Q I love my partner dearly, but he is dirty – and not in a good way. He doesn't wash or wear clean clothes. He wasn't always like this, and he definitely made much more of an effort when we first got together.
Now he lives in my house and I hate him being in my bed because he stinks. The idea of having sex with him is abhorrent for the same reason. I've tried dropping hints and being direct, but nothing works.
I don't want to ask him to leave – he helps out with the bills and other odd jobs around the house – but I will have to if he can't respect me enough to spend five minutes a day in the shower. He has enough time to spend five hours a day in the pub when I'm at work. What should I do?
Many thanks, DM
A DM, we all feel for you. Or should I say, smell for you? I’m quite sure that smelly boyfriends – and girlfriends – are a common problem, but your situation sounds rather extreme.
You have already tried the softly softly approach, and even a direct tack, both of which have failed, so what remains is the gritty, in-his-face-approach, for which you have come to the right place.
If he can find five hours to waste in the pub, he can spend five minutes getting himself clean. End of story.
Depression or alcoholism
What intrigues me is your suggestion that he wasn’t always like this. I wonder what has made him become so. Have the five-hour daytime pub sessions also appeared over the same timeframe? Is he suffering from depression or alcoholism?
Make sure you exclude these possibilities before really getting in his face. But also feel free to use them as a sort of extreme segue to the awkward conversation: “Darling, I was wondering if maybe you needed to see the doctor – that you might be suffering from depression or something – because you seem unable to wash or exchange filthy clothes for clean ones from your cupboard like normal mentally sound types?”
Or join al-anon (al-anon-ireland.org – it’s for partners of alcoholics) and start going to meetings, and when he asks what’s up, say you assumed he must be an alcoholic because someone would have to be properly ill, right, to let themselves smell so bad and not be moved to do anything about it?
If this fails, and once you have genuinely excluded the risk of illness or alcoholism, it is time to take matters into your own clean hands.
May I respectfully suggest any or all of the following: 1. Inundate him with luxurious shower and bath products, and when he fails to use them, start spiking his bath with Dettol. And throw him into it. 2. Organise a spa weekend à deux. He will realise the problem is out of control when all the masseuses refuse to work on him and his mere presence is enough to clear everyone out of the sauna.
3. The promise of sex in return for a commitment to daily showers. With soap. And succeeding for a month. Minimum.
4. When he goes to bed, burn the dirty smelly clothes he has been living in for the past year and then shower him in their ashy remains while he slumbers peacefully.
5. Because he has been around his own bad smells for so long, he has become inured to them. (How acceptable do you find your own noxious emissions?) Refresh his nasal memory by living like him for a week, wearing the same underwear and clothes, refusing to shower or to brush your teeth: the lot.
Try not to lose your job and alienate all your friends in the process, though.
When all else fails, having a good laugh about this sort of thing – especially together. It may be just the ticket to a freshly sanitised relationship. You have nothing to lose here, really, have you? Except those bad smells.
Lack of respect
If he doesn’t sort this out, I’m quite sure there are plenty of other clean-living, non-pub-frequenting blokes who will help out with rent and odd jobs and with whom you will also enjoy the right kind of dirty.
So let’s be clear. Your partner’s attitude to all this is positively faecal. It shows a complete lack of respect that he can while away five hours in a pub while you are at work, yet not spend five minutes on personal hygiene.
Aside from those people with a genuine medical condition or mental health concerns which make it difficult for them to master this, there is no excuse for failing to wash and wear clean clothes. It is rude, inconsiderate and downright disgusting.
The Grit Doctor says
It’s ultimatum time, baby. Tell him to clean up or clear off. Ruth Field is author of
Run, Fat B!tch, Run
and
Get Your Sh!t Together
.
