Your Anniversary: Romantic – Or Just Another Day?

Celebrating a wedding anniversary seems to be an area that magnifies the pink and blue differences between husbands and wives. We recently received the following question from a wife, which pretty much sums it up:

How do men want us to celebrate our Wedding Anniversary?  It seems that my expectation of having a romantic celebration ends up with me extremely disappointed and unfortunately disrespecting my husband out of ignorance.  My husband has said in the past that he just wants it to be like any other day.  Hmmm.  How do we handle these situations where pink and blue obviously have different expectations?  I want to do it "right" when our anniversary rolls around in three months.

I love this wife’s heart.  She’s asking the right questions!  But as a man, I’m going to take the liberty of speaking for her husband. 

When a man says he wants it to be just like any other day I doubt that he means that there should be nothing special whatsoever.  Instead, he probably means, “Please don’t have expectations of me that end up causing us to have a fight which we don’t have on normal days. Can’t we approach this in a way that doesn’t make me feel like I will inevitably disappoint you?” 

She of course is devastated by his comment but he is trying to prevent the pattern he has come to recognize. We decide planning no celebration is better than if we try and fall short. We don’t know how to read your minds, and if we try, we get it wrong…and somehow your deep disappointment hurts us more than if you just think we’re forgetful or unromantic.

Should husbands be a bit more romantic? In most cases, yes!  More on that next time.  But for now, take a look at this video where I describe what can happen between two good willed people on their Fifth Wedding Anniversary.

~Emerson