She says, I’m not enough for her. She says, I don’t listen. And she says, I’m not present. Any guy knows that his wife is a master at picking apart who he is and what he doesn’t do. So much so, unlike anyone else in his life, that it’s her superpower or maybe better said, her shadow power. And while […]
Your wife is not happy. Her job is frustrating as heck. The kids aren’t listening to her. And you’re not enough for her. Just hearing all this makes my stomach cringe. To be married to a woman laden with problems is overwhelming for a guy. Often his natural response is to take on the burden of her unhappiness and compound […]
Dave was a big-shot commercial developer. Multimillion-dollar deals and big financial risks. Yet at home, he was risk-averse, often crippled by the slightest rejection from his wife. In 15 years of coaching married men, I’ve seen this dynamic of financial success and marital failure in a man many times. But with Dave, it was extreme. His wife didn’t seem to […]
Sex. I talk a lot about it. In fact, it’s the biggest complaint men have about their marriages, that there’s not enough of it. Of course, this is because men are superficial and only care about the physical. And if you believe that, then you know nothing about most men and you’re being superficial. Time and again, I hear guys […]
Rick wants his wife to know her place and stop nagging him all the time. He believes inherently by being a man that he has a right to peace and quiet. He is the old-school masculine guy. Tom, on the other hand, tries to not upset his wife hoping that she’ll love him back. He believes if he upsets 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 […]
