My wife and I have been married for 2.5 years. I have played video games all of my life. We were playing video games together a couple of years ago with my cousin, but then she decided she didn't want to play with him anymore. At that point my wife and I played together alone and left my cousin out of it, even though he and I have had a long history of gaming together. There have been several incidents of her getting angry about me playing or even wanting to play games.

We had begun seeing a counselor regularly 4 months prior to the pandemic and the counselor had expressed that we both require "me" time. I took that as a valid reason to enjoy playing my games and I told her I wanted to start playing again with my cousin. She was offended and angry that I wanted "me" time because it meant I wanted time without her. After fighting about it and me insisting we negotiated a 3 hour window a week that I am given to play with my cousin.

We have been playing Thursdays after work and it takes about 30 minutes to get rolling after coordinating what we are going to do during the session and putting away the loot we picked up from the previous week. Before we know it the 3 hours is up. I am NOT satisfied with this. Three hours of "me" time a week is not enough for me.

We had a big fight and she moved in with her mom. She wanted to come home and I told her I would no longer be limited to a 3 hour gaming limit. In exchange I agreed to more undivided attention time together. We spent all day Sunday together and all night Monday with undivided attention. I told her I wanted to play for a couple hours on Tuesday night. She was good with that and all went well. I spent the rest of the night with her Tuesday and we spent Wednesday night together with undivided attention besides cooking (about 1 hour).

Last night (Thursday) was my previously scheduled game night. I had no intention of missing it. Prior to gaming I gave her almost 2 hours of undivided attention. Instead of the 3 hour window I played 4.5 hours. She got angry and slept in the guest room. We continued to fight about this and now she wants a divorce.

Please enlighten me if I am asking too much by wanting me time to video play games for 8 hours a week in exchange for quality undivided attention time together at least 4 or 5 days a week?

Are you and your wife having dates of at least 15 hours per week? That would need to come first before any time scheduled to be on your own.

Have you read all the basic concepts on this site? There are so many things to learn about how to have a really great marriage. The foundation is the Policy of Joint Agreement - Never do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of your spouse. Other than reasons of health and safety, this applies to all the decisions we make on a daily basis. If a couple can't come to agreement, then the couple agrees to do nothing until a solution is adopted enthusiastically by both spouses. The POJA can certainly make things more complicated. The easiest way to live in a marriage is being a dictator and/or making independent decisions.

Your wife is upset because you are indicating through your actions that playing video games is more important to you. The time you spend together as a couple on a date doing fun things together, enjoying great conversation, recreational activities, affection, and making love are supposed to be the best of your week, the reward for all your hard work. Dates aren't working if they are a bargaining chip to gain time to play video games.

Thank you for your response LongWayFromHome.

We spent all of our time together with the exception of game time. We both work in the same home office and get off work at 4:30pm. We spend the evening together until going to bed at 11:30pm. We have great conversations, play board games, go fishing, camping, visit state parks, go to the beach, crafts, and we have an active sex life. Prior to the pandemic we went out on dates all the time. We would still be going out, but we live in a tourist town and nobody visiting here wears masks or socially distances. We still have what we call "date nights" where we dress nice and order a dinner delivery.

I have been familiar with MarriageBuilders and Dr. Harley's concepts for many years. I understand the POJA, but what if your needs are not being met? I should stop playing video games because she isn't enthusiastic about that? I do not think video games are more important than my wife, but they are important to me. If I was doing other things that took time away from us I could understand that. But there is literally nothing else that I do besides work.

Do you want to insist on your right to spend your "me time" as you please, even though she wants to divorce you?

If your right to play games in the way you want to is that important to you, by all means protect your right, even if doing so ends your marriage.

If you don't want a divorce, or a bitter, unhappy marriage where your wife sleeps alone after you fight or worse, moves back in with her mother from time to time, then stop doing whatever it is that annoys her. It's really that simple.

Thank you for your advice SugerCane. Yes. If I can't have any me time then we will divorce.

How many hours a week are you getting of UA time? Are you meeting the 15 hours a week, meeting the 4 intimate needs during this time?

Is your W familiar with Dr. Harley? Do you POJA the game time?

So you are willing to divorce if you don’t get your “me” time?

UA time is supposed to be 4 4 hour blocks a week. How about “going first” and making sure that gets scheduled and then schedule your me time on other days? Or maybe weekends would have time for both.

Thank you BrainHurts and NewEveryDay for your posts.


By the time I was scheduled to play Thursday night we had over 20 hours UA time. I have tried to meet the emotional needs each time we spend UA time. I have no reason to believe she feels differently about that. Prior to the last week I would turn on the news every night for an hour and occasionally be focused on stories I was interested in. I understand that is not UA time, so this week I didn’t even turn on the TV unless she wanted to.


She is. She sent me a link to the UA article yesterday. We do not POJA the game time. Even though we had previously agreed to 3 hours a week, I feel she resents me playing at all. I do not ever anticipate there will ever be enthusiasm about that, even though there was in the early stages of our relationship when we played together.


Sadly, yes. I love her with all my heart and would die for her. She has been my best friend and we have known each other for 20 years. But I am not happy with the life I have. I would rather be dead then to continue living this way. I know a large part of that is the pandemic and what it has done to us. But if I can’t enjoy a little more me time then I do not see another path. In the current condition of our marriage Dr. Harley recommends 25-30 UA hours a week. We were on track for at least 40 this week.


That’s just it. It is scheduled by default. I don’t have to say “hey babe, let’s spend every night together this week and the whole weekend together.” That is our life together with the exception of Thursday. But even Thursday I made it a point to not do anything besides talk to her prior to gaming. We have “chores” like cleaning, showering, feeding the dogs, etc. but each and every night we usually have at least 4 hours of UA time. Saturday and Sunday are closer to 10 hours of UA time, but I believe it has been more than normal this last week. I want that. I want us both to be happy.

Is that why you posted here; because she sent you the Harley link?

I'm trying to establish whether she came across Dr Harley and liked what he said, and sent you the link to see if you could come round to Dr Harley's and her points of view.

I posted here because I needed help trying to understand. Conveniently I was already here because she sent me the link. I also did a Google site search here for video games to see if I could relate to anything. Most of what I found are game addicts who you can't pry away from the computer or philanderers using video games to hook up. I cannot relate to either of those. But the advice given to the wife of one of the game addicts was to learn the game and play with him. I didn't see any advice that she should divorce or he shouldn't be doing that.

I would have to say we have both known about some of Dr. Harley's concepts for about the same amount of time. Although I can safely say I am exposed to them more than her due to an organization I am involved with and have been for nearly 20 years. But the POJA is a new one for me. I hadn't read that before.

I had read about UA, but I read it again and I agree with it entirely. I tried to frame it from the perspective of my situation and my past. I understand where I was failing, because the TV was on or I was distracted by one of our dogs needing attention, etc. Sometimes I would find myself thinking about something she just said and realize I just missed something else she said. I don't recall that ever being a problem before. There are times when she even stops to ask if I am listening to her. Most times I can assure her that I am, but there have been times that I was watching the news or playing with one of the dogs and realize that I didn't hear her. I have removed the obvious distractions from the routine in an effort for improvement.

Then I read about POJA and I tried to frame that in the context of gaming. As I said previously, she was enthusiastic about gaming at the beginning of our relationship, but once it was decided I could only game for 3 hours a week and it was also established she wouldn't game with my cousin, that meant that I would no longer have my time with him. He and my wife are my best friends. I haven't seen him in over 2 years and I miss greatly. The POJA doesn't help me with the gaming situation because following it means I give up gaming entirely. That doesn't sound realistic to me. Had she told me I could not play video games prior to our marriage we would never have been engaged.

I'm just trying to find out if she found Dr Harley's work and send you the link, and you posted here after that. Could you just answer me that, please?

She was already familiar with Dr. Harley and MarriageBuilders.com. I don't know if she came here directly or googled and found it again that way. She sent me the link to the Policy of Undivided Attention via email, I read it, I did additional reading over the courses of the day, and decided to register and post to get feedback.

My question here was trying to establish whether she sent you the link because when she found Dr Harley's advice it showed her the way she wanted her marriage to be, and she sent the link to you because she wanted you to read it and be similarly convinced. It sounds to me as if it might have been that way, and if so, that's a hopeful sign.

She is trying to turn you both into being buyers in the marriage. When couples are buyers, as opposed to renters or freeloaders, they put the goal of having a happy, romantic, lasting marriage first in their lives, and then they use every objective at their disposal to achieve that goal. Your wife has been convinced by Dr Harley's explanations that decisions taken in your marriage should have the objective of making you both happy, and she is trying to get you to see that this is the only way that marriage should work.

Do you think that, since she sent you here, she would come here herself and post her perspective?

I was thinking the same. Will she come here and post?

I just want to point out the obvious. It sounds like you both aren’t enthusiastic with what you came up with, in regards to gaming. So you need to POJA the situation.

Please read The Critical Importance of Undivided Attention

Okay: going back to your first post, I have a few points.

Please read what Dr Harley saysabout what should happen when a spouse changes her mind about the kind of recreational companionship she is willing to engage in. "We exchanged activities that only I enjoyed for new activities that we both enjoyed. We remained each other's favorite recreational companions after marriage even though most of our recreational activities changed. And it's a good thing, because recreational companionship is definitely one of my most important emotional needs."

He says more about the gulf between the activities that men and women typically enjoy in the book His Needs Her Needs, where he describes many men as "enjoying recreational activities that involve more risk, more adventure, and more violence than women enjoy. Typically men pursue such sports as football, boxing, hunting, fishing, hang gliding, scuba diving, snowmobiling, and skydiving. They don't mind sweat, dirt, body odor, or belching during a recreational activity. Most women find all of this terribly unpleasant and tasteless."

Although gaming does not involve sweat, dirt, body odour or belching, for your wife it might still be something that men enjoy that baffles her and does not interest her at all - I know I feel that way about it. I really like board games and especially quizzes, but there is something about competitive gaming on a computer that I find very unappealing.

However, I'm not sure from what you wrote whether your wife does not like your gaming at all, or whether it's more that she does not like you playing with your cousin. It seems to have something to do with her not wanting you to engage in an activity that excludes her, whether you are doing it alone or with your cousin. It seems that for some time she was happy to play with you, so it probably was not an objection to gaming itself - just to your playing in ways that excluded her. And according to Dr Harley, that's quite right. That article says that you should exchange activities that only you enjoy for new activities that you both enjoy. You should remain each other's favourite recreational companions after marriage even though (most of) your recreational activities change. So, if she's willing to play with you (without your cousin), you can do that for some of your recreational time, and if she isn't you should find something else to do together.

You were given bad advice by your counsellor, as many people are. Having read what Dr Harley says about being each other's favourite recreational companions, you should be able to see why. Your counsellor's advice has led you to being willing to divorce over first, your right to have "me time", and second, over your right to spend it doing something your wife finds objectionable. Dr Harley would never have given you rubbish advice like that.

Your wife is very correct in being offended by the concept of "me time". The concept does indeed suggest time that you want to spend away from her. If one spouse feels that they needs such a time, this is a clue that they don't really enjoy the other person's company, and can only take it in limited doses and with time off for good behaviour. That makes the marriage sound more like a prison sentence than the joy it should be. How insulting to her, indeed. Is it that you should not be married at all, because your gaming is so important to you, or is it that you should not be married to her in particular, because she is so insufferable? It must be one or the other. How is she supposed to feel about that?

How terrible for your counsellor to have given you advice that led to her moving out and now threatening divorce. That is not what marriage counselling is supposed to achieve.

Good grief. If that isn't describing a prison sentence, I don't know what would be. That's a terrible way to describe to your wife that this is how you can tolerate your marriage.

So, you got her to agree to a 3-hour time limit, and then you broke the agreement. Dr Harley would completely support her being upset about this.

In the first place, from your later post where you describe what you do when you are at home, what you have been giving her is not undivided attention as described by Dr Harley the in undivided attention article: "Corollary 2: Objectives. During the time you are together, create activities that will meet the emotional needs of affection, sexual fulfillment, conversation and recreational companionship." You can't meet these objectives just by being in the house together, being distracted by the TV or the dogs.

The COVID crisis has removed most of the opportunities for couples to do the recreational things they used to, but even in the dead of winter, in lockdown, with spouses working from home, it provides time to spend about two hours of the day out of the house walking for exercise. They can drive a short distance - somewhere different every day - and walk, looking at the local architecture and scenery, and talking about what they see and about themselves. This is much healthier for the body and mind than playing on the computer, especially if you also use the computer for work, and it allows for 3 of the 4 intimate needs to be met: conversation, affection, and recreational companionship. Sexual fulfilment is best met at home, unless you get your kicks in freezing cold, risky situations. (If you do, and you can do it without getting arrested, then go for that too.)

In a Marriage Builders marriage, where the spouses work to create and maintain romantic love, they maximise the pleasurable aspects of the marriage and eliminate the unpleasant ones. In your marriage, the issue of gaming is causing a crisis that need not exist. It is causing the same issue as any addiction would do - even if you are not in fact addicted to it. It is making your wife unhappy because it is showing that you love an activity more than you love her. No married person should ever send that message to their spouse.

Nobody here gave you advice to divorce. My advice was that "If you don't want a divorce, or a bitter, unhappy marriage where your wife sleeps alone after you fight or worse, moves back in with her mother from time to time, then stop doing whatever it is that annoys her. It's really that simple."

And of course a forum for game addicts would not advise that "he shouldn't be doing that". They are looking out for the game addict. They are not looking out for the marriage!

Please read Buyers, Renters and Freeloaders

The concepts are all related to each other, so you will never get the full picture of what a romantic marriage should look like unless you read them all.

The love buster of independent behaviour is closely related to the Policy of Joint Agreement. You decided to practice independent behaviour towards your wife by refusing to stick to your agreement of 3 hours "me time" (you should also accept that "me time" is a bad attitude to express towards your wife). You now seem to be saying that you will take as much "me time" as you need, and your wife can like it or lump it. The problem is that the only place this will lead you to is divorce.

Dr Harley writes: "I define Independent Behavior as the conduct of one spouse that ignores the feelings and interest of the other spouse. It's usually scheduled and requires some thought to execute, so the simplest way to overcome this Love Buster is to take it off your schedule. If your Thursday night bowling, or visit to a friend of the opposite sex, or spending five hours chatting on the internet while your spouse sits alone watching TV, you should instead schedule something else Thursday night, visit someone else, and spend time doing something with your spouse. Whatever it is you decide to do that replaces independent behavior, be sure that both you and your spouse enthusiastically agree to it."

Thank you so much for your help and guidance.


I don’t believe she had previously read the concept of UA until either Thursday or Friday morning, prior to sending me the link.


I agree with regard to the Policy of Undivided Attention. She sent me the link to read and understand better the importance of undivided attention. I didn’t disagree at all with the concept. In fact I had already been doing the things I said I would do to prevent distractions.


I told her you suggested she come here and post. She has been here to read, but she hasn’t yet told me if she was willing to post.


You are correct. We are working on us right now and getting back to intimacy. I want her to know that she is my priority so I am putting that on a back burner for now.


Thank you for the link. I’ve started reading and wish someone would replace the acronyms with the words. I understand this is a more advanced concept based on emotional needs that one should already be somewhat familiar with, but I found myself having to do a lot of cross referencing to understand. That was enlightening and makes perfect sense to me. I’m sure my wife couldn’t agree more.


My wife is my favorite recreational companion. We go hiking, fishing, camping, boating, and we continue to play video games on the iPad occasionally. We are planning to go fishing today.


My wife has no problem with getting dirty. We both love outdoor activities. She also enjoys video gaming.


She doesn’t enjoy playing with my cousin. He is too helpful. He has a habit of doing things in game to help other gamers at the expense of letting them experience the discovery, crafting or procurement themselves. I’ve told him to let us do it, and he has gotten better about it.


I think exchanging is too extreme. She will remain my favorite RC, and there is no doubt however the POJA goes in regard to gaming most of our recreation time will be together. I believe we can accomplish that without either of us quitting the things that we love. For instance, she loves to do karaoke and I absolutely do not. I would never ask her to stop doing it. In fact, just before the pandemic we went out to a bar that had karaoke and I watched her sing. Not only that, I also participated and embarrassed the hell out of myself. I won’t be able to go back to that place without a PTSD episode.


I respectfully disagree and I believe my wife does too. We wouldn’t be married right now had we not been seeing our counselor.


Again, I respectfully disagree. I love spending time with my wife and we both enjoy each other’s company. I am absolutely certain of that. There in not a soul I would rather be with and live my life with.

I think you are missing the whole point of what the ‘me time’ was intended for as recommended by our counselor, but I will not try to convince you. Like I said previously, if I cannot enjoy any time with my cousin then there is a much bigger problem in our marriage. If a family member or friend is dangerous to the marriage or unsafe, then I completely buy in to the idea of keeping distance. That is simply not the case with my cousin. Sure, he may give you a machine gun, but this is a game and shooting zombies is part of it. My cousin loves my wife and wants us to be happy.


I can see how it could be interpreted that she moved out due to gaming but that is not the case. We were in a fight about something completely unrelated to me time or gaming. It escalated and I was leaving the house to (socially distance) visit my mom and other family members who were in town to visit. My wife assumed I would get infected so she packed up and left.


I thought I had previously mentioned I don’t do those things now. While I used to turn on the TV and watch the news every night, that is no longer in the routine. Instead we get off work, fix our happy hour cocktails and sit down for UA time. Sure, we give the dogs attention sometimes too, but that does not typically occur until a couple hours later, when we are closer to dinner time.


Very good points! We do try to get a 30-45 minute walk everyday during our lunch hour. On the weekends we like to go hiking or drive to a nearby beach town and walk in new places. One day last week we had sexual fulfillment in the office during lunch so I think we skipped the walk that day.


I understand this and I intend to work on it. I want her to know she is the most important thing in my life. I know we will be happier because I will be trying harder, knowing more about UA and the importance of intimacy.


I was referring to the posters on that particular thread. They were encouraging her to game with him. It wasn’t a gaming forum. It was here, on marriagebuilders.com.