No matter how beautiful a marriage is, expectations can make or mar it.
I mean, having too many or too little expectations from your spouse.
No marriage is perfect, and neither is there any perfect individual.
In fact, marriage is ideally between two individuals who complement each other’s imperfections.
So, if you go into marriage with the impression that your partner is or should be perfect, you are starting off on the wrong foot.
You are not perfect.
Or are you?
No?
I thought so too.
So, instead of building castles in the air, it’s time to face reality.
In this article, we’ll discuss signs you are expecting too much from your husband.
That’s the angle we’ll be looking at.
As a woman, you might have been giving your husband a hard time in the marriage, all because you are expecting too much from him.
You might not even know that the problems you’ve been facing in your marriage are due to your high expectations.
Not to worry.
We’ll handle all of that in this article.
Ensure you read to the end to get maximum value.
Enjoy the read!
9 Signs You Are Expecting Too Much From Your Husband
1. You’re constantly comparing your marriage to others
No two marriages are the same.
No two individuals are the same, too, not even identical twins.
Unfortunately, you’re using the marriages you see on social media as a yardstick to measure the success of your own marriage.
People only show you what they want you to see.
And no one will willingly want to show you the rough times unless they’re in danger.
Marriage is much more than the few beautiful moments that are captured and shared online.
A lot of work is done offline.
So, if you think your husband is not doing enough for you based on what you see on social media, it’s time to pause and rethink.
Who knows?
In reality, you might be doing better in marriage than your ‘yardstick couple.’
2. You want him to always spend all his free time with you
One of the signs you are expecting too much from your husband is that you always want him to spend all his free time with you.
You don’t want him to have a life outside of you.
Although it might sound cute and romantic at first, but there’s nothing good about you and your spouse ALWAYS spending time together.
It screams unhealthy.
You both should have your individual lives outside the marriage.
It’s what makes you functional.
Just like you, he should spend some of his free time with his friends, family, and colleagues.
Let him indulge in office and social hangouts and be generally social.
It’s good for him to mix up, network, connect, and hang out with other people aside from you.
Also, interacting with other people will help sharpen his intellect and teach him ways to be a better person for himself and others who come in contact with him.
3. You have a lot of dealbreakers
Do you have a lot of dealbreakers, even in marriage?
I thought that ended at the relationship stage.
Perhaps you used it to sieve out all the ‘underqualified’ men showing interest in you.
But now that you’re still wielding it even in marriage, I’d like to let you know that it’s a red flag on its own.
As I mentioned earlier, no one is perfect.
You have to tolerate some of your husband’s excesses, just like he puts up with yours.
Then, there may be some behaviors that are huge no-nos for you, such as cheating and domestic violence, among others.
It’s okay to have few solid dealbreakers.
But having a long list of dealbreakers?
Try to be realistic, Sister!
If every shortcoming is a dealbreaker, how do you expect to live in peace with your husband?
Unless you’re planning on turning your marriage into a war zone because both of you are bound to always be at loggerheads.
Let’s turn the table on you a bit.
If your husband keeps having a problem with you and doesn’t tolerate most of your shortcomings, truthfully, how will you feel?
Frustrated?
Angry?
Sad?
Exactly my point!
You might even start regretting getting married to him.
Now that you’ve put yourself in his shoes, I need you to extend some grace to him.
Cut down on your dealbreakers, keeping only the very serious ones.
After all, he’s your husband already, and you’re doing life with him.
Don’t turn your marriage into a war zone.
It should be a happy, loving, and healthy journey for both of you.
4. You feel like he’s no longer attracted to you once he’s not in the mood for sex
Every day is not always a rosy day.
There are always good days and bad days.
Perhaps your husband is having a bad day.
For instance, he’s experiencing some financial problems or is having serious issues at work.
You want to initiate getting intimate, but he’s clearly not in the mood for it.
You then assume that he turned you down because he’s no longer attracted to you.
How ridiculous!
Your husband loves, adores, and is attracted to you on both the good days and bad days.
Your timing is not just right.
This is where communication comes in, too.
He is expected to effectively communicate this too.
5. You expect him to always read your mind
It can be that you don’t air your view and expect him to be a mind reader.
I’m putting this out here because there are some women who are like this.
They want to take pride in saying,
“My husband is the absolute best. He reads my mind perfectly. Even without me speaking, he already knows what I want. It’s like we’re in sync with each other.”
Awww, how cute!
But can I snap you back to reality?
While some people are good at reading minds and knowing what’s needed from them at almost every point, but some others are not quite perceptive.
The bottom line is not everyone possesses that superpower.
For some people, you need to spell everything out to them, and it doesn’t make them less human.
You only need to tell them what they have to do at every point, and they’ll get it done perfectly.
Even those who are perceptive don’t always get it a hundred percent.
Your husband might not be very perceptive, and it’s okay.
This is why you should communicate your needs and thoughts to him and not expect him to automatically know what you think.
That’s too much expectation on a person.
6. You don’t want to differentiate fiction from real life
If you expect your husband to have the same qualities as your seemingly perfect guy, it’s one of the signs you are expecting too much from your husband.
Your head is stuck up in the clouds.
In my opinion, this instance happens mostly to people (in this case, women) who didn’t spend much time in the dating pool.
Maybe they just got married to the first person they started dating or negotiating marriage with.
Ideally, everyone has a picture of their ideal spouse, and they get it mostly from reading romance novels.
Now, you may fall into this category.
As a teenager or young adult, you read many romance novels from cover to cover, and they helped you build an image of your ideal man in your mind – Your Mr Perfect.
Now that you’re married, you’ve noticed that your husband doesn’t tick all the boxes of your ideal man.
The man has been good to you and is constantly trying to make you happy in his own ways.
But you refuse to get the memo.
You constantly expect him to be in the character of the ideal man who is in your fictional stories.
How do you want it to happen?
This is a human being with blood flowing in his veins!
He didn’t walk out of a fictional romance story.
Please, snap out of your reverie and face reality.
7. You want him to always be available to you
This is related to point two.
When you notice that he can’t possibly spend all his free time with you, you’ll then want him to always be available to you.
Sister, if you can be honest with yourself, you’ll know that no one can be available to you 24/7.
Well, except God.
But no human can pull that off, no matter how jobless they are.
You always want to be on the phone with him via texts or calls.
You want to know where he is and what he’s doing at every moment.
You want him to always reassure you that he loves you and is thinking about you.
8. You expect him to meet all your needs
You’re ready to turn your husband into a real-life Superman.
When you address him as your Knight in shining armor, you mean it literally.
One of the signs you are expecting too much from your husband is that you expect him to meet all your needs.
Just as you have your needs, your husband has his.
The truth is that he won’t be able to meet all your needs.
You meet the ones you can, and he does what he can for you because he also has his concerns.
That’s why I always talk about retaining your individuality, even while married.
For some of your needs, you need to reach out to other people to help you meet them.
These are people in your circle – your family, friends, colleagues, etc.
You see?
Everyone has a role to play in your life.
So, don’t be quick to discard them just because you got married.
They’ll always be your go-to people whenever you need help of any kind.
That way, you’ll stop heaping all your burdens on your husband, and start figuring out, and fixing your needs by yourself.
9. You expect him to change himself for you
Is it really possible for someone to change all of themselves for another person?
Hmmm!
If you talk about changing some characters, or some things that are not good, then, I can relate.
Everyone does it from time to time for themselves and the people they love.
But for them to change totally from person A to person B just to please someone, I doubt the possibility.
So, stop expecting a 360 change from your husband.
If he needs to drop some habits and attitudes that are threatening the peace of your marriage, he will.
But asking him to become a different person while still in his own skin?
Perhaps, you’re hoping that someday, somehow, he fits into the picture of your ideal man from point 6.
You’re the one who needs to adjust that mental picture of yours.
This is your reality now.
Face it!
Instead of waiting for your husband to change, start noticing all the good qualities he has.
If you keep doing this, with time, you’ll learn to love and appreciate your husband for who he is.