If you are a husband, stop reading this post. This is for women only.
If you decide to keep reading, please forgive me if I offend you. I don’t mean to. I just have to tell it like it is, and it may not be politically correct.
Do you feel angry with your husband almost all the time? There may be something you can do about that, and don’t worry; it has nothing to do with communicating your needs in a different way, etc. I’m guessing part of the reason you are furious is because communicating your needs is not working very well for you. We have all been told that it is up to our spouses to meet our needs. That is such a recipe for disaster!
Married life is difficult. Even when it is rewarding, it is not easy. And much of the time, it is not rewarding. As women, we feel responsible for the emotional state of our families. If something is “wrong”, we want to “make it better.” We think our husbands should be the same way, but they are not. We have so many opportunities to be angry with them. When they don’t listen; when they don’t want to help; when they space out by watching TV or playing video games; when they are insensitive; when they don’t seem to care what we want; when they bumble through our birthdays; when they make messes and leave them for us to clean up, and then AFTER we do, they say they were going to do that, but we know from past experience that could mean sometime in the next few months and by then, we’d have to sandblast it! (Sorry, got a little carried away there.) But I said I had a way to help you stop being angry, not fan the flames! Well, here it is in a nutshell: we have to understand they are different, and then we have to take steps to create a life for ourselves that respects our own needs. We have to draw on our feminine power to be kind to ourselves. We probably need more time alone. We need to take a bubble bath and read a mystery. We need to light a candle, and listen to music. We need nice nightgowns. We need a glass of wine at night. We need to drink coffee out of bone china. We need nice sheets and towels. We need to take an art class. We need to not work all day long and come home and work all night. We may need to hire a housekeeper. We need to go to bed at a decent hour. If any of this sounds absolutely wonderful to you, you are allowed to create a more civilized life for yourself, and to do whatever you need to do to make it so. You can stop waiting for your husband to get a clue, and understand that you are special, and have special needs. You can start tending to yourself a little bit more. You can stop waiting for your husband to give you permission. I am giving you permission. You can stop waiting for your husband to understand your needs. He doesn’t. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t love you. He is just so, so different. Here is one way to understand the situation: Even if a cat and dog are bestest friends, sometimes the cat just needs the dog to go away for awhile.