Is he being oversensitive or am I cold?

[SmashingTurnips]

Don't know what to think.

Been married for 20 years. Lots of ups and downs. Things not great at the moment. I'm perimenopausal and struggling with it. Things I used to put up with in my DH now seem to really get on my nerves.

I worked from home today and went out for a run at about 6pm. Came back and DH's car was in the drive but he wasn't in the house. I assumed he'd gone for a run or walk. DD2 was home and doing homework.

I left the house again to pick up DD1 from bus stop. Passed DH in the drive and we said hello and I asked if he'd had a good run.

In the car DD1 asked if we could go to the shop for something. I didn't have my purse so stopped by the house to get it. DD2 decided to come to the shop too. We left and I didn't say anything to DH because I thought he was in the shower.
As we were getting onto the car he appeared on the driveway looking a bit put out.
I said we're just nipping to the shop do you want to come / need anything.

He went back into the house obviously put out.

We got back from the shop (15 mins max) and I continued getting dinner ready (I had left it in the middle of things to go to the bus stop / shop).

Everyone was upstairs.

After about 30 - 40 mins when dinner was ready I went up to see if they were ready for it.

DH was lying on the dark on our bed. He was upset with me and said that he was incredulous that I hadn't come up before and that I was cold and uncaring.

I was annoyed and wasn't really having that and said I was cooking tea for goodness sake. Why would I go upstairs to check on a grown man.

He didn't come down for dinner and said that he thinks our relationship is in a bad way.

I think he is probably right about our relationship but I felt totally suffocated by his behaviour.

I ate dinner with the children. He came down once they were in bed and sat sighing on his computer in the kitchen. I sat staring into space for a while in the living room and then left in the car to just get away and breathe. I told him what I was doing so that he wouldn't worry.

Don't really know what I'm asking on this thread but just needed to get it out.

Thanks for reading and commenting anyone.

And also I think because he couldnt get to you last night and you stood up to him he has turned on your daughter and given her a telling off for no reason and that is truly awful behaviour

I don't think you should take responsibility for this by blaming your hormones

I was thinking this as I read your OP. Is this something he has said to you, that you're hormonal? Because it seems to me that you are just fed up of his behaviour and no longer want to live with it.
I think women in general as they get older do put up with less shit from partners. I certainly look back to my early 20s and wish I'd had the benefit of experience that 40 year old me has. Things would have been very different.

I saw this happen in my mum and dads marriage. My mum got to her 40s and thought no, I'm not going to do everything any more. We were older, she got a job, a relevant degree and she really excelled in it. My dad had to step up or I think the relationship would have been over. He wasn't a bad man, but like most men of his generation had had everything done for him by his mum then his wife and was used to having his own way. His life changed, his relationship changed but they are still very much together and in love in their late 70s. I think you are at a point now where he either grows with you or you will outgrow the relationship.

XiCi thanks again for your comments, this is all really making me think.

No, DH definitely hasn't said anything to me about hormones. It's me that thinks this is about where I am in life.

By that I mean that I have done a lot to keep the peace over the years. And now I can't be arsed to do it anymore and I'm saying stuff or not bending to the way he wants things to be and so we are having disagreements. I think over the years I've let a lot of things slide in order to keep the peace because he's not good at compromise.

Coming to what you said about telling DD off for no reason - I agree it's shitty behaviour and I struggle with that.
He's got certain "things" that he's a real stickler for and he's very black and white in his thinking about them and imposes them on the household.
For example saying hello in the morning and good night in the evening.

Whilst I agree that manners and courtesy are important I also think that sometimes it's OK to be half awake and forget. And it doesn't have to be a big deal. And maybe you can remind a child with a cheery "good morning" rather than a bit of a telling off.

We've just had another stupid falling out. Sometimes one of the DDs cleans the cars to get some extra pocket money. We have generally given them a fiver for a car.

DD1 spent ages doing my car which is quite big and didn't finish before dark so didn't do DHs car (which is fine and neither of us is bothered it was more about her having something to do outside not on a screen because we are lockeddown).

When she was about halfway through she came into the kitchen for a drink and said it was taking a while and she suggested that cleaning the big car might be worth more than the smaller one.

I idly said, maybe, why not. Perhaps I can pay you for doing mine and daddy can pay you for doing his and if you argue your case I might give you a bit more. That was it, it was a 30 second conversation.

I didn't think anymore of it and then I heard DH and DD talking about it later on. I don't know how they got onto the subject but she must have said something about me maybe giving her more and he started to give her a hard time. He was saying that an agreement is an agreement and that it's out of order to then try to change it.
I understand what he was saying about an agreement but it was hardly like they'd drawn up a binding contract and I didn't actually know that a price had been set in stone. DD2 is 14 now so maybe it's OK for us to change stuff and give her a couple more quid for something than we gave her when she was younger.

So he was getting on his moral high horse and giving her a hard time and she was getting annoyed because I had basically said to her that she could get a bit more and now it felt unfair to her.

So I went down to say "look don't give DD a hard time she asked for more and I said, why not. It's not something to make a big deal out of".

Then he got all high horsey with me saying again that an agreement is an agreement and that I was trashing "family rules" (whatever the fuck they are). I asked him to just listen for a second so that I could explain that for me and DD it wasn't a big deal and it wasn't going behind his back or anything else - we just didn't see it that way.

As usual he wasn't very good at listening to someone else's point of view and continued to treat as a big deal (his DD going back on an agreement and his wife undermining him I guess in his mind).

To me it all just feels ridiculous and totally out of proportion. But I'm not willing to back down or put up with it. So I told him I thought it was unnecessary to make such a fuss and then I couldn't be arsed with it. He had another go at making his point (thanks but no thanks love I think you've made it). At which point I said I couldn't be fucking arsed with such nonsense and left the room. We were supposed to be going out together briefly to drop something off at his mum's house but I said I wasn't going to go with them as I needed some time alone.

To me this is exactly like the shop thing. I get his point but I disagree with how he makes it and I disagree with there being no room for adjustment or compromise.

Again it is petty and ridiculous. Such drama over a couple of quid and the cleaning of the car. But to him it seemed to be a "life lesson" on the values of an agreement for DD.

He's like this about a lot of things - giving them an importance that they just don't have for me. Which is OK - it's OK to see things differently but I don't think it is OK to think that everyone has to go along with your version.

It all feels very "head of the household" to me and I'm not having it. So we argue about stupid things.

I think you are at a point now where he either grows with you or you will outgrow the relationship.

Yes. I just wanted to tell him to bloody grow up just now.

It's so frustrating because he's not a bad person.

His family are all a bit like this.

It sounds like you need a big reset button to push, to get past this petty day to day stuff. It sounds like a constant spiral of silliness, it must be so wearing.

Counselling might be a good option. He does seem quite inflexible and childish in the examples you gave, but nothing world shattering. Maybe some improved communication and assistance to see the other point of view could help?

Thanks for replying. Yes it is wearing. And I don't like it for the children.

I agree it's not world shattering behaviour and I hear so much worse on here. He's not a bad person.

But it does often feel like when we disagree I have 2 choices. Either I go along with what he wants or it has to turn into an argument / drama / big deal. And there is no guarantee that some sort of compromise will come out of the argument.

Very often I don't bother to have the argument because I find it unpleasant and destructive. But if I don't have the argument it feels like I'm being a bit submissive.

Arrange a session of joint marriage counselling sessions and take it from there. It might just be communication or it might be that you have grown apart. It’s not unusual in a marriage.

I read on one of the threads in Feminist Chat once that as your hormone levels drop the scales fall from your eyes and you suddenly the all the male entitlement and misogyny around you. I'm partly joking but maybe there is an element of that!

I think there is an element of that. I'm less willing to submit to his will or to bother trying to manage to disagree in ways that are acceptable to him.

He's full of principles about things that I think are a bit unnecessary and then nags me and the kids about them. And if we disagree with a principle that he holds that is A Problem. But why is his position or principle automatically the right or valid one? And god he can go on and on about stuff. So we tune out and disengage with what he's saying.

We probably do need counselling. I think I'm afraid to go in case I found out that want I really want is for him to be a rather different person.

I started dating again after a long marriage, I’m now with a partner of five years. It amazes me what I find really irritating now but didn’t when I was younger. I find a lot of men and society very misogamist yet in my 20s and 30s I didn’t. I don’t put up BS anymore especially from my partner yet I did when I was younger. What I’m trying to say is perhaps you have changed and he hasn’t.

He does sound particularly insufferable over "small stuff" does he not realise that he is going to drive you and the DC away???

That's interesting Coffeeandcocopops.

I think you are right. It's me who's changed. I'm not very proud of digging my heels in about some pretty petty stuff. But I don't want to just defer to keep the peace.

I think I'm also a bit irritated by him liking the sound of his own voice a bit too much. And it's making me intolerant.

I've been with him for a long time and I don't really know anymore what's "normal" or healthy or what's OK to not want.

I feel like he talks a lot and he probably feels that I don't really listen and would often rather watch telly than talk.

How much do people talk in their relationships? For example DH will often tell me about something he's read or seen that he found interesting and I feel a combination of frustration with having to listen to him recount in a little too much detail and with a bit too much conviction that he's telling me something really incredible / guilt for being a bit disinterested in what he's saying.

He spent a while recounting a TED talk he'd seen to me today that had been really interesting to him and a bit of a revelation. Within about a minute I realised that he was talking about dissociation and how people do it in reaction to trauma. I'm glad he's discovered the concept and finds it interesting but it's not something new to me and I wasn't able to feign interest in his recounting for very long. I don't know how to turn that kind of thing into a conversation where we can say "ah yeah that's an interesting thing that we agree on" rather than him going on about it and me watching the clock. It does feel like I'm being rather mean. Aaahhhhh. I'm turning round in circles again now.

RandomMess - that's exactly how it feels to me "insufferable over small stuff".

I imagine to him it feels like I'm slack about everything. Which I probably am. I'm not a very strict parent but I don't feel the need to be. Our DC are good girls. They do well in school, they keep their rooms nice, they are polite and kind. They pitch in with chores. They converse with us, we generally eat together at the table except when we decide to have Saturday night dinner on trays in front of the telly whilst we watch a film we've chosen together. What's there to be strict about?

(I mean in everyday living. I'm not talking about parties / alcohol / drugs / and all the other scary teenage stuff that we all have to navigate.)

The black and white thinking and obsession with rules that Must Not Ever Be Broken Or Changed is incredibly wearing - it's called cognitive rigidity, and it isn't a healthy trait. If you love him and you want to work on it, you will need counselling together, but he will also need counselling on his own so that he can develop healthier ways of managing his thoughts.

It does sound like you've got the "ick"...

We've been together 20 years, late 40s, definitely peri and DH though far from perfect doesn't irritate me like that...

He talks at me about Footie 🙄 but he will often start with "I know you're not interested but..."
😂😂 although he's an introvert and I usually am fairly interested in chatting to him about random crap?

DH is far more easy going than me and we both try to be chill about the teenagers??

I always say we've rubbed the corners off each other and are in agreement about most things. Kind of a "life is too short" attitude...

I have a few friends that are more similar to your DH and I am far less tolerant of them than when I was younger, one is a colleague that believes she is right about everything and honestly WFH has made it easier to cope

OP, the reason you’re so fed up of this is because it betrays your H’s real attitude to your relationship, which is that he’s in charge and you must obey. He has double standards and does things himself that he has a go at you and the DC for, and he undermines your parenting if he hasn’t been consulted. The reason he threw a tantrum when you went to the shop is not because you went to the shop, it’s because he feels like his dominance is being undermined on a regular basis and the fact that you just went out without telling or consulting him has caused his resentment to boil over.

You could try counselling for the two of you but attitudes of superiority are not something you can shift with a few sessions with Relate. It’s a core belief that he has that he is in charge and that’s much harder to shift. You said yourself you used to placate him all the time and that has had clear benefits for him, namely that he gets to be king of the castle, and sadly for him now your DDs are past the age of worshipping daddy and you’re past the age of being the compliant little wife he’s feeling the loss of these benefits. That’s why he’s being an arse, basically because he feels the loss of status and the benefits that come with it.

I have no idea what if anything you can do about this. My instinct tells me nothing but you can try. It depends what you’re willing to live with and whether he’s willing to curb it enough to make it bearable. Experience tells me however that now you’ve seen this side to him you’re going to find it very difficult to ignore it when it shows itself, and you’ll be more sensitive to the ways it manifests itself going forward. Good luck thoug, I hope he’s sensible enough to realise what it’ll cost him if he doesn’t get his head out of his backside.

You've got the ick.

He won't change.

Is this how you want to spend the rest of your life?

You sound lovely and chilled. Go be free x

God he sounds like my father growing up. Histrionics if he didn’t get his own way, bizarre emphasis on certain family rules, huffing and stropping and ruining family holidays. As a daughter I was outraged by his behaviour and we fought constantly. My DM tried to keep the peace and put up with a lot of crap until I left home (also when she hit menopause interestingly) and then she told him to change or she’d leave. And you know what? He did change. It took a while and my DH only saw one of my father’s freak outs on holiday recently - he hadn’t really believed in them before I think. But I actually have a great relationship with him now. He’s wonderful with his grandkids. Don’t give up on your DH just yet, even though he sounds utterly infuriating. People can change and my DH is nothing like my DF fortunately.

Just reading this is making me irritated...

Frankly it just sounds like two people who are trying to score points and behaving in a rather immature manner rather than trying to communicate about what bothers them.

Not a good sign though. I would not want to live in this environment for long. It sounds mind-numbingly tedious for both sides...

You just seem very irritated with him and I can understand why.
I definitely agree that as you get older, you have no tolerance for other people thinking they're always right.