Dh constantly derails conversations over details and nothing gets resolved

[Mauveviolet]

Every single day I have a conversation that runs something like this ‘I think we should look at that house I saw on rightmove the other day the one with the red door and nice front garden with the green car out the front because it’s probably going to sell quickly’ and he’ll reply like this ‘which house? Which one are you talking about?’ And I’ll say ‘it’s the only house we’ve seen on Rightmove for the last month don’t you remember it’ and he’ll say something like ‘we haven’t seen a house on Rightmove with a red door or a green car. Do you mean the one with the rose front door and the teal car out the front but that was on zoopla so no it can’t be that one’. Then he’ll do something like sip his coffee and look away.

shit conversation example but every single conversation I have with him runs like this, today I’ve just had to sit on the bed and sigh into my pillow as the conversation is more important than the above and I need a resolution and answer that affects our dc and he’s acting like a toddler that can’t understand me on anything I’m saying.

Feels like every conversation I have I have to explain everything in great detail or he doesn’t understand or unless I give the facts exactly the way he imagines them I cant possibly be speaking about anything he can recall except I can’t always guess how he’s imaging things.

im so tired of it all. We get nothing sorted because by the time ive finished explaining that it does in fact appear that the house he’s thinking of may actually be the very same house after all in spite of him believing it had a teal car not a blue one I’m too exhausted to sort out everything that needs to be sorted.

I’ve asked him to just run with what I say because then life would probably go smoother and tasks will get done more quickly but he still insists on these mini ‘actually’ moments. He also likes to explain things I already know a lot, simple things that pretty much everyone has to know I really feel like I can’t take it any more.

Looking at this from the OP I’d tend towards him being arsey:
Then he’ll do something like sip his coffee and look away.
He makes his Well Actually pronouncement and rounds it off with an action that signifies “I don’t want to hear the next thing you have to say”.

Your specific example re the email today is a bit too prescriptive I think. Either delegate the task to him and allow him autonomy to compose it as he sees appropriate, or do it yourself if you think its absolutely necessary to include every detail you have stipulated.

Personally I think it's unnecessary to even include specifically WHY you wanted to visit that school, surely the school dont care about that sort of nuance for an initial visit or open day, just that youre considering it?

Im definitely leaning towards him being ND to be honest- the need to ensure any facts included are objectively absolutely correct is very important to me as an autistic person - partly because worry about being perceived as an idiot if they aren't wrong, and partly cause why bother to include information if it's you are unsure about its validity!
I also have Adhd too, so actually being told to include what would seem to be waffly and irrelevant details would do my head in, and id probably have lost attention part way through!

I do hear you about the load though, and understand how frustrating it is when your task list seems never ending, but you may need to relax a bit on your own specificity in order to get stuff done. Things dont have to be perfect, im learning to embrace "good enough" x

My DH is like this ( no diagnosis, but strongly suspect autism)
I don’t think I really noticed (or it didn’t bother me) until perimenopause snuck up on me!
we are currently driving each other mad for various reasons, but I think we’ll come out the other side, and in the meantime, trying to be patient!

i agree about the email and me micromanaging

Oh please don't take on board what PP are saying about micromanaging. You sound like you care about doing your best for your DC and real problems are being caused by your DH, don't let them twist it around to making you the problem.

I assume you're thinking of comments like it sounds annoying but asking an adult to email for an appointment and telling him what to say is also very annoying, but that's wrong. The way you've described it is a perfectly normal way for a couple to communicate. With DP and me, one of us might say "would you mind popping to the shop on the way home from work? Oh and remember we said we wanted to try that new ice cream flavour so could you get some of that for after dinner please" or "if you talk to your mum make sure to let her know we've got X for DC's birthday as she didn't want to duplicate".
This is everyday talk and not micromanagement and neither of us mind or feel resentful. And if it's something important like a school entry, and he's got form for putting weird things in emails before, it's obvious you'd be more particular. And the problems he's caused aren't your fault.

Ultimately I don't know what the solution is I'm afraid. It's a real bind when you don't want to carry on always doing things yourself, but "letting the other person fail" (as you might do in other situations) means something going wrong for your DC.

He sounds an insufferable prick

I’m reading through these replies today. I took a breather because I was so annoyed the other day! I do believe he may be ND and I will try to be more patient but there are days where I feel the steam coming out of my ears for want of a flowing conversation! Thanks

This. It does sound like you are micromanaging him. I'd ask the same question about the sports field, if their sports field is not big, the email sounds fake Do you know it is big? Why not just ask him to send the email without detailed instructions about the content?

Why not send a link ro the house or show him a picture ro remind him if he remembers it differently?

And before anyone says anything DH and DS are both autistic so I do understand but what I have come to understand and value is just how few fucks both of them have to give about what anyone else thinks of them. It has been an interesting and mostly positive leaning curve to moderate my people pleasing tendencies. So for me that is genuinely a positive thing

I struggle with this and it drives DH mad. If he doesnt give me the correct / exact details for whatever he is talking about, or if he gets the name of something wrong / mispronounces a name, its like my brain cant fit the puzzle piece into place.

He thinks I'm being difficult or picky 'red door / rose door it's the same thing you must have known which house I was talking about', but I genuinely don't! It's not helped by the fact that his attention to detail isnt great, so he is quite often wrong about a key detail, which means I cant recognise whatever he's talking about, but he thinks I should know because to him its obvious!

I'm not diagnosed ND but I have wondered....

Currently in the process of divorcing my ex husband who had a PhD in such conversations. I just couldn’t do it anymore. He needed handling with kid gloves ALL the bloody time. He was a senior manager at work and could clearly respond in the way his colleagues needed him to, just not me.

edit: If I ever said, the sky’s a lovely shade of blue today, he’d argue it wasn’t blue but azure. Bastard.

Try having a family rule about cooperation. That people help each other achieve things, rather than correct them.

That actually works for everyone- you won’t need to correct him, and he won’t need to correct you.

And get very good at saying, ‘that doesn’t matter right now. Email the school.’

And , and and… there will be jobs that you should do not him, because of different skill sets. If you want to impress the school, you send the email.

print or save your articles and then use that as your conversation opener ? @Mauveviolet

@PrizedPickledPopcorn thank you that will help I believe. And yes I should be doing the jobs I am better at. Sometimes that feels like everything though :-)

I know that feeling @Mauveviolet ! DH has a different set of irritating habits, but the same overall issue- not listening, not working cooperatively, and not doing things the way they need to be done.
He’s always busy, but he’ll vacuum the same floor every day for a week and never consider cleaning a toilet. I had to move my clothes out of the laundry hamper because he was ruining them, or hanging them so they were too crumpled to wear so I had to redo them. And when I raised it, apparently it ‘doesn’t matter’. ‘It’s fine’.

So I’ve spent our marriage working out what he does well and then filling the gaps.

My (autistic) husband can get hung up on the precise word I have used to describe something, or will struggle to find the exact word he wants to use so will just pick one because he knows I want him to respond to me - and then that causes problems down the line because I remember what he's said and he says that's not what he meant.

Fortunately this seems mostly to crop up during discussions about emotional matters; with practical things we understand one another more easily but it does sound similar to what you are describing. I have to sort of approach emotional discussions with the default of "I know he's not a bastard" because I need to give him leeway with what he says. (Conversely I am much more emotionally demonstrative that he is so I'm pretty sure he approaches these discussions with the default of "I know her reactions are stronger than mine so I need to just look past them a bit and focus on what she's actually saying"! I am also autistic...)

Every single day I have a conversation that runs something like this ‘I think we should look at that house I saw on rightmove the other day the one with the red door and nice front garden with the green car out the front because it’s probably going to sell quickly’ and he’ll reply like this ‘which house? Which one are you talking about?’ And I’ll say ‘it’s the only house we’ve seen on Rightmove for the last month don’t you remember it’

I would try using MUCH less specific language - here you could have said "i think we should look at that last house that I saw online", for example. I know not everything is that simple but this reminds me so much of us! I sometimes have to be blunt with him to the point that I feel I'm being rude but he thinks I'm communicating with excellent clarity 😁

@SaltyCara you've explained it very well. I even say " yes or no" at times.