Completely Irrelevant Vent

[charlottezweb]

My husband is driving me crazy!!!!!!!! Sun he told me he would fold the laundry on Mon--volunteered! Mon, I get home for my 30 min break between work and my 4 hrs of library and class time to find that he hasn't folded the laundry, hasn't transferred the wet clothes to the dryer and has made dinner but, big surprise, left the kitchen a mess. I don't even care too much abt the dishes in the sink, it's the can opener and the hot pads on the counter, the dish cloth in the sink soaking wet, the salt with no top on the counter! No attempt at all to straighten up, wipe the counters, etc. In the living room, there's a bowl on the couch with a banana in it. I text him from the library and ask him to please transfer the clothes when he gets home--I didn't want to put them in, leave and the house burn down. I get home at 11pm--clothes are still in the washer and he and the baby are in bed.

Yesterday he'd invited people over for dinner--smoked pork roast on the grill--got off at 1pm, went home to cook. I get home to find the kitchen marginally better, but the bathroom still a holy wreck (awesome when we have people over), and the laundry not only not put away, but now he's forgotten which baskets were clean or dirty and has put dirty clothes in with the clean clothes (they were both clean, btw). I "discuss" this with him and his excuse is that I just don't understand how hard it is with the baby in the house to get anything done. Aiighhhhhhh! He only wants to do house stuff if he has a whole day off--it's just too hard to deal with the baby when he has just a few hours before work--or something like that. And I think it's perfectly possible to fold a load of clothes or take the dishes into the kitchen, baby or no.

Last night we agreed that he would take me to work if the baby was awake in the am so they could run errands, since he's got the day off--we need gas, to pick up fair tickets, and pick up three things from craigslist--one of them is in summerville, which is a sucky drive, but we've been putting it off since the end of last week. The baby wakes up and, surprise, surprise, there's some other excuse as to why it's not a good day for that. Oh, cause they don't have time to get ready before I have to leave for work. And when I leave, clearly irritated, he's all like, well, you said we could do it tonight. Yes, if the baby wasn't awake before I left! But now we've got to spend one of our few nights together driving out to summerville and running errands during rush hour instead of hanging out at home watching How I Met Your Mother. Awesome. And now they don't have the car today and will be cranky with each other and stir crazy when I get home. Even better.

And of course, the problem is that I have unrealistic expectations now that I'm pregnant. No, sh*t like this has been driving me crazy for ever, but now that we're about to have another kid, it just can't go on.

Comments

Um, no that doesn't sound like unrealistic expectations.

[hkbear.livejournal.com]

We have similar problems. Unfortunately, I'm firmly set in the "if you want it done, you have to do it yourself" stance because otherwise I'll go batty.

I love my man but why does it take a sink load of dishes to make 2 cups of tea? And how hard is it to CLOSE THE SHOWER CURTAIN?

Sorry, got me venting now.

Re: Um, no that doesn't sound like unrealistic expectations.

[charlottezweb.livejournal.com]

Exactly!!! And I'm tired of having to spend my Sat's cleaning because he is just not down with doing a little bit every day! And then by the weekend it's a big job. Gah!

And yes, we have the shower curtain issue too! Close the freaken shower curtain! Drain the bathwater after the baby takes a bath! Don't leave your wet towel on the foot of the bed on my side! (I've started taking his towel, spreading it out flat and laying over his side.)

[lorres.livejournal.com]

What I don't get is that you're calling this vent irrelevant. It sounds totally relevant to me.


And not unreasonable, as he whole feminist movement has borne out.

[charlottezweb.livejournal.com]

Irrelevant may not be the right word, but something like that. Just because I'm frustrated with this kind of behavior right now and needed to vent but I know that really, it's more important that he does over half the child care, 75% of the cooking, and works full time. He also does the chores I hate like vacuuming and mopping the kitchen floor, etc. For some reason the little things--tops not put back on the spices, for example, are just driving me batty.

We need to work out some kind of compromise between his feeling that it's ok to do the housework a couple of times a week and my feeling that if we don't do some every day, it gets away from us. Like when I cook, I make sure the dish drainer is empty before I start and wash the dishes as I go, so by the time I'm finished cooking, everything is clean and the kitchen is wiped down. He just piles dishes in the sink and then after dinner there's a huge load of dishes to wash that doesn't get done until the next day when they have to be washed before the next meal can be cooked. And then there's no room in the dish drainer for the cooking dishes and...*vicious cycle*

[dr-brat.livejournal.com]

If he cooks, can you do the dishes when he's done?

DWH leaves the kitchen a mess and it drives me right up a tree, but I try to remember that he does a lot of the cooking and ALL of the laundry, so I try to just shut my mouth and do the dishes (including gathering them from all over the house).

[charlottezweb.livejournal.com]

Some times I do, but I have a lot of trouble with it. Just because he uses _so_ many pots and dishes that it drives me crazy! There's no need! So that was one trouble for a long time--he did all the cooking and I felt incredibly resentful about having to clean up when I would've been happy with soup and sandwiches or something in the crock pot instead of a five course 800 pot meal. But he's cooking more simply now that we're on a tighter budget and I'm stepping up and doing more of the regular dishes, and cooking a couple of times a week, or reminding him that we have leftovers to eat or that maybe quesadillas would do for tonight, so there's less of a crazy mess. And part of it is just that when I cook, there are no dishes left over so I get caught there and I need to just let that go. But it's hard.
He's just not good at the daily stuff--cleaning up the baby's toys out of the living room everyday, not leaving the wii remotes and dvds all over the table, taking glasses into the kitchen...and I know full well how small all that stuff is, but sometimes when I'm straightening up the kitchen and I pick up a jar of jam to put back in the fridge and it fall onto the counter because the top wasn't actually screwed on, I want to _throw_ stuff.
We talked about it last night for a while--he feels like I think he doesn't do anything so we talked about that and how my issue is about smaller stuff and freaking out bc a new baby is coming and if we can't keep on top of the small stuff now, (because I do all of it), then we'll be lost when the baby comes.

[elissaann.livejournal.com]

I ran into this a lot during my brief engagement. I was washing everybody's dishes because it was important to me that I cook in a clean kitchen. It wasn't important to J or his housemate. I got resentful. They didn't get it.

It's hard for me to imagine living with someone else ever again, and I'm so impressed that couples manage to get through these things day after day without coming to blows.

BTU, your userpic is beyond cute.

[charlottezweb.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It's one of my favorite Royce pics. :)

Yeah, I have no desire to ever live with anyone again that I'm not related to or sleeping with. And even then sometimes...