Rolling Stones "Mother's Little Helper"

My wife doesn't like taking her vitamins.

It's not that she dislikes its effects.  Or disputes its health benefits.

She just doesn't like to take it every day.

Moreover, she doesn't like to have to take it every day.

My wife is an artist.  Her brain doesn't work the same way as mine.

While I crave and thrive with routine, she bucks against it.  She actually finds it annoying that if she sees me brushing my teeth at night, then that means I am going to bed.  She brushes her teeth when they feel dirty, not based on a schedule or clock unrelated to how her teeth feel.

So she didn't like taking her vitamin in the morning, because she didn't like that she had to do it.

How does she feel when she doesn't take it?  Lousy.  She is completely aware of this.  But will she take it on her own?  No.

I tried to intervene.  Or do what I thought was "helping out."  In the morning as I poured myself a glass of water, I put her vitamin box out on the counter.  That way, she had to, at a minimum, move it out of her way to do anything on our small kitchen counter.  And maybe, because she had to pick it up anyway, she'd just take it.

That is not what happened.

Instead, she came to resent the fact that I was trying to force her to take her vitamins.  So she rebelled, and stopped taking them completely.

Such is the weird, silly, daily, endless negotiation of marriage.  You have two people who live together and love each other, but are completely different people with worldviews that invariably conflict.  And something as simple as taking a vitamin becomes a Battleground State.

It's a miracle that anyone can manage to stay married, when we are hard-wired to fight against the things we consider to be "against our nature" no matter how stupid those things are.

My Mom and Dad have been married for over 40 years.  They each have many entrenched habits and worldviews that drives one nuts that the other will never change.

"But I noticed something went we went to visit them last month," my wife said to me one day.

"Every morning, your Mom would come into the kitchen, pour a glass of orange juice and give it to your Dad.  At first, I thought it was just your Mom trying to force your Dad to do something healthy.  Then I thought to myself, 'Why doesn't he get his own damn juice?'  But then I realized, she was doing something for him, that he wouldn't do for himself.  And instead of resenting it, he accepted it."

She said, "In the morning, put my vitamins out for me.  And you can even tell me to take it.  I promise not to get mad at you."

So every morning, I pour myself a glass of water, and I get her vitamins off the shelf and I put one on the counter.  And she takes it, without feeling like I am trying to force something upon her.

But most mornings, as she takes it, perhaps as a nod to her rebellious nature, she hums this tune with just a hint of sarcasm.



Hear the song on Youtube.