“She’s Very Involved with Gashmiyus”   

Written with Zivia Reischer

Rabbi Shafier,

I’m 24 years old and married for three years. My wife and I live in Eretz Yisrael, where I learn full-time and she works part-time remotely for an American company. We have two beautiful children, kein ayin hara.

I feel bad asking this question because my wife is really a wonderful person and works hard so that I can learn, as well as running the house and taking care of the kids. But there is something that’s been bothering me for a long time. When we were dating, I thought we were on the same page hashkafically. I thought she believed, as I do, that life is about ruchniyus, and gashmiyus is unimportant and a distraction. We both wanted a kollel life and I thought she valued my learning and a Torah lifestyle. And technically, we are living that lifestyle — for which I am very grateful to her.

But the problem is that she’s just very involved with gashmiyus. She spends an enormous amount of time and energy on her appearance. She’s always running to the sheitelmacher to get this or that fixed or adjusted or whatever. She spends a lot of time on how the kids look also. It’s not even that she spends a lot of money — it’s just a lot of time and shopping and preoccupation with how the kids are dressed and what color socks match their new shoes. When we have a simchah to go to, there’s always a whole deal about what she’s going to wear and then it takes her hours — literally — to get ready.

She’s a wonderful person with fine middos and I have a lot of hakaras hatov for everything she does for me and our children. But I feel like we’re living in two different universes. She’s just so attached to gashmiyus, and I find it frustrating and disappointing. I read your article about not trying to change your spouse, but this feels like a much more meaningful issue than being messy or neat, it’s the whole ruchniyus of our lives together.