We're trying and I want us to work out

It's a new week and things are not back to normal yet.  Rick is home again and he is doing much better.  Or at least for the first 2-3 days he was as nice as he could be, but yesterday he started slipping back into his old self criticizing everyone and everything.  

He seems to do well for a few days and then everything starts annoying him.  He worries about everything even before anything to worry about actually happens.  I don't think this man can be truly happy.  He stays so stressed out, but he stresses himself out.  He can be perfectly fine and then talk himself into a frenzy.  A one man show.  It takes no one to do anything, or say anything.  He just starts thinking of things and before you know it he is upset about something.  I've never seen anyone like this.  He's going to die early of some stress related illness if he doesn't learn to handle his emotions.

When he is not stressed or upset about something he can be very sweet.  He helps me in any way that he can, and I appreciate everything that he does for me.  He gets up and he fixes a pot of coffee first thing.  Then he fixes breakfast for us, then as the day goes on he does whatever he needs to do.  He's a regular fix-it man, but it comes with a price.  Either he wants recognition and lots of praise or a meal out and that certainly is a fair price for whatever he does.  I think he deserves more, but that's all he asks for these days.

Every since Thanksgiving Day it has been a joy to be around him.  I really missed him and I know that he missed me too.  We still have our moments, and he still has his demands, but we're working things out as we go.  I'm trying to accept him for who he is with all of his faults, as I'm sure he is trying to do the same about me.  We're both too old to really change our ways, but we are both bending our ways a little to please each other.  It's not always easy living with me because I'm so nice and so stubborn at the same time.  I demand love and attention scattered in with respect, and he demands lots of attention....sometimes more than I can give him.  He wants to be the boss, the head of the house and I can understand that.  But with that he can get more out of me with sugar & honey, than with being a grouchy sour puss all the time.

I love Rick and I think he's sincere and that he loves me too.  We're just in a period of adjustment which has now lasted for all the years that he has been here.  I'm willing to compromise, but he has to do some compromising too for us to work.  I don't like to argue just for the sake of arguing because it's a waste of valuable time.  Why argue about nothing when we could be enjoying each others company instead?