What you do and don't do for your spouse? Opinion needed.

1130 Views 14 Replies 13 Participants Last post by Clark G, Oct 11, 2012

BridgetJones

Discussion Starter · Oct 11, 2012

This is the thing. I have been married for 10 years. Both, my husband and I work. I am not housewife or anything like it. We go to work at same time and he expects me to pick his clothes for each work day. I do not mind to iron his clothes but what really gets me is that I have to actually pick it for him. I feel like I am taking care about kindergarten age kid. This morning I told him to do it on his own. He start arguing with me that I should realize how I am behaving and how wrong I am. He said every wife does this for her husband. I said that is not true and I am not his mother. That I do not mind to iron his clothes but at least he could give me what he wants to wear.
With this, he just started being louder and louder. We ended up screaming at each other. I also told him, that when I am late, I ask him if he can feed our cat and his answer is always NO. But then he will do it anyway after making me mad.
I said, I will say NO to his clothes from now on. He started telling me once again how wrong I am doing and should finally realize we need each other because he fixed my flat tire yesterday. I told him, that I cooked dinner for him after that, so we are even.
He just made me completely mad. He never helps with his clothes but will complain around about me not doing it. When I was leaving house I could hear he him telling me not to crash car somewhere and also how “f….ng cow” I am.
What should I do? Is it really what every wife does for her husband?????????

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Liam

· #2 · Oct 11, 2012

I'm not sure I've ever heard of a wife picking clothes her husband, if by 'picking' you mean selecting them out of his closet/wardrobe/drawers and laying them out for him. With that said, if you have been doing it for 10 years, he is bound to be miffed when you say you aren't going to do it any more. The fact is, he should never have expected you to do it for him, but you have enabled him by doing it for so long.

He sounds quite childish, and it sounds like the way you communicate with each other needs some serious work. Myself and my wife(we have also been married 10 years) used to have this 'who does what' problem, and the way we solved it was simply by allocating certain roles to ourselves, split as evenly as possible. If one of us wants help, or wants the other to take it over, we just ask nicely. Simple as that.

I think there are maybe some deeper issues with your marriage here, and they are manifesting themselves with this task bickering.

wiigirl

· #3 · Oct 11, 2012

Liam said:
I think there are maybe some deeper issues with your marriage here, and they are manifesting themselves with this task bickering.

This....

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CharlieParker

· #4 · Oct 11, 2012

I pick out my own clothes.

BridgetJones said:
When I was leaving house I could hear he him telling me not to crash car somewhere and also how “f….ng cow” I am.

I'd think this is a bigger issue. How is everything else going? Other issues? How do your fights/disagreements normally play out?

Camarillo Brillo

· #5 · Oct 11, 2012

Jesus, he's being ridiculous. I don't understand why some husbands want their wives acting like their moms.

To answer your question, my wife and I have been together 36 years (married 29). I take pride in the fact I don't need anyone taking care of me. Here's how my day has gone so far:

1) I got up at 5:30 and and took the dog out, got the paper, checked my work email and calendar, and washed a bunch of dishes that were left over from last night.
2) I woke the older son up at 6:00 and asked him what he wanted for breakfast. I made him a fruit smoothy and cinnamon toast.
3) I woke the wife up at 6:00 but she strained her back recently and needed to fire up the heating pad.
4) made some coffee for my wife and helped her make the younger son's breakfast.
5) I helped the younger son with his shower
6) made sure all my clothes were picked up from yesterday and are either in the wash or closet.
7) I packed a light breakfast for myself
8) After work I'll take the older son to football practice and will take the dog to my sisters for the weekend since we'll be out of town Fri - Sun.
9) I'll also help both boys pack for this weekend.
10) I'm sure I'll make my own dinner.

I also iron all my own shirts, and have a host of other 'dad-type' things I do around the house.

My wife is equally busy taking care of bills, wash, shopping, running boys to various events, etc.

But, the point is that our lives are incredibly smooth. In fact, just this morning as we were all in the kitchen getting ready for the day I was thinking to myself how pleasant things were.

And one final note. I may be in the minority, but I love always being in constant motion. I can tell that my wife gets annoyed that she isn't 'allowed' to do certain things for me. Maybe it's one way for me to exert and to be in control, but in any case it works.

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BridgetJones

Discussion Starter · #6 · Oct 11, 2012

Yes, there is deeper issue. I just wanted opinion on what happened this morning to make sure I am not the worst wife in the world for not selecting his clothes. You can read more about my marriage here http://talkaboutmarriage.com/genera...7345-how-stop-thinking-about-other-man-2.html even if it is not start about it, people asked, so there are things about my marriage as well.

arbitrator

· #7 · Oct 11, 2012 (Edited)

I did most anything either on my own, or that my STBXW asked me to do or had instructed me to do, with pleasure, and to the best of my ability. Whether it was ranching work, housework, yard work, paper work, I was more than thrilled to try to do it.

That was up until the point, that I received not as much as a simple "thank-you," and that at least in her eyes, that I could not do any of it to even to come close in suiting her expectations. I was always chewed-out by her in a rather condescending tone and was always told that she could do a far better job all by herself.

I pretty much told her that if it was perfection she was seeking, or if it was "hired help" that she needed, then for her to richly go for it!

Life is just way too short to be talked-down to! More especially if what you're trying to perform is done so out of unselfish love for the person you're doing it for!

Ten_year_hubby

· #8 · Oct 11, 2012

BridgetJones said:
What should I do? Is it really what every wife does for her husband?????????

BridgetJones,

Some do, some don't. Some can do whatever their spouse wants, some can't. If I was you, I would buy my husband 5 identical pairs of khaki dockers and 5 blue button down shirts and 5 of whatever else he needs and I would put one of each into 5 large ziplock bags, throw them all on the floor in my closet and pick a bag out for him every morning

40isthenew20

· #9 · Oct 11, 2012

When my wife and I are in one of our not getting along great phases, we tend to point out how little one spouse is doing while the other is performing all of the tasks. It gets annoying and never ends well. One always feels they are right, as does the other.

But, wa la...since we have resparked our sex life, we can't do enough for the other and it happens without even asking. I'm fixing things around the house, washing clothes and dishes, giving her massages while she is going out of her way to cook all of the bland meals that I eat for the week and being super nice to me (this is a woman that is very low key about everything to everyone).

It boils down to if both parties are happy throughout the entire marital hemisphere. We both keep in shape and look good for our age, have good jobs and are good parents. But we took a long time in between seeing eye to eye in the bedroom. That was the cherry on top.

Perhaps the OP and her H need a nice weekend alone to rekindle some old feelings.

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AsTheStoryGoes

· #10 · Oct 11, 2012

I have never heard of a wife picking out clothes for her husband each morning..but I guess in each marriage, spouses expect different things of each other. I don't think you were being a bad wife by not wanting to do that, but like previously stated, if you have been doing it without question for the past 10 years, then I understand him getting mad when out of the blue you decide to stop doing it. It sounds like you guys need to sit down and talk about a lot of things.. and you need to do it without being hurtful or attacking each other. I'm not always the best at communication with my husband, and vise versa, but it's vital in any marriage.

CO_MOM

· #11 · Oct 11, 2012

I usually always lay my husbands clothes out for him when he gets in the shower in the morning, but that is mainly because I can't seem to keep up on laundry so he never knows if its in the dryer, on the couch or in a basket somewhere. Heck, I don't even know half the time, lol!

southern wife

· #12 · Oct 11, 2012

I pick out my own clothes; hubs picks out his clothes. He's a grown man, not a 2 year old.

I do mine and daughter's laundry. Hubs does his own laundry.

Hope1964

· #13 · Oct 11, 2012

There is a lot wrong here. You are married to a controlling jerk, and you are considering cheating on him. Can you tell me if there is ANYTHING good about your marriage?

Camarillo Brillo

· #14 · Oct 11, 2012

southern wife said:
I pick out my own clothes; hubs picks out his clothes. He's a grown man, not a 2 year old.

I do mine and daughter's laundry. Hubs does his own laundry.

I'm with you. Christ, I don't even let my wife buy my clothes, much less pick out what I'm going to wear each day.

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Clark G

· #15 · Oct 11, 2012

I do everything for myself. I will let her do things for me b/c I know as a person she enjoys doing things for me but we are very clear to each other that we both don't need for the other to do things or take care of each other like she's my mother or something as indicated previously.

Pick out clothes? Hell no. I am a grown man and can not only pick out my clothes but also my sons and iron my clothes every single morning so I look sharp at the office and in front of people.

As stated earlier there are some major control/other issues in your marriage and if you are thinking the grass is greener by cheating then you need to confront these things first and then decide if leaving is the option.

Joe

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