Roger called his wife Jenny at work. She was in the middle of a
staff meeting and so she was particularly abrupt with him. When she got
home, she found a note from him. He was gone. From somewhere in his past
experience he was so sensitized to demonstrations of lack of interest in
him that her behavior constituted absolute proof. One misstep--one hint
that she was anything like whoever ran up the debit--was all she was
allowed. This is a common pattern in relationships. And the "proof" of
disinterest could be anything. Perhaps she didn't look at him. Perhaps
she was tired. Perhaps she was sick. One reason men are often intolerant
of a wife who gets sick is that she isn't there for them. It is a painful
reminder of other accounts from the past.
Not only do couples maintain revolving ledgers, but they also carry
over feelings of indebtedness and entitlement from one generation to the
next. Invisible loyalties thus accrue in a family over the generations,
whether or not we end up acknowledging them. An artistic man buries his
creative longing because his family legacy calls for being a success in
business. For each of us, behavior is greatly affected by the family
ledger of entitlement and indebtedness.
Every couple needs to trace the source of behaviors and attitudes,
many of which turn out to have been handed down through their families of
origin. Much unhappiness in relationships can be traced to the fact that
one partner learned as a family rule never to express anger, or even
perhaps happiness. Many people grow up learning to subjugate their own
needs and feelings to those of others. Still the feelings influence
present relationships, and until they can be brought into awareness and
spoken, it is very difficult to improve current relationships.
Once a couple has done this and discovers where their beliefs come
from, they can review them together and decide which legacies they want
to keep, which they'd rather discard. They each work out their personal
history so they do not punish the one who's here now.
At this point I find that couples do well if I introduce an
experience in bonding that is usually very emotionally powerful.
For men, these experiences are revelatory. Men, because they are
often cut off from the emotional part of themselves, are especially often
forced to piggyback their need for intimacy on sex. They have no less
need for intimacy than women, but it usually gets suppressed and denied.
Or they attempt to satisfy their need for closeness through contact
sports and roughhousing. They don't know how to work things out in
man-woman intimate relationships. But when they learn, they almost always
feel an enormous sense of wholeness and relief
In growing up men have learned that the only thing they are
supposed to need to be close to a woman is sex. They discover that
bonding is a valid need in its own right, and needing physical closeness
doesn't mean they are going to regress into helplessness and never
function again. It doesn't weaken you, it strengthens you.
But this is not learnable merely by cognitive statement. Having the
experience illuminates the point and changes the thinking. The exercises
are important because they integrate the emotional acceptance, the
behavioral change, and the cognitive understanding that occur.
It is no news that sexual problems in a relationship are frequently
the by-product of personal and relational conflicts and anxieties. For
too many couples, sex has become a substitute for intimacy and a defense
against closeness. Most poor sex stems from poor communication, from
misunderstandings of what one's mate actually wants--not from
unwillingness or inability to give it.
In the realm of sex as in other domains of the relationship, you
cannot expect your partner to guess what pleases you. You are obligated
to figure out for yourself what stimulates, delights, and satisfies
you-and acknowledge it. It is not enough to give and receive, you also
have to be able to speak up or reach out on your own behalf and take.
Ideally, sexual love will be a flow of this give and take, but it has to
go both ways to keep desire alive.
Before sex can be rewarding for both partners, they have to first
restore the ability to confide and reestablish emotional openness, to
establish a sense of camaraderie. Then physical closeness has meaning,
and the meaning serves only to heighten the pleasure of the physical
experience even more.
Of course, intercourse is not the only avenue to physical pleasure.
There is a whole range of physical closeness couples can learn to offer
each other. Being together. Hugging. Holding each other. Caressing each
other's face. Massaging your partner's body. In fact, taking pleasure in
each other is a habit that some couples actually have to acquire. But
taking pleasure in your partner is the very thing your partner needs most
from you.
THE DAILY TEMPERATURE READING
Confiding--the ability to reaveal yourself fully, honestly, and
directly--is the lifeblood of intimacy. To live together with
satisfaction, couples need clear, regular communication. The great
intuitive family therapist Virginia Satir developed a technique for
partners and families to maintain an easy flow about the big and little
things going on in their lives. I have adapted it. Called the Daily
Temperature Reading, it is very simple (and works for many other kinds of
relationships as well).
Tags:
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belief,
commercialization,
confusion,
cults,
intimacy,
intimate relationships,
ironies,
larger community,
love,
many generations,
marriage,
physical closeness,
primitive cultures,
productive life,
relationship,
sex,
splendid isolation
