Wife who cannot answer Yes or No to any question

[Stewart2017]

Sounds trivial I know, but my wife just cannot (will not) answer yes or no. Ever.
And it turns minor disputes into big arguments daily. And needlessly.

Example tonight - kid kicks off bad behaviour with mum, it's getting very aggressive and I run upstairs quickly to deal strictly with young teenager. Kid continues on at me, and my wife then criticises me for causing issue!

Clearly untrue, and son seizes on this and torments and name calls me. I ask my wife is she genuinely thinks it was my fault, and I get a "don't know" or "you are ruining the night" when I feel the opposite.

Aggrieved I keep asking calmly does she really think it my fault, and asking for a yes or no to clear up any misunderstanding.

We then argue while kid laps it all up and laughing. This is no way to act in front of kid and why on earth am I being blamed.
She just will never answer a straight question. No matter how basic.

This is daily. Earlier today I asked "shall I pick up milk when I'm out?"
She'll answer "mind phone your Dad"
Yeah I will. But do we need milk?
She'll answer after about 5 attempts at question "I don't know"
Shall I come back inside and check fridge?
She'll answer "just go!"
OK, but do we need milk yes or no?
..... and on and on.

Sounds trivial writing get it down, but it is driving me bonkers.
She is intelligent and holds down a decent job. She not ill or anything.
Just seems utterly bizarre that no matter the question she cannot answer clearly. Ever.

Ok Oliver's fine but in this scenario his wife had been shopping a few hours ago with a 'pre-written list'... He wasn't trying to be helpful,he wasn't asking whether they had milk or not, he was trying to make the point that she always misses things off the list and he always goes and gets the things she has missed.

And yeah it is annoying if your wife always forgets things but to be so resentful about it is not normal nor is feeling so contemptuous or being so PA about 'why can't she just answer yes or no?'

With the first thing and the second thing he wasn't asking either question because he wanted to know the answer. He was trying to make a point in order to make her feel humiliated.

Then if she had got the milk the answer is yes if there isn't any then the answer is no.

I sometimes go out and find there is no milk in the shop so sometimes if someone goes out later and asks then the answer is yes.

Maybe the ops wife has always been like this maybe this frustration has built up from years of asking the simplest question and not getting a straight answer.

The only way I overcame dps inability to answer a question was to put a time limit on answers.

Should we holiday in California, India, or Dubai or have you any suggestions. Let me know within 2 weeks otherwise I will book something myself.

I will think about it

2 weeks later have you thought where you want to go otherwise I will book it

I am still thinking.

On holiday.

Why do we always have to go to where you want to go.

Where did you want to go

I don't know I am still thinking

I am finding this thread very interesting. It is reminding me what a headfuck being in an EA relationship is. I had forgotten how I managed to get into a twisted mess trying to communicate with my XH.

I was very good at communicating with everyone else in my life, I couldn't understand why I could not 'do' or 'say' anything right and ended up in a tongue-tied wreck. I know now that I was being set up all the time, that he set traps for me that I would fall into. None of it made sense because it took me years to see that he was creating the madness and blaming me for his anger.

All I knew was the fear when he asked me a question, the hesitation, the stammering, the desperate mind-search of flipping through the options of what might be the 'right answer' or the answer that would provide the least opportunity for him to go off on one. You're trying to guess several moves ahead, whilst someone is staring you out for an answer. It was like having Grant Mitchell in your face accusing you of spilling his pint, so that something as simple as what might or might not be in the fridge was unreachable. In that situation, of course you start to waffle. Of course you end up feeling like an idiot, a scared idiot, which then gives them even more supposed justification for cruel behaviour. It's a horror film.

I had an ex who could never make a decision. The answer was always 'I don't know, you decide', as if he was doing me a favour! I realised in the end he didn't want to take any responsibility for anything.
My DH has an opinion about everything, but that's fine. At least we get things done.

Dp was asked by a friend if he wanted Cup Final tickets, great seats, full hospitality his friend needed a yes or no answer dp started to waffle about he would think about it. Within seconds someone else in the group jumped in and got them.

Was this friend messing with dps head. How abusive was his friend. What awful thing would have happened if dp had given a straight answer

She is simply not designed to say YES or NO. Which is excellent - just ask her questions she cannot say NO to.

"Darling I'm going to be a bit late tonight, drinks after you work, you understand right?"

"My beautiful sweet wife, I'm just going to pop out ok and do a bit of exercise, I'll be back in 5 hours. You have no issues with that right? Thought so. See you later"

But if you really want a YES/NO out of her - can I recommend you do not demand it off her but extract it from her Louis-Theroux-style.

With respect Oliver's you are talking about your dp rather than the OP's wife.

Would you handle the problem with straight answers in the ways he has described? Ask him if there was milk because he never gets the full pre written list of shopping even though you knew he had gone hours before? Would you, in the middle of your dp dealing with an aggressive teen, step in and repeatedly ask him to answer yes or no to whether he had said you weren't helping? Would you ask him 'are you aware you are not able to answer yes or no?' And then switch off to the answer and come on MN to say it was all just waffle?

If you were stressed by his evasiveness and looking for advice you would pick the situations that described your problem most accurately wouldn't you? You have and they are all absolutely bang on descriptions of what you say your issue is.

The things the op described, his 'best examples' are dripping with resentment, contempt and PA and in none of the examples he has given are his 'simple questions' actually simple - they are all combative, accusatory and in the last example contemptuous of her.

This crap about 'different answers because a man' always ruins threads because people aren't able to analyse the behaviour and the content without being accused of fighting some kind of gender war.

I think fundamentally this comes down to - we don't have the wife's side, the op is the only person the op can control, does his description of his behaviour in the examples he gave sound helpful or harmful to what is a clearly dysfunctional family set up which is clearly affecting the children's behaviour.

So have we milk involves an hours interview. Life I far too short.

I recommend the time limit approach. I would go on holiday where dp suggested if he would let me know where that was.

His whole family are like this. Dp asked his dm a question. She gave a non committal answer as per usual. When dp found out the truth it all but destroyed him. He hasn't gotten over it.

Answer the question

If what someone is asking is 'have we got milk?' On the face of it the answer is 'yes' or 'no'.

I think this thread demonstrates that that question isn't all that simple all of the time.

If, for example, what is really being communicated is 'I want you to answer yes or no about whether you have fallen short of my expectations today' or 'I feel I am entitled to treat you as a domestic slave, answer yes or no'.

Communication is not all about the actual words that are said, it's also about intentions, feelings and interpretations. And sorry if some don't like to hear it but claiming that the milk question is a simple yes or no whilst having every intention of using it as a trap/humiliation/wrongfooting is EA behaviour. It is not the same as being frustrated because re important life decisions your partner is a ludicrously slow thinker.

Olivers - all your observations are perfectly sound, and make perfect sense in the context that you describe. As others have pointed out though, your Cup Final Tickets example takes place in a completely different context than the one described by OP.

Yes there are people who are evasive or drive you mad because they never give a straight answer to a direct question. Maybe OP's wife is one of those, but given the context which is described, I suspect there is a hell of a lot more going on than being an infuriating person, along the lines of fear and control. In this case the wife having the fear and the OP is wanting the control.

But even when the cup final ticket question came up and required a yes or no answer dp couldn't answer. This was not a loaded question.

Now imagine doing that over and over eventually you end up being blamed of being abusive to a person who cannot express what they want.

I think there is something not right with me as I always see a question as just that. I have friends who spend hours discussing how to answer the simplest question. They see allsorts in simple questions.

I think what came first the inability to answer a simple question or the ops anger at not getting a straight answer.

Offred with the milk situation if he didn't answer I would take it as a no and buy more milk. And yes on the other thing i would have probably done the same.

What Hillfarmer said. You forget once out of an EA relationship for a few years just how bad it was. My ExDP was setting me up to fail at every point. It was as subtle as fuck. I knew he was doing it but couldn't quite believe it. I was always in the wrong, on the back foot, made to look like a total tool when in the rest of my life I functioned very well at work and educationally. I was getting gaslighted to buggery and beyond. It took me well over a year to get any sense of self creeping back.

Oliversmum, your tone is very different from OP. You sound like the spouse of someone who has difficulty expressing opinions.
OP sounds like he is hectoring his wife. I felt hectored just reading him. I suspect I would probably check out too, despite being on the opinionated side of wilful.

Hmm this is all very interesting. DH is terribly evasive; I am always threatening to tie him in a chair and shine a light in his eyes if he won't give me a straight answer, it is a standing joke with us.

I don't think I am particularly bullying or critical, but FiL certainly is. Could this be a learned behaviour from his childhood?

Possibly the OP's wife also has learned behaviours from her childhood. Or yes, it might be because of him. Time for a frank talk together I think (and good luck with that one).

But even when the cup final ticket question came up and required a yes or no answer dp couldn't answer. This was not a loaded question.

Well yes, but this is exactly why I am saying I think your situation is different to the OP's. Because the examples you have given are absolutely clear that your partner has difficulty making decisions. That this is the pathology. That this difficulty is seen across different situations and with different people.

I don't think anyone is saying or has said people who are evasive or slow thinking or who have difficulty making decisions are that way because their partners are abusive. People are saying that they suspect, based on the OP's own descriptions where he thinks he is being the height of reasonableness and his wife is infuriatingly evasive there is quite a lot of evidence of him not in fact even asking 'simple questions' but loaded accusatory ones, of him being angry and aggressive and dismissive and contemptuous towards his wife that leads to people saying things like 'I was like this when with my EA ex'.

And yes it could be tinkly.

My xh's was learned behaviour from childhood.

At some point people have to learn better coping skills in order to be an independent adult. If you have a partner that is constantly leaving you with all the responsibility or missing out on things because of slow thinking or an inability to make decisions then it's reasonable to suggest they work on that in therapy.

If they won't (like my h) then I think the only real option is to leave them because it will drive you loopy eventually. Especially if you end up being on the end of their temper purely because they have absented themselves from decisions.

There may be an element of this in the OP's marriage that he hasn't mentioned for whatever reason but I think what he has written about in his two small posts is concerning.

And I think if you have read the OP's second post and felt like you relate rather than feeling shocked at the contempt I think it might be time to consider breaking up.

One of the main reasons I left (although there were many) was because I started feeling resentful and frustrated and he wasn't prepared to do anything productive about it and I didn't want to get to contempt.

In reply to Sparkly my sister also uses the 'I don't mind' answer to every question. When she visits, I find it infuriating when the simplest question 'would you like a cup of tea' gets a 'I don't mind' response. By the end of her visit, Ian trying to breathe deeply to stop myself from saying 'Well you do or you dont'. If she finally relents into saying yes, she makes me feel like she is doing me a huge favour by drinking the damn cup of tea. If I don't make it for her, I feel rude for not making it. If I respond with 'we'll feel free to make one when you feel like one', I get a very hurried response of 'ok I will have a cup of tea so' as if I have bulldozed her into something she is humouring me by drinking.

This is a 43 year old woman, she is not a shrinking violet by any stretch of the imagination, but since she was very young, she developed this habit of making people feel like she was doing a huge favour by accepting something people were giving her.

I don't believe this is the case for the OP though.

What is the difference between not making your mind up and being unable to say yes or no. If it takes years to answer a simple question.

Dp waffles on about other stuff if you ask him a direct question. I just turn off and give him a time frame to which I need a response by and carry on.

He then moans that I take over everything and everything has to be done my way. But with no input and no answer to any question what are you supposed to do.

Dp wanted input about primary schools. I asked him over and over what his opinon was did he like school A.

Dc went to school A. He then came up with an alternative. Youngest was 12 by the time he answered.

I think he does it as a PA thing so he can tel people I don't let him have an opinion

Well yeah, he may do. My xh was like that - he had strong opinions that he refused to give until it was too late despite desperate efforts to help him communicate feelings. I would find out his feelings via a later PA attack and his nurturing of his 'victim' status amongst friends and family. He has since been caught out on video emotionally abusing my DD and has continued in the same vein since the split, nurturing victim status, being PA etc.

But again that's about you and DP. I'm struggling to see how it relates to the OP who came across as getting extremely angry rather than checking the fridge (which would have been the reasonable thing to do). At that point it was clear to me it was a communication problem and different parenting styles that was the source of conflict.

Then he revealed his wife had done the shopping that day and his frustration was that she always misses things off the list - not a huge jump to assume that in that case the true meaning of his question 'do we need milk?' was not simple, it was an attempt to show up her poor shopping skills that drive him crazy and his obsession with pinning her down into admitting she is wrong and he is right. Which means the conflict is as much (if not more) to do with his way of communicating.

Totally different to your descriptions of DP but in any case it seems his behaviour is impacting you quite considerably.

(Wasn't me filming BTW was my scared son trying to alert me to get help for his sister)

In fact the turning point for me was realising that it was more than likely he 'won't' communicate with me because it suits him to not rather than just that he has difficulty.

With the recent ex I mentioned above who was the opposite - he was a bully. He even told me once that he absolutely felt it was important to be a bully in order to avoid being bullied.

As well as belittling my opinions, likes, choices etc he also flew into a frightening rage at the slightest thing - even things that were his fault like writing off his car because he was tailgating in the rain on the motorway, would sulk for days in a seething rage if he felt my behaviour was inappropriate, attacked my possessions once, let himself into my house while I was asleep after I broke up with him once, pushed me once... the list goes on...

Abusive people and abusive behaviour often take very different forms - it is the presence of control and oppression that usually differentiates it from acceptable behaviour.