54 Comments
User's avatar
Martin Diers's avatar

I think all husbands who have been married for any length of time know this is true. It is an aspect of female solipsism.

I still remember a time when my wife started (or tried) berating me about some trivial thing, and it was as if I was jumping into the middle of an argument that was already in progress.

I stopped her and said, "You know, I wasn't there in your head when you were having an imaginary argument with me." She stopped, looked at me, and said, "How did you know?" And that was that. Argument over.

Expand full comment
Heavy Metal Girl's avatar

"It can be genuinely alarming, and is especially bewildering when what happens to set off a woman’s jealous rage-spiral is something that she quite literally imagined, but never actually happened."

This perfectly describes a situation I was in, but it involved a gamma rather than a woman. Another behavioral overlap.

Expand full comment
Olga's avatar

"The Female of the Species" by Rudyard Kipling.

Expand full comment
Lacey's avatar

It's not just other women. I get jealous of my husband's hobbies. If only I could stab hockey in some fatal organ.

Expand full comment
Lacey's avatar

Update: My husband just got back from a 3 day trip to go see an NHL game, and duly informed me that he has to leave in a few hours to go watch a local game.

Yeah, I want to stab hockey.

Expand full comment
BodrevBodrev's avatar

Cars too, right?

Expand full comment
CactusEaterBear's avatar

I have no greater joy than to see my enemies get fat or cut their hair short.

Expand full comment
MerryToyotathon's avatar

"Fem-Conan! What is best in life?"

Expand full comment
SirHamster's avatar

"To crush their feelings, see them cut their hair off, and to enjoy the adoring gaze of their men!"

Expand full comment
Masked Menace's avatar

I'm sitting comfortably on the couch browsing through television channels as my girlfriend gets ready. I stop on one of those infomercials staring Suzanne Sommers. I stop because I find Suzanne Sommers attractive. My girlfriend walks in and gets upset with what I'm watching. I'm dumbfounded. I think, does she actually believe I'm going to run off with Suzanne Sommers? Barring a post-apocalyptic scenario where Suzzanne Sommers and I are the only survivors, the chances of that are near absolute zero. What just happened?

Expand full comment
Baker Street Bear's avatar

Would you be just as surprised if she caught you looking at porn?

Expand full comment
Masked Menace's avatar

You make a very thought provoking point. You imply I was watching a subtle form of porn and after thinking about it, I agree. Television is a seduction. That's why it's full of very attractive people. My girlfriend subconsciously realized I'd been seduced and got upset about it.

Expand full comment
SirHamster's avatar

There's an interesting 4chan post about the effects of TV/movies on people, and the TLDR is that our brains process all that moving pictures/audio as real.

This programs us to adopt TV/movie morality and status behaviors, which are scripted to promote ClownWorld values with attractive people. It also means that to your GFs instinctual brain, you are checking out a hotter woman IN FRONT OF HER.

So yes, she is reacting as if you're thinking about abandoning her for the TV fantasy. Women emotions are not rational and are never going to be.

Expand full comment
Lacey's avatar

The way we twist it into a pseudo logical thing is with the notion that "he might be thinking about TV woman when we're together, cheating in his mind!"

Technically possible.

Expand full comment
Person's avatar

It's the idea that you are giving your attention to another girl, and it's probably even worse to her that it's a girl who doesn't even know that you exist in your girlfriend's mind just fyi. Kind of like how I am guessing a man might find it jealousy inducing if his girlfriend stopped on a movie with Patrick Swazey or Elvis Presley. It's the idea of the thing. Jesus said something about how committing adultery with the eyes is as bad as doing it with the flesh. It is one thing when a man looks at a scantily dressed woman for a second because he's human and then tries to think about something else, but stopping to ogle a movie-star, especially if the movie shows her wearing skinny jeans or other revealing clothing and/or making out or going horizontal on screen. Her reaction is totally human.

Expand full comment
Commoner's avatar

Your girlfriend was probably thinking if you like young Suzanne Sommers, then you must find her bland in comparison. I've once compared Laura Prepon favorably to Mila Kunis in a conversation with a girl, and she got pissed.

Expand full comment
JW's avatar

Don't marry her.

Expand full comment
Lacey's avatar

All women do this to some degree.

Expand full comment
JW's avatar

I agree and it's appreciated to an extent, but the smart ones keep it to themselves.

Expand full comment
Redbonebandit's avatar

If you've ever dated a Hispanic woman, you've likely experienced this phenomenon in its full measure.

Expand full comment
Coffee Guy Chris's avatar

An Alpha friend of mine dated a Latina woman for a couple years. Their relationship was riddled with fights and arguments that were always started by her. She very correctly understood that he could have done better than her, so her solution to prevent him from leaving was to make mountains out of molehills and scream at him for things he didn’t do. Thank God he left her.

Expand full comment
MBCC's avatar

I actually had an episode of this with my Hispanic wife this morning. Luckily after 20+ years she's learned to dial it back. There's still a bit of anger directed at me that I don't deserve, but the duration is 5 minutes instead of 5 hours.

Seems to be common among women tho, whereas when guys wake up from a nightmare they are just relieved.

Expand full comment
Contra Stultum's avatar

My wife has had dreams that I betrayed her and woke up mad at me and remained mad for a while.

Expand full comment
Wander's avatar

Mine has done the same thing. She recognized she was being ridiculous, but the feelings were real and she was still mad at me for a while.

Expand full comment
GH's avatar

Owen had a great song about this.

Expand full comment
Nick Ruisi's avatar

Again, just like a gamma.

Expand full comment
Ransom of Perelandra's avatar

And those are probably some of Jami's more tame visions of murder.

Expand full comment
Sicilianswitchblade's avatar

The crazy redhead stereotype exists for a reason.

Expand full comment
JW's avatar

Indeed

Expand full comment
JW's avatar

You’ve never been truly loved by a woman until she plots your murder.

True story.

Expand full comment
B. E. Gordon's avatar

I’m fine with “murderously angry but still understanding it’s irrational and trying to hide it” but you do you.

Expand full comment
James Allin's avatar

That is so messed up.

Expand full comment
Swaggins's avatar

It is startling that you can play the opening line from this song and the vast majority of women will laugh.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gIbiKkhwXtk

Expand full comment
Sicilianswitchblade's avatar

If she hasn't screamed the words "I want to f***ng kill you!" at least once, does she even care?

Expand full comment
info1234's avatar

I remember hearing stories about women who accused husbands of adultery because they dreamed about them doing it.

Expand full comment
The Kurgan's avatar

Not fake. Happened to me at least a few times and with at least two different women that admitted it. Not that I had actually cheated on either of them, but they dreamt I had sex with someone else, so, of course, I must be evil.

Expand full comment
AML's avatar

I think women subconsciously feel that some dreams are "intuitive visions", rather than nonsense created as a byproduct of our hard-drives clearing up space for the next day.

This was shocking to me the first time I experienced it, but it's common enough.

Expand full comment
William Palafox's avatar

One of my good shipmates went from wife to ex-wife in about a year because of this. The dream graduated to careful scrutiny of his every move with demands to account for every minute when he wasn't where she thought he should be (and this pre-dog leash idiotphone era). Being a good Navy man, he figured since he was being punished for having a non-existent mistress, he might as have the real thing. And naturally that led to "My dream was right! Madame Zorka truly can read the stars!"

Expand full comment
Kevin Meier's avatar

My wife does that from time to time she gets over it pretty quickly. We both joke about how pissed she'll be for a little bit in the morning. I used to dream about dirt bikes and pout for a little while in the morning when I realized I didn't have one.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Apr 5, 2025
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Aaron Kulkis's avatar

That's sad. Basic Training was one of the funnest times in my life. Compared to my previous 5 years as an engineering student at a Big 10 university, Basic Training was like a vacation.

Outside doing new things every day. Learning how to shoot from a demonstrable expert. No homework or month-long projects hanging over my head. The only part I didn't care for was the lack of women.

Expand full comment
JW's avatar

This does happen with some women. A friend’s wife has had occasional episodes of this over the years.

Expand full comment
No Name's avatar

Many intuitive feelers - people with NF as the middle letters of their MBTI type - will get angry at you if you are in a relationship and they can imagine a scenario where they think you would cheat. The fact that the scenario came to her in a dream doesn't matter.

Look at dealing with this as a part of the cost of the relationship. In my case I'm willing to pay that price, because I'm an extrovert and most people with an intuitive personality type are among those I can have a genuine conversation with.

Expand full comment
Sicilianswitchblade's avatar

Hilariously a couple decades ago my then girlfriend now wife dreamt about me cheating and was pissy about it for several days. I don't cheat, haven't ever, and won't. It was reeeeeel in my imagination though!

Expand full comment
Cedric's avatar

How would it go if you talked about a nightmare, where she didn't trust you, and she died? After that, you became a widowed man, developed the typical man-widow's depression and died because of that.

Expand full comment
Sicilianswitchblade's avatar

No idea since that's a hypothetical. My guess is she'd be looking for some sort of symbolic allegory in there, pray that her life not be ended before God's appointed time and we'd move on as usual.

My wife is far more rational and reasonable than most women and has come a very long way in the time we've been married.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Apr 5, 2025
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Sicilianswitchblade's avatar

Don't know if I convinced her of anything. I did tell her to get over it because it didn't happen and wouldn't happen. She said something along the lines of "I know, but it was so upsetting I'm still really jarred by it." Yah know cuz feels and stuff.

Expand full comment
S3er's avatar

Probably because a stupid girly magazine psycho article told them that dreams are manifestations of unconscious knowledge and that dreams therefore are scientifically proven to be true. Trust me, sis.

Expand full comment
Snowyteller's avatar

Some people bring up other men as a danger when it comes to philandering, cheating and so on, but what a man should fear is being stabbed to death by a woman who thinks she loves him, if she can't have him, nobody can.

That this madness is made into a charm point by the Japanese in the form of the yandere...

Well, may not all reach the greatness of Samson and Solomon, but doom by woman is quite achievable.

Expand full comment
Cedric's avatar

This is why knowing Game isn't optional. It's critical. I want and need to know who is dangerous, just as you want to know which flowers and which animals are handled or avoided.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Apr 5, 2025
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Cedric's avatar

Another reason to read the bible.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment removed
Apr 5, 2025
Comment removed
Expand full comment
GH's avatar

Next ask for a taxonomy of dreams.

Expand full comment
Comment removed
Apr 5, 2025
Expand full comment
GH's avatar

You're well on your way to 347 genders. Tumblr trembles...

Expand full comment
DREWIEY's avatar

What does it have to do with this article or even the SSH?

Expand full comment
Julie C's avatar

Not a thing. He just wants everyone to notice that he's back.

Expand full comment