A Wife’s Hurt Feelings: Beyond a Husband’s Apology, Rethinking a Fresh Approach

If I ranked comments from wives to me, this one comes in close to the top: “My husband hurts my feelings.”

Her husband’s inattentiveness, forgetfulness, lack of availability, frustration, and contrary choices can end up emotionally hurting her.

Understanding the Cycle of Hurt Feelings

When this happens, typically the sequence of her thoughts follows this pattern:

1. He hurt my feelings and should not have hurt my feelings.
2. I need to tell him that he hurt my feelings.
3. He needs to listen, feel badly, apologize, and change.
4. Then I will feel the hurt leave my heart, a measure of happiness, and a renewed connection with him. Love will be in the air again.

And certainly, many a husband (including me!) has hurt his wife’s feelings and had very good reason to apologize. Such will happen with all husbands and wives. We are human and will make many mistakes.

A Husband's Perspective and Proposal for Change

After a bad day at work where his boss reamed into him for his role in losing a client, he is short with his wife and frustrated that the kids’ toys are all over the living room. Normally, this doesn’t affect him, but today he snaps at her, “Why don’t you ever have the kids pick up after themselves? At the very least, why can’t you keep this place cleaner while I’m at work all day?”

He has hurt his wife’s feelings and needs to apologize.

Or unaware of the tough day his wife had, who had to cut short a long-awaited lunch with a friend because their sick child needed to be picked up from school, he complains about dinner not being ready on time, meaning they would be late to small group that night. He never once considered how her unexpected schedule change had a domino effect on the rest of her day.

This husband, too, has hurt his wife’s feelings and would be wise to apologize.

The goodwilled husband—though he may sometimes be slower to apologize than his wife would prefer—recognizes his shortcomings in these situations and indeed does what is necessary to renew connection with his wife again. However, there are also plenty of times when he honestly feels that his wife’s hurt feelings over a matter are not nearly as big a deal as she seems to feel it is. In fact, he might even feel that she keeps coming at him with every little thing that hurts her feelings, almost like “death by a thousand paper cuts.”

Eventually, this husband might come to the point where he feels it is necessary to share with her something along the lines of, “This week, I hurt your feelings for not promptly calling my mother as you requested, failing to acknowledge our son sitting at the table in the kitchen, neglecting to fulfill my promise to take out the garbage, and unintentionally forgetting your planned outing with friends on Tuesday night. Yes, I can improve, but I wish you could overlook some of these as honest, small mistakes that arise unintentionally due to my preoccupation with other responsibilities. Some things that hurt your feelings don’t carry the same weight of importance to me as they do to you. On a scale of one to ten, I weigh the matter as a two, and you weigh it as an eight. I’m not trying to say your feelings are unimportant or invalid since I see my neglect as minor to me, but I want to invite you to weigh some of these as less important in the grand scheme of things and not let this trigger another talk about how I hurt you. Then we do not enjoy each other as good friends since I feel like the bad guy.’”

An Approach to Addressing Hurt Feelings

It is here that some wives shoot back, “You don’t know how often I stuff my feelings. I don’t tell you half of my hurts. But after a while, there comes a moment when I have to tell you of my hurt feelings. I can no longer hold my feelings in, nor should I.”

He expressed his heart in a way he thought was reasonable and honest, and proposed a way forward. But then she countered with, “I don’t tell you half of how you hurt my feelings so you should appreciate the few times I tell you my feelings.” It is here that he is likely to shut down.

Given a husband has voiced his perspective, no matter how unpleasant, I recommend that a wife should try capitalizing on that differently than she may initially desire. She should recognize that underneath his comments is a willingness to improve but also a proposal to think about his feelings in a new way and her feelings in a new way. This is an open door for dialogue.

If in her thinking, the only solution is for him to apologize and change in response to her hurt feelings, she will probably encounter him avoiding that discussion or quickly apologizing so he can get on with his agenda.

As much justification and reinforcement from outsiders she can garner about being right, I would have her pause and consider if the man she married is trying to convey the following wishes. Might he be trying…

• to be heard?
• to be treated with respect?
• to be seen as having vulnerable feelings?
• to have fair and balanced expectations?
• to encourage her to develop healthy emotional independence?
• to improve their conflict resolution moving forward?

Given her husband is in this camp, I recommend holding off at this time on the “You hurt my feelings and you need to feel badly, apologize, and change” message.

Instead, say to him, “You know, I have talked often about my hurt feelings. But I realize how unfair this can be at moments. You are an honorable man with goodwill, but I have sometimes overwhelmed you with my feelings. I think I have not allowed for honest mistakes or that you and I weigh the importance of things differently. I can weigh things too heavily in the grand scheme or at least sound that way. If you are open, I’d like to discuss what I just learned about some men who try to navigate their wife’s hurt feelings. Many men wish to be equally heard, treated with respect, seen as having vulnerable feelings, given fair and balanced marital expectations, able to encourage her to develop healthy emotional independence, and improve their conflict resolution moving forward. Does that make sense, and can we address some of these things?”

Of course, the frame of reference here about a wife’s hurt feelings centers on the everyday experiences between a husband and wife. We are not discussing adultery, abandonment, or physical and verbal abuse. We are talking about the normal, day-to-day conflicts two differing people will have—basically, the “trouble” Paul warned we would have if we married (1 Corinthians 7:28).

Though these examples of what a wife and husband think and feel may not relate to one or both of you, what nuggets of insight can you apply with mutual benefit? Beyond a husband’s apology, what fresh approach can you apply to bring about mutual understanding and lessen the hurt in a wife’s heart?