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bridetobemnm07
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Why does my husband do things to purposely annoy me???
My husband is constantly doing little things to annoy me! poking me, hiding my phone, saying things that he knows bugs me. Basically just being childish. Why does he purposely want to annoy me?? He has always pretty much been like this since I've known him, but sometimes he annoys me so bad that I want get seriously really upset & all he does is laughs.
Any advice?!? 
Re: Why does my husband do things to purposely annoy me???
My husband drives me nuts sometimes but never makes me angry and can always make me laugh even when I want to be mad. If he didn't however get that his actions were upsetting me and to make it worse laughed when I got upset, it would be time for a Come to Jesus talk
Twice, when we were first dating, I had moments of such great frustration that I had to break down, crying, to get him to really understand that I was feeling stress/anxiety, and just couldn't handle him being silly at that particular moment. He simply didn't understand how frustrated I was getting, and I had to sit him down and explain it to him (he has no natural empathy). I had to ask him in what ways I could communicate to him clearly (without a breakdown) when I needed him to be serious with me.
One of our key phrases now is, "do you give me your word?" The underlying meaning - we want to be trusted men & women of our word. So if I ask him to give me his word on something, it means that all jokes, jabs, silliness, secrets, surprises - everything, needs to be set aside, so that he can give me complete & immediate honesty. Most of the time, I play along with his silliness, and I let him carry on because I know he enjoys it, but if I'm already under stress, or if I don't have time for a playful back and forth - I simply ask for his word, he answers, and we move on without hurt feelings.
He has gotten a lot better, and has even cut down his delayed answers/diversions so that he has his fun - I play along - and then he switches it off before I have to ask him for his word. However, once this last year, he just wouldn't let up, and I had to declare mid-sentence "I love you, but cut it out, I can't handle it right now!"
One day, I'd love it if he could learn to read me and the situation, and switch to "serious mode" BEFORE I have to tell him to (with consistnecy), but I accept that he may never be that perceptive. He'll never be a mind reader, so until he's better at picking up nonverbal cues, I'm fine with giving him the verbal ones.
For you and your husband, you need to explain to him that there are appropriate and not appropriate times to be silly. Ask him, "what can I say or do to help you understand when I've reached my limit, and really need you to settle down for my sanity?" Understand that it is possible that your husband may not ever be perceptive enough to know the answer to that question on his own. You don't want to take away his silly nature (because that's a large part of his personality), but help him understand when it is/isn't okay, or help him find ways that you can be silly together, in a way that doesn't annoy either of you. It may take awhile to work out a way to communicate to him what you're feeling, in a way he'll understand, but the first step is to be honest, and open with him about it.
Read him the riot act immediately: make it clear once and for all that he's to stop doing what he's doing or he'll have a real problem with you. And if he does it again after that, tell him he will be visiting a counselor with you.
I agree: if he has always been like this, you knew what you were in for.