A peek inside a common couples therapy session: 

He says: “I don’t want you to yell at me for not doing laundry… I’ll do mine, you do yours.”

She says: “If I leave it up to you, nothing gets done.”

I chime in and ask him, “What do you contribute to the marriage?”

He says: “All of our finances, bills, investments. I book all our travel and coordinate everyone who works on the house…”

It was clear that resentment was building on both sides, with each partner feeling like they were doing so much yet not being acknowledged for it. 

Here’s what I had them do for homework and what I’d suggest you and your partner do as well: 

• Write down what each of you contributes. Each of you should make your own individual list of what tasks you are doing regularly. 

• Swap lists. On your partner’s list, give each item either a plus, minus, or neutral to signify how each task affects you and/or the marriage. 

• Then, swap lists again and read how your partner rated each of your tasks. Based on the ratings, decide how you want to operate moving forward. 

Interpreting the neutrals: 

If cleaning out the refrigerator, for example, is on your list of contributions and it lands on your partner as a neutral, consider changing the reason you do it. If it is done for yourself instead of for the marriage, you'll get a lot more pleasure from it and will remove any resentment towards your partner for not doing it.

Interpreting the positives: 

Another thing you can play with is picking something from your spouse's positive list and making a silent agreement with yourself to start doing this one thing for your spouse without them asking or nagging. At first, you'll be doing it for them, but soon, you will realize how much happiness you derive from doing something that makes your partner happy.

Interpreting the negatives: 

And here’s an example of what could happen when something is rated as a negative:

When our babies were little, something on my contribution to the marriage list was getting up with Liv in the middle of the night when she would wake up. He sees it on my list and marks it as a negative. I was shocked, thinking I was doing this amazing thing for him/us, and he’s viewing it as negative. 

Turns out, it made him feel like I didn't trust him as a parent to soothe our daughter, and therefore it made him fearful and less confident. Plus, he noticed how much it was killing me - I was so tired constantly, and that made me more bitchy, which made him feel even more frustrated with the dynamic. 

At that juncture, things massively changed. We would swap each week, taking turns on who would get up with her, and it worked out so much better! 

When you recognize what your spouse is doing, it gives you a level of awareness and an opportunity to evaluate what you’re doing. 

Give it a try, and let me know how it goes!