Things you should never say to your man …

Note: I love it when Brittany Wong, an editor with the Huffington Post Divorce section emails and asks me to write something for her on a certain subject. She’s usually polling several therapists and usually needs only a few comments, but her requests always get me thinking and I end up making a whole blog out of it. This one was, “Things you should never say to your husband.” Here goes …

I’m a therapist whose practice is in the Bible belt area of the southern United States. I’ve worked in other areas of the country and do internet therapy with people from all over the world, but here in Arkansas a therapist must tread carefully around entrenched conservative values. Although I hate it that so many people think this way, a huge percentage of the couples I see involve a husband who believes he’s mandated to be the boss, and a wife who thinks she must keep her mouth shut and bear what she believes are his domination and unreasonable requests, demands and rules.

Still, a person can only hold their tongue so long, and many southern belles end up dishing out a little of what they’ve been getting after a while. When they do, it isn’t pretty.

I don’t care how unfair your spouse has been, hitting below the belt is never acceptable, and there’s always a better way to tell your spouse what you need without verbally annihilating him. When it comes to dishing the venom on a man, there are subject areas that can cause permanent wounding and resentment that is exceedingly difficult to get past. Here are some of the things I’ve heard in session and are things a woman should never say to her husband:

• You are such a disappointment (or failure). Telling a man he hasn’t been good enough cuts to the bone. It’s like taking a knife to his ego, slicing it into pieces, and then putting it in a blender. It preys on every man’s worst fear of not being man enough to be all his family needs him to be. Even if it’s true, he may not be able to recover from his spouse saying it out loud.
• I should have married (put the name of a former lover here). Expressing regrets about your marital selection will make your man so angry and shame-filled that I suggest you wear body-armor when doing it and live in an identity protection program afterwards.
• You don’t cut it in the bedroom. Enough said.
• Are you gay? So he’s not a jack rabbit in the bedroom, asking a heterosexual man if he is gay will do nuclear-weapon level damage to his ego and won’t improve your sex life.
• I’m not attracted to you anymore. This is a game changer. Once you let your husband know he is no longer an object of your sexual desire, every sexual advance he may make will be dread and anger-filled instead of the emotionally connected act of love it’s meant to be.
• Have you looked at yourself in the mirror lately? Insinuating that his body is no longer the Porsche-like machine it once was will shrink any chance that he might have confidence within the marriage and maybe anywhere else, and he’ll probably up his calorie intake just to spite you.
• If you have a heart attack, I won’t call 911. Now he knows you wish he was dead. It’s not a real motivator for self-improvement, but it is for him to start considering only himself in decisions moving forward.
• You never finish anything. The woodwork in the house is half painted and has been sitting for two years. You never got certified as an IT tech so you could make more money, and you are three classes short of a college degree. Your family is waiting and you know it, still it hurts to be called out on being fearful and unmotivated.
• I should have listened to my family when they told me not to marry you. Hindsight is 20/20 they say, but this insult stings – especially if you know deep down inside she is right.
• You’re not a man.

Even though I hear these things in sessions, couples still manage to stay together after much damage is done and suffer in a miserable state for many years without correcting it. This is a choice I would never make, and if it’s something you’ve been doing then ask yourself:

1. Why is this acceptable?
2. Why you don’t take action to change it?
3. If you can’t do #1 and #2 why don’t you move yourself to healthier waters and leave the relationship?

Subjecting yourself to terrible things and behaving terribly is not a healthy way to live. I recommend reading the book, “Healing the Shame that Binds You” by John Bradshaw if that’s where you find yourself. You really need to start treating yourself and others a whole lot better.