How can I stop his football obsession ruining our relationship?

[c4clarabell]

Hi,
I really need some advice as I am at my wits end with my boyfriend and his obsession with football.
We have been together 2.5 years and have a 6 month old daughter. I have a 4 year old son from a previous relationship and he has an 11 year old son too who stays with us most weekends.
For the most part he is a lovely guy. He is a brilliant dad and the kids adore him but the minute football season starts my life is a misery.
The minute he steps through the door after work during the week (about 7pm) the football goes on and I'm lucky to get 2 words out of him. while the football is on the telly, he is also playing fantasy football on the laptop and texting his friends about how the match is going, tactics etc.He will watch football or football commentary until it finishes at about 10 then play fifa on his games console until 1.30 in the morning. This is normally about 3 nights a week Monday to Friday.
He will usually pick his son up on Friday night so I go up to bed at 9 to give them some time together (playing fifa). After his son goes to bed at 10 he will continue playing again until the early hours.
His son is football mad too and plays for a team both Saturdays and Sundays which, with travel to and from the games, takes about 4 hours out of each day of our weekend.
When they come back theywill happily watch 3 football matches back to back. It is literally on from the minute i wake up until i go back to bed.
When we first got together he told me he did like football but that it wasnt the be all and end all, which I was glad about because I HATE it!
Since then, he got into fifa and had sports channels added and things have got progressively worse.
I have tried telling him how miserable it is making me. Some weekends I dont even want to go home and have to find things to do away from the house because I cant stand being around it. His attitude to this is that he doesnt drink, smoke, do drugs etc so I should stop giving him a hard time.
I have asked him to comprimise and suggested that i would not complain about it being on throughout the week or a Saturday if we could have a football free day on Sunday (bar his sons training) and keep the rest of the day as family time. He wouldnt agree to this as says Sundays are when most of the games are on and recording it isnt the same. I asked himto suggest a comprimise but his reply to that is that he just wouldnt watch as much, which through countless arguments and past experience ,I know will not happen.
I have gotten to the point now where I am so miserable about it I have removed the sports channels from our tv package. They will be off in 30 days. I do think he may leave if this is the case as he says i am trying to control him and he wont put up with it.
Idont want him to leave but I can not live like this anymore. Am I being unreasonable? I Just don't know what to do :-

[ummmm]

Errrrrr football is not on continuously.

[mccfluff]

bloody feels like it

[ummmm]

Lol...it does sometimes.

She should pop out for 90 mins and leave the baby with him.

[jno]

and return to find him being used as a ball in keepy uppy?

[sfby]

According to clarabell it is - if you take into account the FIFA game playing & fantasy football it's 7 till the wee small hours most weekday nights & all day at the weekends.

[New Judge]

He needs some urgent and serious psychiatric advice as he clearly has a severe personality disorder, and you need a new partner.

[ummmm]

Okay....take the kids and leave he'll probably not notice.

[jno]

in a way the football's irrelevant; it might as well be stamp collecting or building the Eiffel Tower out of matchsticks. Obsession is difficult to live with, unless it's shared.

But as the first answer said, it's your choice. You can live with it or you can't. It sounds as though you can't, and I don't blame you. It might be time to think about an exit strategy.

[chaptazbru]

Well said sfby. AND there's no way I'd take him a cup of tea while he's watching football. He'd make his own or do without!!!

[ummmm]

Lol...some of yous are so harsh.

[Duncer]

Men need football and other trivia to occupy the vast spaces in their heads, otherwise you are courting extreme danger.

To remove football from a man's life runs the risk of him blurting out what he is really thinking, like "Jesus, look at the size of your Yabbie in those jeans", or the answers to other such like questions women fear. I'd leave well alone.

[New Judge]

And it's just struck me:

"For the most part he is a lovely guy..."

What part would this be exactly? You go on to say that from the minute the football season starts your life is a misery. Given that the football season lasts for the best part of nine months (with a summer international competetion every two years) for at least 75% of the year he is making your life a misery (and from your description of his behaviour I would say that is an understatement).

I think you need to think long and hard about what makes you believe "...for the most part he is a lovely guy". He sounds an obsessive, compulsive, self-centred individual who is not prepared to make even the smallest compromise to avoid behaviour which he knows is upsetting you so much. So how can you stop his obsession ruining your relationship? You cannot. Sorry, but you did ask.

[whiskeryron]

The answer is so simple cut his benefits off give him the choice if he continues & will not compromise lock your bedroom door & he sleeps in the spare room.

WR.

[lufc66]

I was dumped by an old Girlfriend once, i was gutted....I had been with her for nearly 3 seasons!