Husband picking at me for being boring. Feels teenage.

[aggycaggy]

My husband has commented a few times about how I've stopped drinking and he misses drinking with me. After 2 years of back to back pregnancies when I wasn't pregnant anymore I realised I didn't miss it, I've found alcohol free gin and tonics to be just as nice and none of the ill effects, I like fruity 0% ciders in the summer, know how to make nice mocktails etc I just don't feel like I'm missing out. I don't see why it makes any difference to him if we're sat having a drink and a chat and he has a real G&T and I have an alcohol free one. They are in the same glasses, you make them the same, I am still the same person. It's annoying me how it's like I'm less cool in his eyes for not wanting alcohol and I don't want to feel pressured into drinking, we aren't teenagers

He also compared it to how I no longer eat meat, again I bought a couple of meat substitutes every now and then to start with but then actually realised some of them are just as nice and meat and I'm doing my bit for animals/the environment so I feel better about it and again don't feel like I'm missing out. I don't go on about it or force it on him.

He then started saying about how I used to like cool music and now I listen to 'chart shit'. I was singing along to a song on the radio.. I still like the same music I liked when we met but yes I do like some chart music, not every song in the charts is rubbish and to me it's quite immature to judge people for liking anything in the charts, it seems like he's insinuating he's better because he doesn't, too cool for the charts type of thing..

It just feels really teenage and weird. He isn't some cool guy I'm trying to impress. We're married and have kids and if I can't make my own decisions and be myself as I age as opposed to staying the exact same as I was when we met then what are we even doing?

And yes

I can’t comment on the meat substitute thing but I am so glad that when I stopped drinking my husband was pleased for me.

We still go out to good restaurants and talk into the night and laugh with each other and get home and have a lovely shag!

It would have been so shit if he was that insecure that he thought my choosing a ginger beer spoilt any element of HIS evening. We did get pissed together in our twenties but it wasn’t more fun than our time together now. Alcohol is a poison - it’s a disinfectant, it’s even key in the petrol you put in your car. It directly kills around 10,000 people a year in this country and far more die from “alcohol related” deaths. Imagine your partner sulking and calling you boring because you don’t want to shoot up!

Everyone has the right in their relationship to choose not to drink for any reason at all - and not be sneered at by someone who has such low self esteem that he needs alcohol to have fun. In my view if I needed to have a drink to have fun with my husband I would seriously need a new husband.

I totally agree with you.

If you’re twenty maybe. Pressurising others to drink to validate their own need to drink in order to have a good time are very immature and are perhaps too reliant on alcoholic replacing an actual personality,

I have a friend who used to be fun until she started being "influenced" by "influencers" into being "her best self" ... it was like she'd joined a cult: yoga, vegan, a heavy burden of social conscience, etc. Not judging me for not doing the same was part of the purity. All a bit Stepford Wives. Is it possible your husband is trying to say something along these lines? Singing along with hits on the radio might come across as more evidence of you becoming more and more brainwashed, if that's how he's feeling! 😉

Exactly what I thought...

I agree with this and I say that as a person who has stopped drinking. It really changes the dynamic and what was once "our thing" is no longer a thing at all. We do go out and dh drinks. He still drinks at home. I'm fine with it but we've lost an element of end of week / weekend away bonding. It doesn't outweigh the benefits for me though so it is what it is.

Both those things directly affect him.
Unless he also becomes vegetarian, then you are now unable to share the same meal each evening. As well as being one less shared pleasure, I imagine it is also a logistical change because two meals have to be prepared or he has to eat food he doesn't like as much.
And not enjoying an alcolic drink together is again, one less shared pleasure. Despite what so many of you are saying, there is pleasure to be had in the feeling that alcohol gives you. It relaxes and reduces inhibitions. A couple of glasses of wine FEEL good and having them alone is NOT the same!

You are absolutely entitled to make whatever changes you like and to eat and drink whhatever you like but he is also entitled to feel the loss of those shared pleasures.

I've given up drinking for unconnected health reasons, (dermatology) and it does render most of life one long admin blur if I am honest.

Oh for goodness sake. The flipside of this is that you can Never Change your life in anyway in case it gives your partner the sulks.

I ate almost no carbs for 2 years (health reasons). Dh having mashed potatoes or noodles didn't make any difference to our relationship and I didn't catch him wistfully staring into the middle distance musing on the glory days when we both ate chips.

I find people who have a problem with others not drinking very strange and controlling! I very rarely drink and have no issues with others having a drink yet people always seem to be uncomfortable that im not drinking!

Part of the issue is that you've changed, and clearly not in the way that he likes.

The dietary changes really can make a difference in a couple, especially if one person cuts out meat completely or becomes vegan.

The drinking thing - he misses his drinking buddy. I don't like getting drunk and could happily live without alcohol for the rest of my life, but I do understand why someone would miss having an occasional drinking buddy in their partner.

The chart thing though? I like some really obscure music, but I also like some chart songs. Doesn't everyone? Is liking the same music something that you used to share?

I feel for you OP. Even though I sympathise with some of what he might be feeling, you also should be allowed to develop and not feel like you have to be a crystallised version of your 25 year old self forever.

I'm also with @BusterGonad on the drinking thing. So much of what we do socially in the UK is centred around eating and drinking - if one person starts doing those things differently, it does affect the dynamic. It's no longer a shared pleasure and when couples no longer have shared pleasures, things that reinforce their bond, it's not good for the relationship. It's not really about the alcohol as such.

OP, you will be having a different experience to your dh if you are both out and only one of you has a drink. I think what your dh is clumsily saying is that he fears you are growing in different directions.
He's going about it in a twatty way though.

MN can be really up it's own arse about drinking - it's a normal thing in the UK and it doesn't mean we are all secret alcoholics or co-dependent!

It's not really about the alcohol as such

Then why does it matter if she has an alcohol free drink?

MN can be really up it's own arse about drinking - it's a normal thing in the UK and it doesn't mean we are all secret alcoholics or co-dependent!

It's only people who drink that get so aggressive about people who don't drink though. I think people see it as an implied criticism of their own drinking. It really shouldn't matter what your partner chooses to eat or drink.

This. Await The Script.

@Stugs, as I said in my post, it matters because it's about the shared experience.
I also think that plenty of non drinkers on this thread have been quite aggressive towards drinkers, with their accusations of co-dependency and alcoholism.

Well, tbf it is the very definition of co-dependent if you find someone else's dietary choices triggering because you feel that it impacts you.

The shared experience - so if she has a 0% g and t and he has a full fat g and t, is that not a shared experience? If you say no it isn't then it absolutely must be about the alcohol....

It Is aboutvthe alcohol! We have said that! Alcohol makes you feel nice! It gives you a buzz, makes you more relaxed and never enjoying that with your life partner is a shared pleasure lost. Nobody has said that it isn't aboutcthe alcohol.

Missing that shared pleasure doesn't make us co dependent alcoholics

I'm not in the UK, I'm quite a few hours ahead, once again you've judged me on the little knowledge you have of me. I do find you boring in afraid, the same old boring droning on about anyone who likes a drink must be an alcoholic, dependent etc etc. Same old boring spill. Yawn.

I like alternative, indie and post punk. But I'm not blinkered and stuck in the past and like any chart music that I feel sounds good to me and won't apologise for it.
He's actually probably the one who is stuck in his past youth and not progressed, moved with the times and adapted. That is less cool in my book.

I find drunk people quite boring, just as they probably find me boring. I just think that sober people and drinking people aren't on the same wavelength. Neither is right nor wrong, and neither can claim to be better, more interesting or having more fun.

I stopped drinking over a year and a half ago and my husband still drinks. It’s made no difference to our relationship. In fact I reckon he likes always having a designated driver!

I don’t know if you know but you can go all the same places and do the same things without drinking alcohol. Presumably it’s more than alcohol that makes your nights out enjoyable? If it is just the alcohol you may as well sit at home and booze there.