Dear Queenie,
Last year my husband and I moved to a new country for his new job. I graduated from college with a business degree and had a good job in our old home, but there is no work for me here.
I have always been the one to take care of the house and most of raising our children, in addition to working a full-time job, but now that I am not working my husband seems to think I am incompetent. He is always telling me what to do and how to do it, how to take care of the children, how to do the laundry, how to wash the dishes, you name it. If I don’t do things exactly his way he gets mad at me.
I have tried to talk to him about this, but he just says I am making it all up.
Queenie, how can I make him understand that I am just as competent as I was before we moved and I don’t need to be told how to do things?—Fed-up wife
Dear Wife,
Your husband’s new job may be stressing him out so that he feels that he is not in control; or the fact that he is now the only source of income in your marriage may make him think he should be the “boss” in your home; or, if you are now living in a place where women are considered inferior, he may have been influenced by that attitude.
If marriage counselling is available where you now live, go for it, with or without him. If not, perhaps you and the children should take a long vacation with your family back home to ease your stress.
