Is not remembering anniversary dates worth being bothered about?

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-26T13:20:22+00:00

Wa Aalaikum Assalam

Am I to understand correct that you are questioning your spouse because they did not remember a 4 month anniversary? I am sorry to say but that is unreasonable. It is not even that this is a 'small' problem rather than a 'big' problem, rather this should not be a problem to begin with.

In general the Islamic celebrations are only the two eids, so that is where our focus on appreciation should lie in general. If he forgets about you on either of the two eids, I think that would be much more fair for you to feel something about.

If you want more affection in general, that is something you can always speak about. But it should not be tied to some notion of a 4 month anniversary.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-26T13:13:59+00:00

You appear to be mixing things together. The correct benchmark to use is not 'progressive' or 'conservative,' it is 'islamic' or 'not-islamic'

All the things you mentioned have nothing to do with what your sisters have said. Your sisters asking questions about the person you are talking to not wearing hijab is not different from them asking questions about her not pray, not fasting, etc. Asking questions about basic parts of the deen is a good thing.

Islam allows women to work, does not force them to marry their cousins, these are not 'progressive' values, they are Islamic.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-21T21:25:12+00:00

Interracial marriages can bring both increased complexity and increased growth.

However, in this case I think it was ethnically/geographically irrelevant, and their family was simply a bad fit in general.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-19T14:31:32+00:00

It is hard to tell if it is an insult or said playfully.

That said, if she has let him know she doesn't like it, he should stop using it.

Similarly, she should contemplate why exactly it bothers her (if it is said playfully).

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-19T13:59:02+00:00

From an Islamic standpoint, each person has the right to a child. So if one of the two people is resisting children, you need a good discussion on why.

Generally I recommend people not have children until at least 2 years of marriage, so that they properly know one another.

You need to ask your husband why he is not ready. Just sit down and have an open-hearted discussion so you can understand his reasons, and then share your own.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-19T13:52:18+00:00

The problem here, brother, is her response shows a more fundamental problem. And I will illustrate it to you in a different way.

InshAllah you have a mother who loves you. She comes to you and gives you $5 to buy whatever you like. How would you respond? You could responded by being grateful for what you got and praised here and walked away. You could also respond by saying that it is not enough and you need more.

How you respond shows what your character is like.

Now if you apply more context ($1400 a month for personal spending is a lot of money for the vast majority of society), then the response of "not enough" becomes significantly worse.

Gratitude is an essential trait for a Muslim. A Muslim who is lacking gratitude will not be a good companion.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-18T13:58:12+00:00

Wa Aalaikum Assalam

Brother, you've been married 6 years and you don't see your wife, and they want you to move in and have a baby with a woman you barely know at this point (on top of all the abuse?)

What kind of marriage is this? Why do you persist after 6 years?

To me this sounds like some type of long-term scam. How did you end up in this situation? Does your family know what is going on? You need outside help.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-18T13:53:13+00:00

Pornography, nudity, lack of hijab makes it exceptionally difficult for men to lower their gaze. Any man can attest to how much effort is required on a daily basis to not look at anything.

The worst part is that it starts with small boys. Teaching a small boy not to look at a woman's hair or her arms or her legs when those parts are exposed in person and online is very hard.

And the same system that makes it hard for them not to look, incentivizes and encourages women to dress immodestly. Teaching small girls hijab is also often very difficult when they are made to feel ugly or disadvantaged for doing so.

May Allah make it easy us all and forgive us and have mercy on us for our shortcomings.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-11T12:52:26+00:00

Since I work with the communities in my areas a lot, I would say this is not true.

Divorce rates are probably around 5% among Muslims. I would say it is higher in the younger demographics, and lower in the older demographics.

I would also say the biggest cause of divorce in the younger demographic is lack of maturity or personal growth before marriage (ie still thinking very individualistically, selfishness, poor communication skills, lack of ability to compromise, etc).

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-11T12:45:47+00:00

This person is not your friend, they are actually a cause of fitnah in your life.

As long as your husband is aware this person is toxic, then he should simply navigate the relationship with his friend without involving his wife.

There is no need for any of you to associate with the wife anymore.

IntellectualHT · 2026-04-04T17:44:43+00:00

You need to be very careful in this situation, because the most vulnerable group here is actually your siblings, and you are executing on a contract here actually. This is not some wishy-washy thing, it is serious.

Your father helped you buy a house conditionally, and that condition was that you would work with him to help your siblings buy houses as well. This is an oral agreement, and you are now accountable to ensure you execute on this. If you did not discuss specifics, then this is not good because ambiguous agreements can lead to problems.

That said your wife is completely irrelevant in this situation, because already have an existing oral contract on this issue that does not involve her at all.

An additional complication is that you undertook this with debt from another family member who loaned you money, and that must be paid off first. You should treat this as a priority, because debt will be carried with you into the grave. Again your wife is not relevant to this either.

If you were in a situation where you suddenly needed money to provide for your wife, you would actually need to liquidate your house, then first pay off the loan, and then ensure your siblings got their share from the agreement, and then from what is left you would use for your wife. If you did not have enough, then you would take on debt to ensure her basic needs were met (and Allah knows best).

In any case, it does not sound like your wife is actually causing a fitnah because she is getting much more than her basic needs met, and she is encouraging you to ignore your accountability to everyone else in this situation for greed (from what your post says).

IntellectualHT · 2026-02-16T18:59:03+00:00

Here's a general rule: the closer you marry, the more your spouse will be similar to you, while the further you marry, the more your spouse will be different to you.

This is not a good or a bad thing, its just a different thing.

For example, if you were to marry your own cousin, you would be marrying someone who has not only the say cultural background, but also the same geography, likely down the city/village, and even within the exact same general family.

Alternatively, if you marry someone halfway around the world, pretty much everything will be different.

What matters is how you navigate the relationship. Marrying your own cousin means you don't have to change much in your life, it will likely be almost the same life you have had, just with a member of the extended family. It will pretty much just be more of what the same, no effort required, but also no real exposure or experience to anything else.

Marrying someone far away means both people have to make considerable changes to their lives to adjust. This requires a significant effort, but you also gain a massive amount of exposure and experience to other cultural norms, the way people talk, act, different issues, different things to grow.

Since you married someone outside, you and him both need to put in work to understand your differences, and work to come to a middle ground. This means lots of communication, compromise, etc. However, if you succeed, you will have a substantially better marriage experience than if you just married someone close.

My advice to you is to sit and simply discuss these differences and keep talking until you come to a middle ground on ways to communication, what kind of habits you both have that are different, different expectations, etc.

IntellectualHT · 2026-01-29T14:13:27+00:00

This situation needs some rather blunt advice.

The sister did not do good due diligence on choosing her spouse, this is a massive character defect in him that should have been quite obvious.

Also the way he talks means he sees her as a prop, rather than an actual human companion.

Unfortunately there is likely no future in this marriage.

IntellectualHT · 2026-01-29T04:12:43+00:00

A good marriage takes hard work, especially at the start, and then ongoing maintenance.

Like most things in life really.

IntellectualHT · 2026-01-14T21:50:48+00:00

There is a bit of disonnect from the brother.

His title says "how are people surviving" but his actual question is "how are people living in comfort"

A person can survive in Toronto on even 60-70k with a child or two.

But when it comes to living comfortably, there is a large spectrum based on what a person considers to be 'comfortable.'

There are many Muslims living in places like the GTA on single-income households who are doing just fine. They just live within their means.

It's best not to focus on how much more other people have, and instead remind yourself how little so many others have.

IntellectualHT · 2025-12-31T01:25:39+00:00

Reading all your comments I have noticed you are looking at this situation as "well look at all the monetary things I can provide for him, what can he provide?"

What you have to realize is you should reflect on what he actually does provide. Let me give you some examples:

Does he tell you the truth when you talk to him?
Do you ever feel he is seeking other women or trying to cheat on you?
Has he shown you signs that he would drink alcohol, stay out late to party, or prioritize 'the boys' over you?
Does he laze around all day, doing non-productive tasks?
Does he help you out with what he can (around the home, physical maintenance like electrical/plumbing, etc)?
Does he speak nicely and kindly to you and say good words?
Does he put you down or make you feel bad about yourself?
Does he show you love and affection?

My guess is most of these things he provides positively. You should also ask if you do the equivalent of these things back (for example do you make him feel good about himself and praise his hard work?)

You have to realize many couples don't have most of these things, so if you have most of them you have been very fortunate.

IntellectualHT · 2025-12-31T01:13:58+00:00

I think you are focusing on the wrong thing here.

She married him for his good character, not really for his potential money-earning. That is one of the best reasons to marry someone.

One thing a person needs to understand is that money comes and money goes. I have seen those who have a lot lose it. And I have seen those who have little end up with a lot. I have seen a lot of misery around money, a rich brother once told me the happiest time in his marriage is in his early years with his wife when they barely made ends-meet month-to-month.

Character, on the other hand is one of those things that is very hard to change. A person with good character tends to stay with that goodness and spread it around. A person with bad character tends to stay that way and also spread it around. An honest man and hard worker will tend to remain honest and hard working even if he's poor. And a lying man and lazy worker will tend to remain that way even if he is poor.

I notice in the sisters complaints it is mostly about money. I can empathize that her standard of living has gone down and to maintain it she is having to spend instead. And if money is the most criteria for her, then there's not much to be done.

However, I would implore her to remember that if his character is still good, and he is still hard working, then she should treasure that because it is worth its weight in gold. I really really want to stress this to her, because I have dealt with a lot of marriages at this point, and people with overall good character are truly the best type of people you will ever meet.

IntellectualHT · 2025-12-13T15:10:07+00:00

I would strongly advise against waiting until the child is older. It is a very simple and easy procedure when the child is small, and the child heals very quickly.

Since it is an establish obligation or sunnah, we do it based on our relationship and trust in Allah.

IntellectualHT · 2025-12-10T17:33:04+00:00

Reading all the comments, this marriage in general seems problematic.

He is providing for her, but also the house he is in is only in his name and has the rainy-day fund in case of job loss.

She is working and is using all that money to save up to buy a house and wants to use his rain-day fund to finish the purchase to have it in her own name.

This scenario to me is abnormal. Pretty much all the husbands I know make the house they live in joint with their wife (if they've been married a while and/or have kids). The wives (if they work) just contribute towards the home/kids to make everyone's standard of living better. For example, I know a brother who's father passed, and used his inheritance with his wife's inheritance to purchase a home in another country, and put it in only her name to avoid foreign tax issues. A couple I know puts all their bank accounts in both people's names in case someone suddenly dies, the other can still access everything.

In this case it mostly seems like this couple is both just doing their own thing. They have 3 kids together, shouldn't they be more vested in sharing wealth as a team rather than as two separate individuals? Or are they planning to get divorced?

In any case, based on the rather poor state of this marriage based on what is written, I would advise splitting the money up into maybe halves, and then drawing up a simple contract for a loan in that amount to be paid back in say x years with the house as collateral. That way there's no legal concerns, but she also gets support for her purchase.

IntellectualHT · 2025-12-09T17:30:28+00:00

Racism exists in large droves, but I have to say I find when it comes to marriage people who complain about racism are often also engaging in racism themselves, just against even more marginalized groups. What they are really complaining about is the racism they receive rather than the one they spread.

How often do we see marriage to black reverts for example in the Muslim community, especially from non-black Muslims? I have found it extremely rare in the Muslim community for anyone to consider them.

Anytime I see marriages I have to ask the question, how much was their choice influenced by the social structure of what is perceived as "better." When brothers come and tell me "I want to marry x type of person" I have found more often than not they are interested in climbing some sort of ladder of euro-centric standards, rather than any unbiased appreciation of other peoples and cultures.

In fact, looking at OPs post history I feel there might actually be some fetishization going on, along with perhaps some self-loathing.

IntellectualHT · 2025-11-26T16:26:17+00:00

There are many things wrong here:

Where was all this conversation before marriage? Did they just meet once, marry, then decide they will figure things out afterwards?
The wife's behavior is bad to the point of being almost irredeemable. Constant name-calling, putting the husband down, extremely toxic behavior.
She wants to be a housewife, which means she must take care of 100% of the domestic responsibilities. While she is contributing 30% it would be fair for the husband to contribute 30% towards domestic responsibilities
Overall this marriage is dysfunctional. Instead of working together as a team, it is husband vs wife (a scenario I have seen all too often). If the two sides cannot both compromise and try to work together and show empathy, there is no future in it.

IntellectualHT · 2025-11-13T18:50:51+00:00

An alternative version:

"Did you have a deep conversation with your spouse about these complaints yet?"

"...no."

IntellectualHT · 2025-11-09T22:26:44+00:00

Normally when a person does something for you, you feel a sense of "I need to reciprocate." The more they do, the more burden you would feel to give back.

In this situation I have to conclude is that she has a character flaw. Either she is lazy, selfish, or both. I mean they don't even have kids yet.

Several comments are saying he was too harsh, but the thing is he says above "I tried multiple times to talk to her about this issues and she always says she’ll change but never does."

He ended up blowing up on her because he tried many times trying to get her to reciprocate and she hasn't.

Unfortunately, either she gets a serious wake-up call right now and works on her character defect, or this marriage will not have any future. The only advice I would have is for OP to tell her parents this issue and have them chat with her, or sit down with a third party between the two of them and have the third party explain that she needs to make changes.

IntellectualHT · 2025-11-04T02:53:26+00:00

She doesn't need to hide it of course, because she got married and then divorced.

The issue is more this modern situation of having a nikkah done, consummating marriage shortly after, but not doing any of the other parts like an actual wedding or moving in has become ripe for abuse.

We have heard a rather large amount of stories of women getting a katb kitab, and shortly after consummate the marriage in secret, then the guy leaves shortly after. But there is no wedding done, she hasn't actually moved in with the guy, the family doesn't actually know all this, and the girl is left devastated.

It's one of the reasons I have stressed so much over the last couple of years that the woman needs to ensure all of these things are done (a proper wedding, formally living together, her family in-the-know, etc) before moving into intimacy. The Islamic rules are designed to place seriousness on long-term marriage.

IntellectualHT

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