A marriage counselor might encourage you to work out your differences for the kids or at least to wait until they’re older to split up.
Intimacy skills teach you how to start enjoying your relationship now, for yourself. Of course your kids will benefit, but you’ll be staying married because you want to, not just for their sake.
I don’t have kids, but my sisters, girlfriends, and clients talk about how, when their kids came into the world, they were so vulnerable and utterly dependent. They say that caring for them is unspeakably gratifying because it’s purposeful and important. They speak about how those little people need them for their very survival and how that need contributed even more to the deep bond they felt. They tell me how completely smitten they were with their babies from the moment they arrived.
Heather told me she felt that, after the birth of her first son, her husband didn’t really need her attention, at least not like her son did. She felt that she could focus all her energies on her son and that her husband would be fine. “He wasn’t vulnerable and dependent like my baby, so I just let him fend for himself.” Heather’s baby was giving her much more of a high right then, so this behavior felt natural.
She also found herself unwittingly ordering her husband around. She’d say “Hand me that bottle” or “Go get the diaper bag.” She was on a mission to care for her son, and it was an overwhelming amount of work. In the course of getting everything done, she inadvertently started honoring her child and parenting her husband.
Another husband told me that since the arrival of their new baby, he can’t seem to do anything right for his wife. “Only she can wash the bottles the right way,” he said. “Then she complains that she’s so overwhelmed and tired. It’s hard to know what to do for her other than just staying out of the way.” So to keep the peace, he backed off and let his wife run the show. She may have noticed him playing on his phone while she was starting a load of laundry and decided he was unbelievably lazy or selfish. She probably resented that he was relaxing while she did all the work and wondered if she’d had a child with a child. From her point of view, he was certainly acting like one.
It’s normal for mothers to fall madly, deeply in love with their children. But one of the best gifts you can give yourself and them is to at least pretend that you love your husband more. After all, those kids are half him, and they want nothing more than to have the home-court advantage of happy, united parents.
If you’re trying to give your kids that happy home but finding it a struggle to keep the peace, here’s a quick way to see if you are unwittingly pouring gasoline on the fire. Ask yourself these questions: What are the first three things that come to mind about your husband? How would you describe him?
Would you say he’s grumpy a lot, loses his temper easily, and is obsessed with his phone? That he’s forgetful, impatient, and insensitive? Or would you say he’s hardworking, smart, and generous? Maybe you’d say he’s dependable, thoughtful, and successful?
Whenever I meet a wife whose first few words about her husband are negative, I know right away that their marriage is a struggle. The surest indicator of a happy relationship is a wife who speaks highly of her husband. And the surest indicator of a marriage with big problems is a wife who automatically brings up her husband’s faults.
You might think that’s because a happy wife has married a good guy and an unhappy wife has not been so lucky. But there’s more to it than that.
When a wife naturally speaks highly of her husband, she’s demonstrating that she respects him. And when she respects him, that brings out his natural desire to make her happy, which makes her feel cherished. So when I hear respectful comments coming out of her mouth, I know that things are going pretty well at her home.
If, however, a woman naturally speaks critically or negatively about her husband, it tells me that she doesn’t respect him and lets me know there’s plenty of tension at home. He’s sure to be defensive a lot, and therefore probably appears cranky, grumpy, or short-tempered. And she probably has no idea why.
Even worse, she most likely has a negative PR campaign going with the kids about their dad. If Mom is constantly complaining that Dad is a lazy slob, the kids are most likely going to take on that view, even though she’s talking about their hero. Husbands get very defensive about that and start to seem hostile or distant but rarely say why.
It doesn’t have to be that way.
When I’ve asked women to consider taking a different approach when they talk about their husbands in front of their kids, they’ll sometimes say things like “I would, but it’s true that he really is a slob” or “But he really is late all the time.”
I get that they have plenty of evidence that their husbands have these negative qualities. But the “truth” is subjective in these cases. Yes, you may have years of evidence that your husband arrives late, but chances are he has also arrived on time on occasion. Perhaps that’s the minority of the time, but it still calls into question the idea that he’s always late.
Instead of constantly complaining about your husband’s lateness, you could decide to say nothing about it or you could wait until he’s on time and then mention how much you appreciate it. Your kids will get a completely different impression about their dad when you decide to focus on the positive.
Even if you believe you’re speaking the absolute truth about your husband, when you criticize him in front of or directly to your kids, there’s not much upside. But I have seen lots of distant, cranky, hostile husbands change overnight when they start to feel respected again.
Another downside when you criticize your husband in front of your kids is that you’re also criticizing them by extension. They came from that guy, so in a way you’re putting them down when you put him down. You’re also creating a vicious cycle where you reinforce the criticism of your husband, because your kids will parrot what you say and remind you what’s wrong with their dad in the future.
Until she learned the Six Intimacy Skills, Evelyn believed her husband was cranky from working a lot, so she was always saying to the kids, “Dad’s just being grumpy.” She didn’t think she was being disrespectful—just the opposite. She thought she was cutting the guy some slack, even though he’d been in a bad mood for the last decade. But when she changed her attitude, she was surprised to find out how much she had been contributing to that bad mood. Like when her husband said he’d gotten a bad deal on their new car because he paid for half of it and she got to drive it to work every day, her first thought was, “What about the years you were out of work and I paid for everything for you?” But instead she made a decision to be respectful. She said, “Yes, I did get a good deal on that. Thanks for being so generous.” He beamed and was in a great mood after that.
In line at the hardware store later that day, Evelyn picked up a pink gardening hat and said, “I want this!” Then she put it back.
Her husband said, “Do you want it?”
Evelyn shrugged and said, “No, that’s okay.”
But her husband said, “I think you do because you said you do.” He handed it to the cashier and said, “We’ll take this.”
She even noticed that her kids were getting along better and everybody seemed happier. Perhaps her husband wasn’t as naturally grumpy as she’d thought. Perhaps he had just been living up to his bad PR.
One powerful way you can start honoring your husband is to be respectful of him in front of the kids. You could decide to always tell a positive story about him, even if it’s hard for you to think about him that way. Your kids are likely buying into whatever you say, so you have a lot of power to represent their dad as capable and wise, or at least as the guy who keeps everybody in the family in mobile phones.
Growing up, my mom’s PR about my dad was that he wasn’t working up to his potential. She would tell us kids that he was a really smart guy and he could be making a lot more money and doing something he enjoyed a lot more than taking X-rays at a hospital. She actually brought people to the house to talk to my dad about various career opportunities she thought he should pursue. She would say what a shame it was that he didn’t try to move up in the world and insist that he worked the graveyard shift because he couldn’t get along with people. As a result, I grew up believing that my dad never achieved his potential and had poor people skills to boot.
My parents split up for the last time when I was seventeen. They were both at their worst during that split, which tore up the whole family. I could see for myself that my dad had serious anger issues, and I didn’t have any relationship with him at all for years.
Then I learned the Six Intimacy Skills. Not only did I gain a completely different perspective on my husband, I saw my dad through new eyes as well.
Looking back, I now see that my dad worked two jobs to support a wife and four kids so that my mom never had to go to work. He worked the graveyard shift because he could make a little more money to bring home to his family. I also remember him helping me with my homework and taking us to Disneyland and to the beach for cookouts. I remember him sharing his love of reading, teaching me to use power tools, and helping me plant a strawberry patch.
The headline of that story could have been: “Man works really hard, provides a house, food, clothes, toys, and family vacations for six people.” That guy deserves a medal. But, because of the way mom portrayed it, we grew up thinking of dad as a tragic, angry underachiever.
When I thought about all that I had gotten from my dad, I became a lot more grateful to and respectful of him. When I finally spoke to him again, one of the first things he said to me was, “Whatever I did in the past to upset you, I’m really sorry. You’ve always meant the world to me, and I’ve always wanted the world for you.”
Another problem with criticizing your husband in front of your children is that you are undermining his authority and power. When you think about all the things that only a father can provide for a child, that’s really a big loss.
I got a taste of how helpful a father can be when my husband and I were babysitting my six-year-old nephew Nate. I got him into the tub for a much-needed bath after a day at the fair, but I wasn’t making much progress getting him washed. He told me I wasn’t allowed into the bathroom, so I would just crack the door a bit every so often and say, “Nate, it’s time to start washing off now. How about using some soap?” But he kept ignoring me in favor of playing with his toys.
I told my husband, “Nate’s refusing to clean himself off.”
John immediately marched into the bathroom and said, very authoritatively, “Nate! Wash yourself!” Nate grabbed the soap and immediately started using it vigorously.
John’s authoritative approach was very different than my friendly suggestions, but it was really effective. A few minutes later I said, “Nate, it’s time to get out of the tub and get ready for bed.”
He ignored me.
I turned to John again, who walked in and said, “Nate! Out of the tub!”
Nate jumped out and started toweling himself off.
What a difference! Just like Matthew’s dad Mike, John knew exactly what to do. It’s as though men come with special talents for child-rearing that seem rather irreplaceable—and so helpful if we’re willing to respect them.
I’m an amateur in the child-rearing department, so maybe I was doing it all wrong to begin with, but it was enormously helpful to me as an aunt to have my husband’s help getting Nate to cooperate. I can only imagine what a big role fathers must play in keeping harmony at home.
Marcia couldn’t understand why her husband would let her boys get rowdy when they were at a restaurant. She felt like he didn’t notice them shrieking or jumping up and down, and then it was up to her to settle them down, which they didn’t do easily. She resented having to be the bad guy while her husband just powered through his meal.
After some coaching around this issue, Marcia tried a different approach. When the boys were getting out of hand at a wedding, she turned to her husband and said, “I wish they would settle down. I would love to fool everyone into thinking we have well-behaved children.” Her husband smiled, then immediately went over to the boys and put his head next to theirs. He was out of Marcia’s earshot, but whatever he said, the two boys instantly changed their demeanor, sitting up straight in their chairs and quieting down.
Her husband not only did the heavy lifting, he got a better result than Marcia usually did in that situation.
“I realize that I hadn’t left much room for him to do that kind of thing before,” Marcia told me later. “I was the expert on these things, or so I thought, so he would hang back. But it’s such a relief to have his help.”
Your husband might also be happy to help more if he knew how pleased it would make you—and how much you wanted his help.