Couples Coping Support Group

I don't see that at all happening on this exchange. Many times have posters/members commented that the woman should be more 'intune' and nurturing and that her behavior is out of wack, to be polite. I wonder how much time you have spent observing/lurking that you would come to this conclusion.

Additionally, did you not get the ideas/views/suggestions or opinions that you had hoped for on the post/discussion or thread that you posted and had hoped for?

Actually I agree with you to a certain extent. The only discussion I noticed where someone was being berated/name called was the guy who wanted to watch his wife have sex with another man and thinks there's something wrong with her for not complying. And I'm sure a lot of us held back in what we really wanted to say...I know I did.


I do think marriage has become less honored and sacred. I believe for the most part it is due to the "me, me, me" instant gratification society we live in. People don't want to put effort into salvaging their relationships, and they just want to make sure their personal happiness comes before anything else. Laziness, and selfishness. Those are the downfalls in marriages these days, because they lead people to do some stupid things and just give up in general.



Marriage has went from till death do us part to, until I don't like you anymore.
Please be picky with who you choose.

That is quite possibly the most intelligent thing I have ever read on this board.

I mostly disagree (except for the last part about choosing wisely and carefully).

(I am a man, BTW)

I think there is a certain superficial knee-jerk tendency for what you described to occur with new posters, or early in a thread when a lot of the facts haven't come out yet.

So, if, for example, a man posts complaining about not getting enough sex from his wife, it is likely that the initial responses will include things along the lines of "you should listen to her more" and "you should help out more around the house."

(As an aside, I love how women portray vacuuming or taking out the trash as the ultimate panty peelers. If only it were that easy! : )

But, I think that these knee-jerk responses are quickly transcended once the discussion gets down to more detail and a deeper level.

I for one really appreciate that this board trends heavily female--there aren't really any women IRL that I could talk to about the kinds of issues discussed here (other than my wife), and I really appreciate being able to get a female perspective.

In general, what you noticed about the boards' bias is (to me) ridiculous. I don't remember anyone here ever saying that men are bad and women are all good, and I don't think men here get berated any more than what the women get.

I think a big difference is, and I'm only saying here on this board not in real life, the men posting here tend to post about sex, the women posting here tend to post about being abused or cheated on. I think it's easy then to perceive people as being less empathetic, because the things that men post about aren't crisis situations. That isn't to say they aren't critical, but men tend to post when they are feeling bad and the internet is a good place to vent.

Women, who in general society are accepted as more "emotional" creatures, don't tend to post here about minor things. Women tend to post here when their frustrations are beyond what they can vent about in day-to-day life, and it tends to be more "make or break" in their relationship. Again, not saying this is the case all the time, but men post here when they're upset, and women tend to post here when they have nowhere else to go.

And really, as good as it is to have a tool like this forum, nobody here is a therapist, nobody here is really "qualified" to give advice. The people who post here don't owe anyone anything, not unbiased helpful advice, not a shoulder to cry on. It's nice when people can help, and yeah it's disappointing not to get it when you're looking for it. So as much of a shame as it can be not to get the help they're looking for, I'd say 99% of the time, the change has to come from within. Most of the tips you listed could be cut and pasted to most posts, and in an ideal world, all of the advice given would be that sound and complete. But it's an open forum. We're all limited by that.

Marriage definitely isn't that social institution that it used to be, and I agree that people need to be more picky about it. But I also think that the kinds of people who, 50 years ago would've worked hard for a happy marriage are still doing that. I think the divorce rate can in part be explained by the lack of social stigma of single parents, and being a single person in general. I think that marriages in the past that would've lasted forever weren't happier, and people weren't more picky. I think they were more trapped.

Good post, pi.

I thought about responding to the "Marriage is under attack..." statement. I guess I'm actually doing so, now.

I'm not sure why the OP things marriage is under attack--maybe because it;s easier (and less stigmatized) to divorce, or maybe because some people (myself included) think that same-sex couple ought to be able to marry.

Those are societal changes, not attacks. The institution of marriage is changing, just as all things change over time. Divorce is not unequivocally a bad thing. It some cases it's the least bad alternative in a very bad situation.

In my case, I think the threat of divorce (i.e. my wife finally figuring out that it was an option I was seriously giving consideration to) was the catalyst to a lot of improvement in our marriage.

That's not too say that some people don't divorce too easily. That's another discussion.

Also, men and women tend to speak slightly different languages. When a man posts that he doesn't get enough sex from his wife, some women may tend to roll their eyes and think "poor baby."

I think what men may really mean by that, in many cases, translated into how women might express it, is that they feel disconnected from their spouse due to a lack of intimacy, undesired, etc. i.e. not just that they aren't "getting off" enough.

I think you are right about what men are looking for when they post that they aren't getting enough sex----what they mean is they are feeling that disconnect, don't feel desired/wanted/needed. I disagree that people roll their eyes and think "poor baby" (at least on this board). I think it's a very serious complaint, as long as it's real and not someone who thinks they should get it 5 times a day and complaining because it's only 3. KWIM.


I didn't take it as the OP meant marriage is attacked on this board, but I understood him to mean in society, in general, that marriage doesn't get the respect it once did. Isn't as important as it used to be, to a lot of people.

As times change, the reasons for marriage change. I'm very old-fashioned, if anyone ever asked me what I wanted for my own life it would be what I have now- a fabulous husband, and my beautiful, healthy children. I always wanted to be married and have a family, and I don't in any way feel "tied" to it. I want to be here. However I feel with many people that isn't the case in this day and time. People want it ~all~ and sometimes it isn't attainable. They want the marriage, two spouses with big careers, a bunch of kids, all the free time in the world, a big house, new cars, all the material items they can get their hands on!... We live in a gimme gimme society and it's sad and it is the downfall of a LOT of marriages. I read somewhere not too long ago that financial problems lead to 90% of divorces.

I feel that a lot of times marriage is about what the other person can give you/do for you materialistically, not what they can offer emotionally, what kind of partner they will be. Marriages are like a financial agreement instead of an emotional/spiritual commitment. It's just disheartening.

Thanks, question.

I agree with you, too. I think men in general are not as good as communicating their wants and needs on the same emotional level as women tend to be more comfortable doing (BROAD generalizations), and that extends to this website, too. I think when men feel sexually disconnected, it makes them feel all-over disconnected, but the way it's presented can definitely come across as just some horny dude and does get pooh-poohed.

And I agree, the Institute of Marriage is changing, as well it should. I don't see why it's seen as such a negative thing. I think that the kinds of people who want the 2.5 kids and happy spouse still seek and work on that, and the staggering divorce statistics and gay marriage statistics are just manifestations of how society in general is letting people do more what they want to do, not what their parents did, necessarily.

People definitely divorce too easily, and people get married to easily and move in too quickly and have too many kids they can't afford and all kinds of stuff that on the outside, it's easy to identify the problem. I've always just found it really offensive to the individual to say "Society is making people do this". People still have a choice, and can only do the best with the information they have at the time.

haha That's my rant for the day.

I'm not sure why it's offensive to say that "society" has something to do with all this. I think that the world we live in is much different than it used to be (obviously), morals are more lax, people are extremely selfish. For some people, growing up in that type of "society" influences them in a big, big way. People in general are just more selfish and don't think about how their actions affect those that they love. Unfortunately, bad behavior and doing whatever it takes to make one happy--regardless of who gets hurt in the process--is becoming more and more socially acceptable. And that's a sad thing.

I don't know--people are more selfish than when? When Cain killed Abel? : )

I'm not sure why you constantly feel a need to respond to my post directly or by allusion, but I'll be glad to explain why I find it offensive.

Firstly, you're making a comparitive statement to something unspecified, which makes no literal sense. "Used to be" can be fifty years ago, five years ago, or thirty thousand years ago. What "used to be" the case in different socio-economic parts of the world can vary wildly.

Also, because you or I or most people that comment on how things "used to be" weren't actually there, we can't say how it actually used to be. I mean, the "times" I'm assuming you're citing for the heyday of the American middle-class nuclear family were also the times when, to the people living in them, America was in a decline because of the shaking of Elvis' hips. Only in retrospect can things be ideal; only in present is everyone "doomed".

My Gram talks to me about the "quiet times" when she was raising her children. Those quiet times included Kent State massacre, the sexual revolution, the civil rights movement, the assassination of JFK and the moon landing. To my Gram, her world was made up of children and family. In the broader cultural sense, things were at least as tumultuous as they are now, just with different things being cited as the cause for the moral/ethical decay. So it really depends on from where you are looking IN the scope of current events, which is almost impossible to then tie into "society" as a whole, especially as time moves on from those events.

Lazy, lax and selfish are hardly the words I would use to describe someone who leaves the sanctity of marriage and attempts to raise their children alone. Just because the relationship does or doesn't work out (and who can say besides the people in it if it is "laziness" or "selfishness" that leads to a break-up?), does not mean that the people for whom the relationship didn't work are lazy. Attempting to judge the character of someone by their relationships is completely unfair, and puts immediate bias on those that "make it work" at any cost.I mean, I haven't been divorced firsthand so I can't personally attest to how wrenching of a decision it is, but I've seen people go through it, and it's absolutely awful. Just because people make that decision doesn't make them wrong or right, it's what they do afterwards that determines what they got from the experience, and how much character they have.

I think treating people like garbage is obviously unacceptable, and there aren't many people advocating for it to be acceptable. I think definitely it's become easier to see when someone is being unfaithful, for example, because they leave more of a paper trail now. But I don't think that more observable behavior necessarily means that that behavior has increased. I think for the people to whom that behavior is acceptable, it always was, they just didn't have the stage that technology/media give them.

As a member of this "lazy", "lax" generation who works hard at two jobs, goes to school, and manages a long-term, monogamous relationship, I find it offensive to blame "society" for the failings of the individual because I think then "society" can come in and take the credit for the good that I (and others of my age who are dedicated, intellectually curious and moral) can do. I think it's the epitome of laziness to blame the society for "creating" any problem, because that promotes the ideology that the individual matters less, and makes people less likely to aspire to more. It fosters the feeling that we're all going to hell in a handbasket and there's nothing we can do about it, and I think that kind of moral laziness is far more detrimental to people as a whole than any kind of stastic I've seen about divorce.

I'll preface this by saying I have no idea what society or marriage was like back in the "good old days" that people reference, when they say marriage was taken seriously & people fought for love. Right now, my perception is shaped by a new love for the TV show "Mad Men." So, if the show is accurate (albeit dramatized) as I hear it is, this shapes my opinion.

Things like homosexuality and unplanned pregnancies led to marriages that weren't built on true love. Also, considering how a woman's place was to stay at home & birth children, this led to women being quite unhappy in their roles (and stay unhappy). They didn't have the freedom, legally/emotionally/physically that we have today. Women felt pressure to fit into this role & may have married the wrong person just to be accepted by society and family.

People tolerated things in a marriage that they wouldn't today because we now understand how unhealthy they are... such as abuse or addiction. Or maybe the couple just couldn't get past their issues, yet still stayed together for the sake of kids... whereas today, being divorced and a single parent is much more common & acceptable.

To say society has declined and/or the value of marriage/love has declined, to me, isn't accurate... because both periods of time had positives and negatives. We can look back on those times and think of how people are more egocentric & selfish, yet we also have also evolved in some areas. Things change, people change, for better & for worse.

" I read somewhere not too long ago that financial problems lead to 90% of divorces. "

Doesn't leave much room for cheating and/or abuse for cause for divorce ... I'd be very dubious of that statistic.