She needs a washing machine. Seriously. I mean no disrespect to the good counselors of Dr. Harley...but if I had 6 kids under 6---a newborn----and my dh was spending money on counselors instead of buying me a washing machine...I would NOT be happy.

Yes, I was just going to say that having six kids, a husband (this is a family of 8) WITHOUT A WASHING MACHINE is a recipe for disaster. You can sometimes get used appliances for $100.00 or less. On top of this you have no dishwasher either.

Marcos, you seem clueless! What is your plan in the future regarding more children? I do not see how anyone can live like this! How do you get the family clothing, diapers, towels, bedding, all washed and put away?

I think that would be a great solution.

I said earlier that I do not agree with some of the advice you are getting. Some of it goes against the MB programme.

The MB course that you are taking demands that you work on yourself, but you have the right to ask your spouse to work on herself. It is a programme that you are jointly undertaking.

Dr Harley promotes thoughtful requests, safe negotiation and respectful complaints. This does not imply that you should work on yourself and leave your spouse to renege on agreements, LB, AO or anything else.

The goal, as you say, is a romantic, happy marriage, and this wont come about if you stuff your disappointments and tolerate LBs etc.

This is not to say that you don't need extra patience for months after childbirth, or that you do not need to do chores when you come home. It means that you must do what you are trying to get help with on this thread: finds ways to use the 2 hours per night after the kids are in bed doing UA.

You keep saying that the hours are there. I think this point keeps getting missed. The hours are there, but Prisca often does not want to spend them with you. We need to solve that problem.

Yes, that's the kind of things I try to say.


Yes. When there is a problem, Prisca usually does not want to talk about it.


That sounds like something I might want to try.


He hasn't addressed it, yet, and I'm going to make sure to ask our coach about it today.


The problem didn't get solved back then. He told us what to do and in fact gave us an assignment.

In fact, I have to fault Steve a little bit here. He said he'd be following up in our next session to make sure we did that assignment.

In the next session, he may have discussed the assignment with Prisca, but he didn't discuss it with me.

markos, I'm going to attempt to answer this, since you are so bad at giving answers!

You have usually had a washing machine.

The washing machine is now broken. This happened very recently.

You will buy a new one as soon as you find the money. You are not choosing NOT to have a washing machine.

You are not spending money on coaching now. You last paid for coaching with Steve in July, before the washing machine broke.

You are doing the MB weekend course follow up, having been on the weekend course earlier this year (again, before the machine broke!) The course gives you free access to a coach and to Q&As with Dr Harley, for life. So you are getting coaching without paying any more for it, and thank goodness for that.

Exactly, SugarCane.

Neither Prisca nor I feel like the problem is our children. We had all the same problems with one child! And we've also seen that when we get our marriage running smoothly for awhile most problems become much much easier to handle.

Prisca doesn't want to spend the time with me. Okay, I can do some things about that. I can try to meet needs. I can eliminate love busters. I've been working hard on both of those fronts. But it's as if I started climbing up a ladder with five rungs, only to discover on rung three there were actually seven rungs, and on rung six there are ten rungs, and ...

I honestly earnestly and sincerely want to do my part for domestic support. I jumped into that with wild abandon several weeks ago. Did anybody read all the way through my long post about that? We had a great schedule. Then we moved forward on plans for our gym membership, the schedule was shot, and Prisca didn't understand I couldn't continue to do the same chores without enough time.

This isn't about me not wanting to do my part. This is about me trying and trying and adding more and adding more and finally coming to a wall where I say I'm not sure I can do any more, and I still don't seem closer to where I was trying to get.

I feel like we've gotten the cart before the horse somehow: I have to solve all the problems, and then we can have a great marriage. But the problems are much more solvable when we have a great marriage. If we solve that problem first, then I know we can solve the other problems together.

Good catch, SugarCane, that is correct. We are still paying off debt for everything we've paid for, but we are not purchasing Marriage Builders services at this time, and I'm not choosing for us not to have a washing machine.

At one point in the past I tried to buy us a dishwasher, and Prisca requested I spend the money on something else.

���Neither Prisca nor I feel like the problem is our children.���

I don�t think anyone has suggested that your �children� are the problem. However, you can�t discount what toll that places on her when that�s her primary job.

���I honestly earnestly and sincerely want to do my part for domestic support. I jumped into that with wild abandon several weeks ago. Did anybody read all the way through my long post about that? We had a great schedule. Then we moved forward on plans for our gym membership, the schedule was shot, and Prisca didn't understand I couldn't continue to do the same chores without enough time.���

So abandoning one of her top needs is obviously not a wise choice. So it goes back to simplify. What can you do to have both a gym membership and meet her needs? For us, we dropped the gym membership�.lol�.

The gym membership was purchased because that was the only recreational activity she was willing to engage in with me besides television. Our coach and Dr. Harley insisted that we proceed with that plan. I was all for it as well, but I'm trying to clarify that the problem is not that I forced us to get a gym membership.

I tried awhile back to raise the subject: "I can't do these things when we don't have time scheduled to do them. When we started going to the gym our schedule changed in ways that keep a lot of this from working. I'll need a new schedule with time to do these chores if you want me to do them." She didn't reply to that, though, and wanted to focus on other things.

Dr. Harley is wanting us to use his strategy to divide up our domestic support responsibilities. I have been looking at it, and I think it will help a lot.

I was discussing that with Prisca yesterday when she had her angry outburst and kicked me out of our email account.

And that's great... I was simply stating that getting UA time at the expense of a top emotional need is likely not a good return on your investment. We purchased one for nearly the same reason and found, for us, that it took away more for us than it gave to us so we dropped it. And now i'm fat and happy....lol....

Supposedly the needs that get met in UA time are ranked higher than DS. I suppose that may no longer be the case, or may have never been accurate.

Of course you should have expectations. You know full well how Dr Harley feels about sacrifice and meeting needs with no return. ummmm no, that is a fast ticket to nowhere that will result you both falling out of love.

Apparently, Prisca is unmotivated right now and I can understand why with all the responsibilities she has. Somehow you have to figure out a way to make your UA time a REFUGE for you both. I am hoping your coach will help with this.

Markos, what I enjoy the most with my H is going out to a nice, romantic dinner and then going house shopping. Part of the fun is the driving around looking at new houses. WE talk and give each other road kisses. Dinner doesn't have to be expensive to be enjoyable. I know people who go to Cheddar's and order a steak or fish dinner and ask for 2 plates. They leave full and it costs under $15.

Thank you for clearing that up SC. That helps me. I was stuck on how she was surviving with no washing machine and 6 kids.

Honestly, I wouldn't know about that so I can only say what worked for us. We put the gym membership money into a date night fund and got a win/win situation out of it.

So have you worked up a new schedule that includes time for your chores?

That is not true, though. DS is not an intimate emotional need. We don't fall in love because of domestic support. We fall in love when these 4 top intimate needs are met during 15+ hours of UA time: converstation, affection, recreational companionship and sexual fulfillment. <----that is what leads to romantic love and what Markos and Prisca are trying to achieve. In fact, Dr Harley says right out his program won't work without this step.

Good call Melody..... As I said, it worked for us but we did this from the already In-Love position and not out of conflict or withdrawal.....

Don't get me wrong, DS is important! And it was obviously important in your marriage. I am just pointing out that his UA time needs to be devoted to the top 4 intimate needs in order to create romantic love. Interestingly, I have found when my H and I try to cut back on this we see a difference pretty quickly!

THE TWO NEWEST NEEDS:

WM (WASHING MACHINE)

AND

FP (FAMILY PLANNING)