my wife's thin skin
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Anonymous
Whether justified or not, once contempt enters the marital relationship, it's over. |
Anonymous
Oh for God's sake. No, I'm co-planning recipes with my wife. She cooks some of the time, and I like her meals, and I eat whatever she serves, and enjoy it, and say thank you. I cook sometimes, she eats what I cook, and usually doesn't complain. In most respects, our relationship is "normal" and functioning well. But when it comes time to discuss something significant, the wheels sometimes come off. And no, my list of "significant" items is not a mile long -- it is pretty damn short. I think a husband and wife need to be able to discuss key issues without the wheels coming off. If what you are telling me is that I can't discuss a damn thing with my wife, because not a damn thing in life is significant -- every last aspect of life is trivial and inconsequential -- then I'm perplexed, because the couples that I know seem to do just fine discussing the very same stuff that I'd like to discuss with my wife. I recall the first time the wheels came off. And I should have thought more carefully about the situation, but I dismissed it as a one-time case. It involved her traveling to the third world while she was pregnant, to a country she had never visited before, and where she had no friends or connections. I was a bit worried and wanted to talk through the situation with her, and she got extremely angry. All I wanted to do was talk about the situation, for Christ's sake. |
Anonymous
| I think the best course of action is to work with a counselor to try to figure out why “the wheels are coming off” when you begin certain discussions with her. It’s hard to tell from the examples but they seem to have in common that she is sensitive to having her judgment questioned and being told what to do. Approach her with sympathy and affection and try to tone down the anger and condescension. Neither of you should enter this process trying to prove yourself right and the other wrong. |
Anonymous
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Some people are like that. My sister is. She had a health scare. At a recent appointment, she got back the news that all was clear from one set of tests, which means it’s not the worst case scenario. They were able to rule out a terminal illness as the issue, but they have to do more tests to figure out what is going on. At the end of the appointment, the doctor asked if she or her husband needed anything else. She has been taking his Xanax because she’s so anxious, so he asked for a refill of that.
She went nuts because he made the appointment all about him. She would never dream of doing something so selfish to him. When she told me the story, I was confused because it didn’t seem like such a big deal, especially since I knew she was taking all his Xanax. (She won’t get her own prescription because she’s not crazy.) I asked if he did something else to make her upset and she said no, that was enough. Then she got mad at me because I didn’t agree that what he did was that egregious. Then she went on to say her DH and I were being too celebratory about it not being a terminal illness, because the chance of it having been that was so small, we were being ridiculous. That us being so happy about her not having that disease means we clearly don’t care that she’s still not sure what the problem is, and we probably think she’s faking her symptoms anyway. Now she’s threatening to refuse further testing and let nature take its course. So yeah, sometimes people overreact at crazy levels over insignificant comments. Some people can be very passive aggressive. With some people, you just can’t win. I’d demand therapy OP. I couldn’t stay in a marriage like that. |
Anonymous
Agree in the furniture decision you have to give her something she can work with and ask her the things she liked about it if you are going to give suggestions that incorporate her taste. That’s actually working together versus employee putting something together for boss to say yes/no. My DH is involved in shopping. I am sensitive (I know this and personality assessments say the same) and he can be critical (friends observed this early on). I’ve gotten better about speaking up for myself and being direct, i.e you need to tell me what you like and don’t like otherwise I’m wasting my time. If you can’t articulate it, pick out what appeals to you and I can weigh in if I also like it. With the driving, it’s possible she still has anxiety about it. I’m one of those overly cautious drivers and being in a parking lot fender bender rattled me. I kept asking expecting someone to do the unexpected wanted even less to be in any busy parking lot. Hard to express that to someone that you think is critical. I could see not wanting to drive the kids after being faced the wrong way etc. and figuring out a way to opt out. I am surprised OP’s wife didn’t suggest he continue to drive the kids until she felt comfortable. |
Anonymous
Yes, this. this is solid advice for dealing with someone with skin as thin as tissue paper. Walk on eggshells around her and play out every scenario of her potential over blown reaction and choose the one that will cause her the least amount of upset to her delicate ego. |
Anonymous
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I find it really odd that 80% of the responses here are that the OP must be critical, full of disdain, a poor communicator, contemptuous of his wife. There is a lot of projecting based on no information.
I feel that if the gender roles were reversed--a woman asking about how to deal with her husband's thin skin, that he couldn't take even suggestions without taking umbrage, people would be commiserating, or telling her that its his fragile ego, or he has untreated adhd, but not that it really is all her fault. (signed, a woman). |
Anonymous
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Advice is the same regardless of gender. Some people are persnickety, perfectionist. It drives people around them crazy.
The lady with the cheese plate example a few post back was exactly like OP. Sometimes it's better to just let things go. My spouse is doing our 4th of July event. The OP would probably want to discuss menu and all the things his wife should buy. I personally want to do it to my spouse as indont enjoy generic hot dog buns. But if I went to the store and 2 d guessed all his selections and was critical of his menu he would likely ask why am I doing this. Indont blame him. Ok, you need to look internally. |
Anonymous
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OP, stop comparing your conversations with your wife to your friends with their spouses. Most people know how to behave I public. I would never embarrass my spouse in front of friends but you better believe if my spouse was critical he or she would hear it while alone.
Ask these people you compare to if they choose to decorate, or criticize driving and what the consequences are. You may be surprised by the answer. |
Anonymous
OP here. No, I wouldn't give a damn about cheese plates, or any of the many tiny decisions that are made on a daily basis. I'm taking about big issues here ... the sorts of issues that arise just once in a while, rather than on a daily basis. Another example -- discussing how best to take care of an aging parent. It would be nice to be able to chat about a major issue like this, but I find that my wife is on a knife's edge within 60 seconds of starting the conversation. If I suggest that we first get a sense of the range of options and choices we have available, she will interpret that to mean that I want to challenge her decision. In other words -- we can't talk about big issues. I mean we can't even get the conversation started. No, I don't yell. No, I don't tell her what to do. No, I don't tell her it is my way or the highway. None of these things. I lay out my thoughts on a conversational tone. But this approach doesn't work. It is almost as if she is opposed to reason itself -- that the mere act of THINKING before making an important choice is a challenge to her approach to decision-making. |
Anonymous
One piece of advice for OP from my customer service communication training that I’ve taken at work is don’t provide a narrative for your wife. Saying “it’s almosy as if she opposed to reason itself” isn’t helpful. Presumably she is an intelligent, thoughtful, self-sufficient adult capable of making many decisions on her own and being responsible for her children. There is something either with the big issue itself or the process of how you two communicate that isn’t working. A good professional neutral 3rd party can help you navigate this. If you are trying to go at it alone, remember the saying “seek first to understand, then be understoood. Read books about communication like “The 7 habits of Highly Effective People” and try putting them in practice. As for the advice being gender specific, I think it is based on what actions can be controlled by the OP. We can’t get the OP’s spouse to be more direct about what’s going on. What we can do is give OP advice for actions within his control. You can ask questions, you can change your approach and see if that changes things, and you can help from a counselor, or you can give up (whatever that looks like). There are really only four or five options to any given relationship situation. |
Anonymous
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OP. Your issues large stem from conversational differences that set you guys up behind the eight ball before you even start a discussion. You have different ways of communicating and you have to learn to compromise and speak in ways that will make your partner more receptive to what you have to say.
Short term: You need to start discussions long before they get to a bottleneck or boiling point. For the furniture, you need to discuss "can we each do a little research, get some ideas and then compare what we've picked. If we can't agree, we can discuss what we want and what we don't and then we can look for alternatives." In your example, she went into the research thinking she would find some alternatives. She put a lot of work into the selection and then you shot it down without any alternatives. It says that her work wasn't appreciated, her choice was criticized and you aren't offering to help, just making her do more work. So, before she gets to the point of making a suggestion and suggesting looking for alternatives, suggest a process to her that includes you each doing work, each providing ideas and then discussing options and alternatives. You felt like you were being open, but from her perspective, you were not. For the driving, again you need to change the framework. After she started to drive, having some compassion that driving in a new country was a good start, but you should have focused on suggesting that she needs some more practice time driving rather than focusing on her driving with the children. Rather than being constructive and suggesting that she needs more practice, you immediately went to "you're endangering our children and I have to step in to stop you." Imagine if you took your children to the playground and wanted to let your child explore the jungle gym without standing below them. Your wife swoops in and says that you are endangering your child, that they could fall and break a limb or worse, their neck, and that she doesn't want you taking the children to the playground without her until she can trust you. Essentially in both cases, one parent is unilaterally saying that they don't trust the other parents' judgment and that they don't care for the safety of the children. Not good messages that will ever be received well. Long term: You should get one of Deborah Tannen's Books "That's Not What I Meant!" or "You Just Don't Understand". She's written many good books on communication but these are a really good place to start. As a friend who is a professional linguist once said to me, these are Linguistics 101 for learning how to understand and communicate better. She frames them in the ways that men and woman are often taught to communicate. In your case, I think the basics to linguistics and learning to read your partner's communication style would be helpful. People have to understand that communication is half communicating the right message and half receiving the right message. If your conversation partner is not receiving the right message, then you need to adjust your communication methods to make sure that the right message is received. My wife and I were mostly on track when we first met, but we still had some miscommunication. This book definitely helped us learn how to communicate to each other better. It wasn't so much what we were saying, but how we were saying it. And techniques in the book helped us learn to read each other better and learn to communicate more in the manner which the partner would understand. 19 years later, we are still much better at framing messages to each other than we were. I frame things differently now when I speak to my wife vs speaking with others because I know how she'll receive my message better. She does the same. https://www.amazon.com/You-Just-Dont-Understand-Conversation/dp/0060959622/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8 https://www.amazon.com/Thats-What-Meant-Conversational-Relationships/dp/0062062999/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8 |
Anonymous
These books look helpful. Thank you. |
Anonymous
I hope you are right. That is, I hope the problems arise from conversational differences. If so, I think we can solve our problems. I wonder, though, if for some issues my wife simply can't reason her way through. She sometimes leaps from A to Z, and I'm unable to trace the thought process that falls in the middle. When I ask "can you explain why you feel that way?" she is sometimes unable. She can't explain how or why she reached her own conclusions. There have been odd lapses in judgment now and then which suggests that no real thinking is taking place ... kind of like a teenager who doesn't look before they leap. This makes me nervous, because when a parent is responsible for a child's life, the parent MUST look before they leap. |
Anonymous
Sometimes people feel something because that is how they feel. Period. I would feel blind rage and hatred towards a spouse who doesn’t allow me to feel a certain way without explaining to his satisfaction the thought process behind the feeling. The comment about contempt earlier in the thread is spot on. |