Hi Achokis.
I have been married for the last five years. My wife and I have had a great marriage by and large, but of late, my wife is getting into my nerves. She is always cranky and complains a lot about everything. I don’t feel appreciated. Nowadays, I avoid going home early just to avoid her. Instead, I go drinking. But this has further complicated things as she has gone crazy and even threatened to leave me. I don’t want to lose my marriage, but I don’t know what to do with this woman. Please help!
-Mark
The process of adjusting to each other in marriage can be a difficult one. When the honeymoon is over, reality sets in and many couples find themselves constantly bickering and on each other’s face. If this is not handled well, the couple may go their separate ways or become indifferent to each other though still together.
Unmet need
The reason we usually don’t get it right is that we start attacking the other person’s reactions instead of asking ourselves why they are reacting that way. We are sure your wife didn’t just get up one morning and decided to become difficult. Normally, when something happens in our lives contrary to what we expected, we react. This event surfaces an unmet need in our lives. That need could be to be loved, to be appreciated as you mention, among others. When that need surfaces, we tell ourselves something like, I’m not needed here, or I’m not worthy. What we tell ourselves then determines how we behave and it is that undesirable behaviour that causes us to repel each other.
Change starts with you
In your case, her way of repelling you is her crankiness and complaining, while yours is staying away late drinking. The more she does it, the more you stay away and the more you stay away the more she complains, and the vicious cycle continues destroying your marriage. How do you turn around this cycle?
First, be compassionate, not judgemental towards her. Have you stopped and asked yourself why she’s behaving the way she is? Instead of blaming her and condemning her, why not reach out to her and find out what it is that you did or didn’t do that triggered that behaviour. You will find that maybe it is not even something to do with you. Maybe it’s pressure from work or stress from housework. For women everything is intertwined and so, she might be complaining about everything as a result of one underlying issue.
On your part you also need to change what you have been telling yourself as a result of what you are experiencing. Ask yourself what outcome do you want? Then what can you change to get the desired outcome? Who knows by you changing you will influence her to change too.
The writers are marriage and relationship coaches
