My son got a new vehicle (used) a few months back. It has brand new tires on it. Last night, it was raining and he hydroplaned through a stop sign. Now my wife believes that he needs a new set of tires that "eliminate" the possibility of this happening again. When I got the tires, I made sure they had excellent wet traction and hydroplane resistance reviews. I know from riding with my son that he stops abruptly and this is more than likely the reason he lost control in the wet condition. I really don't want to spend another $700 on tires when I just bought a set less than 3000 miles ago.

Go find out - ask her for her ideas and give her some of her own.

Does your wife feel that this will achieve the goal of preventing premarital sex?

(Hint: if you don't know, ask her?)

I will discuss it more with her when the time is right. I don't think she cares to discuss matters like this with me right now.

You need to start brainstorming alternative solutions that will be a win for your wife and for you. The current situation is not a win for your wife, so you can't just keep the status quo and expect her to decide to become happy about it.

A couple of alternative ideas that you might ask how she feels about:
* son doesn't drive in rain any more (or at all)
* son buys new tires
* saving for the tires over a few months and in the meantime son doesn't drive in rain (or at all)
* wife researches tires and gives suggestions for what tires she would like for him to have
* you guys call your insurance or a tire shop, tell them what happened, and ask them to suggest tires

If you want your wife to be happy you have got to become her partner in solving the problems she sees in life.

By the way, have you listened to the Marriage Builders Radio show yet? Yesterday and today? If you want to turn your marriage around you can't afford to miss a single one of these hours of Dr. Harley's expert advice.

You can't be a conflict avoider and have a good marriage. I know because I tried that failing strategy for years. It doesn't work.

Rip the bandaids off. Your wife will be very emotional, and you may be as well, but the more you talk about it the more the emotions will simmer down and the more you will be able to think creatively together about how to solve the problems.

The big problem I'm seeing here is that when your wife expresses a problem to you you run away!

Do what markos suggests, and try and find out what she would like you to do to help the kids more.

It might turn out that she accepts that you are both doing all you can, and all she actually wants from you is that you listen to her, sympathetically.

You immediately defended your behaviour when we asked you about this yesterday, telling us all the things you DO do for the kids in an attempt to keep them safe. Well, perhaps that's what you do to her, also; tell her, in effect, that you are doing all you can and she is fretting too much. What you do, if you do that, is dismiss and belittle her concerns. It's also trying to straighten her out; to put her concerns into perspective; "our kids aren't so bad. They are really good kids. We are lucky. Stop fussing about nothing. Some people have REAL problems with their kids." That could all be implied in your response to her worries.

It may well be that all she wants is to be able to tell you how she feels about things, and what she worries about. That, in fact, is what Dr Harley encourages men to use Intimate Conversation time for: to really listen to their wives, and show an interest in what they are saying. To get to know their wives' inner minds. Intimate Conversation might well matter much more to women than it does to men, so if a husband is to meet his wife's need for IC, he needs to listen and pay interest. Not to set her straight, or put her worries into perspective, but to listen and try to understand.

I agree that I try to avoid conflict. I will talk to my wife and offer suggestions on how we can solve the tire issue. I really like the idea of my son not driving in the rain as I think the root of the issue is his braking habits (my wife agrees with this)

I have not listened to the radio show yet. I drive a lot and I have not figured out a good way to listen. I will work on that.

It sounds like you are enthusiastic about the idea and there's a good chance your wife might be as well. If so, congratulations - you've found your first enthusiastic agreement. You'll like these a lot better than the old style agreements and discussions, and so will she.

For couples who have built up a lot of unresolved conflicts there will still be a lot of unhappiness for a long time but as they start resolving these conflicts with new enthusiastic agreements they will find that slowly their marriage improves, in fits and starts, until things are better. [That's how it went for us!]


Option 1: the Marriage Builders app. You can play the live show from your phone
Option 2: subscribe to the archives and you can then download the shows as mp3 files. I've listened to nearly every MB radio show that exists in my car, actually, over the last five years. Been through four mp3 players.

In the past I have done a much better job of listening. My initial instinct is to tell how to correct or fix everything she is worrying about. I uses to listen and ask her what she thinks the solution could be, and then offer up what I think. Instead of trying to force my "fix" on her, I will just offer my idea as another possible option. I know that sometimes she is not looking for a response, just someone to vent to.

Just a quick update from today

After the kids left for school, I was ready to go to work and asked if my wife would like to go with me to get our allergy shots together this morning. She said she did. We went there and as we were waiting I talked to her about the new Apple products that were announced yesterday ( I am a big fan). While we were there, I got a call from work that pretty much consumed our drive home with several phone calls. She did ask me to stop and pick her up some breakfast. She asked me what the total was and I said 10 something. She then asked why my total for my lunch was so high on the day I visited the hospital. She said I spent 16 at Jimmy Johns. I pulled up my cc app on my phone and showed her that it was only 8 dollars. I also said I understand why she is suspicious and what I did was inappropriate.

When I dropped her off back home, she said the ride was kind of annoying because of all my work phone calls. Having that many calls in the morning is extremely rare. I apologized and went to hug her before I left. This time she did not try to shrug away, and let me hug her.

She would love to have a partner in life who would brainstorm solutions with her.

The problem is she does not want someone to say "Psh! This is no problem! All you have to do is ... ! Why don't you just ... ?" Or "We just have to live with it. There's nothing else we can do."

It is great that she is giving you feedback about how you are annoying. That means she is moving from the state of Withdrawal to the state of Conflict. (You are familiar with the Basic Concepts, right, including the three states of mind in marriage? If not, stop and review Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts.)

So, if you want to turn your marriage around permanently, you need to act on the feedback. Eliminate the annoying habit: don't take work calls when you are with her any more.

Just think how great your marriage is going to be when you've eliminated all the sources of annoyance!

Get access to that show and listen. You've got to plug into this if you want to turn things around long term.

Not "vent".

"Talk".

"Confide in."

"Vent" is disrespectful, because it implies that she is angry, and thus irrational, and needs to let rip.

She wants to talk. "Talk" is non-judgemental.

Since I am on call 24 hrs a day, that may be hard to do.

I could tell that her complaint was coming, before you finished this story, and you should have seen it coming, too.

You have been looking for signs that things are slightly turning around. Here was one. She didn't tell you that she'd get her injection by herself; she went with you. She did not mind being in your company - or perhaps even wanted to be in your company. A drive and a late start at work can be a nice time to spend together.

You must know how annoying people find it to have the person they are with spend their time on the phone - whether this is in a restaurant, in a bar or in the car. It's rude, and it is a love buster to a wife that is already withdrawn.

You can't afford to miss opportunities to spend time with your wife and have INTIMATE CONVERSATION with her if she's in the mood, or just be quiet with her if she is not. Focusing on other people and problems is just squandering an opportunity.

And watch out with the conversation about Apple products. You mentioned that you are an engineer, and the engineers on this forum tell us that you can all be a bit obsessive at times.

Talk to your wife about what she is enthusiastic about. If this includes the new Apple range, then all well and good - but ask yourself whether she was, and would be, as interested in computer products as you are.

Nonsense.

You wouldn't have taken that call, nor followed it up, if you had actually been sitting in front of your doctor having a check-up, or if you'd been at the bank discussing your overdraft.

You wouldn't have lost your job if you'd sent the call to voicemail and got back to them later.

I agree with you on taking every opportunity to spend time with my wife and not squander it. Please understand that normally I would not answer a work call from just anybody. The person who called me was my direct contact for my companies biggest customer. A manager of one of the largest car manufacturers in the state of Alabama. If he was calling me, then it was a big issue. If I didn't answer, he was calling the president of my company next because he has done it before. If it had been anyone else I would have auto-texted a reply that I would call them back.

And yes, I have had to answer the phone will sitting with a doctor.

And also, my wife likes apple stuff probably more than I do.

Well, your answer to me tells me that I was wrong on all points, and that you are doing everything right.

If that's the case, I don't know why your marriage isn't deeply happy.