Psychology 409B: The Unity Model of Marriage 3/07/06
Understanding Your Man and His Needs
By Carly Kanemaru
I. Introduction
-The topics in this outline are from Laura Schlessinger’s “The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands” pages 96-109.
-Schlessinger talks about the misunderstandings of a female’s perspective and the need for revised techniques on communication.
II. The Misunderstanding
-Women believe that the more they talk and communicate, the better it is for the relationship.
-Schlessinger says that the opposite is true.
-Women need to “cut down on the communication as a way to improve it.”
-She believes that we include too many unnecessary details.
- By right, a man should get bored and become uninterested in listening to what the wife has to say.
-Women need to understand that verbal communication is not always needed and not always appreciated either.
-Non-verbal communication exists and women need to learn to use it
-Examples of this are “an embrace, a warm look across the kitchen table, a smile, a kiss.”
III. Women
need to give their husbands “downtime” alone
-Men work very hard all day and when they come home, they need time to unwind
-During this “downtime,” a wife should appreciate all that he has done for her by working hard all day.
-To show her appreciation, she should leave him alone.
-Let him to do whatever he pleases in effort to relax and get comfortable.
-A wife should wait patiently for her husband until he is relaxed and ready to converse with her.
-By showing this respect and appreciation, her husband will be willing to focus on her and listen to what she has to say with full
attention.
IV. Women need
to keep their emotions to themselves
-Women are more inclined to have tons of emotions running through them.
-This is biological.
-Biologically, a man does not have the same problem.
-Women need to learn how to cope and deal with their emotional problems and outbursts.
-These are women problems and should remain women problems for the woman herself to fix.
-A man will not understand what the woman is going through and should not be expected to understand and feel the same way as his wife.
V. Women Need
to Solve Problems by Themselves
-When a woman has a million fights in her head with the constant demands of society and life, she should try to deal with all of them herself.
-She is not incapable of problem solving skills and should use them to work on solutions.
-A common mistake by women is “dumping their problems on their man.”
-A wife should accept responsibility and appreciate her husband by not mistreating him this way.
VI. Accept and Realize the Differences
-There is no doubt that males and females are different in one way or another from each other.
-Women need to accept these differences and understand the characteristics that make a man who he is.
-Women can nourish their own strengths as long as they don’t try to bring it out of their man.
-By accepting this, your relationship will be loving and peaceful.
VII. My Opinion on Schlessinger
-I disagree that less communication is
better, unless you are in a movie theatre!
Communication is key and without it, women and
men will
never understand
each other and be able to know what the other needs and wants.
-Although I can see why a man, or
even a woman, may want “downtime,” I don’t believe that it is only beneficial
to the man.
-I also don’t see why the woman has
to wait on the man in order to talk to him in order for him to willingly
listen.
-Both partners should
care so much about the other that they are always longing to hear what the
other has to say.
-Both partners should
enjoy conversations with each other, not avoid it for as long as possible and
turn it into a chore!
-I see that a unhealthy for a relationship!
Related Links
The official website of John Gray offers relationship advice on how to communicate with your partener.
This is a list of different self-help books on relationship troubles and communication tips.
www.menstuff.org/books/byissue/relationship.html
This website is an article on how partners react when personal problems are met.
www.pyschologytoday.com/articles/pto-19961201-000020.html
My Home page:
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/kanemaru/kanemaru-home.htm
Class Home Page
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy24/classhome-g24.htm