Entertainment dispute - Marriage Builders® Forums

I have been married for two years. There are some tv shows and movies that my wife and I both like. We each have certain shows that only I like or only she likes. From the beginning of our marriage she refuses to watch the shows I enjoy with me. I on the other hand, watch her shows with her without complaining. It has reached the point where I only watch my show's when she is not home. This situation angers, frustrates, and saddens me a little. Am i expecting too much out of her? Is this a normal situation?

Originally Posted by JhhJh

I have been married for two years. There are some tv shows and movies that my wife and I both like. We each have certain shows that only I like or only she likesrom the beginning of our marriage she refuses to watch the shows I enjoy with me. I on the other hand, watch her shows with her without complaining. It has reached the point where I only watch my show's when she is not home. This situation angers, frustrates, and saddens me a little. Am i expecting too much out of her? Is this a normal situation?

Welcome to MB.

Have you read about the policy of joint agreement(POJA)?

Read this.
How to Resolve Conflicts

JhhJh, welcome to MarriageBuilders.

I'm going to take a slightly different tack, by asking you: Are you familiar with the concept of "Undivided Attention" ?

This question is actually more important than how you deal with not liking one another's favorite TV shows. I can come back to that later (that's where the "POJA" comes in), but from a marital-satisfaction standpoint, the TV thing is kind of peripheral if you're not getting in enough Undivided Attention time. (Watching TV doesn't really count as undivided attention, because when you're dong it, your attention -- or hers, or hers & yours both if it's a show you both like -- is divided & is not fully on one another.)

Originally Posted by JhhJh

I have been married for two years. There are some tv shows and movies that my wife and I both like. We each have certain shows that only I like or only she likes. From the beginning of our marriage she refuses to watch the shows I enjoy with me. I on the other hand, watch her shows with her without complaining. It has reached the point where I only watch my show's when she is not home. This situation angers, frustrates, and saddens me a little. Am i expecting too much out of her? Is this a normal situation?

What you are doing is setting yourself up to be very incompatible. You should not be watching shows with her that you don't enjoy. That is sacrifice and pretty soon the person who is doing the sacrificing gets sick of it. People who practice sacrifice tend to keep score - as you are doing here - and when the score is not even, they become resentful and make demands.

A better solution is for NEITHER of you to watch a show together unless you are BOTH enthusiastic about it. Choose the shows together and don't choose any shows unless you BOTH will enjoy it. [no grudging agreements and no compromise] Read up on Dr Harley's policy of joint agreement and learn how to eliminate the sacrifice from your marriage.

Also, watching TV is a terrible way to squander your couples time. My DH and I shcedule 15 hours a week together and we never waste it on watching TV. Watching TV together rarely helps a marriage because all of your attention is on the boob tube instead of each other.

One of my old posts:

Originally Posted by Melodylane

Marriage Builders suggests a third way: doing things you both like. For example, if he hates horror movies, that wouldn't be a good idea to ask him to go to a horror movie because that would be sacrifice. He would just be miserable. Compromise, ie: win/lose, is how couples create incompatibility. So no, he shouldn't have been willing to try things he knows he hates.

Here is an example of what I mean:

I hate Chinese food and my H hates Mexican. I love Mexican and he loves Chinese. So I make a compromise with him that he endures Mexican and as an "incentive" I will go suffer through Chinese with him.

Lets say we practice a "compromise" and we go for Mexican one night and Chinese the next night. That means that I will be unhappy on one night and he will be unhappy the next because we are each gaining at the others EXPENSE for one night.

This is called sacrifice. And it leads to incompatibility and resentment. It leads to incompatibility because people won't do things that make themselves unhappy for long. I might go for Chinese 3 or 4 times and tolerate that nasty food, but pretty soon I will be finding reasons to AVOID going out to eat and he will be resentful, because people who practice sacrifice KEEP SCORE. He will be mad because I "OWE" him a Chinese night to pay for his Mexican night.

The solution recommended by Marriage Builders avoids all that. Instead of going to ANY restaurant that one spouse doesn't like, the solution is to find a restaurant that BOTH LOVE. Mexican and Chinese are completely OFF our lists. In it's place is a list of restaurants we both like. This solution builds compatibility because it ensures we are BOTH happy and no one sacrifices at the others expense.