By: Dr. Gregory Popcak

“No matter what I do, it’s never good enough. I just don’t feel like he loves me and I’m completely fed up.”  Colleen and David began marriage counseling as far apart as two people could be.     Often during a first session, I will make time to speak to the husband and wife separately, so that each can feel free to say what they need to without fear of being contradicted. Colleen took the first turn while David headed out for a cigarette.  “I have really tried hard to show him how much I love him.” She said. “I used to pack little notes in his lunch. I try to keep the house looking nice. I try to be romantic. Things have been rough for a while, but a couple of weeks ago, I thought I would try to do something special. I made a nice meal, lit candles, set the table with our good china….” Colleen trailed off, gathered her thoughts and began again.

“He barely said two words the whole meal. We just sat there, eating in silence. I wanted to stab him with my salad fork, I was so angry.” She grabbed for a Kleenex and composed herself. “It’s like that all the time. I try to do things that let him know that I love him, but he never responds. Not only doesn’t he appreciate what I do for him, he never does anything to show me he cares. He says he loves me, but those are just words. Why doesn’t he show me?”

~~~

We discussed a few more issues, getting the general overview of her situation, and then it was David’s turn.  “She is just so fussy. Everything has to be perfect all the time. I feel like it completely kills any spontaneity. The other week, she made this dinner. I came home and I was tired. I was really looking forward to an evening of just hanging out on the couch together, being close, just relaxing–maybe over a pizza or something–and I walk into all this pressure. She had the candles lit and the good china out.     All I wanted to do was get out of my jacket and tie, and all of a sudden I felt like I was underdressed in my own house.

“I was irritated, sure, but I figured this was important to her. We hadn’t been getting along all that well for a while, so I thought I would try to play along, maybe it would help soften her up a bit. I was enjoying the meal well enough, but then I saw her get that ‘prissy face’ she gets when she’s mad at me, and all I could think was, ‘Ah, man, what did I do now?’”  He sighed and made a face. “I was too tired to deal with it. I just kept my mouth shut and got out of there as fast as I could.”  David continued. “She’s always doing stuff like that. I’m always trying to do things to let her know I love her. I try to hug her, but she’s always a million miles away. I used to call her from work to see how she was, but she was always too busy with some project to talk. I tell her I love her, but she says, “That’s just words!”     I love to fix things and keep the house in good shape, you know, guy stuff (he smiled conspiratorially) but she doesn’t really need me to do any of that for her because she’s so competent. Meanwhile, I’m killing myself trying to show her that I care, and she isn’t doing anything for me. It’s always about what she wants.     I just got sick of it after a while.”

~~~

David and Colleen were struggling with a common but serious marital problem. Specifically, the couple’s individual “lovestyles” were crossed.     To put it another way, each was working hard to communicate love to the other in a way that made sense to him or her self, but was completely irrelevant to the other. Colleen, having a more visual lovestyle liked to concentrate on atmosphere.  She was attentive to details, and showed her love in the way she decorated the house, presented a meal, and set the mood with candles and other visual indicators of affection like her appearance, or notes and cards.  David on the other hand was not as visual as his wife. Employing both kinesthetic (kin-es-TET-ic) and auditory lovestyles, he was more oriented to touch and action-oriented expressions of love as well as verbal affection. He tried to communicate his feelings for Colleen through acts of service, hugs and other physical displays of affection, and calling her to check on her day, in addition to saying, “I love you.” as much as possible. Unfortunately, despite all this love going around, both David and Colleen felt horribly neglected.

Back to School.

To understand the concept of lovestyles better, I need to take you back to grade school for a minute. Teachers spend a great deal of time trying to figure out how their students learn best (their “Learning styles”). Some students are visual learners, and do well with reading assignments, workbook pages, and other visual input. Others are more auditory learners. They need to be talked through tasks. They also do well in lecture classes and discussion groups and other oral/auditory learning activities.     Others still are kinesthetic learners, who learn by doing. These students learn through their hands and do well with projects, acting out assignments, manipulatives, and other physical activities that inspire learning.  Because learning styles are neurologically based, they don’t disappear in adulthood, they generalize out of the classroom and become communication styles–and in marriage– what I call, “lovestyles,” which brings us back to our couple.

Both Colleen and David were working very hard to demonstrate their love for one another, but almost all of their efforts were for naught, because they were communicating love in a manner that the other was not neurologically “wired” to receive. Because of that, Colleen’s visual efforts at romance were dismissed as mere, “fussiness” by the more kinesthetic David, and David’s attempts to communicate love through physical affection and words were experienced by Colleen as being either “groping” or as “empty words” respectively.  When I explained this to the couple, they were initially underwhelmed if not outright pessimistic. David said, “It sounds like you’re saying we’re doomed. That we’re just wired differently and that’s all there is to it.”  Clearly, this is not what I was trying to say. The good news is, to the degree that you have five senses, you can rewire and expand your lovestyle. The difficulty is that it simply never occurs to most people.     A person with a more visual lovestyle tends to believe that everyone should give and receive affection just as they do. It never occurs to them to try anything else.     The same is true of the other lovestyles. So they tend to dismiss, or simply miss, those displays of affection not communicated in the lovestyle they are most comfortable with. And it never occurs to anyone to notice all that they are missing.

Rewiring

The answer to this problem is a combination of generosity and awareness. Catholic marriages are founded on the notion of self-donative love, the idea that it is a spouse’s duty and privilege to use his or her whole self–body, mind, and spirit–to work for the good of the other. By challenging our comfort zones and consciously working to love our spouse the way he or she needs to be loved, instead of just the way we want to love him or her, we expand our capacity to give and receive love, and open our own minds to experiencing a world previously unknown to us.  I suggested that David and Colleen try an experiment.     I asked them to list at least twenty different actions that communicated love or attentiveness to them. These items could be more romantic, like cards and flowers, or they could be more mundane, like taking the garbage to the curb, or giving up the TV remote for the evening. The only requirements were that these activities should be low-expense, not terribly time consuming, and still be meaningful enough to cause the recipient to have a gut-level reaction that says, “Ahh! That made me feel very well taken care of.”

Over the next few sessions, David and Colleen developed their lists and worked to overcome some of the basic objections to each other’s requests. Colleen said, “One of the first reactions to some of the things he wrote down was, “You want me to do WHAT!?     I’m ashamed to admit it now, because it wasn’t as if he was asking for anything immoral or demeaning, he just wanted me to do things that don’t mean a great deal to me, and would require me to challenge my comfort level. Things like holding his hand in public, or sitting on the couch and snuggling together in front of the fire even if there were chores that still needed to be done, or keeping him company when he changes the oil. I would NEVER think of doing those things on my own, and honestly, when he has asked me to do them in the past, I just dismissed them because they didn’t mean anything to me.”

David agreed. “My first reaction to her list was, ‘This is really stupid.’     I think I’m a pretty loving guy, but a lot of the things she wrote down didn’t seem so much loving, as they were fussy. ‘Wear something nicer than old sweats in the evening.’ or, ‘Write me a note that says you love me and why.’ or ‘make sure the bedroom is straightened up and light candles when you want to make love.’ I just don’t care about that kind of stuff on my own. Honestly, it seemed a little silly. I mean, why would I need to write her a note? I tell her I love all the time. I just thought she was being picky.”  But after we spent some time addressing their objections and they had an opportunity to practice the items on each other’s lists, the difference was remarkable. As Colleen put it, “It occurred to me that I had been very selfish.     I was only willing to love him the way I wanted to love him. I didn’t care how he needed to be loved. In a sense, my loving efforts in the past were more focused on helping me feel good than they were showing him affection in any meaningful way.”

David added, “It was hard for me to remember to do the things on her list at first, because they just don’t come naturally to me at all. But I tried to check the list everyday and tell myself that it wasn’t important if this stuff meant anything to me. It was just important that I wanted her to know I loved her, and in order to do that, I needed to learn to speak her language. And the first time she read the little love note I wrote in about ten minutes earlier in the day, she just beamed. I knew I’d scored big.”  But the benefits didn’t end there. David and Colleen both learned important lessons about themselves and opened their eyes to new ways to experience and share love. As David put it, “Colleen told me that she can really see how doing these things is helping her become a more open, loving person who is more relaxed and less ashamed about showing affection. And I’m becoming a whole lot more attentive as a husband. I used to think that as long as I was a better husband than most of the guys at the office, that was good enough. Now I realize that God expects me to be the husband she needs me to be, not just the husband my friends think I ought to be.”

If you are experiencing the tension of loving someone with a different love language, call your PaxCare Tele-Coach today and find the solutions you are looking for. Call us to get the skills you need to succeed.

By: PaxCare Staff

In the culture in which we live, there are many stereotypes and misconceptions regarding the roles and identities of men. What makes a man, well…a man? How do we determine manliness? This article will shed some light on the issue.

What’s the Manswer?

Read the following two character sketches and answer this question:   Which man is more masculine?

#1.   Mr. A is a florist by profession.   He enjoys going to the ballet, musical theater and supports the arts in general.  He dresses well and cares for his appearance. He is warm and affectionate to the people he meets.   He is in touch with his emotions and comfortable sharing them.

#2 Mr. B is a contractor by profession.   He enjoys monster truck rallies, loves to watch football, and judges the quality of a movie by the number of explosions in it.   His idea of dressing up is wearing  his nice plaid flannel shirt (the one without the beer stain).   He is friendly enough, but not very affectionate.   Some would describe him as gruff.     He does not enjoy talking about feelings.   He would rather solve problems than talk about them.

So, which is more masculine?   A or B?   Answer:   It is impossible to tell from the information presented.

Why?   Because masculinity has little to do with the jobs we do, the things we like, or the way we look.   Masculinity has much, much more to do with how effectively we live out our humanity through the male body given to us by God. Masculinity is determined by how comfortable a man is with his body and uses that body in the manner it was intended by God to be used; that is, to serve others.   Let’s use two different examples.

The Demands of Loving Service

Same question: Which is more masculine?

#1 Mr. C adores his wife. He is conscientious about fulfilling the promises he makes to her. He is an active father and makes sure to spend time with his children every day. He is concerned about caring for his family’s emotional and spiritual needs and regularly leads prayer in his home and encourages his family to take advantage of the sacraments.     His wife and children know that any time they need something, they can count on Mr. A to help them find the most godly and efficient way to meet their need.

#2 Mr. D says he loves his wife but really couldn’t tell you anything about what her needs are or what it takes to make her happy. When she asks him to do something for her, he will often promise to do it to get her to stop nagging him, but he rarely follows through. He is not very involved with his children. He avoids discussion anything he doesn’t have to with his family. He does not pray with them. He will go to church if his wife insists. Sometimes. By and large, his wife and children do not count on him for much.

So, which is more masculine? Clearly, Mr. C. Why? Because Mr. C presents as a man who knows himself, is comfortable in his own skin and he is using his self and his body in the way God intended it to be used; to serve others. A man might have more in common with either Mr. A or Mr. B above, but it doesn’t matter, because his masculinity is determined not by the job he has or the things he likes or the way he looks. It is determined by the way he uses his self and his body to serve.

By: Gregory Popcak

“Defer to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives be submissive to your husbands…. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church.”

~Ephesians 5:21-33

In my counseling practice, I have recently encountered a slew of questions relating to headship in Christian marriage and the abuses that flow from a misunderstanding of this concept.     I have been disheartened to see first hand how this beautiful and key teaching of Christian family life has been twisted in so many ways to cause so much pain. Let me offer some examples so we’re all clear on what I’m talking about.  “My husband doesn’t want me, just my body. He ignores me or is cold to me most of the time, but then he wants to have sex  at least twice a day. I feel like he is using me, but He says that he is the head and I have to submit to him in all things, especially this, or else I’m sinning. I want to be a good wife. I don’t want to offend God, but I am so sad. What can I do?”

~ ~ ~

“My husband said that I couldn’t buy any birthday presents for our two-year old because ‘He has enough already. He needs to learn to be grateful for what he has.’  He won’t even let my family come to celebrate his birthday. My heart is breaking for our son but I don’t want to disobey my husband, what should I do?”

~ ~ ~

“The people in my homeschool group tell me that when my husband says something, even if I disagree with it, I have to say, ‘Yes, dear.’ because in marriage I am supposed to sacrifice my will entirely to the will of my husband. Something about that doesn’t seem right. It sounds extreme but what if he wanted me to kill someone? Where do I draw the line?”

~ ~ ~

There is a great deal of confusion about what it means for the husband to be the head of the family and much harm can come from an improper understanding of this idea. The key to understanding headship lies in the John Paul II’s statement in Evangelium Vitae, that “Man’s lordship is not absolute, it is ministerial.” Let’s unpack that statement.

1. Obedience cannot be commanded, it must be invited.

There is an important distinction to be made between blind obedience and Christian obedience. Blind obedience uses fear to motivate. The person who relies on blind obedience says, “You must obey me because I am the leader, so there!” Christian obedience is a much different animal though. It is a logical response to loving service.  St. Ambrose was contemplating the scripture, “You are my friends if you keep my commands.” but he observed that friends don’t command other friends, if they did, it would no longer be a friendship but a relationship between a superior and inferior person (the commander and the commanded). What could Jesus mean by tying our friendship with Him to obedience to Him?     Ambrose realized that Jesus was talking about a new kind of obedience based on friendship rather than fear, an “obedience” that meant anticipating and fulfilling the needs of another.     Seen in this light, obedience is really another form of intimacy, where one person attentively seeks out the needs of the other and lovingly fulfills them, often without being asked, certainly without being asked twice.     This is the essence of true Christian obedience. What parent would not want this kind of obedience from their child? What spouse would not want this kind of obedience from their mate? What God would not want this kind of obedience from His people?

Understanding obedience in this way presents a challenge to all of us. Obviously Christian obedience is a good and desirable thing, and yet, we cannot demand obedience from another (nor can we nag, whine, threaten, beat, or manipulate it out of someone) if it is to remain true Christian obedience. In fact, there is only one way Christian parents and Christian spouses can “command” obedience; the same way Jesus commanded it, through an example of loving service.  When my wife or children come to me with a need, it is not my job to sit in judgment of that need and say “Yea” or “Nay” to it. It is my job to take that need seriously, and to help them find a godly way to meet that need. If I do this, then over time, my wife and children learn to trust me. They come to see that, “Hey, Greg always does well by us. He always helps us find respectful and efficient ways to meet our needs.” Because of this, they come to seek my counsel and take my advice all on their own without me ever having to “command” them to do anything. In other words, their “obedience” to my counsel is their logical response to my having served them first. In a Christian home, obedience does not result from me beating my chest and saying, “Me Head of Family! You brainless peon!”     (That is oppression, not headship.)     In a Christian home, obedience is not commanded, it is invited, by the husband becoming like Christ and washing the feet of the greatest and the least member of his family.

2.     The needs set the agenda, not the husband.

I recently spoke at a men’s conference where a gentleman cornered me after my talk and said, “It took me 25 years of marriage to realize I wasn’t going to get any credit– from God or my wife–for giving her things she didn’t want.”  I regularly hear from husbands who want to know, “How do I know what’s right for my family?” Many men think that omniscience is a prerequisite to headship. It is not.  How do you know what’s right for your family? You ask them!  As head of household, you must assume that the voice of God is speaking through the needs your wife and children bring to you. Their needs set the agenda, not you.  Husbands would do well to remember that God is the ultimate head of household and God is the author of all of our needs.  Of course, if you have concerns about certain things your family wants, you have a right to express them, even to insist that those concerns be addressed before you move forward with fulfilling that need (incidentally, your wife has this same right when you bring your needs to her. “Defer to one another out of reverence for Christ…) And you should always pray with your family to help them discern whether the need being expressed is truly godly, but assuming the need persists through prayer and discernment, we have little choice but to respond to it. As scripture says, in the end we must, “Follow the ways of your heart, the vision of your eyes.” Assuming we truly love God first and seek his will then, “all things,” presumably even our errors in judgment “will work for the good of those who love Him.” Again, being head of household does not mean being a one man Supreme Court whose family must convince you that their needs are worthy of being fulfilled.     It means that you must be a responsive and generous servant to whatever needs your family brings to you, especially the ones that make you uncomfortable. If you do this, then, and only then, will you be loving your family “as Christ loves the Church.”

3. You all belong to God.

Paul tells us, “None of us lives as his own…. In both life and death we belong to God.”  Because each one of us belongs to God, he speaks to each one of us, and he expects each of us to fulfill the purpose for which we have been created. The only way to do this, is to learn to be attentive to his voice in our hearts and to follow that voice where it leads us.  But I have met many husbands who think that their wife and children are obliged to follow the agenda that they set for the family, regardless of what the rest of the family thinks of that agenda. This is not headship. It is idolatry.  These husbands expect their family to be disobedient to the voice of God speaking in their hearts, and instead, be obedient only to the husband’s desires. How is this any different than the pagan kings of the Old Testament insisting that their subjects pray to them?     Whenever this occurred, the servants of God were praised for their strenuous resistance to this arguably legitimate authority who made himself illegitimate by the nature of his commands. Jesus said, “No man is greater than his master, no messenger than he who sent him” as he stooped to wash the feet of his apostles. If we would love our wives as Christ loved the Church, then we must first put on the apron of humility–and serve. We cannot concern ourselves with making our family obey us. We can only love them, better and better, until they turn their hearts to us. It is then that we will be like Christ, of whom we sing, “O, How I love Jesus, because he first loved me.”

If you find yourself struggling with any of the issues mentioned in the above article, call your PaxCare Tele-Coach today and get the solutions you are seeking. Call us to get the skills you need to succeed.