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I think I might be allergic to doing the dishes.

At least that’s what I keep telling my wife. Whenever she notices the dishes piling up I get a friendly reminder that it might be time to do something about the Leaning Tower of Plates that has accumulated in the kitchen. I try to remind her that I would, but whenever I get close enough to actually do the dishes I begin to feel queasy and light-headed. I explain that the doctors haven’t officially diagnosed my form of dish allergy yet but their hard at work on it.

She isn’t buying it.

The truth is (and let’s just keep this between us, OK?) I hate doing the dishes. I know, I know; if I just did them every night after dinner it wouldn’t be such a big deal. But most nights I skip other them thinking, “There’s not too many (can you tell we don’t have any kids yet?). I’ll wait till tomorrow to do them.” The problem is that I say this just about every day till a stack of dishes has piled up halfway between the sink and then ceiling. I figure if it isn’t touching the roof then it isn’t really a problem yet, right?

I think a lot of us work this way in our relationships. We let frustrations just pile up inside about someone who has hurt us. We get more and more irritated but never really say anything about it until one day, much like the day I actually do the dishes, we realize there’s a whole pile of things that need to be dealt with.

Most people don’t like dealing with conflict. Most people also don’t like it when you come at them with a bunch of reasons why you’re mad at them either. When we make the time to talk to people about what’s bothering us before it becomes the Mt Kilimanjaro of confrontations it may not turn out as Nightmare on Elm Street-ish as we imagine it in our head.  Take stock of your relationships. Talk to who’s hurt you, but do it in the right way and do it soon. Don’t let the dishes pile up in your relationships (and don’t let them pile up in the sink either).