Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. life.

1908

‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Penny Numbers’ Sporting Times 11 July 1/3: I shouted, ‘Your “bees,” or your “trouble and strife!”’.

2. (also stir and strife) one’s wife.

[c.1635		‘Moggy’s Misfortune’ in Farmer Merry Songs and Ballads (1897) II 27: Once I led a weary Life, / With a cross and froward Wife, / Which created Care and Strife].
[c.1672		‘The West-Country Dialogue’ in Ebsworth Roxburghe Ballads (1891) VII:2 260: She tells me I’m big enough now for a Wife [...] But I am afraid of care, trouble and strife].
1905		Duke Tritton’s Letter n.p.: And six months ago she became my Trouble An’ Strife.
1920		Age (Melbourne) 3 July n.p.: Hello, old pot and pan, how is your trouble and strife.
1927		(con. WW1) P. MacDonald Patrol 138: ‘Wot the stinkin’ ’ell’s the good of gettin’ pipped an’ leavin’ the old trouble to fend for ’erself an’ the boy?’’.
1927		Eve. Herald (Dublin) 24 Nov. 6/4: I was chatting with a taxi driver [...] a Cockney who used rhyming slang. He spoke of his wife quite respectfully as his ‘bit of trouble and strife’.
1929		J.B. Priestley Good Companions 618: Trouble-and-strife, eh? Bad, eh?
1937		J. Curtis You’re in the Racket, Too 152: I cops you tucked up in bye-bye with the old trouble and strife.
1941		West. Australian (Perth) 12 Apr. 4: The twist and twtirl and the stir and strife, / In the froth and foam of our former life.
a.1945		L. Payne private coll. n.p.: Wife Trouble and Strife.
1951		D. Stivens Jimmy Brockett 140: What’s up, boss? Fallen out with the trouble and strife?
1963		L.F. Freed Crime in S. Afr. 106: When he refers to his ‘trouble and strife’ he means his wife.
1975		‘P.B. Yuill’ Hazell and the Three-card Trick (1977) 147: My trouble and strife. The Enemy. Vera.
1981		B. Hoy ‘Uncle George’ in Wright Cockney Dial. and Sl. (1981) 108: Yer couldn’t afford to be choosy, / Yer’d work till you dropped for a quid / For yer trouble an’ strife / And to keep bref o’ life / In a blitherin’ young saucepan-lid.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 89: pen and ink for stink; trouble and strife for wife; cheese and kisses for missus, are just a few examples of rhyming slang terms common to Britain and Australia.
2001		D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 193/2: trouble-and-strife n. partner or wife.
2002		D. Shaw ‘Dead Beard’ at www.asstr.org 🌐 The only bummer is that Monica, my trouble and strife, she keeps coming along with me to make sure I don’t apple core with any of the local twists and twirls.