. I didn't urge him to get up, just left it until he realised. At this point he needed to get himself and DD ready who was awake and fractious wanting her breakfast.
Rather than burst in and take hold of DD, I casually shut the bedroom door and continued doing my hair, DH opened it and requested I deal with DD whilst he got himself ready and I told him that wasn't an option as I was busy myself. He spent the morning running around like a lunatic (rather than me!) And I just continental getting ready as normal. DD was upset which I didn't like, but DH needs to learn that lying in bed on his phone each morning rather than getting himself ready before DD wakes has consequences.

Recently, he also left my clean, washed clothes in a scrunched up pile in a basket. I don't iron as laying clothes out flat in a warm room seems to work and they were completely creased as a result.
I woke him from his turn to ly-in and handed him the iron then made him iron all my clothes (properly.) He was livid. But the was noway I was doing it.

Let him reap the consequences.how about a night away? Just you and DC 2? Let him learn the hard way?