I personally don’t thin either of you had unrealistic expectations, just different ones. Clearly he figured at some point in a relatively long conversation your mom would ask how you’re both doing. A short acknowledgement that he was feeling a bit under the weather seems appropriate, especially since you discussed your sister’s new job and various other minutiae. It shows that he’s part of the family, that your mother would be interested in his well-being, etc.
But for either of you to still be holding a grudge the next day seems petty. And I’d guess you are still, too, otherwise you wouldn’t be making it a “me -vs- him” post, it would be a “look at the big baby” humorous thing.
When I talk to my mother, I ask about her husband and her dog, and give her an update on my pets, even if it’s just a “everyone’s fine” type of thing. These few sentences acknowledge the importance of these beings in our lives.
Your husband is being a whiny child but I think this is one of those times where you can be right or you can be happy. I’ve acted like this to my husband before and he walked over to me and hugged me hard like I was a child and said “OK, we’ll just be mad together” and made a grand gesture of petting me on the head. It broke the tension and let me know it was OK to be whiny every once in a while and he still loved me, bitch and all.
Let it roll off your back and refuse to get engaged in an argument over the merits of telling your mother vs. not burdening her with the knowledge. It doesn’t matter.
I agree with ShelliBean. This is probably the time to smile, raise an eyebrow and tell him that if he’ll overlook the fact that you forgot to mention his illness to your mother, you’ll overlook his overwhelming peevishness and lack of appreciation for all your previous concern. Then I’d act as if nothing was wrong.
If it’s so important to your husband that your mother be made aware of his ear condition, why doesn’t he call her himself? “Here’s the number, knock yourself out.”
I got a great piece of marital advice years ago. When we married, a helpful relative told us, “At some point you will argue about things that are completely, stupidly trivial. It will be something so tiny and insignificant that you will wonder why you are arguing about it. Realize that the argument isn’t really about the tiny issue. There is a bigger issue behind it. When you figure out what the bigger issue is, you will be better able to solve the problem.”
This doesn’t appear to be about his ear or your phone conversation so much as his feeling that you are not sufficiently concerned about his situation. I’m sure that you do care, but for whatever reason he isn’t feeling it.
I’m sort of in your husband’s shoes with not feeling the caring right now. although my ear is fine and I don’t give a fig about my spouse’s conversations with his mother. And I’ve been irrationally angry about stupid little things (like a stained t-shirt that wasn’t pretreated and is ruined and I didn’t get an apology - yes I know it’s just a stupid t-shirt but he didn’t listen when I asked him to pretreat it and he could have at least pretended to be sorry; the anger is really not about laundry, it’s about not being listened to and about marginalizing feelings, and it goes back much longer than last laundry day).
The only advice I have for you, katie, is to remember this moment if your husband ever develops hemorrhoids, herpes, incontinence, or erectile dysfunction.
Might want to have your entire family on speed dial, in fact.
Your husband seems to be acting silly. Makes me wonder if there is more going on than you see. Often when we over-react to silly things it is because we are resentful for something else.
He’s being a baby and wishes you’d opened with 'Hi Mom, I might not be able to talk long, [SO]‘s still got an ear cndition. Isn’t it weird? The doctors can’t figure out what it is. Have you ever heard of such a thing?’ blah blah blah. He may be a bit scared about losign hearing permanently (getting old could fit somewhere in there, too).
That being said, I can still picture myself being on either side of that argument. Everyone deserves to be a po’ sick baby sometimes.
Oh, and while I’m sure this isn’t this case with your husband, a friend of mine lost her hearing in one ear and only the second doctor she went to thought to use saline solution. Cleared her right out.
Well, except that she did ask him about it, and he brushed her off, and eventually got snippy about being asked.
What Solfy and others said has merit, though: Your husband isn’t being a dick (and he is being a dick) because he’s a dick, but for some other reason. Maybe he’s scared that he’ll never, ever get his hearing back in the bum ear. Going deaf is a sign of age. Maybe this reminder of looming mortality has freaked him out. Or maybe it’s just a longstanding private terror of deafness. Either way, as the Man, he has to suppress his fear and be strong and independent. He feels it anyway, roiling away inside him, and he doesn’t know how to deal with it. So this is how it comes out.
I don’t know your husband. I don’t know if he buys into the stereotype of the Strong Silent Husband, for whom any injury short of a chainsaw to the throat is supposed to be dismissed as merely a scratch. But if he is, this kind of behavior wouldn’t be surprising. Call him on it, gently, and find out what’s behind it. Don’t apologize, because you’ve done nothing wrong — but sympathize.
I have learned from my husband’s family that people have way different levels of expectations about this kind of stuff. My husband, thankfully, is more like me in that I will wait until something is serious or until we have real information before telling others about it. Unless it’s a casual conversation and my family asks me about it, like how are you guys all doing, then I will mention “oh, husband has a cold and son is having issues and blah blah blah.” However, if I call someone specifically to check up on her or to talk about something in particular, then other things won’t come up like that. If I called to check up on someone with shingles, I wouldn’t bring it up either.
My mother in law, on the other hand, has a fit if anything at all is happening and she is not immediately informed. I mean, if anyone has a health issue, god forbid you go to the Dr. first and get some info without her knowing you are going to the Dr. A few months ago I went in for an ultrasound because I was having some cramping early in my pregnancy. It was not an emergency, they just wanted to see what’s up. So we go in, sure enough, all is well, nothing to see here. When it casually came up later that I had an ultrasound, she was upset because we didn’t call her before I went in so she could know when it was happening, and that’s what family is for, etc. etc. Of course we would have told her sooner if there was anything to report! She actually gets upset about this kind of stuff and it drives me nuts. So of course we hear about every little thing that is happening to her. She takes it as us keeping secrets or deliberately witholding on her if we are not completely keeping her informed about everything. It gets tiresome. But people have different ideas about what other people are supposed to know I guess.
My vote is that he’s being a jerk and you did absolutely nothing wrong. If he wanted your mom to know about his little ear problem, he could have told her himself. Sheesh.
He doesn’t care whether or not katie’s mom knows, he cares that katie didn’t think the problem was important enough to mention in a wide ranging half hour conversation.
He may be going a bit overboard in thinking this ear problem is serious, but that is the root of this whole thing. He’s worried about it, she isn’t. He thinks it’s a big deal, she doesn’t.
You’ve mentioned twice now that she thinks this is a nothing deal, and while I can read that into a couple of the OP’s sentences if I try, she hasn’t given any impression (to me, at least) that she’s treated HIM as though it weren’t a big deal. In fact, quite the opposite by her continuing to check on him.
Had she been dismissive about it to his face, I can see where he might think, “Oh, and now you don’t even think it’s worth mentioning to your mom, either.” But that doesn’t seem to be the case. If you think differently, please explain.
This is where I would be coming from in this situation. I would actually apologize to him - not an un-apology, but a sincere apology that his feelings were hurt when I had no intention of hurting them. They were hurt, whether they should have been or not. I’m guessing he would also apologize then, for over-reacting (but don’t count on it or apologize just to get him to apologize).
Also, have doctors tried cleaning both ears? I had a strange situation a couple of years ago - I lost the hearing in one ear, and it turns out it was the OTHER ear that was blocked solid with wax (yeah, I know, I’ve never been hotter ). I didn’t know you could get referred deafness, but make sure they’re looking in both ears.
). I didn’t know you could get referred deafness, but make sure they’re looking in both ears.