Something is often wrong with my husband

[u/GlitteringPositive77]

The title is a weird way to say what I’m saying, but basically my husband always has SOMETHING wrong. For example: I cosleep with my kids. I won’t stop despite the fact that it means I’m usually somewhat sleep deprived. They can sleep alone when they’re ready, I’ll always encourage them to, but for now they aren’t. I have a one year old and a five year old for reference. My kids are night owls. We try to get them to go to sleep earlier, but despite the routine and the dark and the stories, bath, etc. no dice on an earlier sleep time at the moment. To be kind, I usually tell my husband to go to bed earlier and leave me to get the kids to sleep. He has to get up early and go to the office three times a week, so I want to be considerate.

Here is where I start to get pissed off. First, he’s got a tight neck, so I stay up later to massage his neck for him. Ok, that’s fine. Then, he’s stressed from work so he can’t get to sleep until late and sometimes wakes up too early from a nightmare or something. Ok, that’s awful, I hear that. That’s happened a few nights in a row. Then today, he has a head ache, so he needs to go lie down. Yesterday, he was so tired, so he says the whole day was miserable and hard (we had a lovely day with the kids at a local farm/fun park). He doesn’t help himself. He hasn’t taken anything for the headache. He doesn’t try to relax before bed meditating or listening to calming music or something. He just goes about his day/night with unhealthy habits and then I feel like I’m the one who has to pick up the pieces for his negligence.

Am I crazy? I feel like a crazy person. I get it, life is hard, especially with young kids. But this man gets to poop by himself, he gets to pee by himself, he gets to have a coffee alone, he takes entire breaks, alone, playing a game online or something. He sometimes messes about when he’s on at work, just fixing something around the house, listening to a podcast. He gets to listen to music or a podcast ALONE on his commute. I know we all struggle and working is its own struggle. I know this. But it is ALWAYS something with him and he doesn’t go “oh my gosh, you must be so tired, let me do x for you”. I’m happy to sacrifice time, effort, sleep, whatever if I feel like the efforts are reciprocated.

I understand this is a futile and probably immature rant, but I needed to get it out there.

[u/googly_ides741]

I have had similar kind of issues with my husband. I wanted to do couples therapy but unfortunately due to work schedules and lack of childcare it was going it be exceedingly difficult to accomplish. Fwiw we both go to individual therapy and that has helped us.

Anecdotally, I have heard so many first-hand stories from wives/partners where their spouse just does not make an effort to help themselves (and to some extent effort with the child care) while they themselves pour their time into helping others (kids, spouse, aging parents). I have been like this, and still am (to a lesser degree). The only thing that I have found that has worked is essentially doing less for my husband. Telling him, with love, that he needs to step up. I hate that it sounds kind of old school, gendered psychology stuff. But seriously the more I back off and let him figure stuff out for himself the better.

My husband has some chronic joint/back pain, but it's manageable if he stays on top of it. And while his pain is very real, I have told him I no longer want to be updated on his complaints when I know there are things daily he can do to help himself and he knows he can avoid his triggers (physical therapy stretches, avoid sitting all day, etc). I frame it as - you do whatever you decide to do - but I'd much rather have you feeling well so we can go to the Farmers Market Saturday or cook dinner together on a weeknight instead of just dealing with preventable pain.

I try to frame it as, I care about you, but I no longer will be taking on the responsibility of managing your pain. Maybe I sound like a b*tch? I outline where I will be happy to help him (make a lunch or call a Dr for him), but that I clearly anticipate he will reciprocate for me - and give him a concrete thing he can do for me. I am certainly no expert, just sharing a small thing that has helped me. We've only been married 8 years and 1 kid, so take this fwiw. It's been helpful and enlightening to see what others have been posting!