Is it reasonable to expect your loved one to know what they don't say?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I am reminded of this peeve by a television episode where a wife tells a husband he was supposed to know that she didn’t mean it when she said it was ok, and the husband asks “How??!”

The specifics of this TV show are completely irrelevant, it is the dynamic itself that interests me, and it’s as common as anything you ever see in relationships.

In my personal experience and observation of 53 years, I have never seen or heard of, in life or fiction, the roles reversed in this. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen, I’ve just never heard of it.

FTR, I am a woman, and here’s how I feel about it: it is grossly unfair to expect anyone, lover, friend, family member, (LFFM) to “know” and act on what is in your mind at any time, but it is particularly so if you verbally state the opposite of whatever it is your LFFM is supposed to magically “know”.

Yes, it would be lovely, and one may reasonably hope that it happens that way in an intimate relationship, but it should never be used as a yardstick of love and concern, that’s a test and a game and it does absolutely nothing to enhance the cause of love, communion, friendship and harmony.

But that’s just me.

Here’s the poll question: do you think that its fair to expect anyone with whom you share a close relationship of whatever nature, to simply know what you REALLY mean, even if you don’t say it, or even if you say the opposite?

And for those who say yes, you do have such expectations, I welcome your explanations of your POV, and I am particularly interested in your opinion of how this expectation improves the relationship.

And yes, my bias is all over everything, but that’s why this is IMHO.

2

There are couples who can read each other that well, but as a general rule, no. It’s passive aggressive.

3

I don’t know about “expect,” but it can certainly be useful. For example, my husband when through a stressful job change a couple of years ago, and for the first couple of weeks he kept mentioning that he wanted to quit and go back to his old job. Now, I knew he didn’t ACTUALLY want to go back but instead was freaking out over a big change, so I argued with him and convinced him to give it longer. Now, he’s far happier in the new job than the old one. He’s done the same kind of thing for me.
So, yeah, I guess I do think it’s fair to expect your partner to not take your words at face value if you’re freaking out about something and they’re far enough removed from the situation to be objective.

4

But that’s not really what I mean, because you talked about it and explored the issue.

I mean where you expect the other person to know and to act on that knowledge.

CLASSIC example: What do you want for your birthday?
Nothing, really. I’d just like to spend a nice quiet evening at home. Maybe order some Chinese.
Seriously, honey, it’s your birthday, what would you like to do?
It’s really no big deal.

He comes home with a small bouquet of flowers and the Chinese food he was thoughtful enough to have already picked up, knowing her favorites, and starts getting out of work clothes and into his comfies.

She starts to steam and feel wounded because he should have KNOWN that she was lying through her teeth and what she REALLY wanted was for him to sweep in with a brass band and carry her off for a night of caviar and passion at the Four Seasons, and now she knows he just doesn’t care!

Which I think is bullshit.

And before we get into the minutia and etiquette of spelling out what you want for your birthday, we’re talking about a very intimate relationship, not co-workers, and you can refrain from spelling things out while still indicating that you would indeed appreciate some fuss being made by saying something like:

“I don’t know… surprise me with what you think I’d like.”

“I don’t know, something fun and frivolous”

Etc.

5

The problem is that women are much more intuitive than men, and some expect men to be as intuitive. We’re not.

6

Even in this example, he doesn’t take her initial answer at face value, so he’s already “reading her mind” to some degree. Then, it just becomes an issue of how much to protest vs. how much to insist.

It seems to boil down to different expectations regarding the etiquette of making requests. If someone’s socialized to believe it’s impolite to make demands, they initially reply with “no big deal, I don’t need anything.” If the partner knows that, then they insist, and it’s back and forth until the required number of refusals has been met to get to the real answer.

7

Careful with saying things like this, there’s some female Dopers around here who will take this statement to mean that women are bad at math and lack ambition.

8

I don’t think tdn’s statement is particularly demeaning to women, I just think that generalizing about any 50% of the population is stupid. Now that nudge nudge wink wink “Oh, I understand you, I’m not like the rest of those silly girls” shit is demeaning to women.

And no, it’s not reasonable to expect anyone to read your mind. If you said you want Chinese and a movie for dinner, then Chinese and a movie is what you should be expecting. That’s not a gender issue, passive-aggressive comes in all variety of genitalia.

9

I think reading someone takes effort. In these examples, its much more important to read the persons body language and be aware of context. Case in point my wife- she doesn’t like drawing attention to herself, overreacting, or coming across as a wet blanket. So even if she says she feels fine, depending on the situation she may be trying to save face. Example back when we were dating:

We were invited to my friend’s for 4th of July bbq. It was kinda last minute and I asked my (now) wife if she was up for going. She was ill at the time but decided to go anyway because she could read in my face that I reallreallyREALLY wanted to go and introduce her to my friends there. We went and started talking and nerding out. I repeatedly asked my wife how she was doing and she said fine, just a litttle hungry. Dinner was pretty late. I had a good time, but my wife was upset. Why? Because she was sick, very hungry, and I didn’t tell my friend to get dinner started sooner. Like you suggested, Stoid, I asked why couldnt she say all that before rather then saying she was fine. And here’s where I screwed up: I never took the time to see and hear how she was feeling. I KNEW she was sick, so if she came along it was for me. I knew she hadnt eaten much. she kept saying she was fine because she didn’t want to make a big deal about it or draw attention to herself. So it was on me for not paying attention to the situation and being too preoccupied with my friends. But I learned a lot from it (and my wife eventually forgave me).

the wife of another friend of mine does “say what she means/wants”. And by, doing so she comes off as crass and whiny to others. If shes having a bad day, everybody knows. If she was in my wifes situation, shed be whining about how sick and hungry she was feeling, and people would think she was being kind of an attention whore.

My $0.02

10

Obviously, if it’s causing action strife or discord in a relationship, expecting someone to read your mind is stupid. But, on the other hand, after nearly fifteen years together, there’s things my husband and I understand about each other and I do expect him to be able to “translate” my words better than some random shmuck on the street. It’s one of the perks of a long-term relationship. There are times when both of us want a favor that we don’t feel able to ask for. It’s a kindness for the other one to hear the unstated request.

Furthermore, “You can’t expect me to read your mind” can be passive aggressive itself. I’ve known people who would complain about “nagging” if things were brought up and talked about, but then claim they “weren’t a mind reader” when they failed to take responsibility independently. This can be infuriating to deal with, be it something as small as chores or something as large as whether or not to get married.

I’ve also known people who used “you can’t expect me to be a mind reader” as an excuse to be exploitative. Usually this involves someone who is infatuated with them, but knows that the infatuation is not returned. The other party then plays off that infatuation to get sex or attention or whatever and generally treats the other person like crap, but justifies it to themselves as “they never said” or “they said they didn’t mind”. Willful ignorance ought not be an excuse to be a jerk, and taking advantage of the fact that someone is too infatuated with you/scared to lose you to ever stand up for themselves is pretty pathetic.

11

This is why “no means no” is such an unreasonable thing to think is ever going to be accepted.

No means either no, or do what you know I want but don’t want to admit I want.

The fact that women want it to mean no when they really don’t want whatever it is doesn’t make it reasonable. It not passive aggressive, it’s selfish, self centered, arrogant, delusional horse shit.

Own the shit you think, and feel. Say what the fuck you mean, or expect to be unhappy and miserable your entire life. Hey, that’s what he though you wanted!

Tris

12

Well, I really don’t think my answer is accurate (I picked “I am a woman, and yes, I do expect people who love me to know my mind, that’s part of love.”) but none of the other answers were particularly accurate either.

If my husband asks what I want for my b-day, I tell him - or more specifically I’ll give him ideas leading up to the day (at his request) and he can pick something. I don’t give some bullshit ‘Just your love is enough for me!’ answer, because it’s annoying and I hate it when people give me a bullshit answer like that.

Now, on the other hand, I expect (and I’m not dissapointed) for my husband to have SOME idea what’s going on with me without me having to spell it out. I mean, not the nitty gritty details, but he’s a pretty good judge of when I’m feeling grumpy, or jokey or whatever and I’m a pretty good judge of his feelings as well.

Finally, I DO think that’s part of being in love - not that you read each other’s minds but that you’re in tune enough with your partner to have some idea what’s going on with them.

13

Yeah, I didn’t answer the poll, because none of the responses really fit.
I’m okay with doing it either way, and my husband and I probably used to fall more to the “less mind reading” than “more mind reading” spectrum, but as we’ve lived together longer it’s shifted somewhat. However, none of my relationships are identical. My dad expects more mind-reading, my mother very little, my sister’s in the middle, and my brother expects almost none, and I’m fine with all of that.

The only thing I can’t stand is when people take it to extremes. For example, it’s annoying when someone takes a “no mind-reading” stance and uses it as a reason to not do obvious chores or take any initiative in relationships. That’s not mind reading, that’s being an adult. Likewise, it’s annoying when someone expects you to anticipate their every whim and foists all responsibility for their happiness and comfort onto others.

14

Stoid, if you really loved me you would know my answer to this poll. If you don’t know by now how I would vote them I’m not going to tell you.

15

I certainly didn’t mean to paint with the broad brush that I did, but I’m pointing out a general trend. I for one suck at asking for what I want.

Learning to communicate what you want is a skill, as is learning to listen with more than just your ears. And those are skills that we could all benefit from improving.

16

If nothing else, we’ve established that it’s complicated.

So here’s another question: if you find yourself in a close relationship with someone who tells you in no uncertain terms: “I say what I mean, and I mean what I say. Never feel the need to guess or read between the lines. If you’re unsure, ask. And I’m asking you to do the same with me, because I am often a very poor judge of subtext and I find it stressful and unpleasant to be expected to figure things out without clear communication, especially in matters of genuine import.”

How would you feel, respond, react? Would this work for you?

17

If by “close relationship” you mean, “dating or close friendship,” I’d probably not bother investing too much, because the people I’ve known who suck at subtext also have shitty senses of humor, which is a dealbreaker for me. If it were family, I’d just deal with it and try to be as clear as possible.

18

Most people that have these type of expectations would never admit they do…however their spouses could probably attest that they do.

19

LOL!!! Gosh, Stoid, [COLOR=“DarkOrchid”]you’re[/COLOR] so funny!

20

Odds are, if it were an issue, we would have had already experienced communication challenges prior to becoming close.

I’m a fan of straightfoward communication, but I’m an even bigger fan of common sense and thoughtfulness. If the person in question can’t be expected to pick up on certain things over time and develop an unspoken understanding of what works and what doesn’t work for me, then I’m gonna have a problem with that.

For instance, if I’ve told you repeatedly that I don’t like constantly being groped and manhandled while cooking and doing the dishes, I’m going to need you to be able to extrapolate this sentiment to other situations. Requiring me to have to detail an exhaustive list of situations where groping is unwanted is going to make me see you as an insensitive idiot.