Ask any married guy about nagging. Preferably ask it in front of his wife and watch the fireworks ensue. Bring popcorn, it’ll be great I promise.

I see nagging as a two-sided issue. We can keep score here and say that some men deserve it and some women are complaining assholes for the sake of being miserable and taking everyone down with the ship. Like many/most things, there are a few angles we need to analyze. It’s going to come down to “Are my actions or lack of action the problem or is her behavior unacceptable or is it a combination of the two?”

Before we get into it, lets define Nagging.

Nag-ging: (adjective): A person who continuously harasses someone to do something or who continuously finds faults in others.
“My wife would not stop nagging me about taking out the trash.”

It’s common knowledge that nagging is predominately done by wives towards their husbands and not the other way around. Men have their own form of nagging but, it’s not called that. From my view here are some commonalities in nagging:

• Generally, wives nag husbands.
• Stems from the wife’s perception or role to manage the home.
• Women tend to be less direct than men and may not ask for what they want. 
• Women are highly aware of nagging and do not want to be associated with that. Oddly enough, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts. 
• Women tend to be quicker in detecting when a relationship changes even in the most subtle of ways. 
• Women tend to nag men (their husbands) over household chores or “honey do” type tasks. Men/husbands may prioritize other things that are more important or yes, they may in fact be lazy.
• SOME women really like to control everything. They will tell you when and how the most mundane of tasks such as how the dishwasher is to be loaded needs to be done. They tend to care more about the control aspect of their technique being utilized rather than the task being done to standard. 
• In a traditional setting (trad wife/stay at home home) a woman cannot put off some of her husband’s request such as buying groceries. If she did the family would have nothing to eat. 

Practical Advice

The man is the problem, the woman is the problem, or most likely ya both are feeding into the problem.

Men: Pay attention and help out with the running of the home. Do the least lazy thing. Don’t pass a problem such as the giant pile of laundry. Don’t create stupid problems like throwing your dirty underwear on the floor instead of putting it in the dirty laundry hamper or whatever system is in place (assuming there is a system here, if not make one). If your wife makes a request that is not obvious to you (some honey do thing) stack it in your priorities and ask why it must be done now and tell her what is on your priorities of things to get done. Provide her a timeline of when it is going to get done and do it. Realize that you probably nag too. It’s just not called that; it’s complaining followed by blaming. Stop doing that. NEVER EXPECT SEX FROM HONEY DO’S OR HOUSEHOLD CHORE TASKS. Physical intimacy should not be attached to this. Chore play is not seduction and foreplay. Failing to help your wife out breeds resentment. Time to fix it.

Women: I fully realize you have probably asked this dude a 1,000 times to do this. I would recommend you articulate why this is a level 84 priority in his day. I know you’re going to say that you shouldn’t have to explain. Well, you should. I’m going into this assuming your husband is a “good man” that cares for his family and for you. He’s racking and stacking man duties in his mind by order of importance or perceived consequences of not doing whatever it is. Little subtle hints aren’t going to work. Be direct “Baby, I need you load the dishwasher now. We have company coming over and it must get done. I love you, you’re a fucking stud”. That will work. Show him you appreciate him.  Kindness and sweetness goes a hell of a long way.  DO NOT PROMISE HIM SEX AS A REWARD. This is horrible form on your part. If your husband can’t do it because there are bigger fish to fry, accept it and move on. Don’t get resentful if he’s working his ass off on bigger things. Your priorities may not be THE priority. That’s fair. Nagging makes you insufferable, miserable to be around.

Both of you two bozos need to stop and have a real conversation on this topic. Learn to be very realistic and prioritize. Your wants and needs both matter and we gotta be reasonable here. Look yourself in the mirror and see if you need to fix you first. If so, do it. If not, address the behavior don’t attack your wife. She should also look at herself and see if she needs to adjust her way of doing things. If so, she should. The truth is it’s probably both of you feeding into this problem. Stop blaming each other and fix your side of the bullshit.