Relationship - deal breaking aspects

I can't articulate this as well as I want to but hopefully my ramble will help your ramble.

You are obviously having some problems at the moment and you are addressing issues with the counselling. I found that I had to sit and explain to MrSC how hard I was working at the counselling and the bits I needed his input into. Our relationship sounds simliar in that I am a planner and he is a laid back dude...

I became much better at articulating why I was planning as I realised I didn't really tell him why I was stressed / planning and that has helped. We then accidentally got pregnant which whilst not a solution actually showed how far we had come.....the pregnancy didn't work out but now when I talk about having decorating done and having a timescale he doesn't roll his eyes so much! Partly because I think he has realised that you do need to have a bit of plan. He is still not great and will say things that I find a bit off but I am in a better place mentally so THE PLANNING isn't such a major stress for me iyswim

So I wouldn't write him off or your relationship just yet but I would maybe talk to him about why you plan and which plans are important and which aren't

x

Hmmm... I think I can understand how you feel, as when I was with ex Mr Dief I always felt like I had to do the thinking / planning / worrying for both of us. It's a big responsibility to shoulder, as if you're like me, you'll worry that if it all goes wrong you'll get all the 'blame'. It used to get me down TBH, even to the point that trying to decide what to make for dinner would send me into a tailspin just because it was yet another thing that I was expected to do, another decision I had to make, with no input.

I have to be honest and say that, for me, it was one of the things that killed our relationship. I couldn't bear the thought of having to 'cluck over' him for the rest of my life, trying to chivvy him into making a plan and effectively pull his weight.... Although if that had been the only issue, maybe it wouldn't have been such a big deal.

One of the problems with this kind of situation (I think) is that you're either a natural planner / worrier / organiser or you're not, and so for either or both of you to change will be extremely hard, although probably not insurmountable. The fact that you say he is your very best friend is good; at least you have a good relationship otherwise.

I can't give any advice sorry as if I knew how to fix it I probably would have! But I wish you the best of luck.

A yoga blog I read once told me to think of my 5 'unshakables' in life, things that I will spend time or money on or whatever above and beyond anything else, and when I was thinking about this Mr P and I had quite a frank discussion about what these were in our relationship too, which is brilliant to have as a reference point when life gets in the way.

With the worrying/planning thing, we are quite similar (without generalising too much, I do think it can be a male/female thing), and I have explained to Mr P why I like to have a plan, even if it doesn't always work. With crtain things, this means getting him to commit to a certain time frame (even in theory: with our house, for example, we discussed how long we will stay there, because that determines how much we invest in it. But due to work and other stuff, that may change). In other situations, I the force myself to go with the flow a bit more. To use a superficial example, it is our 1st anniversary next week, and because I want a 'suprise', I have had to explain this to Mr P and trust that he will figure something out, even though I know he will making the restaurant booking on the day. Probably.

That makes no sense, sorry, but I do hope you are OK. If you are Belfast bound soon, do let me know, and I'll meet for coffee and impartial chats.

Ugh bloody thing ate my reply. I really appreciate all the responses, though sorry to burden you all (you’re very brave with your offer GP?)

We are best friends but everything else isn’t perfect. I feel this is a major part of our problem and we have been here before, thought we’d reached a solution and then something will happen and I feel back at square one. I have tried to explain we need to reach a compromise but I’m getting to the stage where I don’t want to go round in another circle in the hope it’s clicked into place. I feel like his mum more than his wife a lot of the time which we have discussed but he tends to respond that I enjoy having to boss him around (I really don’t think I do boss him – I’ve done everything from ask things nicely, to hint but rarely tell him something) which I really don’t. We’ve been together for almost 9 years now and I guess I’m just tired of it all.

The 'feeling like his mum' thing came up when we went to Relate too - and our counsellor was very good at helping Mr Boop realise how much responsiblity he as abdicating and expecting me to take on, and how acting like a child in that way was not good for a 35 year old man. It was a real wake up call to him - and while he does still renague on the things that we agreed were his responsibility he's also much better at realising what he's doing and pulling his weight again.

What does your counsellor say about it? Are you tackling it as a specific part of your issues?

I guess with that kind of situation, it would boil down to how much of the time it is dragging you down, or if there is any light at the end of the tunnel. If, time, and time again, I was making the effort to make things work and it wasn't happening, or it turned into such a huge effort that it had to be made every single day, or far too much time was spent in a bad, negative place, I would be reconsidering.

At the same time, relationships are hard work, but they shouldn't be that way for nothing. I feel most content on days when we are just sort of pottering together, because I re4alise that huge sweeping statements of romance are actually quite 'easy' in a lot of ways, and getting along day to day is far, far more important.

I do mean my offer btw. I hate to see people confused, and talking can help so very much.

(PS did you do sushi? Is Malmaison nice?)

It's hard to comment fully, as only you know everything that's been going on, but one aspect of your post about planning for how you'll cope emotionally with children did make me think you may be over-thinking things. You can't plan how you'll deal with hormones, lack of sleep etc, because it may or may not happen, and you don't know how you're going to react. I'm not sure how you want your H to respond to that kind of query, as there's no answer, and IMO, he's right, there's nothing to be worrying about.

Although I do think about things more than H, I try to do less of the double-guessing and "what ifs" scenarios. Much of this is because I'm trying to deal with 1000 things at a time, and I don't have too much time to be thinking about what if scenarios ?. H's mother is very much an over-worrier, and I know it's one of the things that annoys H (and me) the most about her, so I do consciously not bring up irrational worries with H.

So, in conclusion to my ramble, I think that yes, you may be over-thinking things at times, but I can't answer your query about it being a deal-breaker as I don't know what else is going on. And I think there are some very good points about mothering men above. I'd go mental if H didn't have a strong sense of responsibility (but the things that are important to me, I do them to ensure I'm not worrying about him not doing them - it's something we've settled into as time's passed, and it suits us as a family).

Sorry guys had to dash out.

Boop yes it’s something that keeps coming up along with just the general communication problems we seem to have over issues. H hasn’t been to any of the sessions but when asked said he will go though admits he doesn’t see the point in talking to a stranger. When I try to talk about things with him he is very hard to get things out of, defensive and just generally a bit like a teenager who is being talked to by his mum who doesn’t want to talk about it. When I’ve brought up some of the things that have come out of sessions he tends to have the attitude of “well god knows what you’re telling her about me/us”. She seems to feel that I have an unhealthy weight of responsibility over me and that although in some aspects I haven’t been great, neither has he and it seems to be a bit of one rules for him a different rule for me in terms of how the other is treated if they cause a problem almost.

Thanks GP, Malmaison was good – the rooms maybe could do with a bit of updating but it was quite bargainous and Zen was wonderful, I need to go back there again soon. The sushi was great but H wasn’t so taken with it though he enjoyed everything else!

In terms of day to day pottering around the house, going to the cinema, shopping we get on great it’s more the way we deal with bigger things I think. This hasn’t come out of nowhere but I guess I’d hoped things would improve with time, with discussions we’d had before etc. We have had our ups and downs before but nothing as bad as this. Neither of us want to walk away as we’ve put so much into it all over the years, it’s just kind of become a bit of a mess.

Carrie I am a terrible over thinker and it is something I had become much better at until we hit this blip. However I do have massive concerns over how H comes to decisions about things. He says he wants to be with me, that we can stay together long term but I feel it is more out of easiness/doesn’t mean as much hassle than because he genuinely thinks we can make things work. In terms of children it’s more of an example of something very possible and life changing where I find his view on it terribly simplistic especially teamed with the worry I have that I already mother him ?. Our problems now can probably be overcome with but I think it’s important to recognise how we went wrong to get to this point and avoid something similar, to recognise that our life ahead will have hurdles and I’d like to have some reassurance or well placed hope that we could overcome them together but just now I don’t have any confidence in that – but he doesn’t seem to think it’s important –that we’ll just weather the storm and then see what life has to throw at us then.

I’m not sure if any of this makes sense as there are other things going on too but this seems to be a real sticking point and I’m just not sure how big a deal it is.

I think he needs to engage with the counselling - I can empathise with much of your posts and see much of our relationship in the way you describe yours. If you're going to relate alone then you're the one that's trying to fix both sides - and you can't. He has to do his bit - and he may well find it very useful. Mr Boop certainly did.

Boop I think that him coming along may well be the way forward. I had sort of dismissed it due to his attitude of it but he might surprise me/himself! I hope things are going better for you ?

This is going to sound like an odd question but how does he react to illness? You being ill? Family being ill? Does he worry about that or wave it off and just say 'oh they'll be fine'?

Just asking cause everything else you say about him could describe my H and he's very much an 'oh they'll be fine' kind of bloke.

I hesitate to say that we're absolutely fine and that things are really good between us because life has a habit of biting you on the bum for being blase about such things but we're probably a good example of how relate can help turn things around - if both sides want that to happen.

Luckily we haven't had much like that happen to us so it's hard to say but I imagine he would be very of the "thinking about it won't change the outcome" school of thought. We did have quite a tragedy a few years ago which he barely spoke about though and I felt quite alone in having to deal with it myself though I know he grieved in himself - I found out some incidents in which he showed emotion with it though rather than him actually telling me if that makes sense.

I was in the same boat with my ex, I just felt like I was taking all the responsibility for our life and our daughter and he was just cruising through.

Ex and I still get on really well, we're like best friends but the attraction was gone and because of the above it just wasn't working for me and I was miserable. In my situation I'm not sure that anything would've changed my mind and as you know I agonised over it for a long time.

It's hard trying to advise on something like this, everyone is different and I really hope things improve for you both.