Yes you are so right. We do have serious issues in our marriage. I haven't posted to many of our issues here. Husband giving me the brush was like dirt in my face. This was his way of letting me know how much he values me.
He knew I would react with anger, which I didn't do. Or hurt feelings. Therefore he would then go into his tirade. I'm childish, I'm not happy with anything, I'm never satisfied, yada yada yada. Then he can feel all smug.
Sounds like passive aggression, you may want to research it. I’m not saying it is PA but I think it’s pretty evil stuff. If you are feeling deeply hurt, very bemused and confused, a bit “out of your head” then those are signs/symptoms of passive aggression. PA is actually “revenge”. It generally comes from a person who was hurt in the past and hasn’t got over it and do things to “get their own back”, but they are not man/woman enough to be up front about it, to directly confront whatever issues they have. PA is an exceedingly cowardly way of going about life’s problems.
My husband and I usually only exchange gifts where people can see....so...Christmas. We just decide what we'll get each other and do it. "Do you want a Kindle?" "Sure, that'd be cool." "Great, my camera's about dead, I like this one. It'd be a great gift."
We stopped with the Valentine's and anniversary's a few years ago. Although he will occasionally stop and pick up a candy bar at Walgreen's or something to cover his butt, lol. We don't ever do a date night or cards or anything...but he'll get a $2 giant candy bar, just in case
It hit an all time low this year with the birthday though. Usually we'll just do dinner, or maybe a concert too. This year, as he was leaving for work he said "oh yeah, today's your birthday, huh? Happy birthday." We had dinner with some friends from work and one of the other couples picked up the tab since we were celebrating my birthday and the birthday of the guy in the third couple. My husband made a grab for his wallet, got brushed off, later on he said that "well, he'd tried to buy me dinner for my birthday." And never mentioned anything about it again. No card, nothing. Not even one of those Walgreens candy bars, lol.
And now he doesn't understand why I'm not really up for spending hundreds of dollars to go spend his birthday in Vegas....
Something shiny would be a pair of earrings or whatnot. How do you end up in the hairbrush section, anyway? It's next to the shampoo, tampons, and toothpaste. Not exactly where you look for birthday gifts, but I don't claim to know how men's minds work...
FWIW, gift giving is NOT my language of love, I am horrible at it. I am always afraid of giving a bad gift, or more so the reaction like yours of getting a bad gift. So I would literally spend hours upon hours upon more hours trying to think of something great. When I inevitably can't think of anything I start pounding the pavement and window shop for hours upon hours upon more hours until the malls close... I would sometimes do this a few days in the weeks and days leading up to a birthday or special occasion, right up until the last moment and then the stores close and I come up empty handed. During that time I "sacrificed" looking for a gift I could have been doing something more worthwhile, and I was always so ashamed to fail so bad, and the look of resignation and disappointment on her face everytime hurt me too (and of course I was never going to brag about how much effort went into my futile attempts). I just couldn't function in this way, and I think she would have been elated to have gotten SOMETHING tangible, even a brush. This is a very sore point with my W and I don't blame her, I just didn't ever know how to overcome this dysfunction.
I don't grok. I offered that this might be what was going on in his mind. Some guys literally pick up anything they pass while walking through the store. "Shiny' is a slang term for looking cool. I'm not saying that I agree with it, but a guy might think that a fancy hairbrush would make a good present. Suggesting that he's doing it as a passive agressive behavior is probably less likely than it just being a lazy choice.
I was also saying that I don't want my wife to have to put much thought into my gift. I prefer a home cooked meal. Just stick a Amazon card by it and I'm happy as a pig.
My gifts to her, however, are the result of hours of planning. My SIL tells me that my first B-Day card poem to my wife was published in a NE journal of poetry.
Grok? Not sure what that means.
Yes, plenty of guys just pick something up as an after thought. In the OP's case, it is clear that he wanted to hurt her. She touched on other major problems.
Lon my husband is a terrible gift giver but I don't berate him for that. I simply give him a list of things I want and he can decide which one to buy. Problem solved.
C'mon. No reason for sarcasm. I misspelled it - Shiney - sorry. I didn't buy the hairbrush.
Been nice!
You know I was trying to be funny and not sarcastic. I thought it was funny when you said a hair brush was shiney. Clearly I do not own the cool ones! I was also scratching my head at the thought process of buying a hair brush for a gift. In OP's case, it sure sounds like it was to hurt her but I think many other men would think, "cool, she has hair...she needs to brush it....viola". Problem solvers that men are. I had a friend who got a gift certificate for a brazillian bikini wax from her husband for her 35 birthday. His thought process? She was always complaining about shaving. Her thought process? WTF is this!!
Thanks everyone for making me laugh. This has turned out to be humorous.
I told H exactly what I wanted so he wouldn't be running around wasting his time. And we both would be happy. I didn't think he would get me anything. He asks so I thought ok since he ask.
He had a hidden motive. I had a brush, he took it, when I took it back he wanted that brush. He bought me a brush for a gift so he could get the old brush back.
It's not the object, it's the message that he sent by using the object
Lon my husband is a terrible gift giver but I don't berate him for that. I simply give him a list of things I want and he can decide which one to buy. Problem solved.
Lists only made it worse, because I wanted my gift to stand apart or be a surprise so everything on the list became one more item that I couldn't get for her
I'm pretty twisted in my logic I know... but at least my stbxw usually didn't bother with lists, she always refused to acknowledge that gifts were her main love language, and didn't want to be materialistic at all - the past couple years we've asked everyone to not buy us gifts at christmas, birthdays etc and announced that we wouldn't either. I'm not sure if the giftless approach was in part a defense mechanism for my wife to cope with my utter failure as a gift giver... But I'm coming to believe that in fact gifts really are her love language in which case no wonder she has been so unhappy for so long.
In my next relationship when I receive a gift list I'm just going to go straight to the top of it.
Sounds like passive aggression, you may want to research it. I’m not saying it is PA but I think it’s pretty evil stuff. If you are feeling deeply hurt, very bemused and confused, a bit “out of your head” then those are signs/symptoms of passive aggression. PA is actually “revenge”. It generally comes from a person who was hurt in the past and hasn’t got over it and do things to “get their own back”, but they are not man/woman enough to be up front about it, to directly confront whatever issues they have. PA is an exceedingly cowardly way of going about life’s problems.
"He had a hidden motive. I had a brush, he took it, when I took it back he wanted that brush. He bought me a brush for a gift so he could get the old brush back."
FWIW.... I haven't even gotten a card from my wife in at least 5 years, never mind a gift from the heart.
Ice in the veins.
Worst part, is that it FORCES ME to do the same.
Now, if the subject comes up, it's laughed off as " haha, we stopped exchanging years ago".
Believe me, it bothers me.
I haven't gotten a Christmas, Father's day, or birthday anything in years.
According to her, that's only for people that are still in the honeymoon stages of their relationship.
Monday is my birthday.
This is the first year that we're working on our marriage. Prior years were considered normal years. This year was a bad one, and we came very close to splitting up.
If there ever was a time to put her best foot forward, it's this Monday.
I guess i'll find out what she's feeling soon enough.
Your wife should be married to my husband. No gifts for birthday, Christmas, Mothers Day, Anniversary in the last several years.
OP, sorry to hear about the hairbrush. Especially the story behind it.
Re: He gave me WHAT for my b'day 
I was also scratching my head at the thought process of buying a hair brush for a gift. In OP's case, it sure sounds like it was to hurt her but I think many other men would think, "cool, she has hair...she needs to brush it....viola". Problem solvers that men are. I had a friend who got a gift certificate for a brazillian bikini wax from her husband for her 35 birthday. His thought process? She was always complaining about shaving. Her thought process? WTF is this!!
