Men & Women

SHE ASKS: Why do men complain about being nagged when they clearly NEED nagging?

After that headline, I’m pretty sure you’ll react in one of two ways: A) You’ll feel judged and highly offended, or B) You’ll be raising your hands in the air screaming, “Hallelujah, I’m not the only one wondering!”

Though not a 100% generalization, most of the hand raising will be from ladies who express frustration over their beloved men who “have no sense of urgency about certain things and repeatedly do the same thing over and over again, digging their own holes,” as a girlfriend put it. I’m pretty sure there is no fix for feeling frustrated when your significant other doesn’t seem to have it together with the simple things. No man is expected to cure cancer or achieve tasks of that magnitude. But if he’s going to clean, clean. If he wants to wake up early and tackle the day, he can get his ass out of bed and greet the sunshine… and his girlfriend. We love them, and want to help them develop into who ever they want to be… but sometimes it frustrates the hell out of a woman to baby her guy when he doesn’t listen to us, and ultimately doesn’t listen to himself.

This leads me to the group of people who are probably feeling highly offended, and probably annoyed from being nagged in the first place. I can understand that a man doesn’t want to be treated like a child when he is clearly older than a 17 year old. Here’s something that might help: Say what you’ll do, and do what you say. That way, you can’t fail. If it’s difficult, simply ask for patience instead of yelling back. That will help the ladies know you’re aware of what’s going on instead of just being pissed.

My friend does hope for a solution with her boyfriend… no one wants to inherit a grown child. Women and men have highly different priorities which probably contributes to her feeling that something is “lacking” versus the man feeling that “it’s not a big deal.” It’s hard to not nag from both sides, especially if there seems to be no progress towards a simple goal.

Any ideas on how to squash the need for nagging?