Secret of a Marriage

Moving to a new house can put any successful marriage into a real test. And we're now into our third month of this test and not doing too great. People who've met my husband fall in love with his gregarious personality. Always cheerful, always happy, always humourous. But they don't see the dark side of him. The side that screams his head off with anger, the side that slams a fist through the wall, the side that in a blink of an eye can cause damage to a cabinet. No one believes me when I tell them about it. And it sure makes it difficult to get any sympathy to my side of the story when he blames me for his outbursts.

But he's a good man. It takes him about an hour to fully regret his behaviour and apologise with a hug.

Me, on the other hand, I can't let it go. I can't forget it. I can't forgive the anger burst. I can't just move on so fast. It takes me a couple of days. So that's why I haven't written in a few days.

The frustrating thing is that the last argument we had this weekend was just a miscommunication. Me thinking that he wanted electricity in the new island in our kitchen and trying to suggest a solution, and him not informing me that he's decided he doesn't want it.

As a project manager it's my role at work to make sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to the design and the client's requirements. But once I leave work I leave the hard hat behind and just act like a regular wife who can't figure out her husband and only contributes to the miscommunication.

Same with him. At work he's a master of communication. Manages dozens of people. And controls a multi million budget. But once he leaves work, there's no budget, there's no communication.

Maybe it'd be better if we continued to work while at home. We do. In a different way. Our marriage is a success because we don't give up after each argument. We keep fighting to get to the bottom of it. We keep arguing til we understand each other. We don't let go. And then we end up compromising our own needs and take into consideration the other person's needs. You'd think this would leave us both feeling short changed and angry at having to give up. But somehow we always end up happily married.

Until the next silly argument.