Someone asked my husband how “bootcamp” was going.
Naturally, we didn’t understand what the person was asking.
They clarified that he meant “husband bootcamp”. Of course we both said that my husband doesn’t need bootcamp, he does just fine on his own.
No, that wasn’t good enough. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been together, the person said, as soon as the ring goes on, he enters the dreaded training period.
It was a harmless joke and I laughed at first but it made me stop and think.
Fine, we’ve only been married a month but here is another thing to keep in mind. We’ve been best friends for 8 years, together for 7, and living together for 4.
He knew how to be a husband before he even was a husband and it didn’t take any training to make him that way.
Talking to my husband about this, he hit the nail on the head; we both had to learn how to be happy with each other. Neither of us “trained” the other. It’s appreciating the effort that your partner puts into making you happy.
After we got married, I was nervous about joining the old wives club. They sit around and complain about how their husbands didn’t do this or they didn’t do that. He’s useless at that and he’s clueless about this.
I don’t want that membership.
After this person’s remark, my husband just received his membership into the old husband’s club. They sit around and talk about how the wife was mad at him again today, how he’s being “punished” with the silent treatment and how she won’t tell him what he did.
If this is the attitude we inherit as soon as that ring goes on the finger then no wonder why half of marriages fail.
I’ve seen it for years with family members. It’s always been who has the upper hand. Who has the control.
What happened to marriage being a partnership?
I don’t want to give my husband “the silent treatment” anytime he does something “wrong”.
If he does something “wrong” I tell him. I don’t go complaining about him to my other married friends about how he is SO clueless.
If I’m mad at him, he’ll know why. If he’s mad at me, I know why.
Marriage is no longer the pants wearing battle between the sexes it was 30-50 years ago.
He works, I work. I work late, he cooks supper. I beat him home, I make supper. I have a 50-60 hour work week, he cleans the house. I have a slow day at work, I come home early, I clean up the house.
We just got a cat, we’re still battling it out over who has to clean the litter box. That is all new territory for us.
Sure, go ahead and tell me that I have no idea what I’m talking about because I’ve only been married a month. Go ahead and try to tell me that my relationship will change.
Relationships don’t change because you suddenly sign a piece of paper and wear a ring.
The relationship changes because we have this warped attitude towards the institution.
I knew the exact marriage I didn’t want before I even married him. Even though he makes it so easy, we still compromise, we communicate, we use words out of our sound holes like normal human beings.
This attitude has been normalized through pop-culture, as well. Men are always wrong, women are always right. You can see it in jokes on facebook, modern day sitcoms and even greeting cards.
I refuse to believe that there are so few “good” men out there that they have to be “trained” to be thoughtful towards another human being.
Looking at the men I know in relationships; brothers, cousins, friends, I also see a hell of a lot of women out there who don’t appreciate the efforts their husbands put into making THEM happy.
I’m not saying either that this is what happens in every relationship. Let’s just not assume that every man is an idiot.
I don’t want to join any club and my husband does not need to be “trained”.
