We women think that we know exactly what men want....and that begins with sex, right? If I ask you: what is beyond sex that men want, and it is not good food? you will be at a challenge to answer...
Well, here we want to share something else, perhaps disregarded in the daily quest to manage your passive aggressive husband. Or ignored by the roles women assume in daily life, as mothers of boys. We want to share here some conclusions of our survey on men needs.
As a first conclusion, a man’s sense of his own identity is almost completely linked to the image reflected back to him by his relationships.How you see him is a powerful tool for him to feel accepted and valued, or ignored and rejected....
When he feels appreciated in his daily efforts, his battle to conquer the world is justified; when he is ignored and taken for granted, he is sapped of his confidence and sense of manhood. At the same time we women need to feel loved and connected, they want to feel respected.
Respect? where is that coming from, you can say? we didn't talk about respect here before....but in my role as a spouse and later a mother, I can remember when those roles mixed, and I ended up seeing all men as children to be guided, told what is best, admonished and sometimes controlled for their own good. I began to lose respect for men as a group that knew what to do....always. Let me share some of my then conclusions:
- Wife assumes that he needs to be told what to do or to be reminded of basic things, like how to dress for a party;
- Wife assumes that if he doesn’t do something, it is because he doesn’t care to make her, the wife happy
- Wife assumes that all relationship problems are caused by him and need fixing...if only she can teach him!
From here, you would be sending him a message that he receives as:
“My wife feels she is in charge and that I am not an adult. She feels she needs to raise me the way she might raise a child.”
Do you remember this happening to you? believing that you can reduce all his motivations to be satisfied in bed and well fed? The core aspect of your partner's soul, his individual personality gets forgotten and we think we can manage them in a very simple way. I had to relearn my own perspective years ago...Now, in our survey, men expressed that situation as feeling isolated and rejected, not respected in who they are...
I hear you immediately asking: How can I respect a passive aggressive man?
First, abandon the idea of fixing him. We call it here "detach," in several old posts.
It means that you are not supposed to "help him cure his passive aggression" by dragging him to a therapist, or a counselor....We know that it produces nothing: he will resist, abandon and make fun of your attempt to fix him.
Second, and in good faith, try to find some aspect of his presence in your life that you can appreciate. There must be something: is he providing? is he taking care of some of the children's care? Is he good at repairing things in the house?
Now, if you take care of appreciating those good aspects of your spouse, you will be solving some of his hidden needs, such as:
“I need to feel accepted and not be put down constantly”
“I need to hear words of appreciation, when I’m doing my best”
Of course, this is not a magic remedy...but a behavior that can take you somewhere different from the stuck place you are in now....It's worth an honest try!
