At the same time, the argument could easily be flipped:
if one person truly loves another, the let things like putting a glass besides the sink _slide_. It is accepting the other person, with their flaws. If you want to change another person, it's selfish. Furthest away from love as can be.
A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
181–190 of 812 posts
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#182Been married for 20 years almost…we never fight. We both do things that aren’t optimal, but we give each other the benefit of the doubt, we talk about everything, we don’t step on each other’s areas of responsibility, we don’t speak harshly to each other and we are best friends. I can’t ever imagine being in a the situation described above. I mean all the individual things happen to us leaving dishes, muddy whatever…
7 years here ( we lived together for a few more ). We do fight, but it appears to be on a semi-annual basis since we do talk about what bugs us about the other person fairly openly ( there is a fine line being truthful and hurtful ).
The simple reality is that I genuinely have a hard time accepting existence without her around. Since that is the case, some things have to be ignored for the sake of 'peace at home'. It goes both ways. I myself am not perfect.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly. I am on the other side of this in my marriage — my wife leaves her water glass out (sometimes for days) because she “might want to use it again”. It bothered me, so I put it in the dishwasher. She didn’t like that, so I stopped doing it. And I got over the fact that there are sometimes six or seven half-full glasses around the house at any time, because I am not a petty psychotic who would take something so…
My wife put some water in the microwave for tea and left the room. When it was done, I put the tea ball in it and set the timer for her. Thinking that she would be back in the room in a few minutes and the timer would let her know it was ready. Instead of thank you for starting her tea, I was told I was "too controlling". Ok... I guess I won't do nice random things like start your tea from now on.
Don't take this the wrong way but after reading several of your comments in this thread, it does seem that you should be leaving her.
That, or start communicating about what makes her get angry over stuff like this; what makes her feel ignored or under-appreciated that she bursts when you make a nice and very cute gesture for her.
My wife kisses me when she forgets about her tea and I do it for her. EVERY TIME, no exceptions, she kisses me and thanks me.
IMO either start chatting with her to pinpoint the issue and work on it, or move on. You don't deserve such an atmosphere, man. You deserve happiness.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Force the other person to plan weeks of meals, keep the pantry stocked, etc. shines a bigger light on the unseen work and value each partner is providing." If my wife were doing this, our grocery bill would double and it would all be frozen dinners and takeout. I'm not sure I trust her to do safety critical mechanic work either. So maybe switching isn't great for some tasks. Edit: It seems people disagree. Why? All…
If my wife were doing this, our grocery bill would double and it would all be frozen dinners and takeout. that's pretty dismissive. do you know this from experience? have you tried it? that's the point. not the outcome. does your wife understand the effort you go through? does she respect that? does she want it? the point is not to train each other to be equally suited to every task, but to better understand each oth…
"do you know this from experience?"
Yes. She doesn't/can't cook. When she shops she buys only the most expensive name brands. She buys only frozen/instant/pre-made meal items.
"does your wife understand the effort you go through? does she respect that? does she want it?"
She sort of understands, but impossible to completely under the circumstances. She sort of respects. She does not want to cook.
"if you are both happy with the arrangement"
For the most part, yes.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#185I struggle with this myself. At the risk of sounding misogynistic: How come it’s always women who can’t deal with these “minor irritations”? I’ve never heard from any of my male friends complaining in this tack.
Feel free to downvote but please tell me why I am wrong. I legitimately struggle with this as is obviously clear from my tone.
1. It is not ‘always women’. Men are also rankled by such things.
2. Women have to deal with the pressure of feminism. For example: I like to cook. I love feeding people and don’t think of it as chore that oppressed women, but I have friends who will not cook(and I know they don’t hate cooking) because they have to make a feminist point.
3. I grew up in India and there is a very vibrant food culture. To be able to cook well is a feather in the cap. It is not so in the states and after I moved here, I was amazed that even those who absolutely loved cooking back home were acting like kitchen work was slavery.
4. Again from an Indian immigrant perspective: There is a weird resistance to obtaining hired help in America. Even middle class homes have hired help in India. These days, even in the states, Indian households will pay someone to help with laundry or cutting vegetables for cooking or just household help.
After apps like Nextdoor etc have come up, it’s easier to find help. Interestingly, the house help is often other women in the same neighborhood who want to make a few extra bucks. But I don’t think it’s about the money as everyone is usually in the same social strata in any neighbour hood. It’s about company.
5. Women need female company. We are just slightly different looking female apes. Women need to be social with those they don’t compete with..and girlfriends are always competing. It’s hideous living 24/7 with men. In nuclear families, there are no other female figures. I grew up with a large extended joint family. We had 3-4 generations of women under one roof. There is an age based hierarchy.
6. Contrast that to modern nuclear families with only one adult head female. For working women, it’s worse because they have to go to work and compete with both men and women. There was clear division of labour and enough people to carry out the tasks in my large joint family.
7. Speaking for myself and specifically about kitchens: The kitchen is my domain in my house. It is a matter of control because it is a matter of pride. Because I am the one who is cooking, if I don’t have a kitchen that is organized, I can’t do my job properly. I expect the knives, glasses and cutlery, spice jars and plates to be where I expect them to be…when I cook I am not thinking, I am ‘reaching’ for that familiar nook where I expect to find the salt or the spoon. Cooking is fast and involves heat. I don’t have time to scuttle about looking for things or dinner would be burnt.
It is the same with a chef in any professional kitchen. My 2c.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#186There is a whole other potential article out there that could be written from the ex-wife's side - "My marriage died because I couldn't make this one simple sacrifice". And I suspect both would just as incorrect, at least by omission. The glass thing is a useful article hook, but it's unlikely that it encompasses the sole reason their marriage fell apart. There is a deeper issue here, about neither side being willing…
Another thing many couples miss is positive reinforcement. Many people fall into the trap of ignoring the desired behavior and chastising the undesired behavior. Because the desired behavior is so normal and benign to one party. But its clearly not to the other party. If the glass was in the dish washer or washed and put away, I could imagine many couples experiencing no conditioning towards repeating that behavior.
Yep. I regularly thank my partner for the work they do to keep the house running and they do the same back for me. It genuinely helps me feel more connected to them when we recognize and show appreciation for the things that could absolutely be considered automatic.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#187It’s very simple. If something is minor for you but your partner prompts you extensively that it triggers them - change yourself. The willingness to listen and change yourself is what signals your love. Because everything else is much easier.
> If something is minor for you ... change yourself.
On the one hand, I think this can lead to ruin in its own way. It cedes all ground to the most neurotic or controlling partner. It breeds resentment in the one who has to make all the concessions. Instead, I would suggest that these conflicts should be resolved explicitly and deliberately. Sometimes that will lead to one person reminding themselves to put the glass in the dishwasher. Sometimes it will lead to the other person reminding themselves that it doesn't matter. Either way, as long as it's a resolution that is mutually agreed and balanced with all of the other minor concessions that each is making, I think it's OK.
On the other hand, a variant of this is a good rule even in non-intimate relationships. If something takes you trivial time or effort, and means a lot to someone else, DO IT. Even for a total stranger. It increases the total "good karma" (but without the moral weight) in the system. Sooner or later, if enough people keep doing it, some of that will come back to you. Something that might have seemed onerous becomes less so because of someone else's minor generosity. IMO the fact that this isn't a common habit, that it's even discouraged by the dominant "everything should be strictly transactional" dogma (ignoring actual results from game and complexity theory), degrades life a bit for everyone.
P.S. Lest anyone claim I'm being inconsistent, changing yourself is hard. It's not a minor effort, like taking one moment to do someone a small favor. They're very different scenarios.
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#188If this couple went to a marriage counselor, the counselor is not going to say "You're going to lose your marriage because you continue to leave dishes by the sink". Instead, (s)he will say "You're going to lose your marriage because of poor communication - she can't communicate what is bothering her, and he doesn't have the communication skills to make it easy for her to communicate it." If you've read pretty much a…
I understood the article as saying that she was communicating her issues, but he considered them minor, nagging and unimportant difference of opinion. Therefore, he never treated them seriously, whether by actually changing or by actually arguing back. Basically, he dismissed it instead of taking it as issue. Here is quote from the article: "Hundreds, maybe thousands of times, my wife tried to communicate that someth…
> I understood the article as saying that she was communicating her issues
She wasn't. She was at best hinting - again, something pretty much every communications book says not to do.
> "Hundreds, maybe thousands of times, my wife tried to communicate that something was wrong."
He doesn't go into details, but it's usually one of two things:
1. Nagging over what seems to be minor issues, and he is supposed to realize that there are deeper issues underlying.
2. Saying explicitly that something was wrong, but not saying what.
In both cases, she is lacking the communication skills to say what is wrong, and he is lacking the communication skills to make the path easier for her to say it.
He says this:
> The reason my marriage fell apart seems absurd when I describe it: My wife left me because sometimes I leave dishes by the sink.
The question is, how does she describe it to her friends? I doubt she says "I left my husband because he sometimes leaves dishes by the sink." And did she articulate that to him before it was too late?
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#189"Hundreds, maybe thousands of times, my wife tried to communicate that something was wrong. That something hurt. But that doesn’t make sense, I thought. I’m not trying to hurt her; therefore, she shouldn’t feel hurt.
...
There is only one reason I will ever stop leaving that glass by the sink, and it’s a lesson I learned much too late: because I love and respect my partner, and it really matters to them."
wow.... this isn't a marriage lesson, it's a basic human etiquette lesson. Listen to what someone is telling you and try to see things from their perspective. At least the author does call out their own immaturity with respect to this:
"I think I believed that my wife should respect me simply because I exchanged vows with her. It wouldn’t have been the first time I acted entitled. What I know for sure is that I had never connected putting a dish in the dishwasher with earning my wife’s respect."
Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem
#190"My wife left me because she's either ridiculous and unwilling to compromise on trivial shit, or incomprehensibly dense" is a much shorter and more succinct than an entire book, but I guess they don't pay people for that. His articles all read as pathetic blame-porn aimed at satisfying the egos of women, while pretending to be advice aimed at men, and even though his only skills are apparently being someone who got d…
Maybe this is too personal, but is your relationship with your partner strong? Frankly, my guess, just by your attitude towards this innocuous article, is no.
It's not an innocuous article. He's literally tried to build a career out of being divorced.
Know why my relationship with my SO is better than yours? Because we talk like actual human beings, compromise, don't fight over trivial bullshit, respect each other and their spaces, and don't always have to be right because it's a partnership not a dictatorship.
Maybe try that out, see how basic common sense works for you.