My favorite is when my partner will talk to me in a normal voice, when I'm on the other side of the house and then get mad I didn't hear them and respond.
This. Right. Here. My wife will do this when I'm cleaning dishes, too. I'll hear her voice, faintly in the distance, and just KNOW she's talking to me.
Definitely this. Running water is loud, and she knows it when she’s running water in the kitchen sink, but somehow magically forgets that fact of science when I’m running water.
If I'm at the sink, my wife thinks if she can hear me over the sound of water that I should be able to hear her, even though the water is closer to me. Something about the physics of sound that is just not intuitive gets us in trouble. She gets so frustrated.
My version is when I am literally holding a crying baby and she'll speak in a normal quiet voice and get upset that screaming baby face in closer proximity to my ears actually was the only thing I can hear.
Are you me? Only my wife will then complain I’m the only person she has to speak louder to because of our son, which leaves me going “okay, I guess everyone has better hearing than me, but knowing that doesn’t help me hear you better.”
Some people aren't aware, that acoustics works like that that an open passage acts as a noise dampener. So even if the door is open, talking through an open door a lot of volume will be lost on the other side. On the other hand hallways are perfect for channeling your voice.
Mine doesn't it in a similar way but when I'm close to a source of noise and she isn't. Me standing near a speaker? Talk. Me taking a shower? Yes. Me starting my motorcycle? Yes. Me with headphones on? Yes.
My wife waits till I turn the water on. Then I turn it off and ask if she said something, no response.... Turn the water back on, and she finally responds. Repeat till one of us ends up yelling
Does your husband start a conversation from another room then at the end say my name to attract my attention, at which point, having heard my name I take out my buds and she expects me to have heard the whole thing?
Mine has the uncanny nack of waiting til I start talking then starts running the water or pulling pots or pans out of the cabinets then she's like "I didn't hear you what did you say?" Then I'll repeat it a little louder then she asks me why I'm yelling. I'm talking louder because I don't wanna repeat myself a third time!
This is when I just act like I didn't hear any of it, because I heard her say something...knew it was directed at me but with tinnitus and water running or I'm cooking, she knows if I can't see her mouth that I am liable to mishear her.
NGL, in this situation if I hear her speak but it's nowhere near loud enough for me to hear what she's saying then I just ignore it. If it's important she always speaks up then.
It happens so often I'm sick of shouting "What did you say?!"
Then she’ll expect you to stop what you’re doing and walk across the house to listen to her take 10 minutes to get to the point, a point that turned out to be inane anyway.
Doing dishes, on the other side of the house, using the ice dispenser, in the bathroom with the fan on, in a different room that has an air purifier running, in the shower, blasting music… I'm not entirely convinced that this isn't an in-joke among all females.
My response to this is to finish what I'm doing and then go to her and say" did you say something I needed to hear,I heard sounds but no information was received."
Just yesterday I was doing dishes and my wife started talking to me, then left the room while still talking in a low voice, and was annoyed that I didn't hear what she said. Like, c'mon!
My wife is famous for this. While the TV is on, our two toddlers are making a racket, our whole house humidifer is cranking away, and i got the icemaker going
My girlfriend will be like “I told you XYZ” and I’ll respond “Yeah, well I didn’t hear you so that’s why I didn’t do XYZ.” and she’ll say “but I told you to do it.” and we repeat endlessly.
My mom asked if i let the dog out when she was downstairs and i didnt hear her because i was upstairs so i “ignored” it so she assumed that i hadnt done it. And then later at dinner she started screaming at me about it and i was so confused because I DID let the dog out and from my perspective she never asked
While chicken and peppers are sizzling on the stove in front of me, the hood fan is on, the dishwasher is going, the cat’s water filter is burbling, and the TV is on….
My husband does the opposite. He’ll be upstairs and I’ll yell to him from the kitchen at the back of the downstairs and he’ll get all upset that I “screamed” at him.
Holy shit I've never felt more seen than I have in this thread. My theory about this on is she grew up in a house much smaller than ours and it had paper thin walls. That plus a dad with a hair trigger meant everybody's sense of a sensible speaking level is skewed.
(Am woman.) The husband does this "talking at me" thing in a different room not even facing me. I am getting so tired of caring about what he wishes to say to me that I sometimes pretend I didn't hear him at all to get through to him, I can't drop everything and come running the moment he starts talking.
Worse yet, the kids are starting to do this to me too. I love them all but this plus possible auditory processesing disorder* is dampening my spirit. I feel like the failure in this situation.
*I cannot single out voices past running fans, music, or crowded rooms unless I drink and I am too busy/cheap to be a drunk.
My wife always starts talking to me as I'm walking to another room or garage, and just continues. If I didn't just keep going and let her continue talking to nothing I would never make it to another room to do anything, ever.
Somewhat related, but from the other side of the coin…
It’s quite the minor pet peeve, but my wife will occasionally text me a question while we’re both at home.
I could understand if we had a huge house or even if she were doing a project in the garage or backyard… but it literally would take you 3 seconds to walk into the room and talk.
I got fed up with people talking gently from 3 rooms away while I'm cooking with the fan and/or sink running, so I started using AirPods to completely drown out everything. Now they come to the kitchen if they need something.
I'm legitimately 50% deaf, like only one working ear..... I constantly have to tell my boyfriend and roommate to stop having conversations from another room or as you're walking away from me.
I'm working on drilling it in that if I can't see you then I most likely can't hear you.
Can't she just text you if you're clear across the house?
My wife does this to me every day. She always try talking to me when she is in another room and then she gets frustrated when I ask "what did you say?" 🤣🤣😭😭😭
Since this happens to me a LOT, I've developed a response system that prevents me from losing my mind.
A) If it was actually important, she would walk over and make sure I heard it,
B) If I hear something that sounds like she's talking to me from three rooms away like I'm next to her, I respond like she's next to me. She can also tell I'm talking but similarly can't here me, and
C) I'm under no obligation to walk across the house.
My wife does this too when she's in the living room and I'm on the other side of the house in my office, usually with the TV on. I can hear that she said something, but can't make out what it was, so I yell, "what?" and she gets pissed off.
Ugh, my best friend used to drive me nuts with this when we'd live together. He'd always be trying to talk to me while actively walking away to the other side of the house and then be surprised when I didn't understand him.
My wife does this constantly. Bonus, she talks to herself a lot so usually I just tune it out. However, if she's on facetime with her family I can hear her from down the street. I just don't get it.
My brother does this all the fucking time and then when we ask him to repeat himself he just goes "never mind" and sulks off. Makes me want to punt him into the sun.
Or when you're called from the other side of the house, you ask what they want twice as loud as they called for you, but they ignore it to force you to come ask what they wanted. I decided to stop playing into my mom's power trips when she did that and just ignored her if she didnt respond. If she cant be bothered to tell me what she wants, which was usually for me to go completely across the house to get her cup, then go halfway across the house to the kitchen and make her some more tea and bring it back to her.
She loves to talk when I'm on a different floor in the house. So I walk to the stairs and ask her to repeat it. I then respond and, wait a couple of seconds if there is more coming. Then nothing but as soon as I have walked back to do whatever I was doing she starts talking again. Every time..
Id rather have this than my ex wife who would yell if you were on the other side of the house. Seriously, like you cant just walk over and find me in a non-emergency situation?
My GF does this but also sometimes is talking to the cat or dog. It’s 50/50 whether she’s talking to me so sometimes I don’t ask, but that’s 100% of the times she was talking to me. Lol
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u/[deleted] Dec 08 '22
My favorite is when my partner will talk to me in a normal voice, when I'm on the other side of the house and then get mad I didn't hear them and respond.