Looking for advice from a husband's perspective?

[Armor_of_Light]

1. Or, she can simply smile to herself, say something like, “Well at least it keeps him off the streets,” say a prayer for her slightly immature husband, clean up the major mess and move on, and enjoy her workout.

Spoken like a true professional…

 

[Ophelia23]

Wow, I have received more responses than I ever expected! I agree that it would be inappropriate to throw his things away, and while I appreciate the advice I think I will set that aside for now. I guess it varies from marriage to marriage on how to make this work! I’ll bring it up with him again. I agree that his friends should help him to pick up after their party. I really liked the suggestion of having a garbage bin in the room for them to at least throw their foodstuff away.

 

[Boulder257]

Wow, I have received more responses than I ever expected! I agree that it would be inappropriate to throw his things away, and while I appreciate the advice I think I will set that aside for now. ** I guess it varies from marriage to marriage **on how to make this work! I’ll bring it up with him again. I agree that his friends should help him to pick up after their party. I really liked the suggestion of having a garbage bin in the room for them to at least throw their foodstuff away.

The Bold is mine. That’s probably the most accurate quote on this thread yet! It always amazes me how different marriages can be from couple to couple and yet in each fo the circumstances the individuals are helping to make saints of the other.

 

[Boulder257]

LOL Nope, not all married to the same guy. DH is dear husband. You’ll also see DW(wife), DD(daughter), & DS(son). D typically stands for dear, or maybe darling.

Ah! Thanks so much for the clarification. I could not figure it out for the life of me! I feel old

 

[SMHW]

Wow, I have received more responses than I ever expected! I agree that it would be inappropriate to throw his things away, and while I appreciate the advice I think I will set that aside for now. I guess it varies from marriage to marriage on how to make this work! I’ll bring it up with him again. I agree that his friends should help him to pick up after their party. I really liked the suggestion of having a garbage bin in the room for them to at least throw their foodstuff away.

I’m not a man but I am told men are usually goal oriented. In this case you have a general goal of having the mess cleaned up. But you really have a more complex goal: you want the mess cleaned up within a certain time frame and you want both yourself and your husband to feel good about it.

The problem is that you have no control over how your husband feels about the situation. He apparently doesn’t feel bad about the mess being there and he does feel (sort of ) bad when you clean it up. You feel bad when the mess is there and you feel (sort of ) bad when he feels bad about you cleaning the mess. So you feel bad no matter what and he only feels bad if you clean up the mess.

Wait! No fair!

I see several options where everyone is content:

1. 
   *]You stop feeling bad about there being a mess
   *]He cleans up the mess in a timely matter without reminders
   *]He gives up feeling bad when someone else cleans up the mess and you cheerfully clean up the mess
   
   I don’t see option number 1 happening.
   
   I propose a compromise with the other two options: Each week he gets x number of hours to assume his *right *to clean up the mess and if he doesn’t then he abdicates his *right *to do the cleaning to you. You will graciously except the gift of the *right *to clean.
   
   And do make it easy for him to exercise his right to clean by providing trash bins, storage containers, etc.

 

[Boulder257]

I see several options where everyone is content:
I propose a compromise with the other two options: Each week he gets x number of hours to assume his *right *to clean up the mess and if he doesn’t then he abdicates his *right *to do the cleaning to you. You will graciously except the gift of the *right *to clean.

And do make it easy for him to exercise his right to clean by providing trash bins, storage containers, etc.

There you go. Just have the attorneys draft up the docs. Make sure to have them properly wintessed, notarized, and recorded with the secretary of the state.