Husband more domesticated than me and its making me feel useless and unhappy

[dublinderby34]

Has anyone been with a man that is very domesticated? I know some people would wish for this, and don't get me wrong having a clean house every day is GREAT. but, it comes at a cost. I have had relationship in the past were my partner worked and he would come home and I quite enjoy making a dinner for him, wondering what to make, totally having the decision up to me etc. My partner now is very nit picky, to the point where I don't actually feel good enough or that i bring any value to the house. He (jokingly) will make jokes like "did you vacuum properly this time?" or, "make sure to wash the clothes before bed so they are dry before the morning" etc. This has taken away my thought process so I have actually become lazy. I don't need to think of dinner, I don't really need to clean, I don't think to plan the food shop as he writes the list, I work daily but I find my spark of being the feminine me is a little lost.

Other examples:
I will make the bed, and he will come in from work and re-make it
.
I will come out the bath and leave my clothes on the floor (until I am dressed - maybe an hour later ill tidy up etc) and he will come up and ask why my bra is on the floor

I left a brush on the bed after drying my hair so he came in and put it on my desk next to me while i worked

I walked across the wet grass in the garden (with shoes on) and the cats followed me but walked around on the pavement and he comments 'even the cats are cleaner than you'

I know he is a good person (he is) and would do anything for me in the world, but these constant digs and feeling like I aren't providing and looking after the family how i want to, are making me unhappy. I know I shouldn't value my worth on providing, and doing domesticated things/feeling needed around the house, but that might just be how im wired. I like looking after people/things. he obviously does too, and it takes that away from me. I feel ungrateful to be complaining about this, but i feel really stuck. I see me having kids and not having to do anything, which is amazing i know but i also obviously need to feel.....needed.

perfect dad to our dogs
I wonder if that is true because he seems to already to have banned them from the beach. Did they enjoy going to the beach?
What happens when you want to do something that causes mess?

yes this is exactly him and what he would say. However it’s now affecting me to the point where as I mention I don’t enjoy the things I used too. It’s easier just to follow suit. I do still go to the beach but he always has something to say. I feel restricted. I feel judged for every little move I do. He says my bathroom is discussing but others have said it’s absolutely normal. It’s just these high standards that are makin me feel useless. How do you cope with your partner? Any advice.

I don't get why you think this is about you not having the 'feminine' role, it's all about him being hyper-critical, making unfunny 'jokes' and treating you like the cleaner's assistant. No wonder it doesn't seem an appealing future. I also don't know why you think he's not doing it on purpose, of course it's his purpose to get you to live how he prefers.

This.

Dump. Him - he’s not ‘more domesticated’ - he’s a judgemental supercilious prick. Putting your hairbrush next to you?

‘Oh dear, Nigel, would you mind putting MY hairbrush back where I PUT IT on MY bed? Thanks dickface’

Seriously do not settle for this and PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don’t marry him or have kids with him - it will be a living death.

Why don't you leave him and create a calm and relaxed home for yourself.
Your home life sounds too stressful and it is eating away at your self esteem. He sounds unkind.

but I constantly feel judged. Nothing I do is good enough and it’s not allowing me to embrace qualities that I used to love displaying. Ugh.

However it’s now affecting me to the point where as I mention I don’t enjoy the things I used too. It’s easier just to follow suit. I do still go to the beach but he always has something to say. I feel restricted. I feel judged for every little move I do. He says my bathroom is discussing but others have said it’s absolutely normal.

Come on OP some part of you recognises that this man is subtracting from your life - not adding to it. But because he is good in other ways you feel you should just suck it up. you shouldn't. An old boyfriend came to dinner recently (we are friends as families). He is probably the most decent, kindest man you could meet - and pretty good looking/aged well. I still was right to break up with him decades ago because the two of us together just wouldn't work.

If you want to stay with him start with the sentence I put up first and say it to him and see how he reacts.

You're not compatible. I'm pretty clean and tidy and DH thinks tidying is putting things in piles. I also hate cleaning so to have a partner who not only does it but does it properly and better than me would be amazing, I wouldn't feel like I'm missing anything. If you want to cook certain meals in the week just say that's what you want on the list. If you're shopping for the week you can't just decide what to cook on the day.

One of my best female friends has ADHD and sometimes I go round and her house is chaos I couldn't live like it, others she'll say to me are you proud of me it's all clean and organised! (Semi jokingly) And even then to me it really isn't tidy and organised and I wouldn't be able to relax living there . I don't so I just tell her it's lovely and why don't we have a glass of wine and relax after her hard work. We are compatible as friends but wouldn't be compatible to live together. I would say my levels of clean and tidy are about average. I have some super neat, hinch type friends and that's definitely not me either!

He doesn't sound like a good person.

You sound quite desperate and also a bit brainwashed. I don't mean that to sound nasty, more that I feel you know something is not ok but you've also normalised his behaviour to such an extent that you're deflecting the issue onto 'I don't have an opportunity to be the giver'.

You know that's not what it is though, right?

OP I completely and 100% understand. I get it. Me and my husband were very similar at one point. I also have ADHD, however we are also fairly certain DH is on the autistic spectrum. He likes his routine, he does things a certain way and to a high standard, and he is inflexible in his thinking so finds it hard to accept there are other ways (and standards) of doing things that are just as acceptable. I find I need a spurt of motivation to get things done which isn't always timed perfectly. He has to do things as he goes along and finishes every single job properly before he does something else. My way results in a bit of mess. His way results in a beautiful clean house but holds us all to ridiculous standards and often pisses me off if I'm left sorting the kids while he goes around doing jobs that could wait.
I felt endlessly not good enough. At one point I was in the park with my toddler, he drove past and looked out for me in the park and phoned me from the car to tell me off for letting toddler put her hands on the dirty bin.
I separated from him, and because I was pregnant with our second child we agreed to some relationship counselling which helped massively. It helped him work on his issues and helped us find compromises that we both felt happy with. I understood the root of why he needed things doing a certain way, and he was more accepting of my ways, and now we work as a team rather than it feeling like a parent and child.

Feel free to message me if you think it would help I'm happy to chat and share some of the strategies if you think it would help xxx

He can't breast feed. You're one up there.

If he devotes himself to tidying up after a toddler, you can messy play and be the fun parent to your heart's delight. If he complains you are prioritising his sensory/emotional development and raising a kid, not a house.

But you might find he doesn't have so much to say after doing early mornings with a baby.

I think you also need to tell him that he's coming across very passive aggressive. His care doesn't need to come with put downs attached
He's not speaking to you respectfully. I could not bear to be with such a controlling person actually. You could try standing up to him?

He's horrible.

I just wouldn't let a man speak to me like that.

Why is your self esteem so low?

You're incompatible and need to split.

I lived with a person like you for a very short while when very young. Clothes on a floor for an hour? Yep. Like why the fuck would you even do that? Don't you have laundry baskets? Why dump them on the floor and not in the basket? And then leave your dirty shit draped all over the floor for other person to find? It's disgusting. Aaanyway. I was very young and didn't know better, so stayed with him and started hating him more and more every day. And behaved just like your partner does: snide remarks, contempt, the lot. Eventually I left him. Didn't wait long, though.

Nowadays I wouldn't do that, the whole thing wouldn't pass dating stage.

You need to find someone just as messy as you are.

My ex put the dishes in the dishwasher one time in the twelve years we were married and I actually had a guilty conscience over that.
I cannot believe the brainwashing my mother put me through.
No more.
@dublinderby34 if your MerryMaid DH wants to keep the house, put your feet up on the coffee table, crack open a lager and scratch yourself.
Be a man.

Ugh I was once married to a man like this, he was a control freak and made me feel useless, if I cleaned he would go behind me cleaning, if I wanted to make a cup of tea, he wouldn't let me he had to do it, if I was off and he was working I'd make dinner and he would come home and be annoyed then proceed to pull every appliance off the counter and clean the entire kitchen. Needless to say we're no longer together

He sounds like a black hole where all spontaneity and joy gets sucked into never to be seen again.

This!!! Everything I do is picked apart. But he genuinely is a nice guy. Did you ever figure out what the reason was behind it? I don’t even know if they realise it.

Well that’s the issue, I don’t want to feel like the dude. I get satisfaction out of looking after things and people I guess. Sad I know.

He would be very strict with kids. Set strict bed times. Only play with toys in certain hours, in certain rooms. He does this with the dogs. They aren’t allowed upstairs sometimes even tho all they do is sit in there dog bed, upstairs?! It kind of doesn’t feel, free.

This is nothing to do with him being 'domesticated' or the stereotypical gender roles being switched up.

He's just a controlling joy sponge of an arsehole. And you're unhappy, and limiting your life because of it.

You cope with people like this by realising they are the problem, not you, and going your separate ways.

@dublinderby34 I'm only like it with things in the house, anything outside of the house I'm 'normal'. So in terms of how I cope with my partner, I tell him politely, I will not lose my rag over it unless I have to ask two/three times, which I think would irritate anyone regardless whether they have OCD or not.
I do get unreasonably stressed about the displacement of things, for example, he will throw his towel on the floor and leave it there whilst it's soaking wet and this will infuriate me, because there's no need for it - my brain thinks, there's a perfectly good towel rail to hang it on.
Another example, he will leave his shoes at the front door, even though we have a shoe cupboard, or wash plates up and leave them on the side or use the hairdryer but won't put it away.
When you have OCD, things that wouldn't annoy the atypical person, annoys 'us'. We don't like mess, otherwise it feels like our 'life' is a mess, and you can get irrationally angry over it, that's the only way I can put it.
Has he been checked for OCD? There are ways to learn to live with it like I have, I've learnt not everyone works the same as me, and it's ok.
The way he speaks to you though OP, isn't ok and you need to speak to him about this, I do not speak to my partner in this way, but I will express it makes me uncomfortable and I'd appreciate it if he could make more of a conscious effort for both our sakes.

@dublinderby34 my ex was also a nice guy, he was honest, loyal would do anything for me but was too ocd I felt like a child living with my parents again, I think he was like that because his dad left when he was young and his mother worked a lot to provide so he had to take care of the house from a young age, but that's only an assumption I don't know. I do also think it's genuine ocd and no matter how good a job someone does if it's not done their way it's wrong, I do understand this as I can be quiet particular about certain things such as at my job I'd rather do things myself than let others help and mess it up. It was horrible to break up with him, this wasn't the only issue I did feel like there was no affection or even a relationship anymore it was just living together so that made my decision definite, I dont regret it as I truly hope he will find someone who will love those qualities about him. It just depends if you can look past this as I don't believe you can change this, also not sure if you have children but how would you feel if they were all proud trying to help clean and he made comments like that?

OCD and perfectionism.

The mean part is only because they're having to do something again "properly" or they don't understand why you're making a "mess."

I have the perfectionism part but luckily not the OCD. So I understand it to some degree. I'm forever redoing/correcting things other people have done, although the things are important (e.g. correcting someone's wrong numbers before we file the wrong amount with HMRC), not moving a hairbrush.

Nah, he's not sweetly domesticated, he's a controlling dickhead.

My DH is a neat freak. He also has bags of energy and can’t sit still. And he absolutely loves food and cooking. This means he does the lions share of the domestic tasks in the house.

He will very occasionally mention it. Just light hearted, taking the piss. I tell him to fuck off. Every. Single. Time.

My DH cleans the house, makes the dinner and doesn’t stop because he wants to. He does it for him, not me. I am not grateful. I don’t pat him on the back and I rarely thank him.

You need to do the same to your DP. He’s not your boss, how dare he tell you how to live in your own home.

I think he may have obessive compulsive disorder...does he repeat things or double checks....may need help if so...to accept disorder thats it it is of course...i myself double check if all wall sockets not needed to be on to be switched off...safer.....in my case goes back to house fire.....but you can work through it...just try your own bit..and do.....see how you go