Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / The HUSBAND Who Wants More (Sexually) And His Annoyingly Satisfied WIFE

Transcript

The HUSBAND Who Wants More (Sexually) And His Annoyingly Satisfied WIFE · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

• 0:05
  Hi everybody, and welcome to the dr.
• 0:07
  Psych mom show today, we're going to be talking about the
• 0:10
  annoyingly satisfied wife, and the husband who wants more,
• 0:15
  which is the inverse of the annoyingly.
• 0:17
  Satisfied husband, and the wife who wants more, which is one of
• 0:20
  the couples in counseling that I've written about and talked
• 0:22
  about and which resonates the most, with my clients.
• 0:28
  So there's an inverse of that and if you didn't guess with
• 0:31
  men, it has to do with sex. So we'll talk about that.
• 0:34
  This is another A common a couple that I see now.
• 0:37
  So versus I guess, when I was younger, I was seeing more of
• 0:42
  the annoyingly, satisfied, husband people.
• 0:46
  I think something changed in the drinking water.
• 0:49
  You know, that that men think now versus ten years ago there,
• 0:54
  you know 10 years older on average, the people who will
• 0:56
  come to see me and so the men are ten years more dissatisfied
• 1:00
  with their sex lives. So they'll come now versus 10
• 1:03
  years ago. So, before we get to that,
• 1:06
  please do subscribe. I have one coming out or whose,
• 1:09
  which has already come out on binge eating and binge drinking
• 1:11
  as escape tools. So if those are anything that
• 1:14
  you engage in or that you know, anybody who engages in and
• 1:18
  listen And subscribe. So getting to the topic at hand.
• 1:22
  So obviously you can go back and listen to the annoyingly.
• 1:25
  Satisfied husband and the wife who wants more, but this is the
• 1:28
  couple, which is very common in counseling where the woman wants
• 1:32
  more out of the marriage. She wants more.
• 1:34
  It's just more correct, more connection.
• 1:37
  She wants them to evolve together and grow as people
• 1:40
  she's probably in her own therapy.
• 1:41
  She wants him to be in his own therapy.
• 1:43
  She no longer thinks it's okay that he just goes out earns
• 1:46
  money and comes home. She's probably earning money by
• 1:48
  now too. And she wants to have a greater
• 1:51
  and deeper connection. That is a relationship that's
• 1:54
  more in line with how she feels Now versus two people just, you
• 2:00
  know, kind of co-parenting real small kids together and trying
• 2:03
  to survive. Now that the Kids are older.
• 2:05
  She wants something that feels more like an intimate
• 2:10
  Partnership of equals that are growing and evolving together
• 2:14
  intellectually and emotionally and frequently sexually, but
• 2:17
  that is usually not the number one.
• 2:19
  The number one complaint in this regard.
• 2:22
  It's more about emotional and intellectual compatibility that
• 2:25
  the woman no longer feels is there.
• 2:27
  As they've gotten older. They've grown, she feels she's
• 2:30
  grown in One Direction. He may have just stagnated at
• 2:32
  another and she's bored. Get out now a direct corollary
• 2:37
  to this are the many men that I see.
• 2:41
  Really not corollary. You know, you talk too much,
• 2:44
  start using the wrong words. A, a Counterpoint to this is the
• 2:49
  men that are in the same situation except it's like that
• 2:52
  game or everything you say, you put in bed afterwards.
• 2:55
  So the men want a companion that develops and grows with them in
• 2:59
  bed. Then wants to evolve in bed that
• 3:02
  is curious about the world in bed.
• 3:04
  And now Watson new identity in bed.
• 3:08
  It's true though. So these men come in, and they
• 3:11
  are real tired with the status quo, they're tired of the status
• 3:15
  quo, the mission, every or, you know, possibly doggy style sex,
• 3:18
  every couple of weeks, and they want to have a real lover, a
• 3:24
  partner that is interested and curious and developing and
• 3:28
  exploring and pushing boundaries and having a new identity as as
• 3:32
  a couple who you know, it Pretty sexual and explores fantasies
• 3:37
  and goes outside Comfort zones. And you know, talks about new
• 3:41
  things and tries new things, etc, etc.
• 3:44
  And so, the men who ever the partners, who wants more in
• 3:49
  whatever way they want it, this is usually because they're in
• 3:51
  midlife, they don't have much of a purpose and a passion is the
• 3:54
  way that they used to, in the kids, or the family, or even The
• 3:58
  Courier for these men, they kind of got to a place where they're
• 4:01
  happy in their career. So, almost the only thing that
• 4:04
  they think, And could stand Improvement and the only kind of
• 4:08
  context that they can see themselves growing and changing
• 4:12
  in such a visceral way is the sex life and since they don't
• 4:16
  want to be unfaithful the only person they can do it with is
• 4:19
  the woman. So this is much like those women
• 4:23
  frequently feel like they had like a lot of, it's really
• 4:27
  probably the same for the women, the kids, and the men career.
• 4:30
  So the man threw himself wholly into his career was like so
• 4:33
  challenging made him think of Self in different ways, a lot of
• 4:36
  growth, a lot of changes, a man, a whole new identity and well,
• 4:41
  now he's got there, you know, to whatever higher level.
• 4:44
  And now, the only thing that he could think about that would
• 4:47
  make him. So kind of transformed and
• 4:51
  interested in his life. Again, would be to change the
• 4:54
  sex life. And so for the woman, while she
• 4:56
  may have changed herself, pulled herself inside out to be like
• 4:59
  the best mother that she could be and thought about herself
• 5:01
  introspected and done all of Of this work on herself to be like
• 5:06
  the best mother of young children and then older
• 5:08
  children. Well, when the children got a
• 5:09
  little older than that, you know, we're talking about late
• 5:12
  elementary, middle school, high school, then she's like, she
• 5:16
  wants that kind of same kind of feeling of personal fulfillment
• 5:21
  via a connection with another and the only person she got
• 5:25
  left. Is that, man?
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  So she's gonna throw herself into that.
• 5:29
  And so the the way that a person defines their identity is
• 5:34
  Different in earlier stages of the relationship.
• 5:37
  It's not so much based solely on the partner.
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  There's a lot more stuff going on, but when you've accomplished
• 5:43
  various goals that you've had such as raising healthy happy
• 5:46
  children or getting to a certain place in your career and women
• 5:50
  can do this when they get to a certain place in their career as
• 5:52
  well and men can throw themselves into the kids.
• 5:54
  I'm just seeing the saying, the main effects of what I see based
• 5:56
  on gender generally. Well then once that's done well,
• 6:00
  what's left, if you want to remain faithful and you want to
• 6:03
  remain, kind of in a, Normative conventional family situation,
• 6:08
  you can't just go backpack across to bet.
• 6:11
  You can't just decide to quit your job and live in an RV and
• 6:17
  travel. You can't do a lot of shit if
• 6:19
  you want to kind of stay in one place for the stability of your
• 6:23
  children and maintain your career.
• 6:25
  So within the bounds of conventionality, what is the
• 6:30
  only way that people can get this sort of Adventure without
• 6:36
  having an affair, which is what people used to do before having
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  Affairs was thought of as literally the worst thing in the
• 6:41
  world. Well sex.
• 6:43
  But again, since Affairs are now terrible.
• 6:48
  They weren't always read the State of Affairs by Esther
• 6:50
  perel. Read the erotic Silence of the
• 6:53
  American, housewife, there's a title.
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  There's lots of books. You can read on like how
• 6:58
  different infidelity thought of Now versus years ago but since
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  The social Norm is that were not allowed to do it anymore.
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  Then. Now what can you do?
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  You basically got to have an affair with your spouse and for
• 7:14
  a woman that manifest primarily emotionally and firm and
• 7:17
  primarily physically, although of course the physical leads to
• 7:19
  the emotional and the emotional, he's to the physical in both
• 7:21
  cases. So both people, they will.
• 7:24
  What this really is is a person who deeply wants to have an
• 7:26
  affair or to be with somebody else, but they can to because I
• 7:30
  fuck up the whole fucking family that they worked, so hard to
• 7:33
  build. So there are people who can
• 7:37
  understand this drive in their spouse and they can have the
• 7:40
  emotional or physical affair. They can let themselves get kind
• 7:43
  of caught up in it and the man can read the books on marriage
• 7:46
  and connection, and the woman can dress up in latex or
• 7:50
  whatever the fuck he wants, and these people are happier.
• 7:53
  But then, you know, not like not like they ever get any
• 7:57
  tremendous deep personal fulfillment on their own from
• 8:00
  this, but they see that the partner who is the engine of the
• 8:04
  drive. Iver of the change does become
• 8:06
  happier and does see more fulfilled in their life via.
• 8:09
  This exploration of self that is Manifest either physically or
• 8:14
  emotionally or both and people that can't that are like,
• 8:18
  basically, just leave me alone. I'm up to the stage of my life
• 8:21
  where I don't want to deal with this bullshit anymore.
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  I just want to rest and enjoy, what I have what I've made in my
• 8:27
  life and where the place that I've gotten to these people
• 8:30
  usually and up, you know, on Happily partner and this can
• 8:34
  lead To divorce when one person is moving toward growth and
• 8:37
  change in the other person. Isn't now the the issue the
• 8:42
  sticking point here when it's men that are the driver of
• 8:45
  change is there frequently wanting women to act in a way
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  completely antithetical, to wear their hormones and biology are
• 8:51
  at that juncture. So whereas anybody any man can
• 8:55
  read a fucking book on marriage, you know?
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  I mean, or take some personality tests or join her at a sculpting
• 9:02
  class or whatever. She thinks would make I'm more
• 9:04
  into a true partner, you know, than what he's currently doing
• 9:08
  of sitting on the couch and scratching himself.
• 9:10
  But the woman age, she just can't function that way
• 9:15
  physically anymore. She can try to put on the
• 9:18
  clothes in to be a game sport about whatever, sexual Endeavor
• 9:22
  he wants. But frequently this is shit that
• 9:24
  she was never doing, you know? And now, he feels like this is
• 9:28
  his last chance to, you know, self develop in the sexual
• 9:33
  Arena. And He wants to remain
• 9:35
  monogamous and frequently does then.
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  She is the only person with whom he could do it and therefore the
• 9:41
  bottleneck that is stopping him from in his mind this, you know,
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  Pinnacle of self Evolution this really isn't fair.
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  But then again you know, love isn't fair relationships aren't
• 9:53
  Fair, my job is to kind of tell you what goes on and maybe some
• 9:56
  ways to work around these basic human patterns that I see and
• 10:01
  couples, right? So, so what I tend to see is
• 10:05
  that the way it was a more game and giving the woman is then the
• 10:10
  better this goes. But if there's some men that
• 10:13
  particularly have a narcissistic streak that wants so much more
• 10:17
  than any woman, could really give at the stage of life that
• 10:21
  it's better, honestly, that they split over the long term if he's
• 10:25
  going to continue to be so unfulfilled.
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  And to wish that she would be acting like a 25 year old sex
• 10:31
  goddess because that's not going to happen.
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  And it's the I think honestly with the annoyingly satisfied
• 10:37
  husband and the wife who wants more.
• 10:39
  There's plenty of women who have a narcissistic streak that don't
• 10:42
  feel any better. When the guy read some books on
• 10:45
  marriage and goes to counseling and takes up, you know, yoga
• 10:48
  with her. And instead want him to
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  basically turn into a completely other person, out of a Nicholas
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  Sparks romance novel, and and these people are better off
• 10:58
  splitting to, you know, eventually.
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  So there's different differing views on whether that should
• 11:03
  happen before or after the AIDS are out of the house, but if you
• 11:06
  are with somebody that no matter what you do, including going to
• 11:10
  counseling, they just cannot get around the fact that you are
• 11:14
  obstructing them from personal fulfillment and growth.
• 11:18
  Well, I mean, don't stay in that situation because it's not going
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  to work. So as a partner, you try to go
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  to the limit of what you can do and this could be more than you
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  think currently. So like a woman who in any way
• 11:30
  condescends to the guys, you know, desire for sexually.
• 11:34
  Open an adventurous life needs to re-examine those assumptions.
• 11:38
  Is this worth ending your marriage over the fact that you
• 11:40
  you know, think it's gross to the, I don't know.
• 11:44
  Do whatever the fuck, you know, remember dress up like a fuzzy
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  rabbit or whatever. I said in the other podcast, but
• 11:51
  probably not. But then again, if you are like
• 11:54
  a 55 year old woman and the guys like I want you, you know, to
• 11:58
  greet me naked every day and to do this and to do that and then
• 12:02
  we're going to bring in a third. Well, you know, No, I mean
• 12:05
  sometimes you got to be like, you know, hasta Lavista best of
• 12:09
  luck, you know, trying to with half your income seduce, a
• 12:12
  younger woman into doing these things and I say half your
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  income because that's what it would be after the divorce.
• 12:18
  But in but it's the same thing for what again what's good for
• 12:21
  the goose Etc. If there is a guy whose wife is
• 12:24
  consistently up his ass to change and grow and he's been
• 12:28
  two years of counseling and he's tried to change his.
• 12:32
  Got his own individual therapist and she's still Says that she
• 12:35
  just doesn't click with him or he's not trying or she, he
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  stopping her from being in the kind of relationship that she
• 12:41
  wants the same, hasta Lavista and see if she could find
• 12:45
  somebody else that does it for her with half of y'all's income
• 12:49
  which is, you know, possible that she can is possible that
• 12:53
  the guy can find a sex goddess of his dreams as well.
• 12:56
  But the point is, there's always something to sacrifice.
• 12:59
  Obviously, the rest of the relationship, the long history,
• 13:04
  Every possibly deep connection. You know what, the the children,
• 13:09
  having one place to come home to etc, etc.
• 13:12
  And, of course, very real sorts of pragmatic.
• 13:14
  Things like, the finances that I'm talking about, or, you know,
• 13:18
  where y'all going to live or like, what have you?
• 13:21
  But if you deeply feel that your relationship is the kind of The
• 13:29
  Proving Ground, for, for your personal self development, and
• 13:32
  that's something to rethink, you know, So individual therapy and
• 13:36
  a lot of introspection can help you figure out are you, whether
• 13:40
  you're the woman in this situation, or the man and the
• 13:42
  situation, when you're the partner who quote wants more?
• 13:44
  Are you setting a person up to fail?
• 13:47
  Are your expectations, even remotely normal for a spouse
• 13:53
  like your spouse of their age and station and personality is
• 13:58
  what you want even possible at all?
• 14:00
  Because listen, you deserve to get what you want.
• 14:03
  And as much as Nobody in our self-centered Society, deserves
• 14:06
  to get what they want. But sometimes if your
• 14:09
  expectations are way too high, the end, you know, you're not
• 14:14
  aware of it, then you can get yourself into a bad situation.
• 14:17
  Where, for example, you divorce your partner.
• 14:19
  And then you wait for the Nicholas Sparks romantic
• 14:22
  character to arrive or the 25 year old sex goddess that
• 14:25
  somehow doesn't want you for your money, despite you being 55
• 14:28
  or whatever. The case may be to manifest in
• 14:32
  your life, like an apparition. And they may not What happened
• 14:35
  to you because they may not exist.
• 14:37
  No, such person may be able to meet your these standards that
• 14:41
  you have created. So individual therapy can help
• 14:43
  people realize are your expectations for your spouse.
• 14:46
  Normal? Are we dealing with a spouse who
• 14:49
  is recalcitrant and can change? But but doesn't want to, but but
• 14:53
  may be able to, if they understand how important this
• 14:56
  change in growth is whether it's emotional, physical sexual.
• 15:00
  Or are you trying, are you have you basically fallen out of love
• 15:03
  with your spouse? And you're like, putting them
• 15:06
  through the ringer when you're going to end up, leaving them
• 15:08
  anyway and or making the rest of their life miserable because
• 15:11
  they just cannot be who you want in which case it's kinder to get
• 15:14
  out quicker you know and not to do the years of counseling
• 15:18
  etcetera Etc if you already know that this person is not the
• 15:22
  person with whom you can be happy long-term but the major
• 15:25
  question is to ask what is it about your life?
• 15:28
  What can you do on your own internally?
• 15:31
  Such that you don't have to use the relationship?
• 15:34
  Like you are like primary vehicle of self-development but
• 15:38
  rather your self can do that by yourself, you can do that.
• 15:43
  You can figure out who you want to be spiritually.
• 15:46
  Career-wise physically. Do you want to be somebody that
• 15:50
  you eat travels and backpacks through Tibet?
• 15:52
  Maybe you do maybe your spouse would welcome.
• 15:55
  You going to Tibet, you wouldn't be up there as all the time
• 15:57
  about this shit and then you could come back and have more of
• 16:01
  a normative relationship after you got it out of your system.
• 16:04
  I've seen things like that happen, you know.
• 16:07
  But would you want to think about is, do you really want to
• 16:10
  be with this person? Long-term, and it's just
• 16:13
  basically, you're having some sort of midlife crisis, or have
• 16:16
  you been unhappy for a very long time?
• 16:19
  It's just, it's now kind of the breaking point because this is
• 16:24
  the first time, you can't even picture subconsciously, picture
• 16:26
  leaving because the children have gotten to be the age that
• 16:29
  you could picture it. Finally.
• 16:31
  And now you are just somehow in your mind.
• 16:34
  Dragging them through like these fiery Hoops.
• 16:37
  Because you want to say in your mind, I did everything I could
• 16:40
  before I got to a divorce, but you kind of know that you're
• 16:43
  going to leave this person or are you somebody that just wants
• 16:47
  a little bit of a deeper closer relationship, whether that's
• 16:51
  sexually or emotionally and therapy, really could help and
• 16:54
  you're going into it loving this person wanting to work on it and
• 16:58
  thinking that maybe in fact, it could be worked on.
• 17:01
  So three different options. So the First is the person
• 17:05
  that's really just unhappy with themselves and using the
• 17:08
  relationship as a manifestation of this deep, internal
• 17:12
  unhappiness, and frustration, and feeling stuck in their own
• 17:16
  life. So that's a person who go to
• 17:17
  individual therapy. The next is a person that's
• 17:20
  using all of these things about growth and change as like a
• 17:24
  cover up for the fact that they are really deeply not in love
• 17:28
  with their spouse anymore. They do not want to stay
• 17:30
  together, but they want to be somebody who tried everything
• 17:33
  before divorce. You that person or are you the
• 17:36
  person that's worked through your own stuff, you're dealing
• 17:39
  with your own midlife issues crises what have you existential
• 17:43
  angst and you really do genuinely, hope that with a
• 17:47
  little bit of genuine change and introspection, your partner, may
• 17:52
  become somebody who you want to be with, for the rest of your
• 17:56
  life and that and you could visualize yourself as a happy
• 18:00
  couple without your partner, change their entire personality.
• 18:04
  Ality and or sexual preferences and or intellectual, you know,
• 18:09
  it literally IQ or whatever. So, think about it.
• 18:13
  Deeply if you're in this situation because I do get these
• 18:15
  couples frequently and hopefully this gave you a lot to think
• 18:19
  about, please do follow me on Tick-Tock now.
• 18:21
  I'm so trendy and young. Just kidding.
• 18:24
  I'm just on Tick-Tock. Neither trendy nor young and
• 18:28
  I'll talk to you soon. Bye.