[Jenn1fer82]

I've observed how my bestfriend is like when she's around her husband and it is as though the ten years I've know never have existed. She's totally a whole different person. She's come to me many times asking me why doesn't her husband care about her enough to work on their marriage and why isn't their communication is clearer and more loving. They've only been married for 3 years with a 3 year old child. She wants to be cared, to be valued and loved by him but she feels that he simply brushes her off and tells her that she's making such a big deal out of nothing. I've recently been observing her how she is when she's around her husband and now I understand why they've been having so many problems. She wants to be valued to be important but with her actions she enforces on what her husband believes. We had taken a vacation together and all that was on her mind was about her husbands wants and needs. As we went out to eat she shared a kids meal with her child where her husband had a large meal with seafood. As she was ill on our trip she still waited in the hot sun for her husband to enjoy himself on the rides at disneyland. Never once did I hear him ask her how she was doing and suggesting that maybe they should go back to the hotel room to get their rest. How could she expect him to value her to consider her feelings when her actions shows him that she is lesser then him that she's not as important. How is that in a relationship most of the time the woman so easily gives up her own needs and her happiness is determined by how her partner is happy or not.

[LMo]

Jennifer, you're a good friend to your best friend. She is lucky to have you.

It's interesting... I was about to retort that often men do the same thing, that it depends on the person not the gender. I've been in a few relationships where the man I was dating would follow me around and give me right of way whenever possible. It got on my nerves like you couldn't believe. THEN, I was going to say that I prefer things to be equal, and that a balanced relationship is absolutely the most important thing to me, blah blah blah.

But then, I realized what a hypocrite I would be for saying that.

My relationship is anyhing BUT balanced in many respects. I definitely give way to my husband's needs so much of the time. He might see it differently, though -- I am extremely headstrong and one would say it's out of character for me to defer to a man, but he chuckled at me after the first time we went to my parents' house for dinner -- he said he never would have expected it, but he observed that any time my dad needed something, I would bolt out of my chair to get it for him. I was kind of shocked because I hadn't realized that I do that, but he was right -- and I continue to behave like that toward my husband (and my dad) now.

I wouldn't say it determines my 'joy', per se, but I guess it's an ingrained habit based on the way I was raised. That's in spite of what I consider ideal.

Good topic for discussion, though.

[desirae]

Your very perspective, and a good friend. It's difficult for somebody to see in between theirs eyes without a mirror. The only way she will be able to see her behavior and how she allows her self to be a stool is if somebody she trusts and cares about shows her through the mirror. You can see her behavior better then she can, so show her.

Then after you make your friend aware of what you see make some suggestions that could boost her role in the her marriage. Like for example, encourage her to speak up and to have an important role. It may even help her husband understand her feelings as well.

I hope it all works out for your friend.

[Maven]

A lot of women have been handed the message that their worth is second to their husband's. Feminism has helped a lot in getting women to realize they matter just as much, and your happiness shouldn't be determined by your partner's happiness. Of course you want your partner to be happy if you love him or her, but pleasing your partner shouldn't determine your happiness.

I saw a woman on either Trading Spouses or Wife Swap (I always get those two shows mixed up) who loves being a slave to her man (and I don't mean BDSM), finding pleasure in the "drudgery" of everyday work, and having him be the "king of his castle." She even clipped his toenails for him!!! Her whole life was making her husband happy. I can't relate to that.

Girls and women often think they're responsible for a man's happiness. It's often passed from generation to generation, but society still gives this message in more hidden ways. How many commercials, movies and TV shows portray a man with lots of women fawning over him as a stud, and a woman who sees lots of men as a slut? Girls are supposed to be sexy and hot and compete with each other for a man's attention. I love men, but not at the expense of loving myself.

i grew up on a working ranch. i worked right along side my father, my brother and my brother-in-law...whether we were baling hay, gathering cattle, feeding cattle (actually, i had to start doing that by myself when i turned 9)branding cattle, etc. so, it was ingrained in me that i had to do "men's work" as well as help out in the house.

well.........one day we had been baling hay (up at dawn and in the field as soon as the dew was off the grass) and we came up to the house for lunch. it was the custom that the men ate first and the women got whatever was left over.(and let me tell you that i got awfully tired of chicken wings, backs and drumsticks.)

i was close to 14, as i remember it, and a sophomore in highschool. it hit me that i was never again going to take "seconds" after i had worked just as hard as those men had worked. (oh yes, my brother got paid but i got nothing)

i lit into my daddy and he almost passed out. i informed him that not only did i work as hard as he did, but my mother had slaved in that hot kitchen for hours and we weren't going to stand for seconds any more. and we didn't.

THEN, i married an alcoholic......fancy that! i put him through lawschool by selling off all of those cattle that i had worked so hard to accumulate. i worked so hard to be sure that he had time to study. he wouldn't even let me buy a television because he thought it might distract him. i couldn't have friends over because that would be distracting. his happiness was all i ever thought about. that's how i had been reared.

i think i'll just go hunt him up now and slap him upside the head!! the only friends that i had were his drunken parents. and since i hated that......i had no friends. so i got a horse and a greyhound and that was it........ANd no rock and roll was allowed..only country music could be played in the house.......but i sneaked in Elton John and Joe Cocker and Leon Russell!!

i thought that when he graduated, he would take over all the work that i had been doing..besides working full time in an office job. NOT. he didn't do diddly ----. he was so used to my doing everything that he didn't even think about it.

i took a long hard look at his parent's marriage and saw the same thing. eventually, we divorced and afterwards i wondered how he managed to figure out using the washing machine, etc. etc. etc.

in my second marriage, my husband just paid to have everything done. so, i found my own niche doing volunteer work, putting on photography workshops, etc. i don't know how that would have played out with him. i do know this. he wanted a cheerleader and i finally figured out that i had laid my pompoms down in highschool. so we divorced. and i'm still single.

it is amazing to me to see a couple where one or the other waits hand and foot on the mate. i'd just slap someone who kept filling my glass now. there's a lot of passive aggressive stuff going on there, i believe. my opinion.

i got so carried away from having to eat chicken wings and backs that i forgot to tell you that i agree with "mirroring" her behavior for her and maybe that would help her.

she is definitely "setting" herself up to be treated unfairly. her self-esteem surely needs boosting. you're a good friend. i'm glad that she has you.xoxoxo pat

[Rhapsody]

I personally see the I CAN'T BE HAPPY if he is not happy as a emotional longing..... Humans were made to NEED other people (for a well balanced life) and with in a marriage the TWO shall become ONE is so true that one can feel the depth of their spouses hurt and dissatisfaction so much that it effects the soul.... our place of being.


LoVe,
Rhapsody -

[Jenn1fer82]

Rhapsody-

Yes I hear you when you say that feeling empathy and being able to relate to others is important in a relationship but there is a difference. To wake up everyday and not even being able to recognize your own feelings of needs and wants and have it determined by your mate if he's having a good day or not, I feel it has stepped over the line. In a relationship tension and negativity is contagious and its hard not to let it affect you but to say that if your partner is happy then you must also be happy is hard to understand how so many people have gotten so misled with such understanding.

[Rhapsody]

I guess that is when one has to say that they have taken the other person happiness a step to far..... for happiness comes from within your self and not from the outside - when one is unhappy they must fix their own wounds and then they can be happy with another person, but not until then.


LoVe,
Rhapsody -

[Sabrina]

I have avoided this thread till now because my joy is very much determined by my husband's happiness and comfort. But having read how your friend is with her husband I realized that I am not that extreme, and certainly not to the point of sacrificing myself. I go out of my way to please my husband but I fight for myself and my needs when I feel it is called for.

You are a good friend to her.

[Maven]

There isn't a thing wrong with wanting your partner to be happy, and doing things to help him or her to be happy. But your partner has to also do things for you. It has to be mutual.

I don't need a man to make me happy or for me to feel whole. While I do have a boyfriend right now, I also enjoy being single and available. But I definitely want a man. I enjoy things that come with a committed relationship. I see both statuses (is that the correct plural?) as being good and exciting. When I'm single and available, I don't feel like I have to find the next guy to join in a relationship. I just enjoy dating until the right guy comes along.

Oh, and I forgot: I love that story, fayerody of how you stood up to your father and didn't accept the idea of women being below men!