Advice Column

Dear Abby,

My husband and I are having our house remodeled. We started the process back in March, broke ground in August, and still have about two months left (assuming things go according to plan, which, as you probably know, is a horrible assumption to make). The problem is that lately we have been fairly short-tempered with each other. We seem to be bickering over silly things and can't manage to agree on the big ones. My question to you is this: Do you think this is normal or should I be concerned?

Awaiting an answer,

Laura in North Hollywood


Dear Laura,

Everyone I know who has had all or part of their home remodeled has experienced similar issues. There are two sides to every story, and it's important to understand both. The person who is home all day, talking to contractors and handling the details, gets frustrated when he sees mistakes being made and things happening slower than he would like. He spends the day putting out fires and answering the same questions over and over again. At the end of the day, he needs to unload his frustrations onto the one person he thinks will empathize, yet often that person doesn't want to hear about all the problems.

That second person sometimes feels out of the loop, not really knowing what's going on at the building site and feeling as if she's missing things. When she gets home from work, she's expecting to hear about the success of the day and becomes impatient when instead she has to hear about what went wrong. She would prefer to discuss interesting details such as the custom-made bathroom vanity unit or the different types of window treatments that might adorn the bedroom windows; but instead she is forced to talk about the 2 degree angle of the plumbing pipe and the argument about where to place the recessed lights in the closets.

Laura, the truth is that until the remodeling job is over and you and your husband have settled down into the new building, these little squabbles will continue. You're both frustrated and unsure about what's going on and you have only each other to unburden to, so the bickering back and forth is your way of saying, "I hope we're making the right decisions here and I wish there was a way we could know for sure that everything's going in the right direction." I can't answer that for you, but I can tell you that it's all going to be worth it in the end. I think.

Good luck!