One of my husband’s car club friends mentioned at the club’s holiday dinner that I haven’t thrown my husband under the bus lately. So let me just make up for that: I think he deserves it for the sake of all woman kind whose men just can’t admit when WE ARE RIGHT.
Fact: The hot water in our shower was not hot, even when the handle was straight up.
Fact: I took several lukewarm showers over the last couple months.
Fact: A year or so ago, when I first complained about it, my husband’s solution was to turn up the temperature on the hot water heater.
Fact: Neither he nor I turned it back to the recommended safety temp right after he turned it up, nor anytime in the past year.
Fact: I knew it was not at the recommended safety temperature because it’s indicated by a white tick mark on the temperature knob.
I really just wanted to have the option to take a hot shower, it wasn’t asking much. It didn’t have to be burning hot, but taking a lukewarm shower just chilled me to the bone for the whole day.
When it started happening a year or so ago, turning up the hot water temperature did kind of solve the problem. But the recommended hot water temperature is recommended for a reason: it’s the point at which the water is hot, but not so hot it could cause 2nd or 3rddegree burns.
This is more of a concern for elderly people and small children; with neither in the house at this time of our lives, I let it slide. However, a couple months ago it started getting worse. I was taking cool showers. My husband probably was too, but wouldn’t admit it. When I complained, he headed for the hot water heater, I said, “Don’t you dare.”
Then he came to me a couple days later, “Was your shower warm.”
“Kind of.”
“I turned up the temp. Just barely, it’s still on the recommended temp.”
“It hasn’t been on the recommended temperature for over a year.”
“Yes it has, you made me turn it back down.”
“No it hasn’t.”
So I showed him the temp knob: “Right” wife exhibit number one.
I knew there must be something plugged in the regulator and I knew what it would look like. I don’t know how I knew as I didn’t install it, except to say that my dad was a handyman and often I would be with him when he fixed things.
“Something is blocking the side of the regulator that lets in the hot water.”
“No, I installed that with your dad. You don’t understand what it does.”
“My dad? That was 15 years ago?”
“See these gears on the handle. You can’t turn it up any higher.”
“What about the hardware behind the actual handle? There’s got to be some kind of regulator behind the trim plate around the handle.”
“In order to fix that I have to make a hole in the wall on the other side, in the other bathroom.”
“Well, the other bathroom needs to be remodeled anyway.”
Apparently he took that statement as a threat or was attempting to prove me wrong, because he removed the plate from the around handle, freeing up the regulator in the back. What do you know? There was another whole set of hardware reachable from inside the shower.
“Hey, I think this regulator is plugged by the piston float that keeps it from leaking. This thing is old and just needs to be replaced.”
But I already knew that. We have hot water.
Gretchen Leigh is a stay-at-home mom who lives in Covington. She is enjoying completely hot showers these days. You can also read more of her writing and her daily blog on her website livingwithgleigh.com or on Facebook at “Living with Gleigh.”Her column is available every week at maplevalleyreporter.com under the Lifestyles section.
