Q: My spouse sits on the couch and watches me cleaning like a cave girl high on Windex. Does he move? I wish I could hook him up to a battery charger. I just want a clean nice home, you know, one where I can open the door to the Jehovah’s Witnesses and my mother in law. I am searching for a formula that will work. There must be one. Am I fighting a losing battle? Should I surrender to the mess? — Seething Windex Wife

Dear Seething Windex Wife:

I hope it’s somewhat comforting to know that what you are going through is very common. Nearly all of the married women I know struggle with the same problem. “My husband is a hopeless slob” ranks pretty high on most women’s complaint lists, with “he can’t get his lazy ass out of bed to deal with the kids” and “he communicates his desire to have sex with me by rubbing his boner on my thigh” running a close second and third.

And there’s hope. I once had the same experience as you. I’d spend hours scrubbing my husband’s pee off toilet seats and removing his dirty underwear from the hallway floor. He’d occasionally look up from whatever was on TV and say things like, “Thanks for cleaning the house, honey,” assuming he noticed at all. Now, he unloads the washer, runs the vacuum, and picks up our daughter’s toys without being asked. And when he sees me cleaning, it’s an automatic trigger for him to get his butt off the couch and help.

Here’s what I suggest.

1. Try to see things through his eyes. He probably doesn’t see or care about the mess. Asking him to care about a clean house is similar to him asking you to care about the color and height of the grass in your yard. Women notice dust and fingerprints. Men notice crabgrass and yellow spots. It’s just one of those weird genetic differences between the sexes.

Most women are taught how to clean from a young age, too. My mother, for instance, had a dust rag in my hands by age 10, and she supervised my work. I also happened to work as a hotel maid one summer between my junior and senior years in high school.

My husband? His mother did everything in that house, and no one lifted a finger to help her. He did not work as a hotel maid, or any other job that would have taught him how to clean fast and effectively. I once showed him how to make hospital corners when making the bed. He stared at me as if I were from Mars, wondering why the heck anyone would care about making perfect corners in a set of sheets.

Cleaning makes many men-especially those who have not been taught how to do it-feel inadequate. It’s similar to how we women feel when we have to dispose of a rodent caught in a glue trap. Sure, we can do it, but we’ll avoid that poor critter for as long as it takes, in the hopes that our lovely husbands will take care of it first.

I’m not saying that you should just accept his slovenly lazy ways. I’m only saying that, if you learn how to understand it and see it from his perspective, it might help lower your anger a notch, so you can address the problem more civilly.

2. Understand the Law of Household Entropy. All houses naturally fall into a state of chaos over time. You simply cannot keep a house clean and orderly every moment of every day, especially if you have children or pets.

Because of the Law of Household Entropy, you must be willing to come to a compromise with your spouse. How much chaos are you willing to have? Do you want your entire house clean once a week, with it gradually falling into a state of complete disarray by week’s end? Or would you rather always have one room that is clean and presentable (that you clean up daily), and others that you let go most of the time (cleaning only in the moments just before the mother in law visits)? What types of household chaos bug you the most? Perhaps you are okay with dust but you really can’t stand having mold in your toilet. Once you understand what bugs you most, you’ll more easily be able to ask your husband for the help you need.

3. Think about why you value a clean house, and go beyond jokes about Jehovahs. How does a disorderly house make you feel? How does it affect your mood, energy, and sexual health? Being able to put this into words will help your husband to understand your point of view.

4. Hold an intervention. Sit down when you are calm (probably not while or just before cleaning). Talk about how a clean orderly house makes you feel: happy, stress free, calm, like having sex. Explain how you feel when you clean it up while he watches TV: unloved, taken advantage of, exhausted, angry.  You might say, “I don’t like feeling taken advantage of. I don’t like feeling this way about you. I really want us to have a good relationship, and I really want to feel calm and stress free in my house. Can you help me with this?”

Then, get solution focused. Maybe he takes on some chores and you do others. Maybe you clean together. Be creative. Whatever you do, make sure your solution is specific. Remember: he’s blind to the mess. He needs an instruction manual, as in, “I would like you to pick up everything on the floor-including your empty beer cans, socks and banana peels-every night before you start watching TV.” Leave no room for misinterpretation.

5. Whenever you notice him cleaning, reward him. Hug him. Say, “Thank You.” Jump his bones. Make him want to clean again.

Tips for Training Really Stubborn Men

So, let’s say you do all of that and your man resists. Let’s say he claims, as my husband did initially, that he already does plenty of housework.

Hold a contest. Create a big chart and list all of the indoor and outdoor chores. Over a month’s time, check off which chores you complete and how long it takes to complete them. At the end of the month, compare results. I did this with my husband and it really blew him away. He truly thought he’d been doing more than he really was doing.

Here’s another excuse that might pop up. He might accuse you of being too uptight. For instance, he’ll whine, “I work hard. When I come home I just want to relax. What’s wrong with relaxing? Why do you have to always be working?”

This is when you tell him that you want to relax, too, and you just can’t when your house is messy. Ask him to help you come up with a compromise that will make both of you happy and relaxed. Maybe, for instance, the two of you clean the house while you are dressed up as a French Chamber Maid. Then, once the house is clean, the good lazy boy gets a nice reward.

Just saying. It might get you a really clean house. In fact, your husband might want to clean the house every night.

Do you have advice for Seething Windex Wife? Leave a comment.

This morning, I woke up before my husband, looked in the fridge and found only three eggs. I eat eggs for breakfast nearly every morning. So does my husband. This was a problem.

I did something that surprised even myself. I made myself a frozen waffle and a smoothie. Later, my husband, who was having a very difficult time getting out of bed, asked, “Are there any eggs?” I said, “There were only three eggs left, so I didn’t eat any. I saved them for you. You know I love you now.”

He smiled and said, “I do.”

Now, let me be honest here. Not long ago, I would have eaten all three eggs, and I would have done it while I thought, “If he got his lazy sorry ass out of bed on time, then he would have beat me to the eggs. You snooze. You lose.”

It made me realize that there are 9 distinct stages of marital disharmony. In these stages, I’m using eggs as an example, but it might be chocolate or English muffins or something else that you and your spouse both love and also tend to run out of before it’s time for the next grocery store run. Note: I’ve written these stages from the female point of view, because, after all, I’m a female. For the most part, you could insert “he” for “she” and “she” for “he,” except in a few somewhat obvious places where you just can’t.

Stage 1: Dating

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You drive to the store to get more, so you can make you and your special love interest omelets. You want to prove to him that you have special kitchen skills because you are hoping that, one day, he might want to marry you because of your special kitchen skills.

Stage 2: Serious dating

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You stare at them for a while. You think about eating them. You don’t. You leave them all for that special guy who is sleeping upstairs, because any day now he might get a notion to pop the question. You don’t want to do anything to dissuade him from that notion. See? Aren’t you marriage material? You leave the last three eggs for him! Who wouldn’t marry a woman who does that?

Stage 3: You just got home from the honeymoon

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You sigh. You wake up your husband and explain the egg situation. He says, “Oh, honey, why don’t you eat them? I’ll just have a slice of toast.” He’s under the misguided impression that he’ll get morning sex for this gesture. He may or may not be disappointed, depending on how many weeks have passed since the honeymoon.

Stage 4: The honeymoon is definitely over

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You split them with your spouse, but you are not happy about it. You stare longingly at his eggs the entire time he’s eating, thinking that any moment now he’ll turn back into that man who once gave you his eggs. You pledge to never have sex with him again, no matter how excessively horny you might become.

Stage 5: The honeymoon is so over that you can’t even remember why you ever wanted to travel with him in the first place

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You eat all of them nearly raw. You weren’t even planning on having eggs this day, mind you. You eat them so he can’t have them, because he doesn’t deserve them.

Stage 6: Marital therapy

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You throw them at your husband.

Stage 7: Martial therapy just might be working

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You eat them, but you feel guilty about it.

Stage 8: Wow, marital therapy actually worked!

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You make something else for breakfast.

Stage 9: You have achieved the much talked about but rarely experienced state known as “Marital Enlightenment”

You wake up. You realize you only have three eggs. You make something else for breakfast. You make the eggs for your spouse.

Note: I have not reached stage 9. I’ve only heard about it. When I again walked into the bedroom this morning (yes, he was still in bed), my husband asked, “Are you almost done making my ham and eggs?”

I said, “I don’t love you that much. Get over it.”