Sex
So where are you going to find the time to rekindle old friendships, look in on your parents,help your kids with their homework... oh, and do something that'll cause your wife to thank her lucky stars she married you? There's the problem: Time is scarce. You don't have the time. Experts blithely refer to this universal modern bind as "work-family conflict." And it's not just a girl thing. "Work and family is almost always viewed as a women's issue," says Joseph Grzywacz, PhD, an associate professor at Wake Forest University school of medicine. "It's equally important for men."
Grzywacz's most recent research focuses on the opposite effect, what he calls "positive spillover" from work to home, and vice versa. Your home life helps your work when you can talk about job problems and seek advice about solving them; it also helps if you can relax and recharge at home, and if you aren't interrupted by family disruptions at work. Conversely, work helps the family by making you a more interesting person, and by providing a good salary and benefits that the entire family wants to protect. "That's the best mental-health scenario," says Grzywacz.
The worst scenario is when work conflicts with family, and vice versa. That conflict leads to a greater likelihood of depression, anxiety, and problem drinking, he found upon analyzing the results of ?3,032 responses to the 1995 US National Survey of Midlife Development.
And, apparently, how men handle that pent-up frustration has everything to do with their ability to recover from it. Emotional spills, surprisingly, may not be the answer. Marc Schulz, PhD, a clinical psychologist and professor at Bryn Mawr College, conducted a study of 42 married couples with young children; the men worked an average of 43 hours a week, and the women averaged 25 hours a week. Among those with the happiest marriages, the man would withdraw after a bad day—and his wife would let him. "They need time to unwind," says Schulz.
"Some evidence supports the idea that men are far from unemotional—that in fact they're exquisitely sensitive to emotions. They might in fact feel them too strongly. And so they just need some space when they're filled with negative feelings. There's something about good marriages that gives each partner the space to do what he or she wants to do."
As you've gathered by now, marriage is the linchpin of a happy life for most men. But to succeed in it, you'll have to balance a man's two greatest needs: the need for power and the need for intimacy. So says psychologist Gordon M. Hart, PhD, in his book, Power and Intimacy in Men's Development.
A common male mistake, he says, is to seek power and avoid intimacy. Some men just work and work and work—and never switch gears. We spend all day honing our lightning-fast problem-solving abilities—and then we take those skills home with us and try them out on the wife and kids: Hey, I get props all day for doing this stuff! Why aren't you guys impressed? Or we get scrappy with our wives in the same way we'd spar with a rival manager at work: No, I'm not selling my motorcycle! We reflexively approach everything as a power struggle: She's not going to tell me what to do. But she may think of it as an intimacy issue: I can't be your partner if you've splattered yourself on the highway.
Hart notes that in the average office environment, we have to keep our emotions in check, "otherwise we're seen as vulnerable. If we're seen as emotional, we're seen as out of control—and of course that's the kiss of death." But unless we trade in our emotional distancing for emotional responsiveness when we get home, we will lose that home. The guys who have figured out the secret of modern masculinity will come home and "take off the emotional armor," as he puts it.
Or they won't—and they'll get separated. Roughly two out of every three breakups are initiated by women. Sanford Braver, PhD, a professor of psychology at Arizona State University, surveyed hundreds of divorced men and women for his book Divorced Dads. The top reason women gave for a divorce was "losing a sense of closeness."
Marital researchers are saying lately that emotional closeness is the only thing the contemporary marriage has left. If she doesn't feel connected to you, is there any reason for her to stick around?
Most women would say no. Not practically, not morally, not financially. She had better feel close to you. If not, there's the door, and a lawyer is propping it open for her. When she goes, the children will follow.
Ironically, women still start out their marriages thrilled to be Mrs. You. Then comes Junior in a baby carriage, which nobody's ready for. According to a Univer-sity of Washington study of newlyweds, nearly two-thirds of wives suffer a big decline in marital satisfaction within about two years after a baby is born—despite what you see in diaper commercials. After year 10, satisfaction rises again—but only for men; it takes women 15 years to see a bump in satisfaction.
Men are rather famous for coming on strong before marriage and putting our feet up afterward. Marriage researcher Howard Markman, PhD, author of Fighting for Your Marriage, once told me that, after men get married, a sort of? "benign neglect" sets in, as they turn their attention to other things. "It's the biggest error men make," he said. "The man just starts taking the relationship for granted. He's assuming it's going to take care of itself." But, clearly, it doesn't.
We've had a nice little chat, sitting out here in your driveway. Now, before you go into the house, tell me: What are you going to do differently?
First off, you're going to take charge of this transition. If you need 20 minutes to decompress, take it. If you need 20 minutes sitting quietly with your wife in the den with a glass of wine and absolutely no children, do that. (My friend Kathy made that a house rule. She's still on her first marriage.) Whatever you need, man, just make it happen. "Nobody has to be a victim," says Marianne Legato, MD, author of ?Why Men Never Remember and Women Never Forget. "Eventually, people learn to wait a minute."
Okay, your 20 minutes are up. Let the games begin. Your wife wants a word with you. Sit down. Listen. Let her talk. You don't have to match her level of emotional intensity. "If other things start cropping up—like all your offenses for the past 15 years—just stop and say, ‘This doesn't help. What is the issue today?' Stop a discussion that is counterproductive," Dr. Legato says. But do it respectfully. And be patient. "Gently guide her to the issues she really wants to talk about. Give her room to calm down." In short, let her feel close to you.
A recent major study of 5,010 couples found that women are happiest in their marriages when they get their husbands' attention. The single most important factor in her happy marriage is her husband's emotional engagement. What does that mean, exactly? I put that question to Steven L. Nock, PhD, a University of Virginia sociologist and the study's coauthor.
He says it simply means "men showing interest in the routines of their wives' lives—the routine, mundane things that men normally don't talk about." Granted, it's not most men's style to do this, an acknowledgment Nock makes personally and professionally.
"I don't know about you, but for me it doesn't come naturally," he says. He wonders how many men find it perfectly natural, after several years of marriage, to sit down every day and say, "Tell me about your day." "It is an effort," he says.
Nock is sympathetic, but adamant: "Get over it," he says. Your marriage is important to you. You earn more money because of it, you live longer, you're in better health all around, your chances of having an active sex life are way better, and your standard of living is higher. If your marriage is happy, you're more productive at work than if your marriage is unhappy.
Plus, there's a more intangible but nonetheless important benefit: "Marriage is a standard of masculinity for guys," Nock says. It shows the world that you've grown up, that you're a stand-up guy. In short, marriage is a better deal for men than it is for women.
He comes to this conclusion after years of studying marriages and writing academic books like Marriage in Men's Lives. His bottom line to you: "If a guy is smart, he's going to realize he's getting a great deal, and he's going to put in a lot of effort to keep his wife happy and keep those benefits flowing."
One of the biggest trends in marriage studies of the past 30 years is videotaping couples talking and fighting. Researchers draft a bunch of undergraduate work-study grunts to watch these tapes and write down what they see, and five years later, you follow up with the couples to see who's divorced. Well, guess what? The couples who split are those who clearly ignored each other or were downright hostile. It's not the couples in which the guy actually listened to his wife when she spoke—listened and showed interest and affection. Five years later, those marriages are okay.
Five years from now, will your marriage be okay?
Now you're ready to walk in the door.
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Men's Health Philippines - December 2006 Issue
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