I always said it would be a cold day in hell before my husband learned how to put away his stuff and clean up after himself.

And sure enough, it’s cold out, and I’m in hell. But he still didn’t learn how to do those things. Seems he’ll never get the chance, either.

We just got back from the funeral.

I’ve cried so much over the past two weeks that my head aches and I’m all out of tears.

I’ve been so caught up in the chaos that followed the accident and the funeral, that I luckily haven’t had all that much time to myself.

But now I’m sitting in an empty bed, looking at a hamper without any clothes lying on the ground next to it, and I’m praying to God that this is all some kind of horrible nightmare that I can wake up from.

But I won’t.

And now I desperately wish I could have my husband and his sloppiness back.

Because now I know what it all means.

You see, he constantly was “losing” his keys because I was always putting them where they belonged. Which I’d inevitably roll my eyes every time I found them on the counter or on the couch or wherever he dropped them.

But now in the silence I realize that he was dropping them where he stood because he was walking in the door from work and running to pick up our two-year-old daughter as she screamed, “Daddy!” at the top of her lungs. Keys get in the way when you’re spinning your little girl above your head, so he had to drop them then and there.

Why was that something that would ever bother me?

I also noticed how there wasn’t a stray dish to be found around the house. This is partially because his family has been over every day since the accident to help take the load off and to keep the kids busy. But now I wish I could find a bowl with milk film at the bottom of it on the coffee table. Cereal was his go-to midnight snack. And whenever he’d get out of bed to comfort one of our kids if they woke up crying or if they were sick through the night, he’d always stop by the kitchen on his way back to bed and fill up on cereal.

And somehow those bowls bugged me before.

And let’s not forget about that damn hamper sitting perfectly in the corner of our room, not a sock or pair of underwear anywhere on the ground next to it.

He either had the worst aim or he was the most forgetful person in the world. But those clothes never quite made it into the hamper. And how quick I was to snap a picture of his dirty clothes next to the hamper and send it to him via text while he was at work with the caption, “notice anything wrong with this picture?”

I could have been sending him a love note or a simple kissy emoticon. But instead I let the minor annoyance of some clothes on the side of the hamper get to me. Now, as I think about getting up, getting the kids fed, and getting myself ready without my wingman there to help herd these cats, I suddenly realize how much help he was. And that maybe he was too busy helping brush our five-year-old’s teeth to notice his smelly socks missed their mark.

I want the mess back. I want the chaos. I want the good, the bad, and everything in between about my husband back. But that’s not going to happen. And I’m left to think about how much I let the minor little things get to me. And I’m left to wish I could have him bug me just one last time.

How I stopped nagging my husband

Summary:
– A study of more than 3,000 people by the health campaign group Everyman found that wives spend 7,920 minutes a year nagging their husbands about household chores, their drinking and their health. That’s the equivalent of five and a half days. The most common complaint was not helping to tidy the home. We also nag men when they fail to meet our emotional needs. ‘Why didn’t you get me X for my birthday?’; ‘Why are you not as interested in our children as I am?’ and so on.

– According to Michael Myerscough, a life coach behind therelationshipgym.com, ‘The problem is that women are highly motivated and have sophisticated needs and men are actually rather lazy. They will get away with doing as little as possible unless the woman is very specific about what she wants.’

– Basically, women are wildly romantic and optimistic and they want a lifetime love affair and men just want an easy time of it all. These things don’t mix and so resentments build up. When the woman finds she isn’t getting her needs met, what does she do? She shouts, screams, nags. It’s the pattern of behaviour that needs to be broken.

– The effect of all this is that I mutter under my breath at him and then just do it all myself, which leads to resentment. I decide I must change the pattern. In a way, my nagging has become such a default mechanism I don’t even know I’m doing it.

– If Ward tells me I’m beautiful, or fills in my tax form, or does something else that’s really lovely, I not only thank him for it but I write it down. It’s a list of blessings.

– Author of Surrendered Wife – (She journals 7 week of no nagging)

– That’s the nail on the head. Women do all these fancy moves to get men to see they need to help but what they actually need is to make deals. Men are blind to women’s silent game-playing. They need quick, focused instructions.

– The woman has to decide what it is she needs the man to do and then make those needs clear. She can say, “I would like you to put the bins out every Thursday. It would be really helpful to me if you did.” They then agree on this and sort out a non-sexual consequence if the bins aren’t put out, such as the man putting money towards a gift the woman really wants. What happens with most couples is that this type of honest deal-making never happens, so no one knows what they are actually supposed to be doing.

– I’ve learnt that my husband and I do not place the same importance on things. He doesn’t put away the laundry immediately because it doesn’t bother him to see it lying around in the laundry basket. He does, however, try to remember to put it away because he knows it bothers me. In that way he is a considerate and kind person.

– ‘If your husband is trying to be helpful,’ she says, ‘then that’s very good. It means he is aware of your needs. He can’t pick up what you want him to do by telepathy. You need to be able to communicate with him more clearly and you also need to decide what is important to you and the areas in which you can compromise.’ (Note: How about that, for once men are not the ones on need to take ownership of everything.)

– We both agree to think more carefully about our dynamic and try to meet in the middle – me by stopping caring so much, him by being more aware.

– To have a healthy marriage you each have to appreciate the good things about each other and play to each other’s strengths. We have family meetings where we discuss who is going to do which job.

– I was on my own for seven years and it was a really lonely place to be and I never want to go back to that again. Instead I come home and the lights are on and it makes me happy. It’s worth stopping nagging and taking charge of delegating jobs just for that happiness. Remember to be positive about each other. It really works.

Top 10 Ways to Stop Being a Nagging Wife–and Be a Sweetheart Instead

Summary:
1. Keep quiet.

2. Walk away

3. Too busy to pry

4. Rest

5. Pray

6. Beauty – Look for the positive side.

7. Don’t take the wheel. Worst thing you can do is what he’s supposed to do.

8. Speak life. Affirmations.

9. Be empathetic

10. Perspective. If you’re a control-freak you’ll hurt him with words you don’t realise.

The Empowered Wife: Six Surprising Secrets for Attracting Your Husband’s Time, Attention, and Affection