A baker who gets frustrated easily appreciates the alone time in her 10-year relationship.
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Age: 42
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Straight
Ethnicity: NZ European
Religion: NA
Occupation: Baker
Length of relationship: 10 years
Children: 2
How we met: Online dating
The best thing about my relationship: We both crave alone time and support each other to get it.
A problem we can’t seem to resolve: I get frustrated easily and my husband always thinks I’m angry when I’m really just frustrated. This leads to argument cycles that we always fall into.
This is how we share/separate our finances: All of our income goes into the same account. We pay all house expenses out of that account, have a separate account for annual bills (insurance, rates etc). We put a set amount of money into a shared eftpos account for groceries/general spending and pay our individual accounts the same allowance of “fun money” each week. My husband makes a LOT more money than me, but we both get the same amount of individual fun money to do whatever with, currently $50 each per week. The rest is all for the house.
This is how we split chores and childcare: I work part-time so I do most of the kid stuff – drop-offs, sports etc. My husband does it when I can’t for whatever reason. I do all the cooking, he does all the dishes (we’re both very happy with that arrangement). He does a lot of the housework in the weekends and I do most of the outside stuff.
Our sex life in three words: MIA currently.
The thing that makes me a good partner: I’m as invested in making sure my husband gets alone time as I am for myself. I initiate most of our couch snugs.
The thing I need to work on to be a better partner: I need to find a way to not get instantly frustrated about things and/or communicate it better.
What I most appreciate in my partner: His calm steadiness, he’s mine and the kids’ rock when everything feels like chaos.
What I most resent in my relationship: That my husband and I have very different desires in terms of adventure – he likes things to be easy and predictable, I’m the opposite. But because easy and predictable is, by definition, easier, we default to that.
The thing that has changed the most about my relationship over time: The start of our relationship was all change, all the time (a couple of international moves, having kids, buying a house). We were constantly managing periods of change and stress. Now we’re settled and in a regular routine which has changed our dynamic. We’re amazing at facing hurdles together, supportive and on the same page. I think we’re probably less awesome at routine life as a couple.
It would surprise people to know this about my relationship: We talk about EVERYTHING. My husband and I are quite different in appearance, attitude, outlook, but there’s nothing we can’t or won’t talk about. For all our pointless squabbling, we’re actually great at discussing stuff.
Our last big fight was about: Letting our oldest child get an objectively stupid haircut (husband was strongly anti – must save child from his own dumb mistakes; I was strongly pro – let the kid make his own dumb mistakes and live with the result).
If I hadn’t met my partner: I’d probably be with a much less sensible partner, stone broke from silly decisions, hopefully still with kids.
I expect my relationship to last until: We passed our 7-year “itch” and it was a rough time. If we got through that, I can’t imagine what we couldn’t get through. So I think we’re in this for forever.
My relationship advice is: So long as you agree on the big stuff like kids, schooling, where to live, etc – don’t let arguing about the small pointless crap (laundry, dishwasher etc) be the thing that takes you down. Take a breath, realise it’s small and stupid and let it go.
