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I am not a relationship counselor. And neither is my wife. We recently celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary and had the chance to reflect on our time together. In all eight years of marriage and the four years we dated before tying the knot, we have not had a single fight. I know that sounds cliche; indeed, every relationship has ups and downs. While we have had trying times, we have managed to pull through it without fighting each other. Today I would like to share some tips to help you get along with your partner.
Common points of contention in a household can be numerous. They range from petty issues like how much salt to put in soup or what to watch on TV to severe problems like money, kids, and infidelity. This short article will only have time to cover some possible scenarios. Still, the most common relationship fights I hear about are based on chores, hobbies, and money.
Talking to other married folks, household chores often come up as a reason to fight. From doing dishes or laundry to taking out the trash, these small, simple tasks should be a non-issue. Still, many people try to handle these tasks by “taking turns” or even going as far as “making chore charts.” Unsurprisingly, these methods tend to fail within weeks or months, creating more contention in the household. This contention leads to fights breaking out.
My wife and I handle chores differently than most couples. We each take care of household chores as though we each live alone. That is, if I was not married, laundry, dishes, etc., would still need to get done. In our case, laundry is done by whoever runs out of socks first, and dishes are done by whoever is in the kitchen waiting for something. (Like a pot of coffee or something from the microwave.) Most household tasks only take a few minutes to complete. When you think about it, a load of laundry is a 20-minute job. Five minutes to load the washer, 5 minutes to move it to the dryer, and 10 minutes to put it away.
Bigger chores, like yard care, are handled differently. While my wife has contributed some to the care and maintenance of the yard, most of the work falls on me. This isn’t due to gender roles or anything else; she doesn’t see it as my responsibility. I take care of the yard work because she has terrible allergies and yard work is murder on her well-being. It does not bother me that she doesn’t contribute to this type of work because her comfort is more important to me than the few hours a week it takes to maintain the yard.
All that being said, I wouldn’t say our household chores are 50/50. Sometimes they are 0/100, and sometimes they are 75/25. It just depends on who does what first. The takeaway here is, sometimes, before you get mad about a dirty kitchen or an unvacuumed floor, you need to ask yourself, “Would I have done it?” The other big thing here is valuing each other’s time. My wife knows I’m busy and don’t always have time to take care of stuff. And when that happens, she covers down by doing a bit more. When she’s busy or having a rough week, I cover for her. We do the things we don’t want to do so that we can both get back to what we want to do.
That brings us to hobbies. Everybody likes to fill at least some of their day with things they enjoy. I hear friends complain all the time that their significant other spent money on a hobby or spent all day working on some personal project. Usually, this is coupled with a complaint about money or chores. IE, “He spent his whole day working on his motorcycle instead of doing laundry or cleaning the kitchen.” Or “She spent 100 dollars at the craft store on stupid stuff she had too much of already.” Another big one is, “My significant other made a huge mess working on something and didn’t clean it up.”
My wife and I, luckily, have similar hobbies. We both like to create things, we both play video games, and we both read books. There are many other hobbies that we have and like to work on as well. Some have a large footprint, taking up a good portion of a room. While it can be tedious or frustrating to walk through someone else’s mess, we both understand that some projects can only be put away once completed. In this way, we are very compatible as partners.
Hobbies are so important to mental health that they should never be a reason to fight. Your significant other should be allowed to spend time on their hobbies, and if it bothers you, get involved. One of the best ways to avoid fighting with your partner about things they enjoy is to learn about them and try to understand their appeal. Who knows, maybe you too will fall in love with whatever it is, and then you can share a hobby.
One of the ways that we deal with the mess, time, and money of various hobbies is by putting ourselves in each other’s shoes. If my wife has a day off and I come home to find no chores done because she was working on a project, I ask myself, “If I was off today, would I have gotten any of this done?” Understanding the importance of each other’s hobbies helps us understand the investment of time and money into these crafts. We do make it a point, though, never to buy hobby supplies on credit, as that can create another kind of mess.
Most people I talked to before writing this article have had regular fights with their significant other over money. Money is such a huge relationship issue it could be its own article. The truth is, no two people will ever agree entirely on how to spend money. However, some people are better at managing money than others. Commonly, fights occur when partners disagree about how to spend money or when partners overspend either with credit cards or by dipping into savings. Whatever the case is, having aligned money goals that are realistic and living within your means can prevent a lot of fights.
When it comes to money, my wife and I are in a unique situation that would only work for some couples. For starters, we both have jobs and make a reasonable monthly amount. We keep our money separate, and both contribute to combined bills based on percentages of total income. For example, I make roughly 20 percent more per month than she does. Therefore, I pay 20 percent more of the mortgage than she does. There is no 50/50 here. I pay for the car loans, the cell phone bills, and the internet. She pays the water, gas, and electric bills and buys most of the food. When we added it all up, it’s pretty close to balanced, as percentages rather than dollar amounts.
However, just like any household, things do occasionally come up. Cars break down, people get sick, pets need checkups, etc. These are handled on a case-by-case basis. Neither of us spends more money than we make. But our individual reserves fluctuate based on needs. If one of us, for whatever reason, cannot meet our money needs for the month, we make sure to talk about it as soon as possible. Some things can even be anticipated in advance. If one of us gets sick, the other knows that will devastate their monthly paychecks and prepares accordingly.
Having separate jobs and bank accounts makes money management a whole lot easier. If I spend a lot of money on a hobby, she assumes that I can afford it. And visa versa. I cannot get mad about how my wife spends her money because she earned it. If she can afford all her bills, it’s none of my business. Admittedly, neither of us is great with money, but we do well enough not to fight about it. The critical part for us is communicating financial needs and goals and building a reasonably sized reserve.
There are many other common issues and disagreements that come up in a relationship. Most of them can be avoided by respecting each other’s time, communicating needs and wants, and having solid plans for handling issues. Being in a long-term relationship can be challenging, but it’s essential to always remember why you are together. It’s also important to remember that everybody interoperates situations differently. The things that are a big deal to you may not be a big deal to your partner. Learning to meet in the middle on these things can significantly improve your relationship.
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