Disabilities. That’s why.

Following this thread, especially the posts about auditory processing, because OP, I feel like I am also married to your husband.

Do shells instead of penne really matter? No. But when it happens on a daily basis, you start to feel like you’re losing your mind, because you know you said it/wrote it down. So if you aren’t losing your mind, I at least feel like my life partner is perpetually checked out/not present, and that’s not a great feeling either (and neither is being called out for mistakes, I get that).

Wish you luck navigating this, OP.

How does he do at work?

My own husband is careful and meticulous and known to be detail oriented at work. At home, I also would have ended up with penne.

Work is important to him, pasta isn't. I get annoyed too, because if you can't follow instructions, you're not helping and you're wasting my time (on issues bigger than pasta).

Either your dh isn't fully correctly diagnosed or properly medicated, or he just doesn't care about things like pasta shape.

Do some research on Chris Watts and autism and you can see how when they first started dating he had autistic tendencies and she taught him how to work with people better but then that led to him resenting her. There is a video of him giving speeches in a class which makes this obvious. Their life ended up with him realizing he couldn’t keep up with all the family pressure, finding a mistress and killing his wife and kids. The wife was also narcissistic, high energy, thought nothing of giving him small criticisms like pasta shells and taking on high risk with money and more kids causing more stress for him and didn’t realize that he wasn’t on board with decisions or could handle these stressors. His family had lots of loopholes because that’s how they deal with stress. His dad is an addict and also autistic. They can’t cope with the world well unless everyone is positive and forgiving with one another all day long. Life is transactional and it’s just expected that multiple errors will occur all day so that the transactions can continue without raising anxiety. Reducing anxiety is the whole purpose of life. Try just making light of things and overlooking the mistakes and see if things get better emotionally. They won’t learn to fix mistakes because they can’t but you can get along better together and find other things to appreciate about each other. People like this can be very loyal but can’t remember back to yesterday and what you did for them and calculate effort with feeling. They just remember how you make them feel.

I think he has autism with comorbid personality issues, anxiety, and auditory processing. It just gets worse with age and that’s what you are noticing. Like how people get dementia when they are older. It means his brain will never be neurotypical and you will beat yourself up trying to make situations go as planned. The loopholes is a strong trait of someone with high anxiety and depression. The person who said to make things light and turn it into fun is spot on. It will help both you and him have a better relationship if you find the loopholes and just move on and make each blunder a positive. Because of the disorder they are very sensitive to criticism. It’s immaturity but there isn’t Anything you can do about it other than to just go along with the blunder. People like this can be very loyal but they will not tolerate criticism. You don’t have to accept it’s correct. You just have to work with what happened in a pleasant way.

Sounds like borderline personality disorder.
They can’t take criticism, have explosive tempers, and twist things you say to make you the perpetrator and them the victim.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP I will bet you $1,000,000 that your husband has an auditory processing disorder. It is a form of learning disability frequently found in combination with ADD.

Can you clarify? Would this impact reading written lists, too?

No, the written lists, would help a lot although he will still have ADD. But it will affect things like him not registering what you say, seemingly forgetting conversations, not hearing or not following instructions. It's a real thing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP I will bet you $1,000,000 that your husband has an auditory processing disorder. It is a form of learning disability frequently found in combination with ADD.

I was wondering about an LD.

He can be formally tested for this.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I showed him the text and said “I asked you to get pasta shells. What happened?”

This doesn’t sound like great communication on your part either. You sound like you are his mother and he is your child. Even if you’re not doing it on purpose, who does want to be spoken to as if they were stupid?

So what should I say? I’m not asking rhetorically. How do I respond to this stuff?

How can you possibly want to be intimate with someone you have to tiptoe around in this way?

Anonymous wrote:OP I will bet you $1,000,000 that your husband has an auditory processing disorder. It is a form of learning disability frequently found in combination with ADD.

Can you clarify? Would this impact reading written lists, too?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying that DH is too literal and it is exhausting, OP? If so, I hear you. DH and all of his family are entirely this way - their communication skills are basically non-existent, and they look for loopholes. I am certain there is a name for it. You learn to be overly specific, without being condescending, and without giving them anything to find fault about. Be precise and to the point.

Some people just like to argue/be right/like drama/be snarky or mean - add stubborn, and wow, good times. And yes, it is exhausting. It is what they are accustomed to, and it sucks.

OP here and YES. Everything you wrote especially the literal and loophole parts. Maybe there is one of those compound words in German to describe it. And yes, it is exhausting. I am beat down and feel so low.

PP here. So sorry to hear - you are not alone. DH's whole family "communicates" (not really) that way. As you can imagine, his elderly parents are quite snarky, but think that they are funny - I find it rude. As if they are trying to outperform each other, instead of just being pleasant, nice, kind, warm....

You have to be short and sweet in your expectations, otherwise DH will try to say that you handled the situation in a negative fashion - they are all about deflection and denial. It is very important to them to blame the other person. I have never once in many decades heard the IL's admit - "wow, you have an excellent point, maybe I was wrong, I apologize....." Nothing like that, so don't wait for that to happen, because it will not.

My side grew up communicative and direct, so it is an enormous difference. Maybe try leading by example? When I am short and sweet, I can tell DH is itching for an argument (to be right, really), but I leave him nothing to argue about - he ends up being speechless, which is nice once in a while.

Anonymous wrote:OP I will bet you $1,000,000 that your husband has an auditory processing disorder. It is a form of learning disability frequently found in combination with ADD.

I was wondering about an LD.

OP I will bet you $1,000,000 that your husband has an auditory processing disorder. It is a form of learning disability frequently found in combination with ADD.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying that DH is too literal and it is exhausting, OP? If so, I hear you. DH and all of his family are entirely this way - their communication skills are basically non-existent, and they look for loopholes. I am certain there is a name for it. You learn to be overly specific, without being condescending, and without giving them anything to find fault about. Be precise and to the point.

Some people just like to argue/be right/like drama/be snarky or mean - add stubborn, and wow, good times. And yes, it is exhausting. It is what they are accustomed to, and it sucks.

OP here and YES. Everything you wrote especially the literal and loophole parts. Maybe there is one of those compound words in German to describe it. And yes, it is exhausting. I am beat down and feel so low.

Imagine how he feels being him. When it's not just pasta but everything.

Therapy or separation. Seriously.