Is DH's sulking, misery, obstruction actually control & manipulation?

[SanPelli]

We have lived as ex-pats in Europe for many years, came back to the uk which is my home from time to time in between DH’s work contracts. We have four teen dc, all very settled since we’ve been back here 3 years now. DH doesn’t like being in the UK, and never has. He is Austrian, and though doesn’t want to go back to Austria, he wants to live elsewhere in Europe. We are renting at the moment and the plan was always to buy a house. Every time we go to view a property DH is miserable and says ‘it’s boring, it’s not like Copenhagen” we go out shopping he’s the same “Copenhagen is so much better” we go out to eat, walk, he says the same. He knows me an dc are not going to move again given their ages, and accepts this on one level, but his regular reactions are getting to me. He sometimes won’t verbally say it (after I asked him not to) but will just roll his eyes, and it’s obvious even to dc what he means. If there’s anything bad in the news crime wise, again he says the same. I know statistically he is correct about some of the facts. But this is so wearing, and he just won’t stop. I just don’t know what to do. It’s affecting how I feel about him now, and I find it so childish for a man in his mid-fifties. He is free to go an live where he wants, we’ve had that conversation, but he wants everyone to go with him. Which is never going to happen. We need to move house to be closer dc school, and my work, and this has become such an obstacle. I don't know if he's trying to control us or what, nor do I know how to get things moving forward. Thank you for your opinions and thoughts in advance.

Can you afford to buy with just your wage? If you can then I'd be looking at suitable properties with the children. Then explain that this was happening and if he didn't like it then he had 2 options. Opt in or out

Thank you @Theluggagerules
I can afford to do that if we split the money we have, all our finances are pooled together, including the money we have from the house we sold many years ago. But as soon as a try to have a conversation about that DH disengages and it doesn't go further. I have tried to talk about how we could split what we have so I can buy somewhere, but he just won't talk about it.

Well you don't actually need to have the conversation with him, especially as you've already tried. You just go ahead and start doing it. You don't need his permission to split/divorce.

You are doing the right thing, by the way. My parents really fucked up my two brothers and my education (and childhood) by continually moving us around the world for my father's job. It only stopped when my mother decided she wanted to buy a house in the UK...she didn't do it for our benefit. My younger brother ended up leaving school with no qualifications at all.

@sianiboo thank you, that is my fear, my oldest didn't get any gcse's and is nearly 18 having had a turbulent journey through education. I strongly believe it has set him back.

I know I don't need his permission to split up, but I do need him to discuss the money side of things with me. But I guess if he won't it's mediation, and if he won't do that then it's court. A long road ahead. The thing is he won't express what he will and won't do, totally ambivalent.

His passive aggressive, no communication way is actually both very controlling and very insulting, really. He's hoping if he basically ignores the problem - and you - it will go away and the status quo will continue.

Very very selfish. My father didn't like my mother's home country (where myself and my younger brother were born) but as a family we were far better off there than in the UK. We went back and forth 4 times between them...first my father got his way, then my mother, rinse and repeat. Little thought given on how it was affecting their children.

I know I don't need his permission to split up, but I do need him to discuss the money side of things with me. But I guess if he won't it's mediation, and if he won't do that then it's court. A long road ahead. The thing is he won't express what he will and won't do, totally ambivalent.

Maybe it's time to put yourself in the driving seat and stop waiting for him to engage; think carefully about what you really want/need for yourself and your dcs and then start quietly powering ahead (begin by talking to a good solicitor). It probably will be a long road so the sooner it's started the better.

Good luck.

If you didn't want passive aggressive and not communicating then you shouldn't have told him you didn't want to hear him! You shut him down. Then you complain that he won't talk about the things that you want to.

He is obviously really unhappy living here but really wants to be with his family and is desperate for you to see that the UK isn't that great. You just don't seem that bothered on him to be honest. I don't know how you can both be happy, I guess all you can do is talk to him about putting the kids and their education first and see if that helps.

More than anything it’s really rude. He doesn’t respect you enough to even have these conversations. I’d crack on, with of without him.

@Choconut

I didn't tell him I don't want to hear him period. I'm very happy to talk about anything with him. I only asked him to accept we weren't going to move and to stop saying "xyz is better in Copenhagen" to everything we do. He was saying it all day long in every situation. He even told me his reason for doing so was to try and make me change my mind, and cave in.

He is unhappy living here and wants to be with his family but only in Copenhagen. I can't work there, I have a specific qualification which isn't transferable unless I can speak Danish at a very. high level.

Sadly, if he values being with his own family, instead of his wife and children then it speaks volumes.

sadly whilst he thought being in Europe was great, was the education that good if your eldest has no qualifications from any country?

Be very careful if you want to divorce OP.

Various countries in Europe have a lot less protection for the lower earner than we do here in England and wales.

So if you moved to Copenhagen, then got a divorce there you may be significantly worse off compared to if you got j divorced here.

It could be that he wants to do that. I've heard weirder things. If you're in any doubt go to solicitor with your marriage contract immediately and get them to issue proceedings here.

It's very passive aggressive and seems it's reached a point where you might have to divorce if he won't allow you and the dc some stability to deal with the fallout of moving around for his career/wants.

I think things like criminal “control and manipulation” are greatly overstated here on Mumsnet where everyone who is a mild dick or a bit butch can be diagnosed as some abuser.

No I don’t think rolling your eyes and passive agressive comments are abusive manipulation - he’s just being an arsehole and you should call it out.

I can see both sides, but is neither of you willing to consider a compromise? Otherwise divorce might be the only option.

Right now he seems extremely miserable in the UK, which I can understand makes him very unhappy, but it sounds like he is just told nope, a move not happening, so he continues to be miserable. I think personally it's unfair to paint him as abusive in some way for trying to express his frustration in the only limited way that is available to him (especially as he's told go then, but we divorce, or stay. Bit of an extreme option, he obviously doesn't want to divorce).

His obsession with Copenhagen seems a bit out there, though, and obviously as you say, you can't work there. If there's a way of genuinely both sitting down with a list of other potential places that would end the impasse? Why doesn't he want to move back to his home country?