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One Christmas, we flew from Los Angeles to Chicago to be with extended family. We spent the first night with Leslie's family. In keeping with lifelong tradition, she woke up early to squeeze every possible minute into being together with the family. But I slept in. My family had always enjoyed a slower, easier pace during the holidays.

Leslie interpreted my sleeping in as rejection. She felt I didn't value time with her family. "It's embarrassing to me," she said. "Everyone is up and eating in the kitchen. Don't you want to be with us?"

Her intensity caught me off guard. "What did I do? I'm just catching up from jet lag. I'll come down after my shower." I had broken a rule I didn't even know existed, and Leslie discovered a rule she'd never put into words. Both of us felt misunderstood and frustrated.

Unspoken rules don't surface until an unsuspecting spouse "breaks" one of them. To keep little problems from turning into big ones, Leslie and I try to discuss our secret expectations and make our subtle rules known. We also help the couples we counsel become more aware of their unspoken rules. Here are some of the hidden rules we've uncovered:

• Don't interrupt another's work.
• Don't ask for help unless you're desperate.
• Don't call attention to yourself.
• Don't raise your voice.
• Don't talk about negative feelings.

As they begin to voice their clashing unspoken rules, couples can create a balance of relationship rules they can agree on.

While unspoken rules trip us up when we least expect it, they're not the only source of mismatched expectations. Think about the unconscious roles that you and your partner fall into, almost involuntarily. Just as an actor in a play follows a script, so do married couples. Without knowing it, a bride and groom are drawn into prescribed ways of relating to each other that are a mixture of personal dispositions, family backgrounds and marital expectations.

Mark and Jenny ran into their unconscious roles head-on. The trouble began during the three days they had set aside after their honeymoon to set up their new home. Following the script they inherited from their families of origin, each of them looked to the other to take the lead. Jenny's dad had all the right tools and was handy around the house. Her mom simply assisted him when needed. Mark's dad was a busy executive who hardly knew how to replace a light bulb. In Mark's home, it was Mom who hung the pictures and arranged the furniture. Mark and Jenny fell into their "assigned" roles as husband and wife, and each wondered why the other wasn't pulling his or her weight.

Most couples follow a script that was written by the role models they grew up with. Being aware of these scripts is often all it takes to make couples aware of their unconscious roles and allow them to write a new script together.

Mark and Jenny went through their first year of marriage without ever hanging a single picture. Their prescribed roles prevented it. Not until they were in counseling did they become aware of their unconsciously assigned roles and set out to change them. "Now we're building our own marriage and not just being robots," says Jenny. The expectations you bring to your partnership can make or break your marriage.

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