Noticing our Expectations in our Marriage

Spoken or unspoken, expectations live between every husband and wife. Knowingly or unknowingly they accompany us on our wedding day, reside with us in our homes and then hover expectantly between us. 

Then one day, one of our presumptions goes unmet, and suddenly, all hell breaks loose between the man wife.   

When I married, I thought my husband would know my emotional needs without me having to tell him. I thought my husband could know my emotional needs if he just paid attention to me. I thought I could communicate my needs via extra sensory perception. 

It felt less scary if I left my assumptions unspoken. It felt less risky if I left it up to him to figure me out. It felt right if I left him with my presumptions.

But his silence told me that he had no idea what was going on with me. So I tried to bridge our communication gap with a metaphor. “I feel like a broken down car,” I said to him one night.  

But that didn’t work. 

Now we were both silent and it wasn’t comfortable. 

Then one morning while journaling I remembered how my mother used to communicate with my father when she was angry. She’d yell. Her yelling did not encourage my dad to converse with her. Instead, it only made him stand in silence. 

Unlike Mom, I wasn’t yelling at my husband. But like Mom, my method of communication was not producing a two way conversation with my husband. 

I tried again, but this time, in plain unassuming language. 

One night while sitting on the front porch swing I told my husband how much I missed going to church together. Although we’d made it part of our routine when we were dating, since we’d married we’d quit going to church. 

He thought that since we now lived out of town, going into town to church was a little inconvenient, he thought. 

I told him about a church that was in our neck of the woods and maybe we could try it.

He nodded his agreement. 

Then, we attended that church in our neck of the woods for the next several years. 

Why Bother?

Why bother noticing our expectations in our marriage? It is ludicrous to assume our spouse can read and understand our unspoken needs. It may feel less risky to leave our expectations unspoken, but, our spouse cannot meet what they cannot see or hear.