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A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

theatlantic.com

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Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#291

Post by aidenn0 »

giantg2 wrote: post #125
hn_user82179 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He digs into his marriage a lot more in later blog posts: https://matthewfray.com/an-open-letter-to-shitty-husbands/ . I don't think she used it as an excuse at all, but he's more using this one frequent occurrence as a metaphor for the marriage.

To be honest, it feels like a lot of the descriptions of the volumes on that page are strawmen or cherry picked bad examples. Nobody gets divorced for leaving a dish by the sink. They might get divorced because they just don't do anything around the house (aka unequal distribution of work/chores).

In TFA he says it wasn't about the dish. He also strongly implies that it's not about not doing things around the house. It was that for all things that he considered unimportant, he treated as unimportant. Even if his wife said they were important to her.

To him, a single glass by the sink was no big deal if there was no company. She didn't want the glass by the sink. Him refusing to even consider a compromise here was communicating "what you think is important doesn't matter."

My wife is one of those people that thrives on a regular bedtime schedule (always go to bed at X PM, every day). I'm the sort of person who goes to bet at 9pm one day, 2am the next, but I always get up at the same time.

So far, all good.

However, she really wants me in bed next to her if we are both home. I think this is silly. It was a constant fight for a while until we had a couple of good talks about it; she sleeps just fine with a light on, so I can have a book or a laptop[1] in bed next to her and be awake as long as I want and she is perfectly happy; me being a voracious reader am also pretty darn happy with this. Also, had we not talked this out, this solution would never have occurred to me; I can't fall asleep with a light on in the room unless I am seriously sleep deprived. At first I was reading only e-books on my phone to not disturb her, but when I mentioned that to her she said "oh I don't mind a light on."

Perhaps in the author's example, if he thought he might want another more water before running the dishwasher, there might be another place he could put his water glass that his wife would be fine with. Maybe she'd even be happy to check there and put it in the dishwasher before running it! Maybe he'd have just had to come to terms with "We got 12 glasses at at our wedding and there's only 3 people in the house, so I can just get another glass." We will never know because these conversations just didn't happen.

1: The laptop I reserve for emergencies only; I really don't want to do anything even slightly work related in bed, if at all possible.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#292

Post by steveBK123 »

glitchc wrote: post #261
rhacker wrote: post #251

This is how I read this. The wife may have long ago brought up some argument that was "banned". In other words - bread winner conversations. Bread winners often have this trait: I make all the money, and I can only do that by working my butt off. So you need to take care of all the other things. No questions. This is why the dishes is such a huge deal now: Since the ACTUAL conversation is banned (by the man) the only…

Yup, a lot of these dissolutions are over money and control of the finances. Breadwinners need to treat their stay-at-homes with nice dinners, shopping experiences and pocket money that feels reasonable. A lot of them get it wrong. It’s all about dignity and respect really. Take that away from your partner and they’ll resent you, no matter how much pove there is between the two of you.

Yes, in a way I think it's almost easier to have two incomes and pay for help/services with the excess.

Even if there is a 2:1 income ratio, each side can feel they are contributing monetarily and collectively decide what tasks are worth doing vs paying for.

I can understand the psychology of both sides - the breadwinner thinks they are doing their job outside the house so why is the spouse not doing all the stuff inside the house.

Any subset of tasks breadwinner spouse pick up (like dishes or laundry) they expects a gold star sticker for doing extra. Meanwhile the homemaker spouse feels put upon for the 1000 other things they do around the house and dealing with the kids.

Likewise this is akin to the homemaker spouse tutored the neighbors kid for $100/week and then telling the 6-figure breadwinner that they are also contributing to the families income. Each side feels correct and like they are going above and beyond their scope..

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#293

Post by jelliclesfarm »

hn_user82179 wrote: post #30
jayski wrote: post #24

Im 99% sure the wife in this story used the glass as an excuse to get out. If youre happy with the life youve built together and love your partner theres no way you leave it over something like this. I dont buy the "it shows disrespect" argument. Shes going to be with somebody else in a years time. But when youre in a bad situation and the other person isn't giving you a good reason to leave sometimes you have to get…

He digs into his marriage a lot more in later blog posts: https://matthewfray.com/an-open-letter-to-shitty-husbands/ . I don't think she used it as an excuse at all, but he's more using this one frequent occurrence as a metaphor for the marriage.

Wait! There is a book. This article is a sales pitch. Read it as fiction. If it’s interesting enough. He is monetizing his divorce. Well..that’s one way..

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#294

Post by aidenn0 »

LegitShady wrote: post #84
NortySpock wrote: post #48

"Is this hill worth dieing on?" is a question I occasionally ask myself. Other ways to put it: "Would taking 10 seconds to do this now make my wife 1% less stressed?" (If so, do the thing to make her less stressed.) "Is it worth starting a fight vs spending the same time just fixing the problem?" "Would spending $COST_OF_THING make my wife happy for a day / make a fond memory of us together?" (Hence why I encourage m…

> "Would taking 10 seconds to do this now make my wife 1% less stressed?" An addition to this unrelated to marriage - if it takes 10 seconds, why isn't it already done instead of considering whether to do it or not? I have a personal rule that unless I have another issue that requires attention right now (like working from home being work time, etc) If it take 5 minutes or less to do it I just do it right away and ne…

I have 1000 things I'd like done that take less than 30 seconds. I don't have 4 hours to do them all.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#295

Post by gompertz »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #254
beckler wrote: post #243

About 10 years ago, I had a internship at Newell Rubbermaid. As part of the experience, the entire group of interns across all the brands got to have lunch with the CEO and basically ask him anything we wanted. At some point, someone asked about his biggest regret. We all expected some business blunder, but he said that he was offered an executive position by Kraft to lead their Asian segment, and that his wife reall…

Reminded me of The Office. "It's not real until your wife is on board."

I keep this in mind too when cancelling plans or trips in order to do 'important' corporate work. The business will never remember you did a day from now; but your partner sure as hell will.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#296

Post by avidiax »

a_puppy wrote: post #275
rhacker wrote: post #251

This is how I read this. The wife may have long ago brought up some argument that was "banned". In other words - bread winner conversations. Bread winners often have this trait: I make all the money, and I can only do that by working my butt off. So you need to take care of all the other things. No questions. This is why the dishes is such a huge deal now: Since the ACTUAL conversation is banned (by the man) the only…

This is an interesting point of view. I don't know enough about their relationship to know whether that's what was going on. But, I do want to point out something else in your comment: > She now has to wash and put away the glass. No she doesn't. She can just leave it there. She can leave her own glasses there, too. The pressure to keep the counter clean isn't coming from the husband. He doesn't give a damn how many…

> it's not that the husband expects his wife to do all the chores, it's that he doesn't actually believe the chores need to be done.

This is a specific example of a general disagreement on values. Disagreeing on values is really difficult to resolve, since people rarely change them, so agreement is often impossible.

It's not entirely satisfactory, but if both partners can recognize the difference in values, respect the other's position, and act in a way that accommodates but doesn't acquiesce to one side or the other, then they can live with the disagreement.

So for the glass, the husband's position that a glass on the counter doesn't matter is valid, as is the idea that a clean counter has aesthetic value. So a compromise might be that the wife learns to accept that the counter will be dirty during the day, and they take turns cleaning it at night before bed.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#297

Post by Jabbles »

glitchc wrote: post #261
rhacker wrote: post #251

This is how I read this. The wife may have long ago brought up some argument that was "banned". In other words - bread winner conversations. Bread winners often have this trait: I make all the money, and I can only do that by working my butt off. So you need to take care of all the other things. No questions. This is why the dishes is such a huge deal now: Since the ACTUAL conversation is banned (by the man) the only…

Yup, a lot of these dissolutions are over money and control of the finances. Breadwinners need to treat their stay-at-homes with nice dinners, shopping experiences and pocket money that feels reasonable. A lot of them get it wrong. It’s all about dignity and respect really. Take that away from your partner and they’ll resent you, no matter how much pove there is between the two of you.

I think not calling it "pocket money" would be a good step.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#298

Post by JoblessWonder »

beckler wrote: post #243

About 10 years ago, I had a internship at Newell Rubbermaid. As part of the experience, the entire group of interns across all the brands got to have lunch with the CEO and basically ask him anything we wanted. At some point, someone asked about his biggest regret. We all expected some business blunder, but he said that he was offered an executive position by Kraft to lead their Asian segment, and that his wife reall…

Valuable lesson for all of those interns that there is more to life than business.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#299

Post by Goronmon »

a_puppy wrote: post #275
rhacker wrote: post #251

This is how I read this. The wife may have long ago brought up some argument that was "banned". In other words - bread winner conversations. Bread winners often have this trait: I make all the money, and I can only do that by working my butt off. So you need to take care of all the other things. No questions. This is why the dishes is such a huge deal now: Since the ACTUAL conversation is banned (by the man) the only…

This is an interesting point of view. I don't know enough about their relationship to know whether that's what was going on. But, I do want to point out something else in your comment: > She now has to wash and put away the glass. No she doesn't. She can just leave it there. She can leave her own glasses there, too. The pressure to keep the counter clean isn't coming from the husband. He doesn't give a damn how many…

No she doesn't. She can just leave it there. She can leave her own glasses there, too.

I'm having a hard time following the logic here.

You agree that at some point someone has to do the dishes, correct?

We can assume based on the article that the wife is the one doing the dishes. So, that means every time the husband leaves dishes out he is making more work for his wife than if he just put his dishes in the dishwasher.

Re: A dirty dish by the sink can be a big marriage problem

#300

Post by em-bee »

jelliclesfarm wrote: post #273
em-bee wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the problem with hired help is that is severely reduces the privacy of your home because you always have someone around who is not family. depending on your culture this can be a serious dampener on things like intimacy in your relationship. my understanding is that in india you don't even show intimacy in front of your children, so this part is very much limited to your bedroom. which means the hired help is rarely…

I have never heard display of intimacy being connected to the decision to employ hired house help before. I am revisiting this just to register my marvel at the perception dreamed up about india in the rest of the world. East and west, they will never meet. I am going with the assumption that you were sincere, but this gross generalization can be construed as a little odd. I never imagine how the westerners are intim…

you are right about the generalization. i should have worded that more carefully. it just seemed to fit as a good explanation for the difference.
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