Hi friends,
Please stop by my home page today and notice the new video I posted. Each week until my new book is released, I’ll be posting a short teaching from The Emotionally Destructive Marriage: How to Find Your Voice and Reclaim Your Hope. Please tell you friends and others who you think might benefit.
Today I’m answering a question I’ve received in various forms throughout the past few weeks.
Question: I’ve been married for 25 years to an emotionally and verbally abusive man. I feel angry and bitter toward him for the way he treats me yet he still expects me to be loving and affectionate with him, especially in bed. I can’t do it. What does God expect me to do?
Answer: No one likes feeling like an object. Husbands sometimes complain to me that they feel that their wives treat them like a paycheck. Wives complain that they don’t feel like a loved person, but merely a sexual object or a slave. Marriage is the most sacred and intimate relationship we have apart from our relationship with God. When one person (or both people) continually disrespects, mistreats or lies to the other, intimacy is broken. It can be rebuilt, but not without genuine repentance and hard work.
From what you say, it sounds as if your husband believes he’s entitled to the benefits of married life (sexual intimacy, your affection and love, not to mention normal care) without having to do his part. He doesn’t seem to understand that having a good and loving relationship requires two people to interact with one another with kindness and respect. His emotionally abusive behavior is driving you further away from him. Does he just want sex from you? Or true intimacy? Marriage was created by God as a loving partnership, not simply a safe place for a man to have his sexual needs met, although that is one of the blessings of a loving marriage.
The Bible calls us to love, not hate. That command includes our enemies. But what does Biblical love look like towards your husband right now? Biblical love isn’t necessarily feelings of affection or warmth, but actions that are directed toward another person’s long term best interests. Therefore you’ll have to ask yourself, “Is it in your husband’s long term best interest to be sexually available to him so that his sexual needs are met?” Perhaps, but that won’t address your relationship problem. It is just a solution to his sexual frustration.
Another way to look at this situation is to determine if it is in your husband’s best interests to let him experience the felt consequences of broken intimacy and tell him that when he treats you disrespectfully, you’re too angry to feel warmth and affection towards him. When he’s not sorry he treats you that way, it makes it impossible for you to feel affectionate toward him. You need to have a calm conversation with him regarding how things are. Here’s a sample of something you might say.
I know you get very frustrated when I’m not responsive to your sexual needs. You want me to be sexual with you and enjoy our physical relationship, but the way you treat me much of the time makes me feel angry and hurt. When you call me names or degrade me in front of the children, the last thing I feel like doing is being warm and affectionate towards you. If you want genuine intimacy and affection, you will need to work on changing the way you treat me. Wouldn’t you rather have someone who wants to get close and affectionate with you rather than someone who is just doing her duty?
Most men I talk with want closeness with their wives. Men find the touch channel easier than the talk channel. Share that you don’t want to be just an object he uses when he’s sexually frustrated, but a person he loves, and right now he doesn’t treat you like he loves you. This may help him see the impact of his behavior, not only on you, but on him.
But hear this: God did not create Eve as a body for Adam to use, but a person to love and share life with. That is straight from the heart of God.
