KGirl - post-move

[KGirl]

I was also thinking earlier today that I don't need to include helping him. It's a relatively easy thing that shouldn't require help. I texted him that we had agreed to switch these by X date and it's stressful for me when i see that they aren't, and could he please let me know when he does change them? That way I don't have to keep asking or checking online - the responsibility is on him to notify me it's all set. He responded "Yeah, I'll let you know when I've changed them."

Why do I think I'm pressuring him? I think it's because of the things he said at BD that are making me overly cautious. He said I gave him an "ultimatum" to get married so he doesn't feel like he did it for the right reasons, because before I moved in with him I said I didn't want to unless he was committed to marrying me, he said not a problem, but then 5 months later still nothing. I asked him what the deal was and he said he "wasn't sure." I told him that was upsetting because he said he knew he wanted to get married when I moved in, and now he was changing his mind, so I wasn't sure I wanted to stay there anymore. He felt this was pressuring him to get married or be alone, so he chose to get married. Who knows if that was the thought process at the time, but that's how he sees it now. He also felt like I pressured him about chores and asking him to do things by a certain time. We had actually made up a dish-washing calendar that we had both agreed to (he'd do pots and pans Sun, Tues, Thurs, I'd do small things like knives and utensils the other days)... but then he started not doing his dishes on the days he was supposed to. He told me at BD that it was too much to mow the lawn AND do dishes in one day. Our lawn is postage-stamp sized, it takes less than an hour to mow. I don't think my expectations were unreasonable for most people (doing the dishes within a couple of days of creating them? Vs. he'd let them sit for a week or two), but maybe they were for him. This is where he felt like I was "nagging" him. Now I feel nervous to ask him or remind him to do anything because it will be more "nagging" or reminders, regardless of my tone. And honestly, I was not a crazy housekeeper or chore person. I didn't feel the need to have the bathroom cleaned weekly, or even vaccum weekly :S I could understand if I had extremely high standards and expect him to do it all, that that could make him unhappy. But mowing the lawn and dishes in one day seems like a fairly normal thing.. but I'm off tangent, I think.

Yes, I'm angry and disappointed. Particularly because he told me that when I wasn't there to take care of stuff for him anymore he was going to step up and really be on the ball on stuff. I don't see that happening.

I'd rather risk him thinking I'm angry. Whose problem is this - I may need to explain a bit more. So things like the cable bill, electric bill, etc. came out of a joint checking account that we contributed equally to. When I moved, we agreed that he would switch those bills to autodeduct from his personal checking account, as I shouldn't have to pay for half of a bill that I'm not benefiting from (I have my own cable and electric bills to pay at my apartment). So any bill that comes out of the joint account I half-paid for, when I shouldn't have to because I don't live there... plus I make slightly less $ than he does so it hurts me financially even more. Right now what's been happening is when I let him know it hasn't transferred, he reimburses the joint account with his personal money so it's made "whole" - premise being we'd split what's in the joint account if we D. It's annoying to me that I've had to be the one to notice this, though, and let him know about it. I don't think he sees it as as big of an issue because the bill IS getting paid, and if he reimburses it I'm not losing any money. It's just frustrating that he doesn't pay attention or keep me in the loop that he hasn't transferred the bills, and that I find out when I see the money deducted.

Is this indicative of our past R? Sure, I think so. He tends to not worry about fixing things until they've become an issue (when the dishes start smelling or he runs out of clean ones, THEN he'll do them). I like to do things before they become problems. I thought I was doing a good job in the past year or so about not nagging but trying to come up with joint solutions. I offered to do things like dishes because they were important to me and not him. He said no because he didn't like how I did them (??). We made a chore chart so things were clear.. he stopped following it. I offered to mow the lawn, shovel the snow, etc. so that I was doing more of the "manual labor" (he told me that things like shopping lists, couponing, picking things up at the store, etc. didn't count because they weren't "real chores") - he told me no, he'd rather do them himself. It was sometimes a struggle to have my needs met for cleanliness, organization, etc., considering he didn't like to have a set timeline. For example, if I would say "I'd like to get this picture hung - when do you think we could do that? Maybe on Saturday?" he'd say "Sure" and then when Saturday came and I asked about it again, he'd get cranky and say "It's just an arbitrary day, there's no reason it HAS to be done today" even though that's what he agreed to.

A good way of summarizing this pressure/reminding conflict, especially w/ regard to tasks or deadlines: we both took a personality test at some point, and I was definitively a "J".
J characteristics:
-I like to have things decided.
-I appear to be task oriented.
-I like to make lists of things to do.
-I like to get my work done before playing.
-I plan work to avoid rushing just before a deadline.
-Sometimes I focus so much on the goal that I miss new information.
H was squarely a "P". P characteristics:
-I like to stay open to respond to whatever happens.
-I appear to be loose and casual. I like to keep plans to a minimum.
-I like to approach work as play or mix work and play.
-I work in bursts of energy.
-I am stimulated by an approaching deadline.
-Sometimes I stay open to new information so long I miss making decisions when they are needed.

I felt like I made a active effort to be more flexible and understand where he was coming from (with the dishes for example, as long as they were done by the end of "his" day, that we had agreed to, it didn't matter if they were done in the morning, after work, etc. And I never cared how long it took him to do outdoor chores.) I don't feel like he worked to meet me in the middle, though, and that his attitude is/was "this is just how I am, too bad." When I voiced unhappiness or stressed about how he handled or took care of something (or didn't, in many cases) I heard several times "If you don't like it, there's the door." Maybe I should have thought more about that when I heard it more than once.