Feel I'm living up to an 'ideal'

[LovelyBath77]

Does anyone know what I mean when you feel in a marriage or relationship, nothing you seem to do is ever good enough? If the dinner is not made for 6pm, if you have taken the children out and the house is not as tidy as it could be, or if you have stayed home and tidied then it is commented on that the children have not been out I don't actually think it is possible to be perfect, or do all these things at once. But it seems to be interpreted as me 'not caring'. or taken personally, feel like I am judges on these, small things. I have to say none of this has ever been said, it's just how I feel. Also, when I ask what he likes to eat, he won't tell me, seems to expect me to 'know'. It's weird. I don't know how to explain really. Just wondered of anyone knew how I feel.

I might do, but feel I'm getting some help from what I am doing already, for now.

I'm just saying it made it seem it was for women 'all women should do it' - but it's not only men who can be controlling.

Thanks for the helpful replies, I'm finding some stuff to help me now so don't really need any more people telling me what I should be doing here, now. Thanks.

Yes I'm looking at FP to help me manage all relationships... men and women.

Loved the pretzel reference... very apt!

It seems on here the only advice is to leave ALWAYS!
It's not as black and white though all of the time.
Whatever happened to fixing things when they are broken.
My dp can be a tiny bit like that.
My MIL said to me " if the monkey in the zoo posses crooked- it's my fault"
😂 I just stay light hearted and don't take it personally. I make him see its redicilous by saying oh I'm ever so sorry for telling the monkey to puss that way in a sarcastic way. It usually ends up in a bout of laughing from both of us as he realises how redicilous it was. 😂
If it gets too much of course consider leaving him. But if it can be fixed why not try.
Don't let him make you feel scared to do so.ething wrong just laugh it off and make him realize how silly he is being.

Pisses*
Damn Auto correct

She's been trying to fix it for 18 years.

What I think is we need to be careful that because someone is behaving in a certain way, it does not always mean they are 'bad' and the only way to deal is to leave/ walk away. If I shared some of my behaviour with you, you may well say someone should leave me, too!

I once posted about my brother's wife on MN, mentioning how she talks to hum, controlling, bossy and got replies that it was none of my business and that they, also do thinks like 'chinking' a glass to get their man's attention (things which if said a man did, would be called abusive) and that they felt it was 'funny' and sarcastic

There are very definitely different ways in which men are seen on here and also a very quick cry to LTB I have noticed, which is concerning. You can't see the whole details about a relationship from an OP which outlines often one specific example and is also only from one person's point of view.

Anyway, just thought I'd mention this. I also wanted to mention that if anyone needs other types of support there is a good section in OOTF site for relationships, mainly to help those who are with disordered relationships and also those who have 'fleas' (behaviour picked up usually from parents). It can be very helpful to separate the behaviour from the person, rather than it defining the person themselves. Sometimes. Other times I think yes, the only way is out.

This whole idea of fixing relationships is problematic if is down to the woman alone to do this (mainly through societal conditioning).

We mend broken material things (however these days they are most likely recycled instead) and relationships do not work in the same ways.

In the OPs case I feel that she has simply repeated the patterns of her past childhood by marrying someone as critical as her own mother.

Have a look at the post about my SIL and you'll see what I mean.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/2931679-SIL-abusive

No-one has said he was 'bad' OP, that level of simplicity that does my head in, frankly.

He's critical and controlling. If you're ok with that and think your faults are equal then crack on. But don't waste time thinking you can 'fix' it. It's been like this for nearly 20 years, it's not going to change.

What your other thread indicates is that you're aware of the pattern of your parents: you call your mum 'abusive' and your father 'submissive' - and that you and your brother are repeating the pattern in different ways.

Your children may do the same.

Lovelybath

Would you want your boys to treat their wives like you yourself have been treated by your DH?. They are also learning from you both about relationships because you two are the benchmark for their future relationships. What are they learning here?. What did you yourself learn about relationships when growing up from your parents?. Your mother is and was herself critical and I cannot help but think your H is very similar as to how your mother is.

Do you still think about moving into your own wee place?.

I am actually starting to feel criticised on here for wanting to try and deal with this rather than walk away!

There are other ways to deal with things.

Anyway i'm bowing out now as this thread is not helping me now. Please don't post any more. Thanks.

Lovely

Backing off from this thread is certainly within your rights here but it will not help you in the long run. The underlying problems still remain in your marriage regardless of whether you post about it or not.

You have tried unsuccessfully to deal with this for the past 18 years; he is not for changing. Your children are now learning from you about relationships; would you want this sort of a relationship for them as well?. I would hope not actually but their template for relationships is being set here as well.

well, hopefully my children will be able to see the changes I make in terms of how to deal with things, then.

Out of interest have many of the posters on here left relationships? I wonder, or chosen to work on things.

I left after working on it for years. Counselling, other therapy, reading, talkinhmg, listening, giving space, etc.

I think my problem was that he was never fully in it. His own boundaries were crap.

I blamed me, he blamed me. Toxic. I think fundamentally we were deeply incompatible. Other than that we are both decent people. Yeah he hurt me so badly, so so badly. He has to live with that.

I know I did all within my power to help, to accommodate, to understand. I was consistent, fair...such a bloody headfuck.

All the best Op....xx

But what changes have you yourself made in dealing with this critical man you are with?.

You and your H are the template for relationships that your children see, after all we learn about relationships first and foremost from our parents. Your brother seems very unhappy in his relationship as well, he also went on to partner up with someone critical and demanding.

I am not getting at you lovely although you probably think I am, I am just trying to make you think outside your own box which was carefully crafted for you. Your own critical mother has an awful lot to answer for, she taught you a lot of damaging stuff about relationships.

The second question you ask is actually unanswerable but some posters do come back saying that they went onto leave their what they came to realise as being an abusive relationship. They left not simply because of what MN told them but they were given some tools to work with that they did not have before. After all knowledge is power.

I was written to a couple of years afterwards saying that I was correct to write what I did at the time but she was not ready to hear it. She solely made the decision to leave him, I simply gave her some facts and tools to work with.

By dealing with things you seem to mean (and forgive me if I'm wrong) changing your husband's expectations of you. That's impossible for anyone but him to achcieve, which I'm sure you know deep down. Or at least, changing the dynamic between you, which again is impossible unless he is equally as committed to doing the same.

Nonetheless, I think trying hard to change things is probably part of the process of realising that a relationship has become controlling (which yours appears from what you've posted - though clearly that's just a small snapshot of your marriage and might not reflect the whole picture).

May I suggest something? Write down privately what things are really like now and what you're trying to achieve with the techniques you're using, and a date on which you will review the success you've had over the course of a few weeks. If things have improved in line with your aims - fantastic. If they're the same, despite all
the books you read and techniques you implement... (or indeed, have got worse) then commit to doing the freedom programme.

Hope things do well for you.

My husband was a bit like that when we first lived together. It's resulted in him doing the majority of the household chores. I do other stuff but I took the view that if he didn't like the way I do it he can do it himself.
Now if I run the hoover round he appreciates it.
(I do lots of other things - remember birthdays, school stuff etc - we do have a reasonably fair division of labour)

Worked through things 😊
First me only later him too.
I think a relationship takes a little work every day. We have our ups and downs but we try to do one thing each day to make the other persons life easier.
You can't change him, you can only change your own actions and reactions. So that's what I go by. Eventually my reactions changed his actions. We discuss things if somethings wrong and work on our selves rather than focusing on the other person.
I'm always for fixing things unless you don't want to anymore or sometimes there's just nothing left to fix obviously in other scenarios.
@lovely maybe if it was up to mums net I should have walked away years ago... probably yes. And we've had breaksof a few days to get our heads sorted but in the end we've always found back to each other.

Lovely, I may get trashed here for suggesting this but do you and your DH get any time alone together, like a date night? It can be helpful to step away from the role of parents and reconnect as people. What did you like to do together before kids? Or even just a movie and dinner.

I have some of the same dynamics with my DH, he works very hard and I am at home and de facto responsible for the day to day shit. He sends me email reminders of things to do, most of which get done in the routine course and a few don't. One thing I have found helpful is to tell him when something he wants done is so nonimportant to me it will not get done by me, period. He can do it if he likes but I refuse to engage about it.

I don't think your husband sounds awful, I think he sounds like someone getting through everyday life and probably tone deaf to how some of his comments are affecting you, particularly if you haven't really analysed with him how your upbringing has affected you.

Whatever...your example illustrates perfectly what I was trying to say. He changed because he wanted to.

He chose to work with as opposed to against you. That's healthy.

Crafty yes we could do with more time together. It does help.

I was just listening to myself in the kitchen going on "You need to cook that rhubarb before it goes off, I'm not having it rotting away like last time!" and "Remember to take the milk, you always forget it' etc and realised I probably sound critical too! My situation is quite different from what my SIL is like too, he doesn't order me around, get me to check his phone and stuff, odd things like that.

What I do like a lot is how he is with the children, backing me up for example if I'm struggling he backs me up "Listen to your mother' that sort of thing, or just now on the way out reminding them to say goodbye to me when they rushed out, he also has this ability to jolly them into thing like having their hair washed / baths, nails cut etc in a way which I can't seem to, so overall we do have a good partnership, in a similar way I can step in if he is struggling with them and we give each other a break.

So, no, overall I would not 'rather be on my own'- of course all of us at times would love to just go off and leave our family but for me, splitting our family up would be devastating and especially for the children.

By dealing with things you seem to mean (and forgive me if I'm wrong) changing your husband's expectations of you

I think I mean more like thinking before he reverts to going on about small niggling things when he's stressed (which is when it happens) really, I don't think he has very high expectations really. I think he struggles with mess when he is very busy and tired.

We do also talk about the way we behave - which is good like for example this morning he was telling me he happened to find an old email he had sent me when the children were small and it was funny as we were being quite competitive int he way parents of small children can over who was most tired. He said, he was 'really hamming it up' about how hard his work was and we were sort of laughing at how we behaved then...

It all changes doesn't it, it isn't that i've "been dealing with it for 18 years' as someone keeps saying, in fact it's more of a recent thing probably compounded by having children (were were together over ten years previous to that). and in more recent times, stress such as illness etc.

Whatever I think I know what you mean- I find we can mirror each other a bit, like if I get more critical he can do the same, and if I say thank you for something he starts to do the same, not copying but just things can change.

I think you'll find a lot of posters really do know what they're talking about when posting about the dynamic you describe. Not all posters, certainly, but a lot.

What would be your bottom line? If he hit you bcs he's stressed at work /depressed/just lost his mother /war vet/etc would you try to understand and work with that?