Marital Discord – II
This is the 2nd part of the article published last week. It addresses the issues of conflicts between couples. Last week we addressed certain behavioral interventions that a wife could make in order to restore balance in the relationship. This week let us look at what changes the husband could make in order to have a better relationship.
It is true that marital conflicts are inevitable. Pure love is a fantasy and love is always admixtured with hatred. To experience intensity in the marriage, a love-hate relationship that peaks and ebbs is necessary. The only problem is that couples then get swayed and lose control. It is becoming increasingly difficult for young couples to maintain the vigorous demands of faith and fidelity in today’s seductive world. Normal marital relationship is often boring and monotonous. The familiarity decreases passion; some have difficulty connecting marital sexual activity to erotic scripts in adolescence. Also the biological drive decreases, men take longer to reach orgasm, there is a longer refractory period and women need more stimulation to reach orgasm. After a while even the sexual activity is placid and more out of physical need than out of love. There is a decrease in the frequency of sexual activity. It depends more on male interest. Also many males move their attention towards career. There is also a deeroticisation of women because of the wife-mother role. This may lead many men to experience marriage as a burden.
What the husband can do:
A simple rule is to think big, listen more, talk less, concentrate more, be honest, use nice words and have patience. You may feel that it is almost impossible to make your wife happy, or perhaps it is possible in the first year of marriage or late (retirement years) in life. What you may require is a better understanding of your wife. Managing and making your wife happy is an art and not a science. A common tendency is to agree with her, do exactly as you wish to and in case you are caught red-handed, say sorry. This may breed duplicity and mistrust in you. If you do whatever she wants first, doing your own thing may become much more peaceful. You could ask your wife every morning about what tasks she would like to be finished in the day, and completing those tasks properly shows that you care. One of the common complaints that she may have is that you do not listen to her. You might have a tendency to rush in, fix up things with good advice. But often you may fail to spend time to look at the problem from her perspective. You do not listen with the intent to understand but with the intent to reply. You are seeing things from your own view, filtering everything and reading your own autobiography into her life. If she senses that the technique that you are employing is devoid of character and relationship base, then she wonders why you are doing it, what your motives are and does not open up to you. You should listen with your eyes and listen for feeling. You listen for body language, meaning, behavior and sense. You intuit and feel. Whenever you talk you have to talk based on your character. Character and radiance builds trust. If behavior flows naturally then she can trust you. She will feel safe enough to express experiences and tender feelings. Unless you understand her situation and feelings, you won’t know how to advice or counsel her. What you say is good and fine, but it does not quite pertain to her. She may be angry and defensive, guilty and afraid to be influenced, even though she knows that she needs what you could tell her. You should also learn to admit your mistakes gracefully. Mistakes are the best teachers and you may benefit from each incident. Find out the basic reason for the unhappiness because it does not matter who was right and who was wrong as eventually both get hurt. You may feel that decision-making is extremely tough for your wife as her perennial question is to decide the dinner. Being asked daily as to what should be cooked might irritate you. You may be sad that your wife is not perfect. It is better to accept the bad points and allow yourself to enjoy the good points. Encourage her to become a hero once in a while, do some social work, and enjoy the limelight. Give her compliments and appreciate what you might have taken for granted so far. Do not retaliate when she shouts at you. Be her punching bag and eventually you will profit. You are the only person in the world who will take it. This will give her a tremendous sense of security in the marriage. When she explodes on seemingly small lapses on your part, ignore the outbursts. Give her time. This might be more valuable than expensive presents. Do something for your wife without expecting gratitude. Do it for the inner joy that you will have. Occasionally you might have to say no. When you do that, do it firmly but gracefully. This will help you to maintain her trust in your judgments and reliability. The final thing is that you need to love your wife, every minute. Perform the little courtesies and acknowledge her with grace and you will have a very happy life.
The best way for the couples is to spend time with each other, increase effective communication and to understand the limitations of the partner. Divorces are messy, traumatic for both the partners and their families and often leave an unremovable stain for either partner. Of course some marriages will break because they were never meant to be made in the first place and were forced on the couple. Sometimes divorce may be the appropriate solution to marital problems. If the decision is thoughtful and not impulsive, then it can help the couple to effect a humane and sensible end to the marital deadlock for the sake of their own mental health and for the children.
