r/MaliciousCompliance • u/snickerdoodlesrule • 5d ago

S Malicious compliance in response to weaponized incompetence

Okay, I’m new to the page! I want to hear all of your stories or moments of malicious compliance in marriage.

Mine is when I asked my husband to move money from another shared bank account to our checking for bills. You guessed it, he didn’t move the money. This was the 3rd time that he “forgot about it” and I was tired of asking. I watched our checking account go into the negatives/ with overdraft fees. I confronted him and he said that I didn’t tell him which account, but we only have one main account for both of us to pay bills from. The account is connected to our debit cards!

The next day he went for lunch at chipotle. As he was checking out he realized that he didn’t have cash or money on his debit card. He called me at least 5 times asking me to transfer money, since I was near the bank that day. I did transfer money, but not to the account with the debit card, because he didn’t say which account 😉

We haven’t had any problems with him transferring money, since.

Edit: We share all of our bank accounts. I crunch the numbers and can’t always be responsible for budgeting and going to the bank/ doing transfers!

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770

u/Alarmed-Ride1719 5d ago

My partner wouldn’t move the clothes to the dryer (I separated the clothes, put them in the washer, started the washer, pulled clothes out of the dryer and folded them, and put the clothes away). After a long time of me harping on him he decided that we should do our own laundry. Cue malicious compliance, someone rarely has clean underwear and I still refuse to do his laundry even when it piles up and he complains about not having clean clothes.

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u/Derpy_Diva_ 5d ago

My husband used to insist he cleaned more than I did (spoiler: he absolutely did not) so when I’d get on him he’d throw out ‘how about you take care of yourself and I’ll take care of me??’ When I told him for the 600th time to put his laundry in the hamper. So I did. I only cleaned my dishes. Didn’t touch his bathroom, and didn’t touch his laundry. After 3 weeks it turned into ‘if you’re doing your stuff why aren’t you doing mine??’. After the explanation of how the situation came about he started doing his own chores and even started helping with mine. He honestly didn’t realize how much work him just existing is because he’s always had roommates to pick up the slack.

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u/Alarmed-Ride1719 5d ago

My partner never lived alone whereas I have so I’m use to having to do everything for myself, I don’t mind doing more household chores but if he can’t help with the bare minimum then that is where I draw the line just like with the laundry

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u/lizardking073 4d ago

I think this concept of people having lived alone has at least some effect on the chores issue. I lived alone for years, and I'm just used to doing things myself. I think if you live with roommates, you always have a "someone else can do it" out in the back of your head

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u/Alarmed-Ride1719 4d ago

Yeah I had a roommate for a couple of years but we cleaned our own things but then I lived on my own for 2ish years before I lived with my partner. He has always lived with a partner or his parents so he has a total different perspective of how to live compared to me

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u/sephraes 3d ago

Unless you're the someone else who does it.

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u/Aslanic 4d ago

My husband had to be self sufficient when he moved out for college and as a result he does just take care of a lot of things around the house. I did too, but growing up I always had chores and helped with laundry and cleaning etc. where he didn't have to until he moved out. I do my share too but our jobs are different levels of exhausting so he does more than 50% in our house I feel like (he legit browses reddit at work like half the day some days at his work, I squeeze in a break some days).

His brother, on the other hand, took about 10 years to go through college for a 4 year degree, and has mostly lived at home as he failed classes his second semester living away from home. He hardly ever cleans or takes out the garbage or anything. He's almost 30 now and it's like he's still a teenager, with mommy and daddy still cleaning up after him. He works but I don't think it's full time yet because he really struggled to find a job after college.

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u/BubblebreathDragon 4d ago

While I get where you're coming from, that's a lot of work to avoid talking it out. I hope your marriage has gotten healthier since.

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u/abishop711 4d ago

Do you honestly think that at no point in the 600 times he was told that there was any attempt to communicate?

Honestly? It’s really old and tired that the constant response to these kinds of situations is cOmMuNiCaTe as if that hasn’t obviously already been done. It’s a kind of victim blaming, where it’s the victim’s fault for just not talking about it enough or in the right way. At a certain point, can we just start expecting partners to be a fully functional adult?

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u/Derpy_Diva_ 4d ago

Oh I tried. With the help of a therapist. I chose the nuclear option when he just couldn’t fathom how much work he creates. He just forgot I wasn’t going to clean up after him after telling him that which was where the animosity came. We’re better now, not perfect but therapy helps.

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u/babythumbsup 2d ago

Wait until I tell you how conversations go when both people believe they're in the right

1

u/C0ugarFanta-C 1d ago

This is a dumb response. They've obviously talked it out hence why the man was arguing he did more work than she did. Please stop jumping onto post like this and trying to blame it on lack of communication. And by the way, why does a grown adult have to be told to clean them after themselves? Are you telling me men don't know they have to clean up unless they're told? Are you children?

271

u/MultiFazed 5d ago

It's mind-boggling that a grown-ass adult refuses to do basic chores.

Initially was going to put "can't" instead of "refuses to", but anyone who doesn't have a crippling disability can move laundry to the dryer. He's making an active choice to ignore basic adult responsibilities.

208

u/__wildwing__ 5d ago

My now ex, has a disability. Not blatantly obvious by sight, but it causes him varying degrees of unending pain. I got that, tried to help where I could. Only he would gripe that I wasn’t letting him do anything.

Ok, can you do some light chores around the house?

Yeah

I come home to find that he wasn’t up to doing it, not a problem, I’ll just tack them on to the rest of the stuff I’m doing after work. But this became constant.

Instead of doing something physical, maybe schedule appointments.

Yeah, can do that.

But appointments never got made, unless I stepped in and made them. Then it was back to I never let him do anything to help.

It took our neighbor pounding on our door to let us know that black smoke was coming from the back of the house. That FINALLY got him to call and schedule the furnace cleaning that I’d been bugging him about for at least 1.5 years. When I asked how soon they would be coming, he said in three weeks. I didn’t yell, though I really wanted to scream. I pointed out that we would not be using the furnace until it was serviced, and the temperatures were dropping. He got pissy at me, because now it’s an emergency call out and those are expensive. Well, no shit, but if this had gotten done in the last 1.5 years, we wouldn’t be having this problem.

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u/WgXcQ 5d ago

He got pissy at me

The audacity of that. Glad to read the "ex" part, that sounds like any attraction to him must've long dried up from being constantly mommified by him. You wanted to live with a partner, not parent a three-year old in a man's body who gets mad at you when he screws up.

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u/__wildwing__ 4d ago

And that was the thing, I entered into the relationship aware that, due to his health issues, I would be taking on a role as a caretaker, to some extent. But this was ridiculous.

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u/tired_but_wired6 3d ago

So ridiculous, caretaker does not equal parent.

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u/ElectricalFocus560 4d ago

And did you not let him do anything. This is weaponized incompetence and classic devaluation of executive functions

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u/talithar1 4d ago

I have unending pain. Sometimes it’s difficult to do anything. But I do many things anyway. Husbands get really upset when I push. But, damn, I can’t just lay around and do nothing! I’m learning to stop when I know it will lay me out for days to recoup. I keep telling myself this is not a forever thing.

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u/Lorcian 5d ago edited 4d ago

Did he have ADHD?

(Love all the downvotes for a simple question, as someone WITH ADHD it reeks of potential ADHD, was simply asking a question.)

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u/ActOdd8937 5d ago

ADHD is not an excuse for refusing to handle even the most minute of tasks.

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u/Lorcian 5d ago

I never said it was, strange you'd assume that from my simple question.

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u/indigopearl 5d ago

Not that strange. There is a mega ton of content out there that basically gives anyone with ADHD an out for anything. Partners of people with ADHD are pretty much constantly told to make allowances or be more understanding. Asking about it without any other reasons leads to a knee jerk reaction.

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u/IHaveSomeOpinions09 4d ago

Just men with ADHD. Women with ADHD are expected to figure out how to work around it by making lists or something.

1

u/__wildwing__ 4d ago

Not that I’m aware of him being diagnosed or treated for.

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u/djinfish 4d ago edited 4d ago

For some reason my wife refuses loading/swapping clothes in the machines.
Nonissue for me.
For some reason I refuse folding laundry. (Unless it's towels/blankets because they're square and they don't frustrate me as much)
Nonissue for her.

If the laundry piles up it's on both of us.

She hates loading the dishwasher.
I don't have a problem with it.
I hate unloading it.
She doesn't have a problem with it.

If the dishes pile up, it's on both of us.

I actually enjoy our stubborness in our shared chores sometimes because it actively highlights when one person is putting off their responsibilities and allows us to communicate it effectively.

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u/zzzorba 4d ago

THIS should be what they ask in dating apps. I want to be matched with someone who doesn't hate the same chores or have the same life skills I do

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u/Pame_in_reddit 4d ago

My granny had arthritis, literally curly fingers. She washed her own clothes, cooked every day and kept her bathroom clean. She even mended my clothes.

Me, on the other hand, perfectly healthy, can barely do the dishes. I can cook, but somehow the kitchen becomes a war zone. So, for me, hiring someone to clean my house is a priority. I don’t care if I have to eat spaghetti with salt and oil 70% of the month, but I need to outsource the cleaning. It’s cheaper than antidepressants.

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u/Important_silence 2d ago

“ Me, on the other hand, perfectly healthy, can barely do the dishes. I can cook, but somehow the kitchen becomes a war zone. So, for me, hiring someone to clean my house is a priority. I don’t care if I have to eat spaghetti with salt and oil 70% of the month, but I need to outsource the cleaning. It’s cheaper than antidepressants.”

Are we twins who were separated at birth? This is me 💯!

119

u/SheiB123 5d ago

When I moved in with my ex, I offered to do his laundry, along with the sheets/towels, etc. (I was young and in love) About two months into this, he came to me and said that his white shirts weren't as white as he would like and I needed to do something about it. I told him I could fix it immediately! He was briefly happy until he heard that I was not going to do his laundry anymore. He ended up dropping it at a laundromat and paying by the pound. He was not happy but it wasn't my problem.

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u/Alarmed-Ride1719 5d ago

When my partner and I moved in together we split chores and one of my chores was the laundry because I didn’t have an issue doing it but with my work schedule it made it easier if he could move the clothes to the dryer and to make up for this, he had some of the easier chores. I am not responding to other people because they are hating on a situation they don’t know. My boyfriend knows how to do laundry and never asked or made me do his laundry, he just rarely has clothes to wear because he doesn’t feel like doing laundry most of the time and since it only affects him, I let him. People are so quick to judge a situation on pieces of information

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u/putin_my_ass 5d ago

Oh god, I refuse to make my wife do my laundry. It's not hard to do, and I like being self-reliant.

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u/ActOdd8937 5d ago

My ex got whiny because I didn't fold his tighty whities the way his mom did for him so that was the last day I folded ANY of his clothes. I'd leave his in a basket on his side of the bed to deal with. He learned not to give me shit about not being exactly like his mom after that.

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u/KatKit52 4d ago

30 years ago, my dad said something to my mom about how she didn't do his laundry the way his mom did. She responded "well you can always go back to your mom and ask her to do the things I do for you."

He never compared them since.

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u/ActOdd8937 4d ago

Yeah, "you, my wife, are not enough like my mom" is a very weird flex.

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u/putin_my_ass 4d ago

Wow, she had that retort on deck ready to bat. Good for her.

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u/Lay-ZFair 4d ago

OR Well your mommy doesn't live here so I guess you're screwed AND also in all probability, not.

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u/cyclebreaker1977 4d ago

My husband used to complain about me not putting his laundry away in the right spot. I now put the pile in his bathroom for him to deal with.

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u/Meat_Flosser 4d ago

This is why I nicely fold all of my wife's laundry, and leave it nicely stacked. Only when I think the stacks will tip over do I insist that she at least finally put them in the right place.

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u/cyclebreaker1977 4d ago

I just make new piles if that happens, he’s the only one that uses that washroom lol.

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u/putin_my_ass 4d ago

Yeah I will sometimes fold her laundry if it's in the dryer instead of bitching at her that I need the dryer. Isn't it a bit nicer that way?

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u/Ravenclaw-witch 5d ago

When I was first married 40 years ago, I told my husband that laundry and ironing were part of personal hygiene. It’s worked well for us.

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u/boo_jum 5d ago

I was constantly amazed at the stories I heard from my friends (especially the ones who had two working parents) at just how little their fathers did anything around the house. It was just a normal, expected thing that my father cooked as much as my mum, he did laundry as often as she did (our who family combined our laundry and he and my mum split responsibility among all of us -- we kids learnt to do laundry as kids), he did his own ironing...

My parents are Boomers and my dad was just as active and engaged in housework and child-rearing as my mum. So my parents were the weird ones, but as a millennial, they are fully supportive of me refusing to live with a partner who won't do the basics of self-sufficiency in household management.

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u/Ravenclaw-witch 4d ago

Good for them. My husband and I raised a daughter who is the primary earner for her family and she has a husband who is awesome at childcare and does his fair share of household chores. Contrary to those who think we should go back to how things were in the 1950s, healthy relationships are a team effort.

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u/chaigulper 5d ago

It's not malicious compliance when HE decided you guys do your own laundry. He FAFO'd.

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u/Alarmed-Ride1719 5d ago

Right but he complains about not having laundry, I still don’t do it for him like he thinks I will

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u/PM_ME_ZACHARY_LEVI 4d ago

I used to do my step-daughter’s laundry and would complain to my husband that she’d never match and put away socks (I refuse that part, but I put everything else away), she’d just plop them back in the dirty clothes so she wouldn’t have to deal with it, or she’d try something on, decide not to wear it, and dump it in the dirty clothes rather than hanging it back up. My husband said it wasn’t a big deal and I was being too hard on her, so I told him he gets to do her laundry. It took exactly twice for him to realize he was just rewashing (and hanging) all the same clean clothes before he was ready with an action plan for her to change. I should have done it years earlier. He still asks if I’ll do it because “she likes how you do it better.” Oh well!

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u/BeachEnvironmental24 2d ago

My wife would rather buy new socks than match them in pairs. It drives me insane. This is one of the reasons I do all of my laundry - the other being that almost all of my non-work clothes are sport specific "technical clothing" and I prefer to wash them as per the labels.

1

u/hatemakingnames1 4d ago

someone rarely has clean underwear

...I don't think this is the win that you think it is

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u/empress_chaos5 3d ago

My ex wasband got pissed at me for washing a pair of pants with his clothes that were on the floor. Next time I did laundry I didn't wash what wasn't in the basket, he got mad. So I told him he had to do his own laundry then. Got mad, don't care.

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u/Alarmed-Ride1719 3d ago

My partner had something like that too, he liked his work clothes washed separately from his normal clothes because they would get dusty. I would always wash them together because the work clothes don’t even take up half of the washer and it felt pointless to me. That’s another reason I make him do his own laundry

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u/Gwifitz 2d ago

Don't get me starter about laundry... My wife hates doing her laundry and always puts her dirty clothes in my basket or directly in the washing machine (without starting it) because her basket is full so I always end up cleaning part of her clothes with mine. I wouldn't mind if it happened from time to time but it's always like that, I always end up doing another batch because I can't fit all my clothes!

Unfortunately I love that woman so damn much, I don't want to bother her with such trivial things haha!