Stand up to your Wife

By Steve Biddulph

In this extract from his book Manhood, Steve Biddulph looks at the need for men to stand up to their partners, to value the warrior that protects their emotional castle and to set rules to their passion.

Man As Loveable Dope

Most modern men, when faced with their wife's anger, complaints or general unhappiness, simply submit, mumble an apology and tiptoe away. (Other men respond in violent ways but we'll look at them later on.) If men grumble, they do so into their beards. For the most part they act conciliatory and apologise for being such dopes. 'I'm sorry dear!'

• In the media this has become a universal male stereotype for many decades - from the classic Dagwood cartoons to the Bill Cosby Show. Everywhere you look around, the 'husband-as-a-loveable-dope' is an agreed-on type.
  
  
• Real life, however, doesn't work like the sitcoms. The millions of men who adopt this stance find that it rarely if ever leads to happiness. Women with dopey husbands are not happy - they actually become more dissatisfied, more complaining. Often without even realising why, the hen-pecking behaviour escalates - for a simple reason. Deep down, women want to be met by someone strong. They want to be debated with, not just agreed with. They hunger for men who can take the initiative sometimes, make some decisions, tell them when they are not making sense. It's no fun being the only adult in the house. How can a woman relax or feel safe, when the man she is teamed with is so soft and weak?
  
  
• I've met dozens of strong, capable feminist women, who tell me in the confidentiality of the counselling setting, that they have finally found the sensitive, caring, new-age man they thought they wanted and they are bored stiff! They are starting to drive slowly past building sites, wondering whether to whistle!
• Whenever a group of men in their thirties and forties gather, it soon emerges how many have been badly wounded in the relationship stakes. Whether they show their sadness openly, or put on a belligerent front, it's the same thing. They know they are failing to satisfy the woman in their life, have failed to keep their relationships together and don't know what they have done wrong.
  
  
• Robert Bly describes this phenomenon in men's groups:
  When the younger men spoke, it was not uncommon for them to be weeping within five minutes... grief flowed from their trouble in their marriages or relationships. They had learned to be receptive, but receptivity wasn't enough to carry their marriages through troubled times. In every relationship, something fierce is needed once in a while - both the man and the woman need to have it. But at the point where it was needed, often the young man came up short. He was nurturing, but something else was required - for his relationship and for his life. The 'soft male' was able to say 'I can feel your pain and consider your life as important as mine and I will take care of you and comfort you.' But he could not say what he wanted and stick by it. Resolve of that kind was a different matter.

• Not only can your wife be wrong, or immature, perverse, prejudiced, competitive, or bloody-minded (just like you) - sometimes you and she just will see things differently because you are different. What is right for her may often be wrong for you - it's as simple as that. Women often don't understand men. How can they unless we explain ourselves to them? That doesn't mean you can't get along, just that you have to keep negotiating! Being falsely agreeable doesn't help either of you. Prepare for many long, patient debates!
  
  
• I have heard literally hundreds of women tell me in frustration, over the years, 'My husband won't fight with me, he won't even argue. He just walks away.' Perhaps the husband walks away because he doesn't want to get physical like his father used to do. But avoidance does not solve this problem. Perhaps he had a nagging, carping mother and a weak father. Retreating is all he knows how to do. To have a happy marriage, a man has to be able to state his point of view, to debate, to leave aside hysteria and push on with an argument until something is resolved.
  
  
• Gordon Dalbey tells of a woman who phones him after he has counselled her husband: 'It's obvious Sam's getting stronger, speaking up for himself and letting me know how he feels,' she said, hesitating, 'I know I've always wanted him to be that way... but... I guess there's a part of me that kind of enjoyed having the upper hand and being able to manipulate him into doing what I wanted. I want to be strong enough myself so that I don't do that any more.' It's a measure of Dalbey's skill as a therapist that this woman is wanting to give up her power in order to experience a really equal relationship, based on intimacy and negotiation, not on emotional dominance. The Warrior

• I have known fertility problems to disappear through this work - as if a woman's body would not bear a child until her mind knew it could and would protect that child. For a marriage to thrive, both partners need to bring their Warriors along. It's not that the other person wishes them harm, just that people getting close will inevitably overstep the other's boundaries and need to be reminded. Often it's enough to say 'Hey, you are crowding me', 'Don't make my mind up for me' or 'Let me choose my own clothes!'
  
  
• Both partners can learn more respect for the other's need for selfhood. At times, there will be a real clash of realities, and more exploration will be needed. This is why couples need to fight in order to root out fixed attitudes or longer term misunderstandings, and pull them into the light of day. A good marriage is therapy, every living day. We made a mistake when we pursued the harmonious, sweet and loving ideal of marriage. The passionate, heated European style marriage has more going for it. Jung said, 'American marriages are the saddest in the world because the man does all his fighting at the office.'

• Bly is at pains to point out that if the woman in this story had been making a point, asking for a change, then the man needed to stay put and listen. But this was quite different. She was 'having a fit'. In Bly's words:
  Men and women both have this capacity for blind rage which achieves nothing. Arising out of centuries of two-way inter-gender abuse, there is an archetypal core of rage in us which if we take into our relationships, destroys all love and feeling.
  
  
• 'I've had it with men' says she! 'Women!' he cries. 'Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em!' It's the frustration of needing each other so much, but coming from a tradition of estrangement and misunderstanding that goes way back into our Judeao-Christian roots. Germaine Greer said 'All men hate all women some of the time'. And we should add, vice versa. There is a long history of male-bashing by women, and female-bashing by men. But this isn't a personal thing and shouldn't be brought into personal affairs. The inner child in our partner cannot bear to face this much hate and he or she doesn't deserve it. So there are two imperatives here. We must fight, debate and be true to ourselves, otherwise our closeness is just an act. But in fighting, we must show great restraint and always have respect. (My partner Shaaron and I wrote a book about this, called The Making of Love, which has rules for fighting and many stories by way of illustration.)

• Never be physical or threaten to be.
• Never walk out mid-fight.
• Don't use put-down language.
• Stay on the point and do not bring in other material.
• Listen to the other's point of view while honouring your own.
• Take time out, by agreement, if it becomes too heated, to think it over and return to continue the argument.

• 'Standing up to' your wife or partner as an equal without intimidating her or being intimidated by her;
• Knowing the essential differences in male and female sexuality and so mastering 'the art of the chase';
• Realising your partner is not your mother and so making it through 'the long dark night'.