Please can someone tell me how bad this sounds? Am I making a big deal of nothing?

[JimCharke]

I have posted about my marriage under another name and NC for this as I just want to ask about this one thing, separately.

DH and I have various issues but a big one is sleep. Around 2022, he started snoring, big time. It would wake me up and then I couldn't get back to sleep, meaning I had to go to work often on 3h sleep.

I talked to him about this many times but he brushed it off. He didn't seem to think it was an issue.

Meantime, I got more and more desperate. I started to feel ill. One day at work, I realised I couldn't feel one side of my face. In fact, it turned out to be a tension headache but at the time, I thought it might be a stroke.

That evening I broke down in tears and said I couldn't live with so little sleep. He finally seemed to get it, and we borrowed an old camping mattress and I started sleeping on the living room floor. At first, it was a relief just not to have the snoring.

But soon, I felt resentful. The living room floor was not comfortable. I began to get pains in my hips from sleeping on the thin camp mattress. I started to say to DH I wanted to look at different solutions. He wouldn't engage.

Not only that, but he made me feel really shitty about it by huffing and eye rolling if I suggested I didn't like the camping mattress arrangement. He would do things that wound me up, probably out of proportion, like when I had set my bed up for the evening, sitting in his chair and propping his feet up on my pillow.

This went on for 15 months before I massively lost it with him and told him he HAD to swap sometimes so I could sleep in a normal bed or I'd leave.

Now, we are in a different house. I have my own room (which DH didn't like) with a normal bed. But I can't get this period of our relationship out of my head. I feel it has shown me that DH deep down does not care about my needs and I cannot rely on him.

How would you feel? Am I over-dramatic? I'm feeling really raw right so if you think I'm wrong, please be nice.

What a selfish cunt.

He sounds very selfish.
I wouldn't be able to get past this, either.

Divorce seems to be your solution. Or would the two of you go to joint counselling?

I couldn’t forget that either! Now you’ve had some sleep and able to think straight what are you going to do about it?

Is he overweight? Did they check for sleep apnea?
He's an arse.

My partner refuses to even believe he snores. We now sleep in separate rooms.

I'd get relationship counselling, it would help you to talk about it. There's some unresolved hurt, it will help you understand each other better.

It does seem pretty selfish all of this, like "well the snoring isn't affecting me so why would i be open to taking medication, sleeping on a camp bed or being open to other resolutions?"

@Whatachliche

I could have written what you did.

Every single word.

Yes, it is bad as it sounds. Selfish behaviour. I totally understand how distressing this must have been for you. I had a similar issue with my DH about fifteen years ago. We had a newborn who didn’t sleep and his snoring would just about tip me over the edge. It made me very resentful. However , my DH could see this so promptly took himself to GP and got himself sorted with a CPAP. He wasn’t thrilled about it but recognised it was a health issue that affected me just as much as him. You deserve the same respect.

Mack’s silicone ear plugs work brilliantly. No one can help snoring - my late husband was a nightmare 😮

Not sure I would get past it either OP. He's shown himself to be a selfish shit who doesn't care about your heath or mental wellbeing.

That is awful, no kindness, no communication.

Hi @Whatachliche how are you getting on?

@Whatachliche so it's weird, right, in some ways he is the opposite of toxic masculinity, he is a hands-on dad and went PT when the kids were really little and is now on a career break so at home FT, though that won't be forever.

But I have to admit I see little signs, yes. One thing was, he used to insist on doing all the cooking - which sounds like an absolute dream - but he would often cook things I didn't like or didn't want to eat and then get really huffy or cold if I said I wanted to do my own thing. He would also leave the kitchen in a complete state and not clean it for days. We do now eat separately, at my insistence.

@EmptyHandles so he is okay with birthdays now but that is partially bc we had a bust up about one. Our birthdays are quite close together, and the first birthday after DD1 was born, I was suffering from quite bad pnd. I remember driving around town with her and crying like a loon 😂 anyhow, I saved my mat pay and bought him a comparatively expensive and nice present. On my birthday a fortnight later, he got me nothing because he said now I was a mum he thought we didn't need to bother with my birthday anymore. I remember at the time being so so hurt by that, it just felt symbolic. To be fair he later apologised and admitted that was unpleasant and now gets me a low key present every year.

@TheBroonOneAndTheWhiteOne honestly this is what I am starting to ponder. I am mid 40s now and for the first time, I am starting to think - this feels like hard work.... has been feeling that way for a few years.... is this what I want when I'm mid 60s?

Now, it would be financially very hard to move. But I am a planner and am starting to think ahead.

@ns87 yeah that is very succinct but that is how it felt. I felt like Cinderella if that is not too dramatic.

Look thanks everyone. This has been bugging me for a while now and I wondered if I was being precious. I don't feel like I am now. That doesn't nec mean I will leave, but it makes me feel like being bothered about this is valid.

.........but he would often cook things I didn't like or didn't want to eat and then get really huffy or cold if I said I wanted to do my own thing.

Really? He sounds less and less appealing.

He would also leave the kitchen in a complete state and not clean it for days. We do now eat separately, at my insistence.

You mentioned just now, "do I want to be doing this when I'm 60?"

Presumably you don't. I'm 69 and I couldn't imagine being with a man like yours. You sleep separately, you eat separately, you have all this distress and anger from his previous behaviour.......... I'm assuming you don't have sex, either?

There's not much of a marriage there.

One thing was, he used to insist on doing all the cooking - which sounds like an absolute dream - but he would often cook things I didn't like or didn't want to eat and then get really huffy or cold if I said I wanted to do my own thing.

Same. The number of times I asked him not to add something to a dish he often did - he could have plated mine then added it for himself before plating - but no, it was added in increasing amounts. Now that I know what I know about what I was enduring, it was deliberate. If I'd told him at the start I enjoyed it it would never have been bought again let alone added to my food.

he said now I was a mum he thought we didn't need to bother with my birthday anymore

We!! Fuck's sake, after you'd gone to quite a lot of effort, whilst having PND after giving birth to his child, to buy him a present for his fucking birthday . And now the low key presents sound rather begrudging.

The picture you have painted of him tell me quite clearly what he thinks of you @JimCharke

He is a horrible abusive bully and it’s all coercive control.
Think about how your life will be in 2, 5, 10 years if you stay with him
Please leave and be happy, you have a lot of years left, do not waste another second with this man

Do you believe he can change? Would want to change?

If he doesn't change, do you want this to be your life?

@LadyLemoncake I think he would theoretically like to change but likely cannot. He thinks and acts in very fixed ways. MN cliche alert, but I think he might be ND.

I honestly don't think he IS a bully, I think he more gets into fixed patterns of doing things and cannot see how it's affecting others

And the reason for his behaviour doesn't matter, in terms of what you decide to do - the reason doesn't change its effect on you. He is not treating you the way you want or deserve to be treated in a relationship, for whatever reason - you don't have to stay just because he might have a "reason".

I hold my hand up - I'm the snorer, but only when sleeping on my back.

I've asked DH to nudge me if I'm snoring, I roll onto my side - job done, well, that's until I roll over onto my back again then it's rinse & repeat.

I was beginning to think my then husband might have some kind of neurodiversity with his reactions to perfectly ordinary random non events. It turns out he was just still, after so many years, training me no to subject him (not that any of them were my doing) to perfectly ordinary randon non events.

Their behaviour can seem so natural, so un-aimed at you (although it'll be you who is affected), so subtle and easily deniable, it can be hard to see that it's intentional towards you. It can be hard to see it for what it is when you are in that life because your brain is filled with them and 'how can I make this better?' that you don't have the headspace to see their behaviour for what it is.

If he carries on doing something after you have broached it calmly, or reacts badly to you trying merely to have some autonomy, that is telling that he has no intention of changing - his behaviour works for him.

He can see how it affects others fine, he just doesn't want to make it any easier for those others because it would mean putting himself out.

If you can get a hold of Living With the Dominator by Pat Craven it might help you work out if any of his behaviour is intentional @JimCharke

Have you ever annoyed him? Did the solution work out? Would you like him to hold that period of time against you forever?

I think if you've found the solution and this is the one and only time he's been awkward (which may have been down to embarrassment, etc), then let it go and live your life happily.

Hi @JustReal those are definitely valid questions. Of course I've annoyed him, we've been together for 15y and I am not a saint! 😁 I guess the question for me is, is preventing someone sleeping properly for more than a year "annoyance" and you should just take the rough with the smooth, or something more?

I honestly do not think I've ever done something which compromised his wellbeing for months and months, and I think if I did, I'd cop on and stop it.

Thanks @EmptyHandles I will take a look. I really do think in his case it is not planned like that but it is worth thinking about. Thanks again