I was going to suggest something similar, but I dislike going all Dr. Phil.
But since it was brought up, I wouldn’t do it this way. I would ask him to track the time, and you to track it as well, independently. (With him knowing, of course.) Then after a month or a couple weeks – however long you can stand to hold tight, but at least a week – compare your time histories.
If his total time list is only half of yours, well, that explains much of the problem, no? Assuming this disparity exists, when he sees how widely your perception varies from his, I’d imagine he’d not only reevaluate his perception, but also work to come to a more functional solution.
Just don’t spring it on him; there’s no better (worse) way to put him on the defensive than to surprise him with a laundry list of documented “infractions.” Defensiveness is not conducive to communication or resolution.
Just another (mostly useless, no advice) voice saying that I don’t think it’s unreasonable. My boyfriend, for several years, worked irregular schedules. For a few months, he worked 5 pm - 1 am when I was working 8 am - 4 pm. We would see each other one and a half days on the weekend (he would usually work one weekend night as well) and when one or the other of us was sleeping. It was very hard on both of us, and the notion that he is voluntarily choosing such a schedule (rather than it being thrust upon you by the needs of money) would make it worse.
Oh, c’mon, it’s not like I buried the lead. (Pretend I put a smilie here.) I opened the post with:
So, obviously, I agree with you 100%.
And I was deadly serious about what I think their reaction would be if they found out that his commitment to the team was compromising his marriage. In fact, I would go so far as to wonder if the other coaches – and not just the part-timers – think that he’s being a raging asshole when he adopts this attitude of superiority regarding time commitment to the team.
Note that of the hardcore sports guys in this thread, (Me & RickJay), he’s not getting any support. That should be telling in and of itself.
Don’t give up yet, though it’s possible you already have. Guys with a passion can be amazingly clueless. He knows you’re upset, but he may actually be laboring under a delusion that his time away is near-trivial. I think if he starts tracking how much time his coaching is taking away from his family life, he just might make changes all on his own.
As in, if you two agree to independently track the time for a month, I wouldn’t be stunned if after a week and a half he came to you and said “Screw the time lists, I had no idea it was this bad. I’m sorry, I’ll scale back starting now.” (Although don’t expect that to happen, as he may be not counting a lot of extraneous time because it’s not “official” team stuff, even though it still keeps him away. Expectations too easily lead to disappointment.)
In college, I had a two year relationship with a medical student. It ended when I met a guy (my future husband) who had the time and energy to devote to me. As much as I loved my boyfriend, it didn’t take much foresight to peer into my future and see that I was going to be a very lonely person. I hated his beeper already; it wasn’t going to get any better. And so I ended it.
Today my ex is his mid-40’s and has a wonderful career as a pediatric orthopedic surgeon specializing in helping children with spina bifida. Oh, yes, he’s still single.
But at least I can look back and now that he had a more important mission in the world than making me happy. Can’t say that I’d look back so fondly upon it if he deserted me over baseball practice.
I have been sharing this thread with my husband because, of course, we both have an interest in working out this issue. Here’s his input:
I think I’m going to have to suck it up and admit that I was wrong about his time commitment. It still seems a little extreme to me, but I have to admit that it isn’t as heavy as I thought it was for as long as it seems to me, and he has made concessions already. Damned crow, getting all stuck in my throat and all.
(Mods, I hope this isn’t against the rules, Jim not being a member and all.)
It sounds like you’ve both got a lot of consideration for each other. And Jim, it took guts to wade into this thread, thank you. You sound very level headed and aware of what’s at stake.
But don’t let featherlou’s crow-eating mislead you. She’s hurting. It sounds like you know that. I wish you both the best. Life is full of very difficult choices, eh?
Personally, I think it sucks for you to go “cold turkey,” as it were. Also, uh, Jim, since you’re reading this, no offense meant by my earlier posts. (Nor this one…) I understand what you’re saying about the part time deal, but here’s a quick story:
As an IT guy, it’s not unusual for crunchtime to hit and I’ll find myself working 16 hour days. Occasionally a 30 hour day will crop up. I know what it’s like to work too hard. But there’s this other guy in the office who would always work 16 hour days, week in and week out, regardless of the workload. But he would always pull out the martyr complex; casually tossing out “I was here untill 11 last night” if anyone mentioned staying late.
Here’s the thing: Everyone in the office derided him behind his back for this. Their opinion to his face was that he had great commitment, but behind his back every single person held a very low opinion of him. The general concensus was that he was sacrificing his life for no reason. Views on him ranged from pity to disdain, depending on how many times he’d mentioned his recent hours.
The thing is, it’s easy to find yourself locked into a situation where you’re devoting too much of yourself to a thing, despite the reality that it’s not really necessary, and all too often nobody (but your wife) will tell you.
As I said before, it sucks to give it up completely. You know yourself best, though. If you can’t “half-ass” it and still respect yourself in the morning, then I guess you have to give it up completely. But you should really stop and think about why you have internalized such a stigma about being a part-time coach. Surely a part-time coach rates higher than a not-at-all coach, doesn’t it? The kids you’re coaching, they don’t have a wife and fulltime job to deal with. I get that you being there everytime they show up imparts commitment, but do you ever wonder if the kids are thinking, “damn, that guy must be a shitty husband for spending so much time away from his wife.” They probably are, especially if they have dads who work too hard and are never home for them.
Kids pick up on a lot of things. I think they’d pick up on your values of being a good husband almost as easily as your values of being a good coach.
This reads way too harsh. My sincere apologies; I truly mean you no disrespect. I wish you two nothing but a happy life together. I suspect there is an amount of time that featherlou would be comfortable with that could still give you enough of an involvement to derive some satisfaction. It’s nowhere near the whole schedule, but it’s got to be more than none at all. (Right, featherlou?)
I’m imagining something like:
Skip scouting and draft altogether. (You’re helping kids, not trying to assemble a dynasty.) Limit yourself to one day a week (preferably the same day of the week) through late April, then average two days a week throughout the season and playoffs. To accomplish this, skip exactly half the games while attending all in-season practices. I’d say skip all the away games using the logic that travel time reduces your return on time investment, but skipping all the home games instead would probably work too. (Scheduling a vacation for the two of you soon after the season ends wouldn’t hurt.)
The idea being that if you show up the same day of the week each week from February through April, that demonstrates to your players a reliable, consistent presence. Same idea behind “every away” or “every home” game. Not ubiquitous involvement, but rather predictable and reliable.
Perhaps featherlou would still find (averaging) two days a week intolerable due to pent up resentment, for which I couldn’t really blame her, but after 19 years quitting altogether will likely simply transfer that resentment to you. Well, it would me, but honestly you sound like a better man than me, so maybe it wouldn’t.
I don’t know, those are my thoughts, but I’m just some random stranger on the internet – I don’t harbor illusions that it’s a perfect fit for either of your needs. I do hope things work out for you two, as you seem like a nice couple.
Well, my opinion only, but seems like such a shame.
I really don’t want to complicate things with my meaningless posts, but I can’t understand how two and a half months of allowing someone the joy of life enrichment through coaching/teaching/being a positive influence can jeapordize an entire marriage.
You’re far enough north that games really can’t be played for much longer than that, so I can understand mid-Feb through March is on a limited basis (1-2 times a week) and that for the most part the busy months can’t even be that bad, from what it sounds like.
I’ve been involved with American Legion baseball in Nebraska, which involves 60+ game schedules over May/June/July with daily practices in-between. It is massively time-consuming, but I also see how people involved (parents/coaches/assistant coaches (me) consider the opportunity a priviledge, rather than a burden. It’s summer, it’s being outside, it’s sharing the experiences. Together. So on a less than full-time basis, I just think it’s unfortunate, I suppose.
I don’t think, featherlou, that your comments/arguments sound totally unreasonable, but I do think they might inevitably come at the cost of resentment of mr. featherlou… at which point some of the alternatives suggested on page one might look like better options in the long-run. I know husbands who love their wives the that spend more time than this golfing or at the bar - 12 months out of the year (not that it’s right, obviously)…
I have to admit, featherlou, that I’m now switching over to seeing things your husband’s way. That really isn’t excessive at all if it’s his one big interest.
Yeah, after seeing Mr. F’s statement, it doesn’t sound so bad. Maybe the both of you should still follow the suggestion to keep a log for this season, just to see, really, how much of a time commitment it is. Seeing it on paper might give both of you something to think about and maybe Mr. F wouldn’t have to give it up and maybe it won’t bother you so much after all. And maybe it still would, but at least it would be based on something concrete.
I have to agree with that. One or two evenings a week for several months isn’t the same thing as four to six evenings a week for half the year. I still think you should log the time so you can both see what it looks like.
Just because I admitted I was partly wrong* doesn’t mean I’m not partly right. My perception that he’s gone a lot more than he’s home did not develop in a vacuum. Baseball is by far his largest commitment outside of work, so that’s the one that got labelled as the problem. This thread probably should have been about feeling lonely and neglected sometimes in an otherwise healthy marriage, rather than just about the baseball issue, but we live and learn. (And I was mad about the baseball when I started the thread. )
*I wasn’t that far off, either. Jim also plays slo-pitch once a week all summer, and is still curling two nights a week at the start of the baseball season. But you guys are probably getting tired of this squabble by now.
Nice of Jim to stop by. I am concerned (if I can go all Mrs Cravitz on you and butt in here) about him quitting altogether. That makes no sense to me.
The beef is feeling neglected and alone inside a marriage-him quitting something that feeds him will not make those feelings go away. IMO, what needs to happen is perhaps a slight scaling back of time commitments, but also he needs to be emotionally present when he is home. Not on the phone, arranging schedules and talking line ups (I have never coached and dont’ really like baseball, so I have trouble sounding like a coach, sorry). Maybe he needs to give up curling.
Why not a special couple thing like a mini-break after the season- AND THAT THING IS NOT TO IN ANY WAY BE RELATED TO BASEBALL? Frankly, a guy who was one note for even 3 months a year would bore me to tears, but that’s just me.
I think there is room for both partners to be happy here. I do hope this doesn’t lead to Jim being resentful of feather in a year’s time. It is an admirable thing he is doing–more of us should invest in kids etc.
I agree. At the beginning of the thread, I was agreeing with those supporting Featherlou in saying that Mr. F was being unreasonable. I’m not saying that I’m against FL now, because I think that FL’s feelings of neglect were valid. Now it looks more like FL and Mr. F have a healthy place to start from. Both parties keeping a schedule of their non-office activities would seem to be a good place to start.
And as El said, during the baseball season when FL and Mr. FL are together, they should concentrate on really being together, not just being in proximity. That might be a good starting point for a future compromise. If it really turns out that FL can get her need for togetherness satisfied without Mr. F completely giving up coaching or giving up other, less important hobbies, then that might be a way to forestall other kinds of dissatisfaction.
Worse comes to worse you could try a PM and/or e-mail although I have no idea if her e-mail of record is still valid. And for the PM figure it may be a while before she sees it and include a good e-mail address for yourself.
And just because I am a smart-ass who always enjoys the zombie (what we call old threads woken up around here. Yours isn’t really a zombie because you asked a very direct question to the situation today) jokes --------- if my wife turn zombie I’m dumping her.
)
