Barbara Angelis - Secrets About Men Every Woman Should Know

I believe that Mistake #1 is one of the primary causes for the lack of a satisfying sex life in many marriages. Being together for twenty years, having financial pressures, bringing up a family – these all contribute to the tension that can inhibit passion. But none of them are as destructive as the transformation of the husband and wife into a mother and her son.

Here are some suggestions for transforming yourself from a mother into a lover with your man.

1. Stop doing things for your man that he should be doing for himself.Treating men like children is like an addiction, and like any addiction the only way to stop is to Stop. This means that when your husband asks you where his keys are, say “I don’t know,” and let him look for them himself. When he is ready to get dressed for a certain occasion, don’t suggest what clothes he should wear. When he leaves a pile of clothes lying on the floor, don’t pick them up for him.

If your man is used to your doing things for him, he is going to have to adjust to your new role. At first, it might be difficult. You may have to put up with his frustration as he learns to do things for himself that he hasn’t in years. And don’t be surprised if your life temporarily becomes a little more chaotic. You may be late for a party because he can’t find his keys. He may leave the house with his tie crooked. But when these things happen often enough, he’ll learn. He’ll remember how frustrated he was looking for his keys and will learn to put them in the same place every night. He’ll recall how many times he’s told his tie is crooked and will learn to check it in the mirror himself. In other words, he’ll grow up and learn to take care of himself.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the next time your husband asks you if you’ve seen his keys you should respond, “Find them yourself I’m not your mother! “And I don’t believe you should stop being loving, nurturing, and supportive to your partner. It simply means being more of a wife or mate, and less of a mommy.

2. Treat your man like a competent, reliable person.Don’t remind him of information he should remember. Don’t be his brain and his calendar for him. Act as if he is a competent adult who can be counted on. Remember, your man might have gotten lazy since you’ve been doing a lot of the scheduling for him; he may unconsciously rely on you to make sure he doesn’t forget important appointments or responsibilities. So when you stop mothering him, he may find himself missing meetings, forgetting to pay bills, or neglecting to take out the rubbish. If this happens, do not scold him or criticize him, just sympathize with his frustration, and go about your own business.

Let’s say your partner has a dentist appointment on a Thursday. Say good-bye to him Thursday morning as usual. On Thursday evening, he comes home and announces “I’m so mad at myself. Dr. Hopkins’s office called me at work and told me I had an appointment today. I totally forgot about it.” You respond by saying, “That’s a shame, darling. I’m sure you can reschedule.” After enough missed appointments and forgotten events, your partner will learn to keep better track of his own schedule.

3. Don’t speak to your partner in “mommy-talk.”Promise yourself that you’ll stop talking to your man as if he is a five-year-old. That means: No Scolding! It’s perfectly all right for you to let your partner know when you are upset or angry. But talk to him as one adult to another, not as an exasperated mother to her bad little boy.

What about “baby talk” in a relationship? I think some baby talk is natural, an intimate way we share our vulnerable selves with each other. If you and your partner speak in baby talk a lot of the time, however, especially in bed or during sex, then you’ve got a problem. It’s time to have a grown-up relationship.

4. Decide what responsibilities you want him to handle in the relationship, and don’t take over even when he makes a mistake.I know how difficult it’s going to be for many of you to do this. It means letting go of control and trusting things to work out all right in the end, even if they don’t happen as you would have liked them to. For instance, your husband says he will make reservations for dinner one evening, but he calls the restaurant too late in the day, and all the tables are booked. When he telephones you at six o’clock to say he couldn’t get reservations, you say, “That’s too bad. I’ll be ready at eight o’clock as planned. I’m sure you can find some place for us to go. See you then.” He’ll feel stupid for procrastinating, grateful that you didn’t berate him, and will remember this feeling the next time he plans to take you out for dinner.

Warning: You will be tempted to intervene when you see the situation falling apart. Your vacation is coming up, and you know your husband hasn’t made plane reservations yet. Or your boyfriend decides to make some lasagna, and you know he is putting in too much sauce.

DON’T GIVE IN TO THE TEMPTATION TO RESCUE HIM

Let him make his own mistakes, and live with the consequences. That’s the only way he will learn to do things differently next time.

Having spent fifteen years of my adult lift mothering men, I consider myself, unfortunately, an expert on the subject, and want to share a story about breaking the mommy habit. I was in a relationship with a man who was chronically forgetful. He’d forget his appointments; he’d forget to return phone calls; he’d forget to mail in bills; he’d even forget where he was going when we were driving somewhere, and would miss the correct exit on the motorway. For two years, I took on the responsibility of being his brain, reminding him of what to do and where to go in his life. Whenever we’d drive somewhere, I’d never relax – I’d be on the lookout for each exit and appropriate turn, to make sure we got to our destination on time.

Finally, I got fed up with mothering him and decided that the only way he was going to learn to pay attention on the road was if I stopped doing it for him. One weekend we took a trip to a spa in southern California. We’d been there before and, of course, I knew the exact directions. We’d been driving for about an hour when we reached the signs that indicated that our turn-off was a few miles ahead. I glanced at my partner to see if he’d noticed, and felt my stomach tightening up. Not I warned myself. You promised you weren’t going to say anything. The closer we got to the exit, the more of a nervous wreck I became. And then we were at the exit, and my partner kept on driving. He’d missed it! I clenched my teeth tightly together to keep myself from screaming.

Time seemed to stand still as we drove ten miles, twenty miles, thirty miles past where we should have turned off. It was beginning to get dark. Suddenly he turned to me and said, “Does this area look familiar to you?”

“No,” I replied softly.

“I didn’t think it did,” he said. “Maybe I missed the turn-off.” He stopped at a petrol station and found out that, sure enough, he had just driven forty miles out of his way, making us late for our arrival at the spa. It took all my self-control not to say anything. As my partner turned the car around and headed back in the other direction, he looked at me sheepishly and said, “You knew I’d missed the exit, didn’t you?” I smiled at him; he smiled back. We both knew that he’d learned more of a lesson from driving forty miles in the middle of nowhere than he would have if I’d intervened and pointed out his mistake.