Mr The Home That Made Me – How To Train Your Husband

How to train your husband –

Blowjobs.

The End.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I thought this post was going to be a tough one!

Obviously this isn’t always practical so I suppose that I had better explore some other avenues to run parallel with the first.

Before I begin, if you haven’t read last months ‘Being An Instagram Husband’ then where the hell have you been? Click here to have a look and see why our kitchen bin is probably the area I spend most of my time in. You can also read my Introduction post here.

Now we all know that when it comes to house maintainence, upkeep, childcare and answering to Charlottes every whim, I am a pro. We always joke that outside of working hours I am a single parent, this includes weekends, to give you an idea; a few Saturdays ago Charlotte got out of bed at 7:10. That isn’t too bad, that is actually quite early I hear you say……..7:10…PM! Once I had put the kids to bed and tidied up she emerged and was greeted with an understanding smile and dinner. Now for any of you that are single/don’t have kids this may be a regular occurence as you wake up after a night of doing Jaegers in Walkabout with sick in your hair and less self-respect than you woke up with the previous day. But consider I have not had a lie in past 8 in approximately 4 years.

It wasn’t always this way, I used to be the sort of partner that was lazy, would always try and scrimp out of doing anything productive (especially around the house) and was happy to be almost “mothered”. It has only been in recent years that the balance has changed and I have been pulling more than my share and willing to do so. It wasn’t necessarily a Eureka moment but lots of small realisations that changed my perspective. Having kids definitely helped me grow up, but this is definitely not the solution to curing your husband of LHS (Lazy Husband Syndrome).

One thing I am not going to do is advocate nagging because it is bloody annoying and you don’t train a dog to stop barking by barking back at it. On the other hand I also don’t think that becoming the “Alpha Dog” in the words of Cesar Millan will help your husband become more domesticated it will just make him more child-like. Just to clarify there were various ways that I was trained but I am helping to identify the way that doesn’t end in murder.

The route I am going to go down that will help to alleviate LHS is Positive Reinforcement. There are many ways of trying to get your husband to do things he my not want to and all can be done in a positive way. I have taken the below bullet points from a dog training manual and will try to convert them into a comparable scenario.

• Verbal cues – when your partner exhibits good behaviour a “good boy” and scratch behind the ear might go a long way but to be more elaborate and to get engagement try outlining specifically what needs doing and why this is important to you in a non-parental manner. Try and avoid words like “idiot”, “twat” and try to avoid exaggerating e.g – “Why don’t you just get off your fat arse and do what I have told you to a million times already you twat”. Instead – “Dear husband, if you could please take the bins out at your earliest convenience I would appreciate it. It is full so ideally now if you have a moment” and when the job is complete “Thank you, I appreciate the swiftness of your actions and I really admire the way you conduct yourself”.

• Hand signals – Now the wanker sign and the middle finger are two big no-no’s. Maybe try and thumbs up, fist bump or a high five. Great for morale and everyone loves a high five.

• Treats – food or other offering that are more appealing than inaction.

• Correct bad habits – now this does not mean moan or lose your shit over the fact that there is a spoon in the sink. This means identify the issue and raise it in a calm and constructive manner. Avoid – “What the hell is wrong with you? Does the spoon live in the sink you stupid walrus-like dickhead” and try the approach, “I noticed you left a spoon in the sink, you know how important maintaining a beautiful house is to me and the little things that don’t take long is what gets me disheartened so please consider this next time”. See, how lovely was that.

Now all of the above can be thrown out of the window if you try and get them involved while there is an important sporting event on. Just to clarify, sporting events are on live and you cannot record and watch at a later date or pause to do your bidding. Alongside the fact that sport is life the chances are that they have notifications that pop up on their phone/friends messaging/Facebook status which will ruin the result if accidentally looked at when not watching live. It can be done afterwards. Win the war, not every battle. You need him onside and in the knowledge that you are a rational and understanding partner, not a crazy psycho, which you know fully well you are, but you don’t want him to fully realise the extent of it.

There are a couple of quotes I live by in this house that you may have heard before and may want to steal and repeat until they do the same.

• “Happy wife, happy life”

Pretty self explanatory. If I do things to make her happy then my life will be easier and happier in the long run.

And the second I think is the primary one for trying to train your husband:

• “A man’s home is his castle and his wife is his Queen”

My home is my castle and although Charlotte’s passion to keep a good home for our family it inspires me to want to do the same. I want to feel like a man that looks after his family and his home. I feel house proud and once you have that you are 99% of the way there.

Ultimately you cannot force someone to change, they have to be willing but hopefully with time and a few small realisations they will soon come to the same conclusion that I did. LHS is not terminal.

 

And if all else fails……there is always blowjobs.

Also, a bit of a shameless plug here but it is in the name of charity. If your husband is suffering from a severe case of LHS, why not donate to my Justgiving Page and watch me be hit in the face repeatedly. Guaranteed to make you feel better about the diagnosis plus raise money for Cancer Research.

On Saturday night I am going to be getting in the boxing ring in front of 2,000 people to fight for this incredible charity. I’ve been training solidly for 8 weeks and lost 4.5 stone beforehand to be able to do this Ultra White Collar boxing. I’m sure Charlotte will be drunkingly videoing on Instagram so keep your eyes peeled.

I’d really appreciate any support so if you can spare even a pound please visit my Justgiving page at https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Joe-Valentine1

Mr THTMM x