Reserved for really REALLY big fights

Do you ever have that feeling that someone is upset with you, but you don’t really know why? Like you obviously did something wrong, but it’s not obvious to you. Well, I woke up this morning and felt like Jill was giving me the cold shoulder. Not an icy cold shoulder, just a moderately chilly shoulder.

I got out of bed this morning and slumbered towards the bathroom. In my groggy state, I rubbed my eyes to clean out the cobwebs. You could still see the outline of a wrinkled up pillow case on my cheek. Jill and I met eyes in the bathroom but no words were exchanged. I watched her do her hair for a few seconds when she said, “I’m taking the kids to get pictures today.” That was it. I was getting the sense that something wasn’t right. So I asked her if she was alright. She responded with a half hearted “I’m fine.” But if you could hear the tone in her voice you would know that she wasn’t fine. What she was saying was, “I’m fine”, but what I was hearing was, “you’re a douche bag.”

So I asked her again “what’s the matter?” Her second response was the more sincere one. She said to me, “I hate it when you fall asleep on the couch. I just want you to be in bed with me.” Jill was referring to the fact that I fell asleep on the couch watching poker around 10:30 and didn’t come to bed till 4am. Historically in our marriage, falling asleep on the couch is reserved for really really big fights (it’s happened maybe 5 or 6 times) …not for reruns of poker after dark. So when she woke up at 2 and noticed I wasn’t in bed, she associated it with the feelings of being in a fight. When I saw her in the morning we were not fighting, but it still had the atmosphere of a fight. I went out of my way to tell her that it wasn’t anything personal and that it was unintentional. I think she understood but that shoulder sure was chilly.

As a guy, it is so easy for me to blow something like this off. In fact many times I do. Because the things that make my wife feel insecure don’t even register on my scale. But as a husband and a father…it is my job to make sure those things matter. I’m sure at a rational level Jill is at peace, but that’s not good enough for me. I want her to wake up at 2am, see that I’m next to her, and feel totally safe. That’s what matters. So for now on, falling asleep on the couch is reserved for really really big fights.