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

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

#301

Post by ngc248 »

giantg2 wrote: post #83
snarf21 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Divorced and looking back, the root cause of this (in my experience) is a lack of empathy. Love is easy to come by while empathy requires walking in someone else's shoes. I understand this Same Fight because I lived through that. It is never about that thing, it is about not being seen. As the author is processing his divorce, it is good he sees that there is value in doing something selflessly. However, I can't help…

"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…

Totally agree... different people are suited for different things

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

#302

Post by greedo »

mswen wrote: post #103
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…

Your comment reminds me of the following. My wife and I have been married over 30 years now. Our total household is 7 persons. A couple years ago, my wife was complaining once again about someone using scissors and not bringing them back to their proper storage place. "How can we have 3 pair of scissors and none of them are here when I need to use one?" This didn't bother me but hearing her complain about it did both…

Yet the solution to many relationship problems isn't finding a solution!

I'm a sysadmin. When I see a problem, I try to fix it, and prevent it from happening again. But relationships aren't servers. Sometimes we see (or are told about) a problem, and immediately go to fix it. Yet often the problem isn't what we see. Usually (maybe 99% of the time) problems in relationships are about communication. Listening. Commiserating.

My partner hates it when she tells me about her day at work and I try to offer solutions to the problems she faces. It's dumb on my part, she's a grown woman, a professional, and I have a solution? This behavior on my part is very unhealthy to a relationship, and I have to fight my natural inclinations to fix things.

Instead, I have to listen. Let her talk, let her explain how it makes her feel, let her talk through how she might solve it, or let her not think about a solution. Just be there for her.

Not easy at all for someone on the spectrum who has a hard time reading social/emotional cues. Nor for someone who has a career as a fixer...

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

#303

Post by jelliclesfarm »

treis wrote: post #211
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…

Projecting a lot, I feel like this guy is just a narcissist. Kind of making it all about him but in a way that doesn't portray him in a truly negative light. Also, guessing his ex-wife probably doesn't want a book about her divorce to be part of the national chatter.

[..] Also, guessing his ex-wife probably doesn't want a book about her divorce to be part of the national chatter.[..]

This. I was thinking the same thing too. Shouldn’t there be a law against this?

If I were his ex-wife, I would have sued his sorry ass for airing marriage laundry. But that’s just me.

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

#304

Post by AlanYx »

RobertRoberts wrote: post #286
AlanYx wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't always work through emotional dysregulation issues (inability to return to baseline after six hours of argument being one indicator of such issues) by just talking it out. Sometimes you can, sometimes it's associated with something more fundamental like a personality disorder where professional help needs to be involved.

I have a theory I use that helps me with this, the "million dollar gun to the head" theory. Would either of them stop fighting instantly if there as a gun to their heads or offered a million dollars? If the answer is "yes", then it's entirely within their control to solve the problem. The only people I think that fail this are psychopaths, and I think those are rare.

If you don't have experience with people prone to emotional dysregulation, it's hard to appreciate how it works, but you don't need to resort to such an artificial scenario like your gun scenario. People with some personality disorders can be triggered by seemingly little things into anger/rage states for 4-6 hours that cannot be resolved by talking them out, but if someone outside the household (i.e., someone who is not their partner or not their kids) shows up unexpectedly, they can often immediately control themselves. But the underlying dynamic doesn't get resolved, and generally won't be without professional tools that go beyond conventional talk therapy, like DBT.

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

#305

Post by olyjohn »

em-bee wrote: post #205
jelliclesfarm wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 co…

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 mean, I live alone and just pay someone to come in once every two weeks. You don't need someone living there full time. Just outsource some of the major chores. Folding laundry, scrubbing toilets and tubs, cleaning the floors. Cleaners bust through that stuff in a couple of hours and then you've got all your privacy back.

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

#306

Post by toss1 »

RobertRoberts wrote: post #286
AlanYx wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't always work through emotional dysregulation issues (inability to return to baseline after six hours of argument being one indicator of such issues) by just talking it out. Sometimes you can, sometimes it's associated with something more fundamental like a personality disorder where professional help needs to be involved.

I have a theory I use that helps me with this, the "million dollar gun to the head" theory. Would either of them stop fighting instantly if there as a gun to their heads or offered a million dollars? If the answer is "yes", then it's entirely within their control to solve the problem. The only people I think that fail this are psychopaths, and I think those are rare.

To quantify "rare" it seems there are about 1% of the population are psychopaths [0]. A quick search came across a number of refs to that number, but IDK if it is multiple studies, or just one a long time ago that is amplified through time.

[0] https://psichologyanswers.com/library/lecture/read/601609-wh...

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

#307

Post by avidiax »

incomingpain wrote: post #280
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…

I read this and feel like I'm the bad guy and I don't understand how. I'm the breadwinner. I pay 100% of the bills, excluding the 'I went to buy potato chips and ice cream' I WFH so I also tend to do the majority of chores. Which when I get burnt out or get sick I don't get as many chores done and the house goes to shit. Only ending up punishing myself really. I also have to 100% of the time decide what's for dinner…

It's time to ask your partner how they feel about the relationship, what they value in your contributions, and what they feel they are contributing, and vice-versa.

This is a way for you to learn if you are undervaluing your partner's contributions, or if they think/know that they are free-riding.

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

#308

Post by Hayvok »

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."

They don’t teach you stuff like this in business school, but they should.

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

#309

Post by whateveracct »

62951413 wrote: post #240
epicureanideal wrote: post #175

The most important marriage lesson is: don’t get married. The person you marry is not the person you divorce. You can lose a huge amount of money battling it out even if YOU bend over backwards to be reasonable. If you want to flip a coin to see if you lose ten years of earnings, then marriage is for you.

It's factually correct though you need to replace "can" with "will", especially in states like CA. Make no mistake, the discrimination is systemic. So it's not just you who is unlucky and you won't find a loophole just because you're clever. And it's all fun and games until you're about 40. At which point a man needs a family to take care of. So it's the most existential catch 22 situation in your life. You cannot wi…

You actually can win..love exists..

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

#310

Post by thewebcount »

AlanYx wrote: post #255
RobertRoberts wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked from home for many years (before it was popular) and I had a family too. This kind of things happened to me and my wife a lot, hours of arguing while I should have been working. You can work through it, you just have to care enough. We no longer have arguments longer than maybe 20 minutes now. It can just be personality types and where you are in life. But a valuable person in your life? You work through tha…

You can't always work through emotional dysregulation issues (inability to return to baseline after six hours of argument being one indicator of such issues) by just talking it out. Sometimes you can, sometimes it's associated with something more fundamental like a personality disorder where professional help needs to be involved.

I just want to point out that it's not just personality disorders that can cause this. There are very real physiological problems that can surface this way, too. For example, some people have adrenaline issues where seemingly minor, or even pleasant things (like running into an old friend at the grocery store), cause a much larger than normal spike of adrenaline. If the person it happens to isn't aware of what's going on, they can react the way their body is telling them to (fight, flight, or freeze). Sometimes if they're aware of it, they can have enough sense to take a pause, but it is often very difficult because the biological response your body has is so overwhelming. It's as unpleasant for them as it is for the person who has to deal with their overreaction to the situation.
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