The scales have fallen from my eyes. How can I ever repay Dr Laura Schlessinger for showing me where I have been going wrong all these years?

There was I, muddling blithely along, thinking that give and take would get me and my Other Half through those rare, but bracing episodes of discord Americans refer to as "learning experiences".

After all, give and take is what Golden Wedding couples always credit for keeping them from the divorce court.

But now it's clear that what I should have been doing is prostrating myself on the carpet and having the word "doormat" tattooed on my backside.

Evening Press readers will have seen, as I did in last night's paper, Dr Laura's failsafe plan for marital harmony.

Ironically enough, I probably follow a fair few of Dr Laura's rules. I cook dinner (I like to cook); and I don't mind if my OH plays sport, watches it on telly, or if he goes off with his pals on sporting holidays. I like some time to myself, so I can hardly complain if he does, too.

But Dr Laura's recipe goes far beyond this, and it appears to boil down not so much to give and take, as to give up and give in if you're born with breasts and a womb.

Women with kids should, apparently, pack in their jobs, because, reckons Dr Laura, feminism and careerism have severely damaged male/female relationships.

How silly of me not to realise that bailiffs and county court judgments are so much less painful for families that could be on their uppers without two wage packets coming in to the house. There's more. Men don't chase women for their IQs, she says, and I freely admit that may be true.

Funnily enough, it cuts both ways. Please don't tell him I said this, but I didn't first admire my Other Half for his philosophical genius.

And Dr Laura believes gays to be "biological errors", which must have made their day.

But what really gets my goat about Dr Laura and all those experts who stick their noses through your net curtains and analyse your home life is the way they prescribe a lifestyle for you.

If a couple wants to live along entirely traditional lines, that's fine with me, just as it is if the man stays home while his spouse brings home the bacon.

And if, over Dr Laura's dead body, they both want - or need - to go out and earn a living, and they arrange proper care for any children they may have, then that's nobody's business but theirs.

The moment somebody uses the word "should" about an entire gender, or asserts what its "role" should be... that's the moment I reach for the hand grenades.

The Evening Press also discussed last night the difficulties couples have in communicating their wants and needs. This was much more like it, particularly questions such as "Do I look fat?" which translated as "Do you still love me?"

With this in mind, I offer a few other translations of commonly-used expressions:

This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you (I am sick to the back teeth of you, so this is going to hurt like hell)

To be perfectly honest (either I'm lying now or I'm telling the truth for the first time in my life. All you have to do is work out which one of the above applies)

Your call is important to us, please hold (I couldn't give a damn if you live, die or end up in hock to your phone company before a real person picks up the line. Here, have another blast of The Cuckoo Waltz)

Just between you and me (and anyone else who knows me)

To be fair (To be absolutely unfair)

Updated: 11:08 Wednesday, September 08, 2004