Originally Posted by CWMI
Just be sure that you schedule your 15 hours with your wife FIRST.

Just an idea here, to disarm her insults/complaints: she says something snarky, and you respond with a smile, an "I love you. I'll work on that," and an affectionate gesture like squeezing her hand or kissing it. Then go work on it! I don't know what she's saying. Of course, if she's just viciously tossing out names, an "Ouch," is quite effective. Just "Ouch" and walk away.

But if it's something like, "Can't you take out the trash???" or "Why do I have to do everything around here???" or even "You don't know anything about Dostoevsky!", a smile and an ILU and a promise to work on it followed by action will be incredibly effective. With an added bonus of confusing the heck out of her if she's accustomed to you being her sparring partner. smile

Definitely don't turn to divorced/divorcing people IRL for advice. My H was in the habit of talking to single people, cheaters, and divorced people for marital advice. BIG mistake. Of course, the folks on here are better educated on MB than your regular run-of-the-mill IRL folk, even if they are divorced or former cheaters, so give them an ear.

A great piece of advice I heard in church was to only seek advice from people who already are where you want to be.

Great advice! Yesterday was good all in all. This morning was pretty good, I made her coffee and put a note on there that said "you are appreciated". I got a "thanks for the coffee" from upstairs. She made one semi-snarky comment this morning about a bill that we owe that suggested that it was somehow my fault for some late charge that we incurred. It was something really small so I just let it go and the rest of the morning was ok. I called her friend this morning to see if she was free to come pick up my wife one night this week to get out of the house away from the kids and relax for a couple hours. Hopefully she'll appreciate that. I know that I need to get her time with me but for now she is just so tired and not in a place where she wants to even do that thus far. I can't force her to spend time with me right so I'm gonna have to take what I can get. The 15 hours a week rule is pretty challenging with a 4 month old baby needless to say.

Married 15 years
12 y/o DD
10 y/o DS
6 y/o DD