It’s not the easiest thing to be the best husband ever. When you find someone worth marrying, you assume that it’s going to be the experience of your life.
That’s what romcoms say, right? Find someone who’s cute and you like to be around, date for a while, propose, and then ride off into the sunset. Easy as pie! False.
It takes a lot of trial and error, even after years of being together. Even when you’ve been together for years or just recently, it’s not a walk in the park to provide your partner’s needs and wants.
You see, it’s not that marriage is complicated, it’s that people don’t know how to do it right. School doesn’t teach you how to be the best husband ever. Unless your parents were the perfect model for marriage, then most of us just didn’t have anyone to teach us.
The reality is that not everyone is lucky enough to have parents to look up to as what marriage is all about. For the unlucky ones, they have to live through their parents getting a divorce or separation. They have to find and redefine how to have a happy marriage on their own terms.
How to be the best husband – Little changes that lead to happiness
Don’t worry, you really can be a great spouse to your wife. There isn’t a magic ingredient or pill to make you the best husband ever. A happy marriage takes a lot of hard work and effort and it’s not something you just happen to have.
Anyone who’s been married for over a decade will tell you that it takes consistency, communication, understanding, and a whole lot of forgiveness to make a marriage not just work, but last. In other words, you can’t escape putting in the effort to be an amazing partner.
The good news is that it’s not really that difficult to make your wife happy. If anything, it’s really easy to make your wife happy if you know what really softens her heart. In this feature, we’ll be listing down the ways you can be the best husband ever.
1. Talk to her
You literally don’t need a grand gesture to make your wife feel like she’s on top of the world. Just talk to her – it’s as simple as that. If you want to be the best husband ever, talk to her about everything under the sun.
Believe it or not, a lot of husbands think it’s a chore to talk to their wives. They think that women talk too much and give too many irrelevant details about their lives that they just don’t care about. You promised her for better or for worse.
Even when it’s not convenient for you, talking to her makes her feel heard and loved. Especially if it’s one of her love languages, talking might be the easiest way to make her feel loved. Even if you don’t like doing so, you’re going to have to fake it.
2. Share the chores
Nobody likes doing all the work in a relationship. If you want to be the best husband ever, let her feel that your marriage is indeed a partnership. This means helping her around the house, especially on days she’s more tired with work than usual.
You didn’t marry her to make her do all the world, you married her as your soulmate and life partner. You’re both tired from work, but teaming up with the chores would make things easier for you. Gone are the days when the wife was the one who did all the cooking, cleaning, other household chores.
You can’t really expect her to do everything without being frustrated at your lack of initiative, can you? Don’t wait for her to tell you to do it, otherwise, she’ll think of you as another child.
You need to make things easier on her behalf and fulfill your duties as her husband. This means help her in every way you can, even if it’s something as exhausting as chores.
3. Share the kid responsibilities
I know you don’t like to change diapers. Who does? I know your wife doesn’t. This isn’t a valid excuse to help her with kid responsibilities.
I know you know it’s not easy raising a kid. Beyond the diapers, kids can be just downright exhausting. Sure, we love them. They’re our kids, but we need a break.
4. Help her keep track of plans
According to research, the most stressful thing for a woman is to be the only one who keeps track of plans for the family. Okay, fine, women are generally more detailed-oriented and organized than men. However, this doesn’t mean you should leave all the planning up to her.
Learn to pitch in help every now and then just to reassure her she’s not alone in this. It’s so exhausting to be the only one who keeps track of everything. So, in order to be the best husband ever in her eyes, you have to be her partner.
5. Pay attention to her needs
The world doesn’t revolve around you. While you rationally know that, a lot of men don’t get it. Stop being so self-absorbed that you think everything is about fulfilling your needs and wants.
What about her needs? What about what she wants? Did you ever think of asking her what she needs from you? selfish. A marriage is about two people trying to meet each other’s needs, not the wife trying to please her husband 100% of the time.
If you keep being self-absorbed, she’s going to end up resenting you. She might be so understanding and patient with you right now, but that patience has a limit.
Little do you know that every time you don’t pay attention to her needs, it builds up until one way, she won’t choose to tolerate it anymore. She’ll just walk away from your marriage and you’ll never see it coming.
6. Don’t forget to be affectionate
Women are wired to be affectionate so this should be at the top of your priorities in being the best husband ever. You can’t ever assume that your wife always knows how much you love her when you fail to show her in simple ways.
While a lot of men prefer touching their wives in the bedroom, women feel more intimate generally when you touch them without the expectation of s*x. Touching your wife outside the bedroom gets them much more in the mood to be intimate with you inside of it. Touching is an extension of your love.
7. Learn the love languages
Everyone has different love languages, meaning your way of showing love could be different from others. There are 5 love languages you should know about – quality time, acts of service, words of affirmation, giving gifts, and physical touch. Just because you feel loved through words, you can’t expect that to apply for your wife.
For all you know, you could be loving her in the wrong way. Having contradicting love languages is okay as long as both of you give what the other needs. For instance, your love language could be acts of service but since your wife’s is quality time, you do your best to spend time with her.
8. Understand each other’s personality types
Another really helpful hint for being the best husband ever is to learn more about each other’s personality types. No, I’m not talking about astrology here. Rather, there are several personality tests online such as the MBTI.
Once you understand the personality differences between the two of you, then you can be more tolerant and patient with one another. Understanding the personality of your partner can help you avoid conflicts and accept one another unconditionally.
9. Don’t be complacent
Some people think that once they’re married, they don’t have to put in any effort anymore because the “chase” is over. However, this is the one aspect that can make you lose your wife and your marriage altogether. You can’t assume that just because you’ve been together for years, you won’t put in the work.
This doesn’t just refer to effort, but this also refers to your hygiene and physical attributes. Don’t just stop looking good for yourself and being clean just because your partner has seen your worst.
10. Don’t forget date nights
No matter how many years you’ve been together, date nights are so important. There’s no excuse in the book you can use to avoid having date nights with your wife. Especially if you want to be the best husband ever, make your wife feel like she matters consistently.
