Hannelore, the original request came years ago when I was working full time, taking night courses and hardly ever home. He was newly retired, so took over all the household chores, but was having difficulty adjusting to an empty house/life after 33 years of being a military firefighter/chief. He went from an endless network of social contacts to nothing at all. My heart ached for him when he finally summoned the courage to tell me how he was feeling...it opened my eyes to a not-seen-before vulnerable tenderness in him.

Spending a couple of hours watching TV with him in the evening after work was the only thing he ever made a point of asking of me in all our years together. And yet he (cheerfully) cooks, cleans the house (including bathrooms and windows), does laundry, grocery shops, vacuums, irons, and makes wonderful home-made soups for me - even now that I'm retired too. Spending that time with him involves more than watching TV - it's a commitment to a promise I made to him all those years ago to always be sure to carve out time in a busy day especially for him alone - it's the one expression of my continuing love and gratitude for him that I'm able to make no matter how sick/down/sad or fatigued I might be.

And he does make an effort to choose shows that we can both tolerate - we negotiate and compromise. Whenever he's away, though, the TV is hardly ever turned on (except for General Hospital - I'm a GH addict).

I don't think that makes me a better wife - it's a choice I make to carve out that time because it's what he needs from me...another man might not need that. God knows I'm one of the most difficult women to live with, because of my ancient insecurities, hyper sensitivity (not only emotionally but right across the board - smells, textures, tastes, household chemicals - everything!) and chronic fatigue/depression - my husband might well be the only man/person on the face of the earth who could live (cheerfully) with all of that!!!

I should not have complained about having to watch TV with him, because I realize now that it's exactly where I want to be in the evenings. But that doesn't mean my brain still won't be multi-tasking - how does one turn it off??!!