Who's being passive agressive to whom?

[ditzzy]

Reading confusedandangry's thread all the way through this morning has made me question yet again whether my (d)h is/was actually passive agressive. And if I assume the was in the previous sentence is the current 'good' patch actually just the reconciliation phase?

For those of you who haven't chatted to me in the past: I walked out on H a year ago after realising he'd destroyed my self esteem, confidence and generally my right to be my own woman over a period of about 8 years. We went back to dating while I was living out and I moved back in with him (new house, new jobs, new start) in september with the theory that I couldn't really 'test' whether he'd changed his attitude towards me unless we were actually living together.

Trouble is now, I don't know whether it actually is me who's passive agressive towards him rather than the other way around... or whether the fact that I'm even considering that option means that he's got control of me again to make me think that!

Some things won't go back to as bad as they were, the controllable things:

He used to stop me seeing my friends (or for staying over with them when I did see them) - the friends now all know what was happening, and will soon flag up to me if I stop visiting them.

He used to spend what he liked (he has an expensive hobby) on our joint credit card and expect me to sort out paying it/manage all the finances; while making me feel guilty for spending a tenner on a new pair of shoes, resulting in me rarely spending any money on myself - the joint credit card is now strictly for joint food/household bills only; we've now got separate bank accounts, and handle our own money.
(The 'is me being pa' question wondering why the new system got set up just one month before he was made redundant, and has had no income for months? I'm getting a lot of comments from him about that one, even though I'm now covering all the household bills, mortgage AND an allowance for him to spend at will from MY wage)

The list goes on. I did a bit of counselling on my own when we were apart, and have learnt to react differently as well. When he insulted my hair in front of a large group of close friends recently, I just laughed, told him that he was mean to say it and insulted him straight back - I would never have done that before, and shockingly it worked! It kept him as centre of attention in the group so he was happy, and I'd made the point in front of everyone that I was NOT going to accept those comments any more.

Anyway, the point of this post is to try and lure some of the experienced ladies from confusedandangry's thread over here for advice and comments. IF the situation does get worse again, what do you think is most likely? Would it esculate so gradually that I'll not see it coming again? Or just fling straight back to the worst point?

Does anyone think I might now be being agressive towards him? Given that I now 'demand' him to contribute to the housework (he is unemployed at the moment remember), have cut off his access to most of my finances and maybe my whole 'moving out' episode was to manipulate him?

I'm not really sure what I hope to achieve from this, but the situation's suddenly been bugging me again over Christmas; and realising how slow I was to react last time, I'm now paranoid about why it's playing on my mind so much again now.

I'm not one of the experienced ladies from confused's thread but you don't sound passive aggressive to me. You sound quite assertive, and very strong and that you've come a long way and are doing really well. You should be patting yourself on the back rather than getting paranoid.

I don't think it's passive aggressive to be upfront and honest about what your bottom line for a relationship is.

"Does anyone think I might now be being agressive towards him? Given that I now 'demand' him to contribute to the housework (he is unemployed at the moment remember), have cut off his access to most of my finances and maybe my whole 'moving out' episode was to manipulate him?"

You demand that he contribute to the housework? What's aggressive about that? I
simply don't understand that, why isn't he demanding that you contribute to the housework? Why is it yours to demand about? You live together, he's an able-bodied adult, wtf is aggressive about expecting him to clear up his own shit? Men being expected to do half the housework isn't passive aggressive, it's equality. While he's unemployed, unless he's been writing job applications or looking after the children, he should do slightly more housework imo. But I accept that that doesn't work for some couples. If you would be expected to do more housework if you were unemployed, then he ought to as well. If you wouldn't, fair enough that he wouldn't.

Cut off access to most of your finances - this is a trickier one, because couples have such differing ways of organising their finances. I know one couple who have a joint account for household bills but nothing else - food, transport etc. comes out of individual incomes, which I find bizarre, but it works for them. If your DH has an expensive hobby which he is expecting you to finance, then frankly no, it's not PA to refuse to do so. When one of the parties in a partnership loses their income, sacrifices have to be made until they get it back again. Expensive hobbies have to be put on hold until that income is replaced. Having said that, if you had an expensive hobby which you continued to gaily pursue, I would say that you were being unreasonable because it's a partnership.

Your moving out episode wasn't manipulation, it was making it clear to him that you weren't going to continue the relationship in the way he wanted it continued.

If he is trying to persuade you that you are PA and he is hard done by, then it seems to me that he hasn't understood what was wrong with his behaviour in the first place and that he is wanting to sink back into old roles. The problem with this, is that you can fight that, but your relationship will be one long weary battle of you continually looking out for his slipping back into old habits and pulling him up on it - not a very fulfilling way to conduct a relationship. Much better to get to the root of why he is still hard-wired to fall into PA modes of behaviour and get him to pinpoint it in himself, instead of playing the victim and looking out for it in you. But he has to really accept that this is a problematic way of behaving and not want to behave like that anymore, for that to work.

Has he just paid lip-service to the idea of change, or do you believe that he really does genuinely recognise his behaviour was vile and he wants to change it long term?

BTW you've cut off access to your finances, but you haven't cut off access to joint finances, household stuff, have you?

So you're not doing what one man I know does, who gives his wife £300 a month to buy everything - food clothes, brownies, music lessons etc., and then complains when she hasn't bought enough meat because she can't afford it?

Hi I posted a few times on the other thread - usually I'm a bit of a lurker but things seemed to take off there!

Only you know whether your partner is being aggressive towards you but it does sound a bit as if you're in a 'mother' role to him as in you're responsible for everything - this does remind me of my ex a bit as I was responsible for all of our finances and he would complain all the time but never wanted/offered to take any of the responsibility himself. He then would resent me for it but refuse to work with me to share the responsibility which to me felt like a catch 22 situation (think this is part of the expecting you to cater for their every need).

AS in whether you are being aggressive to him - doesn't sound like it but you do sound a bit confused and thats not a good sign is it? I think it's quite good to read some of the replies where people are clear that they have a good realtionship with their partner with the usual sort of arguments and see if yours are different.

I guess the fundamental question to all this is whether you are happy with him, and if you are asking these questions about him at all what does that say.

I do have loads of sympathy for you as even being away from my ex for so long (9 yrs) I still have doubts about how bad it was - and then if I write it down I'm stunned that I put up with it.

Hope this helps a bit.

Thanks for the replies!

I always hope I'm not the one being agressive, but when he's huffing and puffing around the place because I've asked him to cook dinner, tidy up, or whatever, I always start to wonder - its very easy to think you're doing more than half the work when you're just not noticing what the other person is actually doing.

Regarding finances - yes he still holds the joint credit card and access to the joint account, which always has a healthy float in it. I then give him an 'allowance' to spend on whatever he wants into his own account as well. I don't think this is mean, but the timing of it has meant I always have more cash available than him, and he likes to remind me of that every so often... which prompts me to remind him that at the very least he could sign up for JSA (haven't quite understood why he hasn't yet).

He says he knows he was treating me inapproproately in the past, and won't do it again; its my problem that I can't just forget the past. Actually I do accept that bit - to move back in I had to believe it, and have to be able to move on!

By the way, I joined MN when we were unsuccessfully TTC a couple of years ago... so no children to look after. Thats probably why I don't usually start threads of my own.

Thanks for such a detailed response Little Bella; and for making me feel better Mary!

Cross-posts with kate - yes it helps. Everyone making me think helps. It was reading the other thread and everyon's that made me want to start my own, I can identify far more with the people who acknowledge they have a problem than with the happy ones.... but I hope thats me remembering the past too much again, rather than trusting the future.

"when he's huffing and puffing around the place because I've asked him to cook dinner, tidy up, or whatever"

See for me, that sounds like PA behaviour. If he has a problem with your requests, then he should say so: "Look I've spent all day doing xyz, I don't want to cook dinner, could you do it this eve... etc"

Open discussion is healthy. Huffing and puffing is not.

Perhaps a constructive way around this, is to have a rota of who cooks when? I know this is a bit student-like, but at least it sets out expectations and airs opinions as to what is fair. So much domestic tension seems to come down to housework, it's worth thrashing it out so that each party knows where they stand.

Actually a rota sounds like a good idea... I wonder why I've never thought of that before. For housework in general thoug, not just cooking. And if the jobs rotated week to week, then there could be no 'fairness' disagreements.

The problem is holding out for it to be fair, without being accused of being aggreessive. I have no idea how long he actually spends writing job applications to compare to my 40 hour working week, so I would have to still split it 50/50. Although that would be such an improvement anyway.

Actually to be fair to him, since I've moved back in he has started helping with dinner but only under instruction - I'd just so like for him to do things of his own accord too. Which is why a rota might work, he'd know what he was responsible for without me nagging every day. I hate nagging.

Thanks! This is making me think of more ways to make things better - I was worried everyone would just jump in with 'why did you go back'!

I've just reread what I've written. Obviously a rota would be an idea thats discussed, not me inflicting it on him

LOL. If he doesn't want you to inflict a rota on him, you could ask him what his solution is for ensuring that housework is done fairly. Don't give him the opportunity to accuse you of "inflicting" anything on him. Ensure he has ownership of any solution.

The problem with many PA people, is that they don't really want solutions, they want conflict. They don't realise they do, poor things, it's learned behaviour and can only be unlearned if they are willing to acknowledge it exists and they want to change it.