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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   2557 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 21, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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Got married a few days ago, which was cool. Post your tips for a happy marriage.

Prop Joe had some thoughts

Congratulations, that's great! Best of wishes to you.

Communicate lots about money, and blend your finances as much as you possibly can. There is no "yours" and "mine" anymore, there is only "ours." You live in a tiny commune now, and it will succeed or fail based primarily on your joint commitment to its continued success.

Have sex frequently. What this means specifically depends a lot on the individuals involved, but roughly "more often than the lower-libido spouse prefers, but aim for at least 75% of the way from there toward what the higher-libido spouse prefers."

Have children, assuming you don't already.

Don't begrudge your spouse your labor. You're lucky to have someone to work with on the long term project that is now your family unit. Intelligent division of labor creates efficiencies that can do wonders for what each of you can accomplish (it doesn't take twice the time to do twice the laundry, or twice the prep time to cook for twice the mouths, e.g.). Leverage it together and enjoy the dividends together!

Have fun!

I've enjoyed reading everyone else's advice here, so I'll add in my own: It's your responsibility to manage your own parents (and protect your spouse from their inlaws).

In the extreme case: my parents traumatized my wife ~1 year into our marriage by getting into a yelling match over politics/religion. I had to tell them that they were out of line, and that I'd be cutting contact with them if they continued to behave that way.

Less extreme: my wife's relatives regularly give too much sugar/presents to our kids, and it's my wife's job to let them know when to stop.

Oh, and one more thing: go read the wifejak memes and don't be like them. Yes, it's just boomer humor adapted for millennials, but it's still directionally correct.

  • W: Hey, can you do X?
  • H: Sure, when the movie finishes in 15 minutes.
  • W: passively-aggressively starts doing X

Thankfully, I was able to explain to my wife that this is several times worse than saying "just pause your fucking movie and move your lazy ass".

I only really have two pieces of advice, from the man's POV, based on my own marriage and the marriages of the other men I know.

Thing number one is the constant battle against their wive's neuroticism. Iliza Shlesinger has this great bit about how driven she (and by the applause the got the women in her audience as well) is by neuroticism. Just the complete inability to sit still, and instead constantly fuck with thing and fuck with things and fuck with things. And only at the end of the day when she's so exhausted she can't possibly do anything at all, she gets 5 minutes of peace from her own brain before the oblivion of sleep overtakes her.

This is not a problem the typical man contends with. Your mileage may vary.

It's an older special she did this in, and in the context of the bit she's single. In the context of being married, myself and every man I know deals with their wife expecting them to do their neuroticism for them, because they are so tired of doing their own neuroticism all day. As a concrete example, I might call the doctor to set up an appointment for my daughter, and then write it on the calendar. My wife will get anxious that the calendar is wrong and want me to call the doctor's office to confirm that I wrote it down correctly. This excessive neuroticism is frustrating to me, and she refuses to make the call herself because she doesn't feel like it, but she can't act right until I do her neuroticism for her.

Side note for the husbands, never, ever say "Fine, I'll do your neuroticism for you". That was a mistake.

It has not helped that therapy speak has been popularized around these issues such that men are utilizing "weaponize incompetence" when they don't perform task to their wive's neurotic standards. It also has not helped that counselling services largely treat a wife's neuroticism as the highest possible priority in a relationship, and don't assess the reasonableness of it what so ever.

The second plague on husbands has been the popularization of "love languages". Suddenly every wife has decided that "acts of service" are her love language, which means her husband has to do everything she ask or he's not loving her properly. It's been one of the most effective mind viruses of entitlement I've ever seen, and it's swept through every marriage I'm aware of. Seems to have largely run it's course, but it was a thing about a year ago, and every man was run down and miserable under the relentless entitled demands for a solid 3-6 months before things came to a boil. Don't do that.

Why do you know my wife so well?

Anyways, I have grown thoroughly tired of the neuroticism, the entitlement and the learned helplessness. I have, for all practical purposes, exiled my wife to her parents' house during the work week because I didn't want to deal with her shit while also working (or failing to work, as that went with work-from-home). When she complains of some ache or ailment, I straight-up tell her that I don't care, don't want to hear about it, and will ignore it, and that it is hers to deal with. When she asks for acts of service, I do them if they're just harmless bits of luxury (make her a cup of tea, bring her high-quality ingredients to cook with instead of the cheap stuff, etc.) or just tell her to do it herself or else it won't be done if I genuinely don't want to do it, disagree with it or consider it her responsibility (drive out on an extra shopping trip because she wants a piece of cake, remove the trash from her room because she can't be assed to do it herself, make her calls for her, drive her to routine appointments that she could take the bus to). On weekends I no longer try to plan activities with her that invariably fall through because of her inability to commit to a plan and see it through; I straight-up skip the foreplay and assume that she will spend the entire weekend lying in bed and staring at her phone and probably cooking a meal at the small price of turning the kitchen into a blasted wasteland. Instead I plan the weekend around acitivities with our daughter, and ignore all my wife's inputs that goes along the lines of "she's too sick"/"don't be gone too long"/"that's dangerous". If the wife wants to come along, I tell her to stay at home because it's time to play and explore and have tiny adventures, not to complain that the sunlight / social anxiety is killing you and that the outdoors does not agree with your screen addiction and to try and derail the trip so it takes the shortest route to the nearest eatery and stops there. When now she tries to escalate her hypochondria and demands attention à la "I fear I'm dying!", I tell her to get it over with or call an ambulance because I'm not going to spend another night at the hospital just for her to be told she needs to exercise more and worry less. When she again fails to get our daughter to Kindergarten, I tell her to stop it with the excuses and do her damn job or else stop assuming responsibilities only to fail to carry them out. When I go to work, or to sleep, or outside with our daughter, or just don't feel like it, then I switch off my phone and let her ride out her panic attacks on her own. We considered moving closer to town so that she can take the bus and needn't get her driver's license, but I called it off when she refused to commit to actually taking that bus instead of being chauffeured around. When my wife says something, I refuse to believe it and tell her so, unless it either comes with convincing evidence or aligns with my perception, because her perception and thinking are dominated by fears and wishes and there is rarely an attempt to align on any shared "objective" reality.

Yes, I have gone full chauvinist. Straight-up "being a stay-at-home-mom is an important job and I will fire you if you don't do it". "You can be a feminist when you pull your own weight.". "Going to therapy is not a contribution to the family unless it actually improves something.". "Are you losing a sizable amount of blood? Is a bone broken? Can you still look at your phone? Then you're not dying and I don't care.". "Your appointments are yours to keep, don't expect me to make time for them.". "Yes I only work 40h a week and you are a housewife and mom 24/5. You work more hours than me. It's still an arrangement in your favor, because I would switch and you would not."

And so she divorced me and sued me and now I am a crying wreck, a shell of a man, misled by misogynist propaganda into playing by outmoded roles, tripped up by toxic social constructs, hated by my daughter...

Just kidding. We get along a lot better. The marriage may still fall apart in the long run, but while she will not outright admit it, I think she's actually a little glad to be forced to actually live up to at least the bare minimum of her responsibilities instead of just sliding ever-deeper into the patterns outlined in your post, and establishing at least the rudiments of a routine has been good for our daughter too, I think. Yes.jpg chad is actually a better role model than all the psychologists and bloggers and instagram content creators in the world.

The worst thing I ever did, by far and with no contest whatsoever, was to spend several years taking all that neuroticism seriously and doing it for her.

Not married and not planning to do so at the moment, but I have to enthusiastically third both your and WhiningCoil's sentiments despite not being a member of the married men club: No is the only correct response to this kind of ridiculous female neuroticism when it emerges. If you do not do this half of your life will be spent managing it, trying to work around it, attempting to placate it, and it is never over.

I have female family members like this, and while thankfully (for me) husbands/boyfriends are the first port of call for every issue, when there isn't one they sometimes fall back on virtually any stable male relative that's around to help manage it for them. I've had to deal with low levels of this in multiple points in my life, and I know guys who have succumbed to it in their relationships, and it's like every Victorian henpecked husband trope magnified by ten. It is not a good situation to find oneself in.

Do you love her or just do it for your daughter?

Yes and yes. I probably would have given up on the whole mess a while ago if it weren't for our daughter, but it's not like my wife, for all that I complain about her (and I do so with good reason), is entirely without merit.

The marriage may still fall apart in the long run

Sounds like it already has bro.

By normal standards I suppose so, but we are stubborn people.

That was a surprisingly uplifting read. Nobody's perfect, but my wife is not like yours or WC's. She's only slightly neurotic and doesn't cripple herself with needless worries. Time to go hug her.

Had a kid yet? It gets approximately 2.5 times worse after you have a kid.

interesting, I would say our marriage improved across the board by about 2.5 times after having a kid (if not more).

I mean, mine did too, but not along the neuroticism axis.

Yep, he turns 11 next week.

uplifting

Not the reaction I expected, but I'm glad for you.

Dang your first part describes my wife so perfectly well.

Congratulations! I assumed you were already married and I hope he realizes how lucky he is. No actionable advice from me, I'm afraid — I'm still going on first dates.

Maintaining relationship is work. Do it diligently. Don't be afraid to remind your partner you appreciate them (may be too early, but still never hurts), find a form of doing it that's compatible with their temperament.

Accept that you're both humans, eventually you'll screw up and have to ask for forgiveness, and your partner will screw up and need forgiveness from you. Accept that sometimes you'll piss each other off (maybe not, if you're super lucky but usually at least sometimes) and that's just life, and remind yourself why you are together. Communicate, even if sometimes it may take an effort and be hard to do.

Learn to give each other space when you need it. Some people need to be alone sometimes (yes, even alone from their loving partner) and that doesn't mean the love is gone. Many people need to have their own things in addition to "our things" - that's ok too. Supporting your partner in being them is much better than trying to change them.

Yes, agree with not keeping score - if you're in for the long run, keeping score is only going to make trouble. The only fair thing is what you both feel is fair, and that's something you need to find out by communicating. Don't feel you need to conform to any outside notions of what you relationship should look like.

Congrats 2rafa.

I agree with George and hydroacetylene. A couple from me:

Loving your husband is an action that you do. I'm not telling you what to feel for the length of your marriage—I'm telling you what to do: go home and love your husband.

My wife and I waited too long to start having kids, and we regret it.

Just casually got married? Nice one.

Uhh... don't get divorced?

Congratulations to you and your fortunate husband! I hope you had a great day and I hope you have many happy decades together in your future, that's awesome.

I won't offer any advice, because I still haven't figured out how to maintain a happy relationship, let alone a marriage. Do you plan on having kids?

Is he a lot like you or more of a normie?

As for advice, dont overthink it. Ive never seen one of our kind that applied too little theory to his relationships.

Aside from the internet werewolf terminology I agree. Ya'll were boyfriends and girlfriends before ya'll were spouses and before that ya'll were friends and before that ya'll were friendly acquittances and before that when God said let there be light ya'll were strangers trying to impress eachother. A marriage is just a continuation of the relationship with a different name now.

And here I was trying to find a tactful way to ask that lol

Pick a good wife.

Edit: Pick a good husband.

Congratulations! One thing which comes to mind is to not keep score. It's real tempting to do that, but once you start down the path of "I did the dishes the last 5 times, it's your turn" (or whatever) it breeds resentment. You will need to talk about things he does that bother you, but try to not let it start with "you always" type language.

Many happy years to the two of you!

Congratulations, the world needs more dramanauts!

The only advice I have, from my parents' and grandparents' lifelong marriages, is to accept that your husband is the person he is, even when you really wish he wasn't.

Congratulations! I hope the two of you have a long and happy marriage!

Make more Jews, please. We're running out.

Congratulations! My advice: Don't go to bed angry. If something is on your mind, talk it out.

Congratulations!

I'm 8ish months in. You're gonna have good times and rough times. Being married is different from living together. Tiny things will matter and start fights for no reason. Tiny things that don't matter will be celebrated and become wonderful things you share with each other. Make sure your bed is comfortable for the two of you. Don't keep socre.

Other than that, Hydro and Roystugnr have it right.

Men and women are different. This will likely result in a division of labor that is not fair. Score keeping about this will not help your marriage.

Have children, don’t be neurotic about it.

If he needs space it isn’t because he’s mad at you, it’s because he needs space.

Have children, don’t be neurotic about it.

2rafa, you don't need to have children if they don't work for you and your husband's lifestyle.

2rafa is a woman.

Have children. Fertile marriages give you something to collaborate on. It ties you together, forces you both to be responsible in your relationship even when you don't feel like it. And you won't always feel like it. Sometimes, you don't have to like it, you just have to do it. Children make sure there's a point to that, and you don't just let it slide. Besides, they make you happy. You need the joy in life. You need the randomness, the wonder, and the being-depended-on.

I don't think there's a way to collect objective data on whether having children makes a marriage better or worse- the selection effects overwhelm anything useful- but there's a sense of 'burning the bridges' in making a permanent commitment and there's a sense of connection to the ancestors, this sense of abandoning individualism to stick together by hook or by crook. You won't have a successful marriage by saying 'this far and no further', no, you have to firmly commit to making it work whatever the cost, and what better way than to have that which, by nature, you love more than yourself depending on it? By having children you become another iteration of the human condition, getting by how you can, the same as your forefathers and foremothers, part of the great engine of continuity because there is no other option even when you really don't want to, or you'd rather do something else. There's no I in team, and you're a team now. Not just when it works with your lifestyle.

Having children is a choice not a requirement.

Well, you can stipulate this, and I can do the opposite. I don't think it's marriage unless the couple is at least willing to try for children, and my church would back me up on that. A secure partnership for the generation and upbringing of children is at least one of the central aspects of marriage.

But people can call a legally-encumbered fling anything they want, I suppose.

Yes, it's the right choice, and not having them is the wrong one. Not having them is opting to become a casualty of your own bad decisions.

Not having them is fine, too. There are plenty of childless, married couples out there making it work.

I fear a critical factor for my own happy marriage might have been "dumb luck finding the right woman", which isn't very actionable. And most of what I've learned since then has been ways to avoid or fix specific problems and conflicts, not very general tips.

But I've saved and at least tried to live by a lot of broadly-applicable advice I've read from others:

"the work in every relationship should be split 60/40, with both people trying to be the one giving 60%"

"My mom asked an elderly couple who had been married for decades what their secret was. They said that they act as if being nice to each other is a competition."

"I see so many couples who act like "Well now that we're married, I don't have to deal with the stress of self-censoring, and can be as cranky, demanding, and sharp as I wanna be." Which seems to me exactly the wrong choice. If you're married to someone, you should treat that relationship like anything else you need to last a long time: with care."

"when asked how they managed to stay together 65 years, the woman replied, "we were born in a time when, if something was broke, you fixed it ... not throw it away.""

"Your mindset changes from "Is this going to work?" to "How do we make this work?" That's it. It's both a small change and a huge change at the same time."

"Successful marriage is predicted by a consistent pattern of irrationally optimistic assumptions. That is, each spouse tends to believe, in the face of common sense and even prior evidence, that his spouse means better than he says, has kinder thoughts than seems evident from his speech, et cetera. In short, a certain amount of mutual delusion seems necessary. Although it might not be fair to call it delusional, since it seems the spouses often rise to the expectations — expected to behave better than they initially meant, they rise to it."

"Marry the version of the person you see before you right now, exactly as they are today. I cannot tell you how often I've heard "Well, I thought after we got married, s/he would get a real job / finish school / take the lawn seriously / drink less / go out less / be less of a slob / learn to manage money / take career more seriously / want to have kids" or whatever. ... I am not saying people don't change with age and maturity. I am saying: a) the ways in which they will mature are entirely unpredictable, and b) marriage is not the thing that makes that happen."

Of course, that's just the stuff applicable after you choose a worthy partner. But from what I've read from you here, my guess is you didn't have any problem doing that wisely, with luck optional.

Congratulations!

I also suspect you aren't learning anything new from the advice above, rather that you posted your question because you decided that a tiny chance of missing a little useful advice would have been worse than a large chance of wasting a little time soliciting and reading redundant or unnecessary advice. If I've guessed right, kudos; that's exactly the right attitude to go in with!

Congratulations!!! Fantastic news.

To you, as the wife: Don't change, as much as possible, from the woman he married. Some change is inevitable, but he shouldn't look at you some day and think "Who the hell are you?" He probably still will.

Avoid becoming a complainer like you would avoid getting bubonic plague. You needn't be always positive all the time, but a nice rule is: The first thing you say to him on meeting after any time apart should be something positive. If he can depend on you for positivity, you will be worth to him more than Africa's ivory and Asia's gold. This is true even if you complain together about things.

Let him have his downtime, alone time, whatever he does to have that, and almost all men do. It's nothing personal.

Finally, and this isn't an exhaustive list but I'm in the bath and it's past midnight: When and if you do have kids, remember that he is not one of them

I wish you many healthy happy years together. Mazel Tov!

Avoid becoming a complainer like you would avoid getting bubonic plague.

Well, @2rafa, avoid becoming an unproductive complainer. Hopefully your spouse can be a good active listener without being a problem-solver, since that is a very useful skill when it's required, but it's not an easy one for many people. If there's a problem and we can't solve it then that's hard, and if there's a problem but we shouldn't solve it then that's utterly exasperating.

Being a productive complainer can bring some couples closer together, though. "Men love quests. Well not all men, but most men." If there's something reasonable he can do for you, and you make it clear what he should do, and you show proportional gratitude afterward, that's better than not asking it of him, not worse. This can require good communication in some cases: you can't grossly over or under emphasize how important something is to you, and he has to give you some feedback about problems of uncertain difficulty, otherwise "reasonable" and "proportional" can be too ill-defined. But hopefully you have or develop that level of communication anyway for a hundred other reasons.

The other time to not avoid complaint is when you have a serious problem that won't go away otherwise and that you can't just live with. For a tolerant person there might not be many of those, but if and when one comes up it's much better to complain as early as possible, when hopefully the problem and your level of upset (or in the worst case, resentment) about it hasn't had time to grow very much. If you try to bottle up negative emotions until you just have to let them out, then you end up trapped in a choice between revealing their full extent (which can come off as a blindsiding attack) or downplaying/"trickling" their full extent (which hurts communication, as well as making it less likely the problem will be resolved).

I agree with all of the above. My main issue is when complaining becomes a hobby, a pastime, a personality trait.

Congrats man, second marriage I've seen here, how'd you meet your wife, does she know about this place, do tell us what you can.

Congratulations! Concord and love, as we say here.

The biggest tip I have is picking your battles. Always ask yourself if having your way is more important than making your husband happy. Hint: it almost never is.

The other tip is having a common hobby and a hobby of your own. Both time together and time apart are important in a relationship.

Congratulations!

The simple advice is generally correct. Make sure to communicate. Keep the love alive. Make it a partnership.

Wow, congratulations!

Accepting that men and women are different was a big one for me. It's a lot easier to just live with the differences, than to try to convince your other half that they should do what you want them to do, with facts and logic.

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