Coming up on 19 years. Ummm… What a weird question. We don’t ask each other for ‘permission’ for anything. We choose a course and follow it with some side stops along the way to adjust the course if needed. Quite simple really, I want to make her happy, and she wants to make me happy.
We are both ‘allowed’ to do any thing we want.
You guys are all sounding nice but come on. She doesnt get mad at you buying something that goes along with one of your hobbies? She doesnt get mad at what you wear? She wouldnt get mad if you chose to spend the day with your buddies fishing? She doesnt demand you leave the stinky clothes you go hunting with in the garage?
Women always get their way.
No. Again, I married an adult.
This. And, she married an adult.
Will my wife get mad at me for wanting to spend a day with my friends (gaming, rather than fishing, because I’m a nerd)? Almost undoubtedly not; she goes off to do things for the day with her girlfriends, too. However, she would get mad if I decided I wanted to spend the day with my friends when we’d already made plans to do something together (or to spend time with her family). And, I’m wise enough to simply know that doing that would be immature and stupid – which means that I simply don’t do things like that.
Will she get mad at me for spending money on my hobbies? No, as long as I’m not spending money that we don’t have, or going overboard on it. Which, again, I don’t generally do.
Will she get mad at me for what I wear? Well, no…what do you wear that she doesn’t like, Urbanredneck?
And, regarding stinky clothes – if I’ve gone for a run on a hot day, my running clothes get pretty ripe. And I’m responsible for washing them.
This reminds me of the Cosby show when Cliff would always have a hoagie when Claire was away, since she would not allow him to eat food. I think if your spouse doesn’t “let” you do things, eventually someone is going to end up like Bill Cosby.
I don’t know. It’s kind of nice to know someones watching over you as long as their not being a real bitch about it.
Same here, but add sardines and herring in cream sauce to the list.
Every weekend, I go for a bike ride at least one morning. I brought that into the marriage almost 22 years ago, so it is accepted. I liked herring and sardines back then, but had to give those up. Hmmmm. Well, marriage is about compromise, isn’t it?
Um, nope. Just bought a high end ultra-book computer. But, it’s for both of us really. Upgrading. It was time, but my choice.
Searched for a few years to find a new plow truck to replace my 1976. Wanted something < 6 thousand. She convinced me to buy something newer. I did. After I fitted it out, it was closer to 20 thousand. Same with the brand spanking new Kubota tractor I bought.
One of my very best friends and drinking buddies is a woman that I’ve known for longer than my wife. When I was taking banjo lessons near where my friend lived, I would stay at her house overnight. We still hang out every couple of months and I just stay in her guest room.
Oh, I drink too much beer (true), and I know she is not pleased that I enjoy a cigar. As others have said, we are adults. Treat each other with respect and try to please each other.
My wife races Ironman triathlons. I support her in that. It’s quite $ and takes lots of time and travel. I support her in that. I’m her Sherpa.
Sort of out of the blue, my wife agreed to take care of her friends Chocolate Labrador for a week. She would usually ask me about this bit of interruption first, but the friend needed help and was between a rock/hard place. She knew I would be perfectly fine with it. Sure, our routine is going to change while looking after this big goofball, but he gets along great with our dogs and cat. It’s fun. :shrug:
You know, there’s a difference between someone getting mad and that same someone “not allowing you” to do something. BTW, does your wife truly get mad at you for “buying something that goes along with one of your hobbies” , rather than , for example , spending a relatively large sum* of money without a discussion? Is it really “spending the day with your buddies fishing”, or is it more like spending all your free time hunting, fishing, playing golf? Because if your wife truly gets mad every time you buy something for a hobby and every time you spend a day with your friends just because you enjoy those things , you have a problem. On the other hand, if she gets mad because said hobbies are consuming all the discretionary spending money and spare time, you have a different problem.
Yeah, both of these. I think there’s a practical margin where she’s going to get angry and yell about me doing something I want or not doing something I don’t want to do.
Some are a bit quirky. She wants me to watch more television, as it’s something we do together, and gets pretty angry when I spend too much time reading instead. She criticizes me for not liking folk music and considers it something wrong that I’m doing. She always bugs me for not salting my food and pushes me to check it and add salt before I sit down. And I pretty much hate television, folk music and salt.
She can’t really stop me from doing much. But she has driven some of my behaviors underground. She says I make a mess whenever I make eggs or use the washer and dryer, so if I really want to do these things I’ll take a secret day off and do them (and she’s never noticed).
I’m always doubting myself about whether I’m choosing my battles carefully or just letting somebody walk all over me.
To all of you saying you married an adult, well, good for you! (Really, I mean that sincerely.)
Some of us weren’t so lucky.
I don’t need permission from my wife to do anything. She doesn’t need to stay married to me if I do something she doesn’t like. But aside from serious crimes and infidelity there’s not much for me to worry about. Not that she can’t get mad about almost anything at times, but there’s no litmus test aside from the most serious matters.
My first wife was for the most part a good wife but we ended up divorced because she was constantly trying to force me into obeying her. It started off gradual with little hissy fits and graduated into breaking dishes and other extreme behaviors. In the begaining I admit I needed some behavior modification and I did make the needed changes within the first few years but she kept pushing for more and more and I just could not deal with it.
Word.
I’m putting this “I married someone who “lets” me do what the fuck I want to” right up there with the mythical “friends with benefits” thingy.
Just curious that it doesn’t look like any women have chimed in on this thread yet…not to hijack this from they guys…but I just wanted to add a couple of thoughts from the female perspective.
I was married for 20 years, and I honestly can’t recall ever telling my husband he wasn’t “allowed” to do anything. Likewise, I don’t recall him ever telling me that, either. Honestly, there’s no way I would put up with that kind of controlling behavior, so I would never think to try to use it on my husband. Mutual respect. Oh, sure, we had disagreements about stuff, but worked it out like adults. It’s not really that difficult.
I do have married friends that fall into the “my wife won’t let me” category, and honestly wonder why anyone puts up with that. Oddly enough, it looks like (from my perspective) that it’s almost always the wife that sets up those uncrossable boundaries, and they’re usually married to husbands that either blindly obey, or just sneak those behaviors behind the wife’s back.
Battles? I really don’t understand that. “Lets me do things”??? In the 24 years we have been a couple, we have had one argument.
No one tells the other what we/I must do. I can’t even imagine that.
I have a coworker who says he promised his wife he wouldn’t watch R-rated movies until their kids get older.
He insists that he’s still allowed to watch NC-17 and unrated movies, since the promise only specifically mentioned R-ratings.
I’ve never told my husband he’s not allowed to do anything. I did ,however, tell him we didn’t have to stay married if he though he was going to bowl five nights a week and leave me home with two small children. I’ve known three kinds of men who fall into the “my wife won’t let me” category.
There are the ones who married crazy women, who really want to decide what their husband is allowed to do, as if he were a child and didn’t have the option of simply not putting up with it. And in my opinion, those men who put up with it are just as crazy as their wives.
There are a surprising number of men who feel like they can’t tell other men " I’m not going fishing this Saturday" for any other reason than “my wife won’t let me.” They won’t say because it’s because they don’t like fishing , or because they prefer to spend Saturday with their wife and kids. It’s like when kids don’t want to do something and blame it on their parents.
And then there’s group number three , who sees it as shorthand for “If I do (whatever) , my wife will be so pissed off she’ll (fill in the blank) and I want to avoid that more than I want to do (whatever)”. It could be anything from " If I spend 1 of my yearly 2 weeks vacation on a hunting trip my wife will divorce me" to " If I wear that bright yellow shirt and the pants that are two inches too short, she won’t go out in public with me". And whether the wife is being reasonable depends on how those blanks are filled in.
There is nothing unreasonable about expecting someone to remove stinking mud encrusted clothing in a garage or mudroom.
Mrs. Homie comes from a family where how you appear to the community is Very Important. As in, her grandfather trimmed his fingernails while waiting for the ambulance to come pick him up after a heart attack. As in, her brother won’t go to his dealer’s house to buy pot without pressing his pants and tucking in his shirt.
She’s slightly less anal about that type of thing when it comes to me, but believe you me, when we’re going out in public, I get the once-over, at least twice.
She also tries - and fails - to limit how much pot I smoke. Officially I’m only “allowed” to smoke on weekends and on Wednesdays (Modern Family is ten times funnier when you’re baked, I can assure you). However, consider my driver’s license says that I was born on August 19, 1970, I take that to mean that I’m not a fucking child and will smoke pot whenever I damn well please. It just so happens that it’s on weekends and Wednesdays 