According to Gottman, 69% of all problems in marriage are perpetual (p 138). In my experience, I would have to say that this is accurate. I’ll tell you a funny story to illustrate. One summer about 10 years ago I was enjoying mowing my yard. We had just purchased a new lawnmower and had just built a new house. I was loving the wide-open spaces in my new yard and not really paying attention to the detail of mowing the lawn. When my husband got home, he stormed in the house and yelled, “Which one of you kids didn’t move the sprinklers when you mowed the lawn?” Knowing that I was the culprit and not my kids, I sheepishly raised my hand. Not knowing that he was cussing out his wife, he said, “Oh, it was you. I guess that’s okay. I’ll just go and fix it.” I was glad that he had backed down to his complaint, but at the time I was pretty miffed.
Now looking back, I can laugh at the incident, but I knew then just as I do now that he sees things differently than I do. He likes things exactly right and I don’t really pay much attention to how straight and tidy things need to be. We talked about this over the weekend when I asked him if this was a perpetual problem. He agreed that it was, but he decided in the last few years that he would make it perfect if he wanted it perfect, and I decided that I am trying harder to make things tidy. We still disagree over the level of cleanliness and order in the house, but we have learned to be softer in our approach to each other concerning this problem.
I think that more than half of our problems are perpetual, but we have learned to love each other through our shortcomings. As Gottman stated, “Despite their differences, these couples remain very satisfied with their marriages because they have hit upon a way to deal with their unmovable problems so that they don’t become overwhelming” (138). I agree. I couples are willing to find solutions to immovable problems they find themselves laughing about miss-cut grass instead of fighting about it.
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