Expectant Father Makes Mistakes

Dear Harlan,

My wife is pregnant, and I can't seem to stop making mistakes. This weekend we painted the nursery. I mentally planned ahead that if my wife corrected my painting technique, I wouldn't take it personally. Well, as we were painting, I occasionally dripped paint on the floor. Most of it hit the dropcloth. She asked me to be careful. I tried, but I dropped more paint. That turned "Happy Pregnant Woman" into an enraged cross between "Angry Pregnant Woman" and "Irrational Pregnant Woman." She blew up about how I ruined the floor and how it will never get clean. She threw her stuff down, left the room and said: "You just finish everything!" Trying to be a good and understanding husband, I did not explode back at her. I said that I would clean it up in a minute (I was holding a roller full of paint at the time) and that I'd stop putting so much paint on the roller. This caused a second explosion. Now, the REAL problem, she says, is that she hates the color of the nursery and doesn't want anything to do with it.What the heck am I supposed to do now?

Receptive to Advice

Dear Receptive,

First, congrats on the coming baby! Let me break this down: the paint on the floor — it's a mom wanting everything to be perfect. The color of the paint: that too is about everything being perfect. This is about control, and right now, you both have so little. Put away the paint. Once the baby arrives, pick a color based on his or her personality. Get enough dropcloths to cover the entire floor (and a fan to help the paint dry faster). The baby will sleep in your room for a while (in a bassinet or co-sleeper), so this will give you time to figure out the paint. As for your wife and her emotions, all you can do is ask that she speak to you nicely (even when yelling). She can get mad, upset and even irrational, but still, you deserve to be spoken to nicely.