Reply to Lack of spousal support when needed

Forum Index » Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)

Reply to "Lack of spousal support when needed"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]OP, what would "being supportive" mean to you?  What do you wish that your wife would do?  Because if the answer is "listen to me vent and complain," then my advice is different from "I wish she'd attend the funeral, or take over some of my regular household chores so that I had time to do X thing," or whatever.  If the latter--then you might need to ask.  Tell her what would be helpful to you or make you feel supported.  Don't expect your spouse to be a mind reader.  If she refuses to do any of the things that you ask, then you have a problem.  But what helps one person doesn't always help another, so the things that make her feel supported might not be the things that you need.

If it's the venting--you absolutely should be able to talk to your partner about what's bothering you.  But it can be hard to listen to someone complain about the same thing over and over again, especially if there is no obvious end to the problem in sight.  My husband went through a rough patch at work, and he would start complaining about it as soon as I got home.  It was like walking through the door at the end of my own long day and getting a bucket full of sludge dumped on me, day after day.  I knew that he needed to be able to talk about it, I just couldn't handle hearing about it for hours at a time from the moment I got home.  So we agreed that he would not talk about work until I asked, and I would always ask.  That allowed me to control the timing a little bit--I could change clothes, start dinner, we could have a glass of wine, etc., and then I would feel a little refreshed and ready to lend a sympathetic ear.  He also agreed to cap how long he talked about work, so that we weren't spending the whole evening being depressed.  It actually worked very well--I got the mental break to be able to listen, and he knew that I would always give him a chance to vent.

If you expect her to curtail her social life so that she can sit at home and mope with you, though, I think that's your problem.  Yes, we all need someone to vent to, but venting doesn't solve anything.  It's not reasonable to ask her to stay home with you so you can be sad together.  Again, if you just want a little extra company that week, and wish that she would stay home and snuggle on the couch and watch a movie, that's a concrete thing you can ask for, and something a spouse should be willing to do.  But a general "she shouldn't want to go out with friends because I'm having a hard time at work" isn't fair.  [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics