Here’s One For The One-Sided Double Standard Rule Book Of Marriage!
Well, maybe two…let’s see:
The Video Game Addiction
A wife is angry that her husband stays up late playing video games because she likes to have him in bed when she goes to sleep (who cares what he wants, right?) and so she makes him promise to tell her what time he will be coming to bed. Then for her birthday, she gets a video game she loves and ends up staying up late, unable to stop playing her game. Husband gets tired at about 2 am and heads off to bed and now his wife is angry that he went to bed before her and demands he give her a 30-minute warning before he goes to bed.
I listen to this and wonder how this “contract” got “agreed” upon in the first place? How does one person in a marriage/long term relationship decide that they get to make all the rules? Why don’t they see that they have double standards? How do they decide that their way is the “right” way? That they know what’s best for everyone involved, without asking?
It happens time and again and I am amazed. In order for double standards and one-sidedness to happen you’ve got two players: the one calling all the shots and the one who has always allowed it. I don’t think we have to fight in relationships just to be the winner and the top dog, but what good ever comes of always giving up your own values and preferences? Just so you don’t have conflict? Just to keep from losing that person?
Against Doctors Advice
What if it means putting your own health at risk? For example:
A husband is told by his doctor that he needs to do some physical exercise or be at risk of heart problems and high blood pressure/stroke. When he tells his wife, she informs him that he cannot exercise. Because? Because she is concerned about her weight, knows she should exercise but can’t get motivated and so she cannot tolerate him exercising. What?? And to top it off, she says she is even scared to exercise in her own home because she worries people will look in their windows and judge her.
This man gives in, doesn’t work out, to appease his wife, putting his own life at risk.
What sense does this make? Why does he “let her” make all the rules?