Posted on 01/15/2006 4:55:00 AM PST by Excuse_My_Bellicosity
She mops up spilled juice with your favorite T-shirt, and then she makes you go shopping in the pouring rain. Let's face it, she's the wife from hell--but you still love her.
Sound familiar?
It should. This "mean wife, happy marriage" scenario has become a fad. When one man in a similar relationship began writing a blog about his experiences with his nasty wife, his account struck such a chord with readers that it's now been turned into a book and a TV drama series. He and his wife, it seems, are far from the only ones whose relationship thrives on the wife's selfishness--as 34-year-old Mina would no doubt agree.
Mina (not her real name) does Internet-related work at home and has been married to her 42-year-old husband for 12 years. "Why don't you ever wave goodbye to me anymore? Why don't we ever talk anymore?" she asked him one day.
"Actually, I'm the one who stopped waving goodbye," she admits with a laugh. And the reason they've stopped talking is because Mina's become deeply involved with her daughter's extracurricular activities.
But Mina was the one who began feeling angry. To let out her frustrations she began to use her hubby as a metaphorical punching bag. "When I take it out on my husband, I feel much better and forget what I got so wound up about," she says.
As Mina became busier, the house got messy and she cut down on the time she spent cooking. But her husband never complains. "He knows I would just tell him off if he did," she says.
After patiently letting Mina get things off her chest, the husband once said: "Pretend you've been tricked into cleaning the house. You'll calm down a bit." She did. When she cleaned the house and saw how nice it looked, her frustrations went away.
"He actually analyzes me very objectively," Mina says.
For all her flaws, the two behave like a couple in love. On weekends, they shop together or watch their son's baseball games. On birthdays, they buy each other presents.
Masanori (not his real name) is another man happy with his wife, even though he says his friends think she's mean. The 34-year-old Tokyo-based designer has been married for three years. When he told his 32-year-old wife, who works with him, that he wanted to buy a new computer for work, she insisted they buy a refrigerator at a later date and they ended up saving money for that instead.
His wife has a mug that cost 3,000 yen. Masanori's cost 1,000 yen. "Mine is more expensive," she brags. But her husband has no problem with her attitude. "I get really angry when it comes to work matters, but at home, things don't really bother me," he says.
In fact, the wife is very protective of her slim, quiet husband. "If someone picks a fight with you, just keep your distance," she often says. "If something happens to you, I'll go fight your battles."
Masanori is more than willing to do as she says. "My wife is a very determined woman," he says. "I have no complaints."
The blog that triggered the phenomenon is titled "Oni-yome Nikki" (The true story of my devil wife) and was started four years ago by a 33-year-old company employee from Fukuoka who calls himself "Kazuma."
Readers don't need to look far to find examples of the kind of behavior that inspired him. "When I had a cold, she made me sleep under the kotatsu (heated table) because she didn't want to catch my cold," he writes of his 33-year-old wife. "When I came home soaking wet, she made me strip naked by the front door because she didn't want me to get the floor wet."
These online entries received so many hits and attracted so much attention that the contents were published in a book last July. The blog was also made into a TV sitcom with the same title last fall.
"Times have really changed, I think, for this kind of relationship to be featured in a drama series," says Kazuma. "If men in similar situations feel better thinking that at least they're better off than me, I'm happy with that."
People often wonder why he doesn't just break up with this "devil" woman. "I would much rather see my wife happy than make her angry and create a hostile environment," he says.
While the drama series was aired from October to December, its official Web site often received e-mail from people in similar situations.
"I'm a devil wife myself," writes a woman in her 20s. "I say whatever I want to my kind husband and live a happy life. Of course, we are totally in love."
"I do all the cooking, cleaning and laundry," runs a message from a man in his 30s. "(My wife) was kind to me before we got married, but now she is quite the devil."
"My mother acts like the female lead," writes a teenage girl. "She forces my father to exchange her favorite ramen ingredients with his, and takes his money and blows 80,000 yen in one shopping spree."
Nonfiction writer Yuki Ishikawa expects the number of tyrannical women to increase. "There are more and more wives who brag about giving their husbands instant food instead of home-cooked meals, justifying their actions as giving their husbands what the husbands want," she says. "I feel like devil wives are innocent in a way, but immature. In the past, there were more women who wanted their husbands to give them attention. But now, many women look for husbands who let them get away with doing little around the house, getting together with friends or going for beauty treatments. I think this change in mindset will increase in the future."
Freelance writer Chihiro Fujiwara, 38, interviewed almost 100 self-described selfish wives and their husbands, and published a book on her findings in early November through Ameba Books Ltd.
When a friend of hers who was making an effort to be a good wife was suddenly served with divorce papers, Fujiwara wondered why that happened at a time when selfish wives were doing whatever they wanted and yet were loved and happy.
As she began interviewing people, she noticed a pattern. "There are no hard feelings because the women immediately tell their husbands whatever is bothering them," she says. "And when their wives demand money from their husbands, the men seem to feel glad that they're needed and are making their wives happy."
Fujiwara herself has been married for seven years. She used to keep her frustrations to herself. But she began telling her husband how she felt. "My husband was surprised at first because he had no idea what I was thinking, but he became kind. When I hinted that I wanted a pair of boots, he bought me a pair and was very happy about it."
"Society as a whole is still dominated by men, so if men ruled at home as well, it would be nasty," says comic book writer Mayumi Kurata. "I think it brings balance to society when women have control in the home.
"Devil wives who can spontaneously be selfish and ask for whatever they want are talented, in a way. Some husbands are happy being ordered around because it's easier to be told what to do. They also love getting all that attention from their wives. But this relationship style is different from the so-called weekend-only marriages and separated couples. I think married couples just need to find a relationship style that suits them."(IHT/Asahi: January 14,2006)
Thanks for sharing about the wife replacement, too. I've been there myself. Even before the first date, (which never happened) he and his adult daughter were planning on how I would be keeping him young when he retired. LOL!
I am staying out of this, too. We have so much to share about how many of us get treated like a commodity, but consciousness raising isn't part of this thread. It would just turn into a flame war again. LMAO!
I'm really happy, and my wife is too unless she's a master faker. Things would have to REALLY go south to be close to a divorce, so I guess I better not let things get there, eh?
OK, now fast forward twenty-five years.
Last week I had a conversation with the handyman that does some repairs for me occasionally and he told me he was leaving his wife of thirty years.
He said that since he turned fifty and his libido started to slow down he has become increasingly irritated with his wife's selfish attitude. He said he realized that not once in their marriage has she ever apologized for her behavior. It's always been up to him apologize to her even though he did nothing wrong.
Last month she ruined a weekend getaway just because he walked in front of her on the way to the hotel room and it dawned on him that he did not want to spend his remaining years with this inconsiderate, self absorbed woman.
The divorce papers have been served.
I have the autobiography of one AVG member ("God is My Co-pilot" by Robert Lee Scott)
Scott was an active-duty military pilot. He and his friends were approached by an officer of the US military the the US would release them from active duty if they chose to volunteer to go to China and fight, and would be allowed back into the US military at a later point in time with no loss of seniority
Stripped of the "plausible deniability", these were US military who volunteered to fight the Japanese prior to the official start of hostilities with the full blessing and support of the US military
No FLAME WARS!!!
Behave!
Even in the face of insanity!
...or a room at the motel six !!!
Still wasn't a US Military Action. It was a volunteer group.
Yep. Just got back from the stripper bar after a good morning at the gun range.
Well ...let me say...i have followed these threads for quite a while on FR...there is truth that there have been guys on FR that bash american women like they are all the same....it is true....but as of late, there is a cabal of women that attack these threads and try to shame every man married to a foreign woman...he's a loser, he's impotent, he's a pervert,she's a greedy green card witch, she's a doormat....so i usually don't argue because i'm not personally interested in changing anyone's mind....
Are there green card scammers out there...you betcha!! Are there some dorky guys married to beautiful foreign women out of there league...yep....but i know from experience that many american women will sneer at you if you are married to a foreigner...so it goes both ways....just like everything else in life....life's short...don't get offended so easy and let others stew in unhappiness because they are single and can't find a mate worthy of them...male or female.
I always behave. It's you!! ;) LOL!!!
Remember the secret life of Walter Mitty?
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Cafe/6821/thurber.html
"Just got back from the stripper bar"
And you're going to lecture others on marriage, are you?
Thanks for the chuckle.
Yes, they are very obvious lately, and I don't know what they're trying to achieve, but their efforts are highly counterproductive to their ostensible goals.
Actually there is a cabal of women that attack woman bashing neanderthal freaks.
We don't care who you marry or what your deal is. We will not stand by and have you talk about all American Women as if we were a lower life form.
It's called Training. Perhaps you should call your local Humane Society for their Spring schedule.
Are old socks an occupational hazard of working over there? 'Cause I gotta tell you, that'd give me second thoughts. Only new socks for me! ;)
BTW, I got a pair of chenille socks for Christmas - they are THE softest socks I ever tried on, but they are extremely warm as well (a little too warm, in light of it being roughly 72 degrees here today).
I'm sure that's true, but I haven't been involved with men in that way (being a straight man) so I couldn't really speak from direct experience.
Were you bashed in this thread?
"so i usually don't argue because i'm not personally interested in changing anyone's mind...."
I guess I just can't shake that off. I seem to have this compulsion to contradict error.
"Are there some dorky guys married to beautiful foreign women out of there league...yep."
And this is bad because...
"but i know from experience that many american women will sneer at you if you are married to a foreigner"
Oh, yes, indeedy. Bigots.
"life's short...don't get offended so easy"
Good advice.
I bet your wife loves that.
I'm single, came close to getting married in my mid-twenties, but it 'didn't work out.'
Anyway, my Father used to jokingly tell my beau that if he married me, he would starve! He then went on to amend what he'd said by proudly annoucing that I had won the Betty Crocker award in 1974, always murmurring something beneath his twinkling eyes and under his breath akin to 'is it possible it could have been rigged?' All in Italian broken English, mind you.
God bless you, dsc, and your wife and kids. By the way is your baby closing in on her first birthday yet?
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