In my 20 year marriage, I had a few holidays where my wife and I were just not in a good way. We weren’t talking much. We were functional or barely dealing with one another. I was wondering if we should stay together or not. And then there was this pressure to get gifts and show up “happy” for her […]
The holidays can be a super-challenging time for a married guy or any man in relationship. His wife’s over-spending on excessive gifts. Trying to be “joyful” with her when you’re just not. The sense of obligation to be on your best behavior for the kids. It can all leave a guy dreading the holidays. Yet these are mere symptoms of […]
Eight years ago, I was 44 years old, married 17 years, with a 15-year-old son. I’d been through many death and life cycles in my marriage. I was about to go through another one. My wife and I were in the kitchen, talking about what we should get my son for Christmas. She asked for my opinion. I brought my […]
“It’s been months since we´ve been intimate,” Bob says to me. “I try to go near her and she pulls away. What the hell? This is insane.” “This is my wife, the woman I committed to being monogamous with, and yet she won´t even let me touch her.” Do you struggle when it comes to intimacy with your wife? A […]
Every week I talk to guys with some version of this experience. I’ve been married to my wife for x number of years. I do A and she wants me to do B. I ask her what she wants of me and she says I should just know. After so many years together, I still don’t know what she wants […]
“This being human is a guest house” is the first line from a Rumi poem. The line means things happen in life and we get to decide if we flow with them or resist. It speaks to when you feel like things are happening TO you instead of FOR you. In your marriage, that might be the same old conflict […]
My client Simon was a top dog in the software industry. A founder and CEO of his own company. He prided himself on the outcomes he achieved in his business. A great workplace. A profitable bottom line for 12 quarters straight. A super relationship with an awesome board of directors. If only he could say the same thing at home […]
Shhh. I have a secret. It’s something nobody tells you about marriage. In fact, it’s something you should’ve known way before you even got married. It’s precisely because you don’t know this one thing that you may be in a marriage that drains you more than fulfills you. And it can put you in a position where you feel like […]
Us guys. We’re notorious for taking poor care of ourselves. Did you know that for most guys, their wives are more likely to make the annual physical appointment to the doctor than they are? Why is that? Well, it’s part of being a man. You’re taught from a young age to suck it up and deal. To be tough. And […]
Anger – it’s common for good guys like us to suppress it. We don’t want to be that dominator or aggressive asshole. But still we’re human. So inevitably anger might bubble up now and then. Maybe anger comes up when your wife says that you’re checked out, or you’re not consistent with your words, or you’re just not enough for […]
