‘What was your ‘What the hell are you doing?’ moment after moving in with your partner?’ – 23 people who found themselves on steep relationship learning curves

Moving in with someone is a huge step in a relationship and usually comes with visions of romantic evenings in, relaxing breakfasts in bed, and choosing nice furniture from IKEA.

However, the reality is likely to be somewhat stranger, as you find out that the person you are smitten with has some bizarre traits and habits that only become apparent when you’re spending time with them 24/7. Over on the AskUK subreddit, user subterranean_habitat asked:

‘What was your ‘What the hell are you doing???’ moment after moving in with your partner?

‘When I moved in with my partner this year I could not believe that when they use the soap bar they rub it directly onto their body. I always thought everyone would lather the soap in their hands and then use it. I quickly purchased my own soap bar. Lol. Not a problem for us but it did surprise me.’

And plenty of people chipped in with the surprises they’d had when they started cohabiting.

1.

‘He would squeeze the liquid from Ariel pods into the detergent drawer of the washing machine – he genuinely didn’t know they dissolve in the wash.’
–curiouslykenna

2.

‘My ex had only lived at home before he met me whereas I moved out at 19. He didn’t understand council tax and asked if we could ‘opt out’ and I said yes, you can opt out temporarily and opt in for a short stay in prison instead. He was flabbergasted.’
–tittychittybangbang

3.

‘I asked my ex to take the bin out once. He asked me when the last time I did it was, so I responded ‘When’s the last time you cleaned the hob?’. And he said, ‘There’s no point cleaning it, it just gets dirty again’. Oh well, I guess there’s no point eating cos I’ll just get hungry again?’
–Pins89

4.

‘When a hand soap is empty, instead of replacing it, he will just fill it up with water from the tap to create a thin, sudsy liquid that will not clean anything, and squirts down your front if you apply normal pressure to the pump.

‘We have had probably over 100 conversations about why this is bizarre and unacceptable, but he’s made it clear he will never stop for reasons incomprehensible to the sane mind.’
–Emaweare

5.

‘Nowhere near as bad as any of the others, but he wraps all and any cheese in 15 bloody layers of tin foil that take hours to unwrap and kind of ‘smooths’ the layers together so the foil shreds whenever you open it, meaning you can’t then reuse the foil. Drives. Me. Insane.

‘Other than that, he’s quite an adult and very good around the house.’
–crgoodw

6.

‘I’m still waiting for the day my husband realises that the reasons some of our plates come out of the dishwasher dirty is because he stuffs them in like an overfilled magazine file, allowing nary a drip of water between them. Bowls too – they’re all but stacked on each other.’
–Intelligent_Bar_710

7.

‘About 24 years ago, my boyfriend, now my husband, put fabric softener in the iron. He filled it right up.’
–Abject_Tumbleweed413

8.

‘He puts the empty egg shells back in the egg box and just leaves them there.’
–standupstrawberry

9.

‘He punctures holes in bags of peas, porridge, etc instead of cutting them from the edge.’
–_TattieScone

10.

‘Made a cup of tea, drank half of it. Fine. Then he poured a glass of orange juice. Dunked an innocent custard custard cream into the orange juice and not the tea! On purpose!’
–HugeElephantEars

11.

‘She put all the clothes in the washing machine together, including some wool jumpers, and turned it on at a 40 degree cycle.’
–BobBobBobBobBobDave

12.

‘We’ve been together for 11 years now and after 6 months I insisted on a separate toothpastes policy because he somehow manages to get toothpaste all over the outside of the tube and it gets all crusty round the top. Accidentally getting a bit of hard crusty toothpaste in my mouth first thing in the morning makes me actually gag.’
–badonkadonked