Becoming Your Spouse's Better Half (14 page)

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Authors: Rick A Johnson

BOOK: Becoming Your Spouse's Better Half
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Men and boys without positive male role models and mentors in their lives often grow up angry and frustrated by the challenges of life. They are often unwilling to accept challenges because of a fear of failure. To fail as a man is humiliating. It’s easier to walk away or not even try than to risk the embarrassment of failure.
Fatherless boys frequently grow up to be indecisive, passive, docile, and unable to commit to a relationship. Because they were raised with a feminized vision of life, they tend to rely on females to make all the decisions that govern their lives and seldom take on natural leadership roles. The presence of other adult males in a man’s life can help to guide and encourage him to look at the world with a masculine vision and to persevere through struggles until he succeeds, thereby gaining the positive self-image and confidence to accept risk and attempt challenges in other areas of life.
If your husband was raised without strong, positive male role models in his life, he needs to find some good men to hang around with, men who care about him and can teach him things he needs and wants to know. Finding and integrating into a group of men like that can be frightening for a man who is uncomfortable around other men—especially if he has never been accepted into the company of men before.
It might sound illogical, but he may need his wife’s help and encouragement to do this. If you as a wife know healthy men, make friends with their wives. This allows a slow, natural process for your husband to get to know their husbands. Eventually, as he hangs around healthy men, he will begin to feel more comfortable and confident. Then your encouragement for him to join in with these men on trips, retreats, and studies will be much more effective. After a while, his confidence will begin to grow and he will start facing life and making decisions as the man he was created to be.
Fathers
 
No matter how old he is, a man needs a relationship with his father. The curse for so many men is that they never had that relationship. A man needs a father to bless him and help propel him into the world. He needs a father to teach him, model masculine roles for him, and encourage him as he struggles through life. Even a grown man yearns for that kind of approval and blessing from his father.
For any man who had an absent or abusive father, or just a neglectful father, this need will impact his journey through life. It is imperative that a man find a way to reconcile with and forgive his father any grievances (real or imagined) in order to grow and heal from those wounds. If his father has passed on or is not to be found, this can be a difficult journey for a man. But know that these grievances keep him from becoming the kind of man, husband, and father that he is capable of and wants to be. They are roadblocks that prevent his growth as a man in all his roles. They are stumbling blocks that stunt his masculine growth.
I still have not fully reconciled my relationship with my stepfather, but I have been powerfully blessed with a steadily deepening relationship with my biological father, whom I met when I was twenty-four years old. His presence in my life is a blessing of profound magnitude. Having a father who is proud of me and loves me is so encouraging that I can almost feel it bind and heal the wounds accumulated from childhood. His physical closeness is like a cool drink of water on a hot summer day. His unspoken approval fills my soul like a warm, nourishing meal. But most of all, he has given me the ultimate gift—of letting me know I am a man. Without that blessing, I would have, like many men, spent the rest of my life trying to prove to myself and everyone else that I am, in fact, a man.
And yet even with that huge healing gift from my biological father, there is something inside that still yearns for the approval and pride of the man who raised me—my stepfather. I long for him to tell me I am a man and that he approves. Without that I can almost feel a hole in my soul. My stepfather, a broken man himself, is unable or unwilling to grant me that blessing at this time—perhaps because he never received it from his father.
I recently met with a young man who is struggling with a variety of issues, including drug abuse. He had been away for the past year as he bottomed out and then entered drug rehab. He is now trying his best to straighten his life out and become the man he was made to be. As we talked over lunch he made the comment, “I have really missed you.”
Even though I’m not his father, I gave him the blessing he yearns to hear from him: “I’ve missed you too. You are a good man. I have always been proud of you. I believe in you and I believe God has big plans for your life.”
Those simple statements brought tears to the eyes of a young man who needs the encouragement and support of a father figure in his life.
Men, if you have a poor relationship or none at all with your father, I want to encourage you to do something about it—for your benefit and for your family’s. Approach your father and try to find common ground to start communicating. Consider what kind of man raised your father to see how that might have impacted his life. Tell him you need to talk to him and resolve your issues. Tell him the things you need to know from him. Let him know you forgive him. Start slow but be consistent and patient.
Some of you are thinking that I don’t know what I’m asking you to do, that I don’t understand how hard that would be. Yes, I do. I have made repeated attempts with my stepfather, but without as much success as I would like.
This will probably be the most difficult endeavor you will ever attempt. It will take more courage than you think possible, because of the potential to be wounded deeply again. I know that I am asking you to risk throwing yourself on the sword again and being hurt once more by the man who has the ability to rip out the core of your manhood. I don’t do this lightly. And I’m afraid to tell you that some of you
will
have a sword driven through your hearts again. But the rewards far outweigh the risks. It is the right thing for a man to do, and you need the closure.
In fact, I’d even go so far as to say that if you have the courage to attempt this, it proves you are a man. If you have done all you can and he still does not reciprocate, you have fulfilled your obligation to honor him and can be at peace in your efforts. Worst-case scenario: you are no worse off than you are now with a broken relationship—wounded again, perhaps, but noble in your manhood.
But just imagine if you were able to heal some of those father wounds and have a better relationship with your father as an adult. Wouldn’t that be worth the risk? Wouldn’t it be worth not passing on some of those wounds to your own children? I think it would.
And ladies, if your husband has unreconciled issues with his father, I want to encourage you to help him. Men struggle with emotions and the intricacies of relationships anyway, but attempting to mend the powerful bond between a father and son is even more formidable, especially when it’s been broken and rusted after a long period of disuse. He will need your encouragement to muster the courage to tackle this big challenge. He might be discouraged or even wounded deeply. Attempting this mending takes great reserves of courage on his part and merits your admiration. He will also need your support and healing touch to go through with it. This healing process can take a long time; it’s rarely a one-shot deal. Your support will be the difference between success and failure. In fact, he may attempt it only because he realizes it is in the best interests of you and your children. Use all the power that God has given you as a helpmate, nurturer, and completer to stand with him and help him accomplish the journey.
 
Fearfully and Wonderfully Made
—Love the fact that God made him so different.
Men need other men in their lives.
All men need friends, mentors, and a father (or father figure).
Because men are less relational than women, they struggle with finding and developing friendships and other relationships.
Men don’t have to talk to enjoy the company of other men.
Men who are not accountable to other men are easy prey for the evil one.
 
Get inside His Head
If I open up and allow myself to be vulnerable to another man, he won’t respect me—or else he’ll use it against me.
I’m not going to let myself be hurt by my father again—once was enough.
I’m not going to ask another man to mentor me—he’d probably turn me down or else make fun of me.
I can’t mentor another guy—I don’t have anything to offer.
 
Words Have Meaning
 
Words That Heal
“You should go on that men’s retreat—I always get turned on when you return from one.”
“Mary’s husband would really like to meet you.”
“Honey, I am behind you every step of the way if you decide to try reconciling with your father.”
“I believe in you.”
 
 
Words That Hurt
“You don’t have any friends; what’s wrong with you?”
“Other men that know how to network are more successful.”
“You are just like your father.”
“If you weren’t so pigheaded and stubborn, you could learn something from another man once in a while.”
Women’s Moods
 
 
To be happy with a man you must understand him a lot and love him a little. To be happy with a woman you must love her a lot and not try to understand her at all.
Helen Rowland,
A Guide to Men
 
 
U
nderstanding women and their needs (moods) may seem at first glance like a monumental task for the average guy. After all, even the father of modern psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, failed to answer the age-old question, “What do women want?” However, while women are certainly more complicated than men, there are simple, specific needs they have that must be met in order for them to thrive. These needs are even rather logical if viewed with the right perspective!
For instance, despite the protests of radical feminists over the past forty years, most women do want their husbands to provide a model of servant-based leadership within the home and the relationship. I hear this desire expressed frequently by women of all economic backgrounds and demographics—they desperately want their husbands to be leaders of the home. But this leadership needs to be nurturing and uplifting, not self-serving or oppressive. Even successful, independent career women get tired of always being in control and under the pressure of constantly making decisions. They yearn for a man to provide this kind of leadership in their personal life and relish relying on a man’s strong but gentle leadership and provision. In fact, the most frequent complaint I hear from women about their husbands is that they do not lead the family. Due to a variety of factors, many men do not understand what this leadership looks like and how to fulfill this need in a woman’s life.
Every man I know wants his wife to be happy and content. It’s a mark that a man has done his job well if his wife is content with her life. Plus all men know that an unhappy woman makes everyone around her unhappy. Solomon, perhaps the wisest man in the Bible, talks about a contentious (unhappy, dissatisfied) woman being like the continual dripping of water (Prov. 19:13; 27:15). Even more to the point, “Better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife” (Prov. 21:9 NIV). I have to believe that Solomon, with all those wives and concubines running around, knew a thing or two about living successfully with women.
I generally do whatever I can to try to make my wife happy. She doesn’t ask for much, so this task is usually not that difficult. But she is frequently frustrated when she tries to make me understand what her needs are and I either don’t have a clue or miss the clues she’s giving me. Generally, this is a case of my not paying attention. One time she wanted me to ask our daughter and her boyfriend to drive with us on a trip. Because I wasn’t paying attention to her desires, she repeatedly tried to tell me why it would be a good idea for them to ride along with us. When I finally told the kids to just take their own car, she had had enough and stamped her foot in frustration. It was actually kind of cute, but it definitely got my attention enough to recognize I should meet a need she had. Needless to say, our daughter and her boyfriend rode along with us. Much like Westley in the movie
The Princess Bride
, I often tell my princess bride “as you wish” when she wants something that badly.

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