I have enough married brothers to conclude that the excesses of most wives – towards in-laws – often start with how wide the man opened his mouth against his people to his wife.
A woman who came into your life knowing your people cannot be disrespected never loses sight of that.
The average man becomes ‘disloyal’ to his family once he’s married.
Most men think it is love to put their folks on the slaughter table to curry intimacy with a wife. But, the excesses of the wife will also spill over to him and he will find himself running back to his people.
Stop dragging your people through the mud to please your wife.
It doesn’t speak well of you that your spouse disrespects everyone in your family.
If your people have flaws, leave them out of your marriage because your spouse is also coming from where people are not perfect.
Your folks – with all their flaws – may even be better than those you are idealising but you will never know, because someone is not telling you more than you need to know.
A happy man is the man who has firmly established boundaries between his folks and his wife.
If you want to help a troubled wife, point her to a mind therapist or counsellor.
Fear (of losing her husband) could also be at the root of the behaviour of a cantankerous wife.
The easiest way to put a cantankerous wife in her place is by decisively drawing the lines, after having a conversation with her.
If she crosses that line, refuse to be swayed by emotions as you act, and if that means a separation, so be it.
Your greatest weapon against an unreasonable spouse is your closeness to your parents and siblings.
That reality is a major threat to a troublesome spouse. It’s one weapon you should never let go of.
The alternative is being at the mercy of a spouse and feeling all ‘alone’ when they display their excesses towards you.
If a wife wants her in-laws to embrace her, she has to take herself closer to them with a good attitude.
I had a brother that often came home for the Christmas holiday with his two daughters. His wife lived overseas. His girls were less than 10 years old at the time. The youngest was about five years old and such a picky eater. Her major meal was liquid beverages. The older girl was bed-wetting badly.
I shared my room with them to enable me to look after them better.
I would bathe them. Wash their clothes and then go the extra mile with their feeding.
What came out of the mouth of one of my sisters-in-law was that I handled some children in the family more specially than the others. And it actually became an issue of gossip and animosity.
It didn’t occur to this person that these girls did not have their mother around and someone needed to pay more attention to them.
Yet, this person that was seeing issues where none existed had never looked into the care of those children while they vacationed in the village.
She minded only her own children.
After that experience, I convinced myself that you really can’t win with someone whose reasoning is down there. So, I began to keep my distance.
It’s a nightmare to bother with someone who doesn’t have a similar outlook on issues with you.
If a troublesome wife chooses to continue in her ways, please do not feel guilty about choosing your peace above that marriage.
A wife must not have a close relationship with her in-laws for peace to reign in the family.
Once a woman learns to contain her energy, how anybody chooses to relate with her will be the least of her worries, because she can contentedly stay in her lane.
Credit: Chukwuneta Oby