Small Changes

Priya and I are coming up on 4 months of marriage. Now obviously when you get married a lot of big things change but perhaps just as importantly so do a lot of small things and what I've found is that dealing with the small changes can be just as challenging as dealing with the big ones. I think that is in part because you tend to know what big changes are coming whereas the small ones are a surprise. When you first live together everyone knows you have to get used to sleeping in the same bed, sharing a bathroom, combining your finances, choosing food, cleaning up after one another and even sharing the TV and while these things are certainly challenging none of them were unexpected rather they were all things that were easy to see coming. But the small issues are sneaky they are the ones that you didn't see coming and the reason you didn't see them coming is because a majority of the time they surround the issue of one’s habits the things you do that you don’t even know you do. An example is that after I use the bathroom I always leave the door open whereas when Priya uses the bathroom she usually leaves the door closed. Now this has not created any problems it is just an example of how most of the little things we do in the day are habits that were shaped a long time ago. If I step back and think about it I don’t leave the bathroom door open on purpose meaning that I don’t leave the bathroom door open because I think it’s the right thing to do rather it is simply what I do without thinking about it. And that’s what a habit is, a repeated action done with little thought put into it.

  

Now the problem with habits is that while they are almost always thoughtless actions to the person doing them they are not always viewed as such by the other person dealing with them. Basically there are habits your partner might have that just annoy you or cause you problems despite the fact that your partner does not do these things intentionally to bother you…hopefully. Now while I think it is always good to talk about this kind of stuff it can be hard to bring them up because you don’t want to hurt the feelings of your partner and because the things you are now asking them to try and change are things they don’t tend to think about in the first place. So whether it be where you put the keys, rinsing the dishes when you put them in the sink, the temperature you place on the thermostat, cleaning the hairbrush after using it, how to organize and store the food in the refrigerator, hanging up your jacket at the end of the day, drinking out of the other person’s cup or any other numerous habitual things you and your partner do in a day you have to realize these things do affect the other person. And yes that list is made up of personal examples of both Priya and I. Therefore one must be open to at least reexamining their habits and be willing to try and change some of them for the one they love no matter how hard it is to suddenly think about the things that were previously thoughtless like leaving one’s wallet out on the dresser (me) or letting Colby (the cat) in our room (her). 

I recently discovered a habit of mine that creates problems for Priya and it is something I never even noticed. It seems once Priya and I have gotten into bed with the intention of sleeping soon I have a tendency to get up a lot whether it be to go to the bathroom or because I forgot to do something or because I just want some water. The other night I got in and out of bed 5 or 6 times within a 30 minute period. Now I rarely noticed this about myself let alone thought about the repercussions of this action upon Priya. Priya explained to me that once she gets into bed it is a time that she begins to unwind and relax from the day and this unwinding period is very important for her in order to actually get to sleep. So when I get in and out of the bed it interrupts that time of relaxing for her and makes her have to start over once I get back into bed. When I found this out I of course felt terrible because I had no idea that just by getting out of the bed I was making it harder for Priya to fall asleep though when you think about I’m sure having someone else move around a lot in the bed would make it harder for anyone to sleep. The fact is Priya has a hard time sleeping even when I’m not involved. It often takes her an hour of relaxing, usually with background noise from the TV to fall asleep and even then she only sleeps for an hour or two before she’ll wake up and have to go through the whole process again. So there are many nights she is only getting 3 or 4 hours of sleep before she has to get up and go to work. Now while I have known Priya wasn't a heavy sleeper for quite some time I just didn't really take into account how my movements affected her ability to sleep. For some reason I tended to associate her sleeping pattern with time rather than environment. By that I mean I thought she tended to fall asleep around the same time each night as well as wake up around the same time and thus I thought the time had something to do with her struggles sleeping rather than what was happening around her. So for me if it was 30 minutes before the time that she often dozes off I didn't think my action of getting in and out of bed mattered I just thought she would fall asleep around that time no matter what I did. But now that I know that that period of relaxing in bed before falling asleep is an important part of Priya being able to sleep I try to be more cognizant of getting in and out of the bed.

What is difficult for me in this process is that for better or worse there is something about lying down in bed that makes my head jump into action. I can be sitting in a chair starring at the wall and not be able to think of anything I need or want to do before I get into bed but the second I put my head on a pillow things just jump into my head or my body making me want or need to get up. Often I find I need to go to the bathroom or I realize I forgot to take my medicine or I think of something I want to write about the next day so I want to leave myself a note in order that I don’t forget it. Trying to change this about myself is difficult because I can’t just turn my mind off when I get into the bed. Now Priya was very kind when she shared all of this with me. She wasn't angry or yelling at me because she of course knew that I wasn't getting out of bed to intentionally bother her. In fact what was somewhat humorous about when she brought it up was that during the evening she talked to me I was a getting out of the bed frequently because something I had eaten earlier was not agreeing with my stomach and needless to say I was fairly gaseous. So I was actually getting out of the bed and leaving the room in an attempt to save her from suffering from my dietary mistakes. Now I didn't tell her that when I was getting out of bed nor did I even tell her right away when she told me how my actions were bothering her. Rather I kept it to myself at first because I was fairly embarrassed and didn't want her to know that was what was going on so I didn't share that secret information with her until the next day. Now the fact that I'm even confessing this in writing is fairly surprising to me but hey it makes for a clearer picture of what happened and it is kind of funny when you think about it. Anyway I appreciated her gentleness when she spoke to me about how I was bothering her and it made me want to change all the more for her but it still can be difficult for me to think about it before I just get out of bed. Normally when something pops into my head I just get up to deal with it. It’s a habit and now that I find myself trying to think about it I see just how hard it is to change one’s habits. Since our discussion there have been times I have gotten into bed and like always I think of something I want or need to do and I get out of bed only to suddenly remember that I’m doing something that creates difficulties for Priya. I, of course, I don’t want to create difficulties for Priya especially since she is the one who has to get up and work every day while at this time I don’t but it is just hard to stop yourself from doing the things you do unconsciously. Now with most habits we both have to give a little, one of us tries to be more aware of our habits while the other becomes more accustomed to them but in this example I believe the responsibility for changing falls more on my shoulders rather than hers. Priya would say this habit of mine doesn't annoy her as much as just making it harder for her to sleep and to me that is only all the more reason why this habit of mine is so important to deal with. And while this isn't the perfect example of how little habits can create stress on a relationship it was the event that made me think about that issue.

As time moves on I think both of us are becoming braver with talking to each other about something that might be bothering us and likewise we are both trying to be open to adjusting our behavior to help the other. That is not to say that we always agree or are happy about the other person’s objections but hey this is part of having a real relationship, right? When I was in China by myself I certainly never had to compromise about what to eat or what movie to watch and I never thought about my general day to day habits and how they might affect someone else because there was no one else. Now while there are certainly nice things about not needing to think about that kind of stuff the fact was that once I made my decision of what to eat and what movie to watch with no “annoying” issues I noticed that I was doing those things alone. And I must say that I’d rather watch a movie I don’t want to see with Priya than watch a movie I want to see by myself though in reality it is much more common that Priya watches a movie that she doesn't want to see for my sake than the other way around. So I guess I should say I would rather make Priya watch a movie with me that she doesn't want to see than watch it by myself. Of course that can often lead to me getting a bit aggravated as Priya feels the need to point out all the scientific flaws in an awesome movie like Face-Off with Nicholas Cage and John Travolta. I mean come on I’m not saying the movie deserves an Oscar but can you really have more fun than two guys switching faces and blowing stuff up? The answer, of course, is no unless you have Bruce Willis in Die Hard.

So all that to say, the small things we do, often without thinking, really do matter. Perhaps for just for one day we should all step back and try to think about why we do each of the small things we do and then think about how those things may be affecting our partners because we care about them and it’s also just fun to try and figure out why you actually do all the things you do. I still can’t don’t have a good reason for why I always leave the bathroom door open but I always do.