The Desire Husbands Don’t Like to Discuss
One of the most controversial topics I address with women is one of the clearest findings from my anonymous nationally-representative surveys of men for books like For Women Only. Ready to hear it?
In your man’s mind, if you put an effort into taking care of yourself, it shows that you care for him – and if you don’t, he feels that you don’t care for him.
Yes, I’m going to go there.
Over the years, multiple women have confronted me about publishing this finding, furious that I would “defend such archaic demands” or “promote misogyny” or “body-shame” women. As if it wasn’t hard for me to hear this from the men, too!! I’ve struggled to stay at a healthy weight my whole adult life. When we hear that men think this way, it is easy to get defensive, because it conjures up the offensive stereotype of a “yes, dear” 1950’s housewife greeting her husband at the door in a dress and heels. Or we think it means that men only want a nice collection of body parts, and not the brain and heart inside. Or more likely, secretly, we’re most upset because we assume that if we’re not a Cosmo model, we’re not enough for our man …and we beat ourselves up about that already, thank you very much.
But I’ve discovered that none of those offensive ideas are in a man’s heart when he shares this very private but very real desire.
Here, instead, IS what is in your man’s heart in this area – even if he’ll never say so out loud.
Men feel loved when they see their wives taking care of themselves
Men feel loved when they see their wives taking care of themselves.
Click To Tweet
For fear of being misunderstood or hurting their wives’ feelings, men are largely silent about this. And that’s probably unfortunate, because it turns out this is exceptionally important to them, emotionally. Here’s the bottom line: When he sees you making an attempt to take care of yourself, he feels loved by you. To the men in my research, that means that unless you have a physical reason why this isn’t possible (which does happen sometimes), that you generally try to stay healthy and active and able to go do things together, you try to be a healthy weight (whatever is healthy for you), you care how you look around the house at times (not just out in public), and you don’t do self-destructive things. Nothing crazy – just basic self-care.
Why does this matter so much to men? The research isn’t clear. My educated guess, based on the research so far, is that it has something to do with a) the fact that romance for a guy means going out and doing things together (which requires you to have the energy and ability to do that, to some degree) and, most important, b) how highly visual men are. (The visual nature of men is a whole other topic, but if you’re curious what I mean by that, you can see more in this little book I wrote to help women understand their husbands and sons.)
Although there are always exceptions, the bottom line is that a man’s brain wiring processes the world visually and emotionally in the same way a woman’s brain process the world verbally and emotionally. Where you as a woman probably want to talk about life, his emotions, sense of desire, and sense of connectedness to his wife are strongly tied to what he sees.
A man loves his wife, regardless! But if he sees her not making an effort to take care of herself, he instinctively feels that she simply doesn’t care about him. After all, he subconsciously feels, someone with a visual brain should instinctively understand this. But because her brain (in most cases) is not wired with that visual-emotional connection, she doesn’t understand it. But he doesn’t realize that. So in his mind, if she doesn’t seem to want to make that effort, he ends with the feeling like she really doesn’t care about him in an area that “she should know” is incredibly important to him.
Men do not have unrealistic expectations for our bodies (really!)
Here’s the good news that we woman have to be willing to hear and believe: When our husbands say they love it when we make the effort to take care of ourselves, they do not have unrealistic expectations. They don’t expect us to look like we did 20 years and three kids ago. They don’t expect us to look like the Cosmo model. They don’t expect (or want!) us to go on crazy fad diets. They don’t want us to feel bad about ourselves. And they definitely don’t want us to have unrealistic expectations about what they expect.
We have to be willing to hear what our man is and isn’t saying. When a man says he cares about, ‘the effort to take care of yourself’ he means exactly that: the effort. There is no expectation of some end result that he’s secretly hoping for. It is your awareness and effort that matters. Because to him, that says “I care.”
I tested this on the survey for For Women Only, on which the men were anonymous and very, very honest. And 83% of men said that they did not secretly have some visual standard – like how their wives looked when they first met. Each man said he truly just would love for his wife to make the effort to take care of herself for him as she was today.
There really is a tender heart behind this entire notion. Your man is saying simply, “please try and do it for me.” He is touched by seeing your effort on his behalf.
He hopes you won’t be cynical (or, worse, punish him for this desire)
It’s easy to be skeptical that the effort is really what matters to your husband. It’s even easier to cynically think, he’s just saying that….but what he really wants is the cute young thing on the magazine cover. But you have to put aside your cynicism and be willing to believe that most men are men of goodwill who deeply love their wives.
Put aside your cynicism and be willing to believe that most men are men of goodwill who deeply love their wives.
Click To Tweet
The truth is that he would take you over the magazine model any day. Why? When I ask guys that question they look at me like I’m crazy. Like, “What do you mean, ‘why?!’ Because I love my wife!!”
It’s you that he loves already! He is not saying for you to become someone you’re not. He does not want to trade you in on a younger model and he doesn’t expect you to remain physically unchanged as you age.
There’s a give and take in marriage, right? There is a need to know what truly matters to your spouse on the inside, even if they will never talk about it on the outside. Don’t force your man to say this out loud (it is almost certain that he will not want to talk about it). And certainly, don’t make him think you are dismissing something that matters to him by assuming it is something it’s not (misogyny, a selfish demand, unrealistic expectations, etc.). Instead, just be willing to be consider what you can continue to do as a lifestyle of self-care that should matter to all of us anyway.
It matters to him in the same way his effort (perhaps in other areas) matters to you!
Think about it from another perspective—what makes you feel loved?
Does it matter if your husband makes an effort to do something that makes you feel loved, even if the results aren’t ultra-elaborate and huge? For example, when he plans a special date night for you out of the blue, isn’t that what matters, rather than the amount of money he spends? More than the “results,” the fact that he made an effort says “I care about you.” Even better, doesn’t it mean even more when you know that what he is doing is difficult or doesn’t come naturally?
It’s the same thing here. Just like we women have things that are important to us, men have things that are important to them. (Maybe you get this right away, because you want him to take care of himself for you, too!) And taking care of ourselves for him is just another way to show the most important man in our life that we care about him. Listen to his words and hear what his heart is saying. “I love you. I want you. I desire you. Stay healthy so you will be with me for the long term.”
Want to know how to be kind, when you really don’t want to be? Looking for encouragement for your marriage or parenting struggles? Subscribe to updates from Shaunti here!
Shaunti Feldhahn loves sharing eye-opening information that helps people thrive in life and relationships. She herself started out with a Harvard graduate degree and Wall Street credentials but no clue about life. After an unexpected shift into relationship research for average, clueless people like her, she now is a popular speaker and author of best-selling books about men, women and relationships. (Including For Women Only, For Men Only, and the groundbreaking The Good News About Marriage).
Her newest book, The Kindness Challenge demonstrates that kindness is the answer to pretty much every life problem, and is sparking a much-needed movement of kindness across the country. Visit www.shaunti.com for more.
This article was first published at Patheos.
The post The Desire Husbands Don’t Like to Discuss appeared first on Shaunti Feldhahn.
