Tag Archives: Apology
Handling the Silent Treatment
Have you suddenly found yourself in a silent world? Has your wife suddenly and inexplicably gone quiet? You may have just found yourself the target of the Silent Treatment. You don’t have to be married to experience the silent treatment. It appears to be a tactic used in all types of relationships. And it is not used exclusively by one gender. Both men and women have been known to employ the silent treatment as a form of relationship manipulation.
Since this blog is intended to assist my fellow husbands I will focus strictly on the issue from a husband’s perspective. Besides, we are usually the worst at handling it. We are often clueless as to the cause of the situation, causing confusion and frustration. Some guys don’t even notice they are getting the silent treatment because they have long ago tuned out the sound of their wife’s voice. For those of us who do notice, here are my tips for how to handle it.
1. Be Thankful – Before you get upset about your wife employing the silent treatment on you, take a moment to count your blessings. Realize that at this very moment there are men who would pay large sums for a few hours of not having to listen to their wives. Some men haven’t been able to get a word into conversations with their wives for years. In their eyes you have been given a gift so enjoy it for a few minutes.
2. Don’t Ask – The number one mistake most of us make is asking the question, “What did I do?” Don’t do that. The situation is a set-up. If you admit that you do not even know what you are guilty of then you have just given her additional ammunition. Now you are insensitive in addition to whatever crime you initially committed. It’s kind of like a lineman in football that suddenly jerks his hands back from a block as if to say “I didn’t do anything.” The referee will call holding even if they didn’t see what happened. Don’t help them out by your reaction.
3. Apologize – I realize that some of you may be shaking your heads at this point saying, “I didn’t do anything wrong!” This reaction is normal if you misunderstand what apologies are. Many people assume apologies are admissions of guilt – an admission of the losing side. I disagree. I see apologies similar to a punt in football. You are simply giving the ball to the other team in hopes of ultimately gaining better field position. Apologize to your wife with something like this: “I’m sorry I upset you.” That’s a clean punt. It states the obvious (you somehow upset her) without furthering the argument. And we all know that furthering the argument does nothing for the relationship – nobody wins. If you can punt and put your marriage in better field position, you would be stupid to try a fake.
So what do you think? Do you have any tips for handling the silent treatment? Share them in the comments!
I’m Sorry. I was wrong. (And I’m giving away a free book!)
Man Rule number 487 states that a man can never admit when he’s wrong. Additional penalties apply if he admits to being lost – which is the worst kind of wrong. (And, yes, looking at a map or asking for directions counts as admitting we were wrong.) What some people don’t realize is that marriage vows release a man from this rule. In fact, husbands are expected to admit wrong even when we are not wrong. “I’m sorry. I was wrong.” is one of the first phrases every husband needs to learn.
So it is without fear that I must admit something about which I was wrong. For the past few weeks I have been convinced that the readers of this blog were giving me the silent treatment. With each post I waited, hoping for comments, but none were ever posted. I began to make wild theories that perhaps only wives were reading this and had instituted a secret vow of silence against me. I even imagined some poor husbands trying to post a comment only to be halted by “the glare.” If you’re not familiar with “the glare” it is the look that wives learn at bridal showers that allows them to stop a husband in his tracks. “The glare” quietly and violently speaks with raised eyebrows, “You better think twice before saying anything about me.” For any single guys that are having trouble understanding, just imagine something like a Jedi mind trick without the brown robes.
I even devised a plan to try to overcome the silence. I’m going to give away a book! I don’t mind copying from all the other bloggers I follow and giving away books certainly seems to be the current blogger version of McDonald’s Monopoly game. I had already purchased a copy of The Love Dare with the expectation of giving it away so using it as a peace offering to break the silence seemed like a winning plan.
Then my wife had to step in and prove me wrong. And in true wifely fashion she did it with a casual comment, “I tried to leave a comment on your blog, but it gave me some weird message.” It didn’t take long after that comment to discover that the comment section was not working. I’m not very familiar with Blogger (I usually use Drupal) and had somehow set it to use Captcha for each comment. The template I am using apparently doesn’t work very well with Captcha turned on. Oops. I’m sorry. I was wrong.
I think I have the comments working now, and I still want to give that book away. In fact, I’m thinking this may be just the first book of several. I haven’t read The Love Dare yet – I bought a copy for myself. However, I do have other books on Marriage that I think are awesome. I’ll be doing some reviews and then giving away some of my favorites.
So here’s the deal: Over the next week I will be posting three blog posts. The first one will be “How to Handle the Silent Treatment” followed by thoughts about laundry and a list of perplexing mysteries. If you are interested in winning the book, simply make a comment to any post on the website (even the older ones) and add the text DARE somewhere in the post. Two days after I post the last article I will have my wife select one of those comments at random for the book. I’ll announce the winner and hand deliver the book myself (to the post office.)
So let’s get started! Feel free to comment away (assuming the site will let you.) And quit giving me the silent treatment! 
