Carolyn Hax: Husband is losing his ability to manage small frustrations

Washington Post

24-07-2025

Adapted from an online discussion.
Hi Carolyn: My husband and I have been together about 15 years, and I've noticed he is increasingly unable to emotionally handle mishaps and life's inconveniences. I tend to let things roll off my back, but any kind of hassle ruins his entire day or week.
Recently, one of our appliances broke — not the fridge, fortunately — while he was home on a sick day from work. I told him to leave it for me to deal with when I got home, but he refused. He spent several hours trying to fix it, wasn't able to, then was in a sour mood for 24-plus hours.
It just feels so unnecessary to me to react like that all the time. There were some mild suggestions from him that I wasn't helpful enough, even though I had offered multiple times to be the one to deal with it.
I see this as a twofold problem: refusing to let me do things myself, and becoming miserable because he insists on doing things himself. I'm not really sure what to do at this point, whether it's suggest therapy for him, marriage counseling or maybe both.
— Hassled
Hassled: Just a layman's hunch, but I wonder whether this is depression, manifesting itself as anger, frustration and helplessness. It does tend to present in men differently — as anger in particular — so it can be harder to make the connection.
Even if I'm way off, a medical screening in response to a mood change or an emotional situation that is 'increasingly' problematic is an appropriate first step.
Accordingly, that's the place to start: Suggest an evaluation with his doctor. Tell him you have noticed a pronounced change lately in his mood, affect and reactivity, and you're worried about him.
Especially given that defensiveness is part of the issue, it might take some patient persuasion. 'Humor me' is a viable tack.
Dear Carolyn: My dad was a bully and an intolerant religious fundamentalist. There was a lot of corporal punishment during my preschool and grade school years. Plenty of insults and threats. For example, when I announced at the dinner table that I had decided to become a vegetarian, he replied: 'Eat that hot dog or I'll shove it down your throat.'
Dad was absent from most of the big moments. I played baseball one year; he didn't attend a single game. I had the lead in the school play; he skipped that, too. When my daughter was born, he wasn't going to visit us because he had a 'scheduling conflict' — a karate tournament he considered a higher priority. (My mother insisted he change his plans.)
Mom died two decades ago, leaving him with lots of money, and he spends it all on himself: seven new houses in the past 20 years; new campers, trucks, boats. He checks in periodically to brag about his latest purchases. He didn't visit our home at any point in our kids' teenage years.
Now, Dad is complaining to relatives — I'm not making this up — that his kids don't spend time with him, that he's not a priority in their lives and that he's somehow the victim in all this.
What, if anything, should I say in response? And should I feel obligated to travel across the country to attend a big 80th birthday party that his new wife is planning?
— Anonymous
Anonymous: Nothing, and no.
I'll elaborate if you'd like. But mostly I'd like to say: I'm sorry that's who you drew in the dad lottery. Anyone he's complaining to either knows the truth or isn't relevant to you.