Engagement Rings Advice : Wedding, Marriage, Anniversary

If a husband and wife-Miriam and Ken Thompson, let us say -agree that they are predominantly a status-struggle type of couple and are frequently engaged in stressful competition, they can learn to enjoy great cooperation and to function less competitively by practicing the series of exercises which follows. These techniques will not completely eliminate status struggles, for such struggles are necessary from time to time when issues arise for which rules have not yet been agreed upon. But the practices we suggest can help limit the struggles to appropriate areas, and make the marriage correspondingly more workable. Let us stress that the spouses must go slowly. They must not attempt to change their marriage overnight. After all, psychoanalysis not infrequently takes six to eight years. These exercises should therefore be taken slowly, step by step, over a period of weeks.

First, Miriam and Ken are to sit down together and compile a list of the various duties performed and roles filled when they are home together over a weekend. Such activities as cooking, cleaning, entertainment, and helping the kids with schoolwork will be listed. Miriam and Ken probably will discover that status struggles occur when both attack the same problem at just about the same time, as when Ken is helping Johnnie, their son, with his homework and Miriam cannot refrain from putting her two cents’ worth in.

For the sake of experience and practice they should plan for the next several weekends to divide functions and tasks rigorously, agreeing in advance about which spouse is to take charge of each particular duty. For example, it may be Ken’s job to drive the kids to their swimming lesson every Saturday and to mow the lawn, while Miriam goes to the laundromat and arranges for a baby-sitter for Saturday evening. (The matter of choosing the type of entertainment will be discussed later because this is one function that cannot be assigned to a particular spouse as part of a role.) Miriam and Ken may find during several weeks’ trial that they have to do some shifting of tasks. Perhaps Miriam is better at helping the kids with their English homework, and Ken with their mathematics. If Miriam accepts the task of attending the PTA meeting on Wednesday evening, perhaps it will be desirable for Ken to take charge of providing for dinner on that night. Since he does not cook, this may mean taking the family out to dinner, or having a simple barbecue.

The procedure described here sounds very simple and mechanized, but in carrying it out, most couples will find to their surprise that although they have been assuming that each has his assigned tasks, actually-except for the most obvious ones-tasks have not been clearly assigned, and that status struggles occur when husband and wife attempt to take over a task at the same time, or when one interferes with the other’s performance.

The couple will soon discover that even after weekend functions and tasks have been divided, many areas of dissatisfaction remain. This is most often the case in matters involving idiosyncratic taste or choice such as the selection of a movie. Status struggles occur in the choice of anything upon which one places cultural value. It is always possible to argue that it’s better to go see a Shakespearean play than a gangster film.

In situations of this sort, many unnecessary status struggles can be eliminated if the spouses agree to alternate in choosing the evening’s activity, with each in turn accepting without adverse comment the selection of the other.

After the status strugglers have weathered a weekend in which the labor was broken up into tasks for each, they are ready for the next step, the assignment of areas of competence rather than specific duties. This change introduced a relative freedom into the system, because areas are not as confining and controlling as specific duties. The trick here is to realize that a good cook is no greater than a good accountant, that the successful gardener isn’t superior to the careful housekeeper. In order to work out areas of competence, the spouses must have made enough progress to be able to agree on a number of important areas which must be taken care of if the family work is to get done, to recognize that the question of someone being better than someone else is not relevant.

Here is a method for assigning areas of competence. The spouses sit down together, and one tells the other what he did best-what situation he handled most competently-over the weekend. If the other agrees, this may be considered one of his areas of competence. For example, the wife may say to tile husband, “The way you kept the children from quarreling was marvelous. I think it would be a great thing if you could take over the discipline of the kids over the weekend because by the end of the week I’m somewhat weak and frustrated with them and probably not very effective.” If he assents, she is free to take over another matter; the husband may now suggest that she keep the family financial records, since she handled them neatly and systematically over the weekend and he finds bookkeeping a boring chore.

After trying a weekend during which areas rather than tasks are assigned, the spouses review the allotment of areas; some shifting, or at least a few slight changes will probably be necessary and these should be discussed at this time. The next step will then be to decide how to share responsibility in those areas in which some overlapping is inevitable. One such area is shopping, since an individual out for other reasons may stop to “pick up” something, thus doing part of this job. Child rearing is another area in which both parents are usually involved.

Many status struggles involve the question of who is doing a better job of disciplining the children. The fact is that the mother is with the children a great deal more than the father is, therefore her values will predominate despite her husband’s best efforts unless he has intimidated her completely, and the husband’s frustration is evident when he tries to impose his values upon the children during the infrequent periods when he is with them. In the effort to eliminate status struggles over the children a good first step is to assign the father complete charge of their discipline when he is present on weekends. His wife will often be dissatisfied with his approach, but only by stepping out of the picture does she make it possible for him to experience the burden of total responsibility for child discipline. The chances for settling into a compromise are much improved once one recognizes that it is all very well to wish the children were behaving in a certain way, but it is quite another matter to put forth the effort to get them to do so.

Spouses who attempt exercises of the sort just described will recognize, in all likelihood, that in their efforts to bargain and to divide responsibilities, they end up competing over who can fulfill his share of the bargain better. But though it is still competition, competing to cooperate is one step forward, for it leads toward more positive interactional patterns and gives one less of a sense of struggling with the other spouse over fruitless and never-ending “issues.” Issues are usually smoke screens hiding a more basic disagreement over who “cares the most” or who is being “more thoughtful.” The many status struggles occurring over particular issues may, indeed, be reflections of the basic status struggle implied in this central question.

For most people, the main difficulty in being thoughtful is that they experience a hurt vulnerability when their thoughtfulness is not returned, or when they fear that it will not be returned. The result is the defensiveness described elsewhere in the book as reverse vulnerability. To avoid this fear of being thoughtful, and hence this reverse vulnerability, spouses should divide tasks and areas of responsibility in such a manner that neither can claim that he is being more thoughtful than the other or is being denied thoughtfulness by the other. If the reader will think back on recent arguments with his own spouse about who has done the most or who has worked the hardest or had the hardest day, he will recognize that the discussion rarely concerns actual man hours spent in labor; it usually involves some ill-defined question of who “cares” the most or who “gives” the most. Such scrapping represents the desire of each for recognition that he has contributed at least his share, the desire for a display of thoughtfulness and appreciation on the other’s part, but usually it leads only to further argument, recrimination, and status struggling. Therefore, it is desirable for each spouse to avoid merely thinking competitively about how to “beat out” the other spouse, and try instead to put himself in the other’s position and imagine how he feels, asking, “If I do so and so, how will Jane (or John) be made to feel?” This approach introduces a forward look into relationship behavior and drives home the knowledge that cooperation is not just a moment-to-moment thing, but also affects the future.

Some additional exercises to break down destructive status struggles over who is “more thoughtful” and who is “less appreciative” of the other’s thoughtfulness can be found in discussions of reverse vulnerability.

I have often thought that what helped our marriage most was that everyone was against it in the beginning.

We were introduced to each other when he was in law school, I in graduate school, both planning to spend the summer in Washington. We barely saw each other until we arrived in the new city, but June, July, and August were lovely with intimacy. In the fall we released other entanglements and, in the stressful routines of the university, depended on one another. Marriage gradually came to seem inevitable. We were adults (he was twenty-four, I twenty-three), committed to one another, ready to begin life together. What matter that his parents were Jewish and mine Protestant? Our families were much the same.

We proudly announced our engagement with a twenty-dollar turquoise ring, purchased because I thought something should mark our momentous undertaking. Then, innocent, we faced his parents, who, unreligious though they were, met our glad news with thin lips. We felt rejected, misunderstood, unappreciated.

My parents were little better. Although polite on the surface, my mother found every obstacle in the way of a wedding. An uncle was hardly civil.

And these were the relatives we heard from. We came to anticipate the anger of others-my grandmother of another generation, his aunt who celebrated each Friday with beautiful Sabbath ritual.

By spring that year, planning to marry in June, we realized ruefully that our envisioned joyful celebration, bringing a proud new law school graduate to my family and an accomplished graduate student to his, would not be as we had dreamed. My parents were unwilling to cooperate in any plans. His mother complained of the hurt to her family.

Ironically, some friends were little better. Why should I leave graduate school to marry? Why should we bother with commitment?

Before the combined weight of opposition, we were faced with an absolute choice: We could salvage life as we had known it, loving parents and grandparents, families, and communities. Or we could choose each other.

Without thinking about it very hard, we chose each other.

More than twenty years later, I see that choice as an act of unwitting wisdom. We entered marriage utterly committed to each other, already free of the strings and ties of the past.

With our decision made, events gradually turned around. A friend found a judge who happily volunteered to marry us. Faced with the possibility of her daughter’s wedding going on without her, my mother decided a home ceremony would not be so bad. His parents thought perhaps a rabbi’s blessing would be comforting, even if we were forbidden a Jewish ceremony. Our parents met each other cordially, discovering with pleasure that they shared common interests, bonded by an aversion to social drinking. (We had known how much they were alike, why didn’t they believe us?) The wedding took place, necessary forms were upheld, and we were free to begin our life together.

Now, looking back, I think the united opposition we faced was the greatest wedding gift of all. We started our life together with our relationship a healthy, strong organism, already tested, already mature. The marriage easily has withstood the irritating lumps and bumps of living and has continued to be a haven and home for us both.

lance heard marriage described as like a base camp in mountaineering, a place from which to gather strength for the assault on the peaks and a place to return for comfort or celebration. As we’ve gone through life, our marriage has seemed such a base camp. From it we each have gathered the strength and confidence to face challenges that must be faced alone, knowing the marriage, the home we have made together, is utterly secure.

Now we have two children, both teenagers, a large house, two successful careers, a cat (universally recognized as exceptionally dim-witted), and a piano, among other things. My father has apologized to my husband. Both of my parents are now very close to him. Even after twenty years, his parents have not accepted our marriage, or their grandchildren. We are very happy nonetheless and look forward to at least twenty more years in each other’s company.

Some people are just so good it hurts-really hurts. The technique which we call pseudo-benevolence is one that can drive a spouse crazy in no time, and it is common in our society.

The pseudo-benevolent dictator may be the husband or the wife, or both; his identifying characteristic is that he imagines that he is an abundant giver and can anticipate or know the needs of his spouse. The problem is that the victimizer fails to recognize and show approval of the expressed needs or real desires of his partner. This behavior has something in common with the mind reading act described earlier, in that both rest on unclear communication and the assumption that one person ‘mows” what the other is really feeling, wishing, or thinking.

In one young couple we knew (whose marriage lasted less than five years); the husband brought frequent little gifts to his wife. One day he would burst in with a chocolate malt (his wife was on a diet) and say boyishly, “I thought you needed a treat!” A few weeks later, he ‘would bring home two tickets to a night baseball game because his wife had been wanting a night out (his wife hated sports and for months had been nagging to be taken dancing; her husband hated dancing). This went on and on. H the wife needed new clothes; the husband might surprise her by picking out a dress on sale which he “knew” was just right for her, even though she preferred to do her own clothes shopping. After every such gift, the husband would look expectant, proud, and pleased because he was being such a considerate person.

The wife played right into the game. Not about to be labeled the “bad guy” in this twosome, she would praise the husband for his thoughtfulness, and accept the gift. She seldom had the courage to object.

The pseudo-benevolent dictator sometimes senses that the happiness of his spouse is only feigned, so he may end up feeling just as depressed as the recipient. Since neither realizes what is happening, the giver may regard the receiver as ungrateful, while the receiver thinks the giver is super-selfish.

The person who believes he is benevolent usually does not recognize the discrepancy in his behavior. He overlooks the fact that “benevolence” based on one’s own fantasy of what the other person wants, or one’s own need to give, turns out to be dictatorship. It cuts the other person out, and any hints or clues the other delivers that he feels left out are ignored, or simply not heard, or seen as lack of appreciation. If the victim tries to press his point, the conversation may go something like this:

‘What do you mean I never do anything for you? I took you to the movies two nights ago.”

“But, darling, you forget I didn’t want to see that movie. I was tired that night and told you I’d rather go to bed early.”

“You did not. You just said you were tired, and I thought the movie would relax you.”

“But you were the one who wanted to see that movie I hate John Wayne movies!”

“Boy, see if I ever do anything for you again. Other wives never get taken out, and when I try to do better, you nag me for it. That’s the last time.”

The imputation of desire as illustrated here is not the same as responding to the spouse’s real needs, expressed or unexpressed. In some cases, a spouse may certainly give spontaneously without being asked, because as a result of past experience he knows that his partner desires a particular gift, or loves to cuddle at bedtime, or likes a certain meal especially well. If a person is genuinely sensitive to another’s needs, and gives to fulfill these rather than his own, he should rightfully be called-not a pseudo-benevolent dictator-but in romantic terms, a lover!

This destructive technique is especially effective against the spouse who is naturally aggressive and imaginative and seldom has the time to do everything he wants to do. The more the person is a success in his profession or business, and wants the same degree of control in his home, the more effectively this destructive technique can be used against him. It consists of subtly undercutting the efforts of the aggressive spouse in a frustrating manner which can’t be readily identified. Here is an example.

John Z. Alderson has a deep feeling of resentment toward his wife, Eloise. Whenever they are together he is ill at ease, frustrated, and in a smoldering sort of way, angry at her. John thinks about this often, with a sense of shame and guilt, for he cannot understand his feeling of frustration and annoyance at his wife.

‘Why should I feel this way?” his thoughts run. “Poor Eloise works so hard. She is a sweet, thoughtful person and certainly a good mother. I really have little excuse for being so angry at her so much of the time, especially since the things which annoy me are so trivial.”

The reader is now invited into the Alderson home.

It is seven thirty in the morning. John has just finished shaving and in a few minutes will go down to have breakfast with Eloise. He reaches into his dresser drawer for a clean shirt, but the drawer is empty.

“Eloisel” “Yes, dear.”

“How come I’m out of shirts again?”

“But, dear,” Eloise says, “by having the laundryman come just every other week; we’re saving considerable money on the laundry.”

Eloise’s remark doesn’t seem quite logical to John. He scratches his head and begins thinking that perhaps his own logic is faulty, although he doesn’t know what the error is. He grunts to himself, looks in the mirror, shrugs his shoulders, and rummages around in the laundry basket for an already used shirt. He puts it on, and selected a bow tie instead of a four-in-hand, because the bow tie hides the wrinkles in the soiled collar a little better.

When John has finished dressing he goes into the kitchen.

Eloise is humming happily to herself as she spoons coffee out of a two-pound can.

“Eloise, for God’s sake, I’ve asked you not to buy two-pound Cans of coffee. The damn stuff gets stale on us and loses its flavor. You know how much a good cup of coffee means to me.”

Eloise looks at him somewhat maternally. She shakes her head and smiles patiently. “But, darling, I couldn’t resist; I save twenty cents a can when I buy it on sale.”

“Eloise, I don’t give a damn if you save five dollars a can.

Stale coffee is stale coffee. Please don’t buy two-pound cans anymore.”

“Yes, darling.”

Twenty minutes later, as John is leaving for the office, he notices some cobwebs in the corner behind the sofa. Now he starts looking. His eyes go around the room, and he observes (as he has several times recently) that there is dirt behind all the furniture.

“Eloise!”

“Yes, darling.”

“When are we going to get the cleaning service?”

“But we’ve talked about it before; remember, the day after your birthday we outlined the whole plan…”

“Oh? Eloise, I think you work hard enough as it is, and if we both want a clean house, which I certainly do, why can’t we employ the cleaning service?”

“Oh, darling, you know how spooky I feel about having strangers in the house. Those cleaning men are always underfoot. They shove the furniture around, and I can’t do a thing while they’re here except stand around and bite my fingernails. Really, darling, I’d much rather do the cleaning myself.”

“I know, Eloise, but you’re terribly busy as it is now, with the children, and the PTA, and your reorganization at the Red Cross, and that business you’re doing for senile elderly people. I understand how important all these things are. But after all, there are only so many hours in the day, and you can’t be so active and keep the house clean too.”

Eloise looks at John. Her eyes grow watery. She bites her lips and says, “That’s all right, darling, I’ll do the very best I can. Anything I can do to help you by being a good wife, is what I want to do.” With this Eloise turns and walks into the bedroom to make the bed hastily before leaving for a meeting of the local Red Cross chapter.

John leaves the house and heads for his automobile. All the way to the office he finds his stomach growling. A throbbing ache is beginning at the back of his neck and spreading up into the occipital region. He feels rather bitter toward the world at large-but he knows only vaguely that it is related to his wife.

However oversimplified the above incident may seem, it does exemplify a particular behavior pattern commonplace in many marriages.

In this case, Eloise is a master tactician, even though she doesn’t realize it. By assuming the “one-down” position, by appearing to be considerate, thoughtful, and above all patient, she is slowly driving John nuts. He is angry and frustrated for no apparent reason, and so can only conclude (unbelievingly) that something must be wrong with him alone.

What has characterized their conversation is the absence of a completed transaction. No decisions have been made.

Eloise’s manner suggests to John that she will do anything he desires, but the logic of his past experiences with her indicates that she will not. He is completely frustrated and angry and doesn’t know how to deal with the situation. His own conclusions about it swing from one extreme to the other; sometimes he believes his wife is a liar, and at other times he feels there is something terribly wrong with him.

Both of his conclusions are correct. But husband and wife alike are unaware of what they are doing.

Here is another spouse-killing technique employed frequently in our affluent society.

Marge Edgeworth looks across the settee at her husband, who is engrossed in the evening paper. Between them sits a tinkling martini pitcher and Marge is sipping her second drink. This is her method of gaining courage, and she needs it, for earlier in the afternoon she decided to put an end to a situation which has been bothering her.

She clenches her fists, sits up straight.

“George, put down that paper,” she says in a loud half-command, half-whine.

“Eh, what?”

“Put down that damned paper,” shouts Marge. “Oh, oh … sure.”

George lets the newspaper fall to his lap, removes his glasses, and says, ‘Well, what’s up?”

“George,” Marge says, trying to speak calmly, “why don’t we ever talk together anymore?”

George looks at her quizzically and drops his shoulders, a sign of constraint. “I didn’t know we weren’t talking to each other, dear.”

“Oh, come now, you know what I mean. You used to tell me about things, your work and all. That was when you always used to say you loved me.”

George looks at his wife as if he were about to curse. He scratches his ear and with effort forces a smile. ‘Well, dear, what would you like to talk about?”

This routine of George’s deserves the label of “the perfect squelch.”

Marge twirls her martini glass–because she finds herself unable to think of anything to say. She wants to get some conversation from her husband, not to make a speech herself. She doesn’t know has never yet learned that one cannot compel a “spontaneous” response.

‘Well, I don’t know,” she says after a long pause. “Did anything interesting happen today?”

“No, no, dear, not a thing. Just the usual routine.”

George starts to pick up the paper. He hesitates, looking over the top of his spectacles.

“Oh, by the way, Marge, we’ll be going to the Waterhouses tomorrow night and I think it would be a good idea if you got a new dress. You’ve been much too conservative about spending money on yourself, and I think you’ve got a new dress coming.”

“Oh, thank you, dear,” says Marge with a grateful smile. “I’ll take a look and see what I can find.”

While she is speaking, George has returned to his paper.

Marge reaches for the pitcher to start her third martini.

If a psychiatrist were to step into their living room at that moment and say, “Look here, George, old fellow, you’re being destructive,” this husband would be startled. George regards himself as a generous man. He considers his wife’s life easy and pleasant. And he is absolutely sure that his business success is responsible for the pleasant life that Marge is leading. How can she complain when he is working so hard and doing so much for her? “Why:’ he thinks to himself, “it’s almost a shame how hard executives work to maintain their families. The coronary rate of executives is the highest in the nation.” The fact that this has nothing to do with what Marge is talking about is completely ignored.

Somehow Marge is unable to bring her complaint into the open. If she does buy a dress for the Waterhouse party, especially if it’s an expensive one, she has further contributed to her own problem. How can you complain about a man who allows you to buy whatever you want?

Characteristic of this type of marital combat is the way in which George suggests-almost requires-Marge to buy things for herself. Or he may encourage her to visit her sister twice a week or to take a class at the local college in order to entertain herself, thereby reducing her demands on him for companionship. More and more Marge will learn to wait for these suggestions before she takes action. Particularly when one receives a reward such as a new dress-for following another’s dictates, loss of initiative is the usual result. For example, animals are trained to obey commands instantly by being given food each time they obey. After a few weeks or months of this reinforcement by rewards, they rely heavily on their masters’ commands to determine their behavior. A “well-trained” animal has learned to not take initiative. Marge, also, under a “reward” system such as that used by George, begins to lose her initiative, and this loss in turn places more responsibility on George to arrange her life for her.

A vicious cycle develops, for she gets from George only the bare victuals of life, not the emotional nourishment she desires and needs. But rather than get nothing at all from him she plays the game “Thanks, darling.” At the same time she does not help George solve their problem, because by accepting, she gives him the illusion that he is doing what she wants and thus has satisfied her. George also has learned his role. If Marge refuses the gifts and insists on more companionship instead, George will have to learn a new role because he will then know that the gifts are not those Marge desires most and that therefore, although they may be effective in silencing her complaints for the moment, she will soon be dissatisfied again.

Many women, too, take George’s role in this game.

How to Handle the “Thank-You-for-Nothing” Pattern

What can be done to break up a “thank-you-for-nothing” behavior pattern? As in any of the marital misery games, it is essential to change the old routine. First of all, Marge must begin to take more initiative in determining her own behavior. One way is for her to respond each time George proposes that she buy something by saying, in effect, “A new dress? No, thank you, but I’ll take the money because I’m going to spend the weekend in New York with Mary so we can see some Broadway shows.” This technique accomplishes two things. It allows Marge to refuse and yet not to be denied, and it causes George to realize that he does not make his offer because he is completely benevolent, that he is not simply trying to please his wife. Marge, in order to change their relationship, should plan or buy something at least equal in value to whatever George has offered-but chosen by herself. If when Marge asks George to talk to her he suggests that she might go to a movie with her sister, Marge is to say, for example, “No thank you, dear, but I think I’ll ask some of my friends to come over for a game of bridge.”

Concurrently, a technique should be employed that is planned to reduce the repetitious aspect of this pattern, the routine meals and the nightly hiding-behind-the-newspaper act. Marge should take the initiative and responsibility for deliberately planning activities for the two of them-going to the theater, dinner parties, movies, or whatever. Marge should anticipate that they may not enjoy themselves, that there may not even be good conversation. The point is not that they have a good time, for like spontaneity, enjoyment cannot be compelled. Rather, the purpose is to initiate changes which will help break up the old patterns.

If George requires even more confrontation to make a change, Marge should aggressively arrange, and press, their going out two or three times a week, within the limit of their finances, until George rebels and thus becomes conscious of the repetitiousness of their past behavior. They can then negotiate a “happy medium” that will be acceptable and reasonable for both. As in most bargaining it is often wise to set one’s initial “price” a little higher than one requires, expecting to come down in the course of the negotiations.

There are more disaster seekers in our society than most people realize. In the symmetrical, or status-struggle, type of relationship, disaster seeking is frequently employed, for it is a clever technique for proving one’s equality or superiority. For example, Mary Bicker throws a dinner party and works hard to make it a success. She may lack the cultural polish and the experience of her husband, John, in this sort of thing, but she tries her best. Her husband, the disaster seeker, begins looking around for something that has gone wrong. Everybody may be having a pretty good time, but John discovers that the meat should have been browned a little more, or perhaps the cheese sauce needs another herb, or he makes sarcastic remarks because there are no guest towels in the bathroom or they are not set out where the guests can find them, and so forth. Consciously, John thinks that he’s doing a good thing. He feels that he’s improving the quality of the party and that Mary, who comes from a lower-middle-class family, will never learn how to throw a party properly if he doesn’t show her. Moreover, he suspects that left to herself, she would be satisfied with a mediocre performance and would continue to entertain in that way.

As a result of John’s constant heckling, Mary becomes tense and makes some real mistakes. The tense and frenetic feeling that John is stimulating with his disaster seeking soon spreads to the guests.

Having created a disaster, John is satisfied. Suddenly he becomes benevolent and tender; he takes charge of the party, corrects everything, and ends up a big hero, while his wife looks like a fool. John would have been very disappointed if he had not found something wrong with Mary’s party techniques.

Another variety of disaster seeker is known as the killjoy.

Al has just been invited to New York City to deliver a lecture, and he decides to take Carol along. AI’s lecture turns out to be a tremendous success, and he receives much applause. In his exuberance, he suggests that they go out to a well-known restaurant and celebrate with a wonderful meal. Carol counters, “But AI, can we really afford it? I’d feel guilty spending fifty dollars on a fancy dinner when I know that little Madeline is crying her eyes out for a pair of skates and the dentist’s bill hasn’t been paid yet.”

AI persuades her that they have both earned this celebration and so they go to the expensive French restaurant. Al is chatting away about how the pioneering ideas he has developed were accepted by the entire profession at his lecture, when Carol breaks in with “Why in hell can’t they write these menus in English?”

AI calls the waiter and gets him to translate the menu. When he is through, Carol asks him petulantly, «Are you sure the oysters are fresh?”

She continues along this line, and by the conclusion of the meal AI is convinced that he made a terrible mistake in coming to this restaurant. He feels guilty for having spent so much money, and is no longer holding forth about his very successful lecture and his plans for the future. He retreats into his shell and stops talking. When he begins to appear definitely glum, Carol reaches over, pats his hand, and tells him how proud she is of him. Now Carol becomes genuinely merry. She has not only searched for disaster; she has found it.

Marriage may be difficult, but divorce is difficult too. Married people often feel trapped, for divorce is frightening, painful, expensive, and subject to social disapproval, and it is one of the few important institutions in our culture for which there is no formal ritual. Birth, marriage, death, all have formal cultural rituals associated with them-divorce does not. Furthermore, there is evidence that even when divorce is feasible, it is not always the ideal solution for marital difficulties. Among white people, those who have been divorced have the highest suicide rate, and there are often emotional problems in children whose parents have experienced divorce or desertion. Most divorced people can’t stand loneliness-they try promiscuity and booze, and become more despairing; then they try remarriage, and here the divorce rate is still high, though some do better in the second marriage than they did in the first. When a person moves on into second, third, fourth, and fifth marriages, the chance that he will succeed becomes increasingly small. We end up saying that marriage is hard to live with and hard to live without.

On February 1, 1966, the state of California began a massive attempt to gather information on the background of divorces, in order to provide data for professionals trying to develop ways to lower the incredible divorce rate. Each of the major counties in California had over a thousand divorces in 1965, and San Mateo County reached seventy divorces for every one hundred marriages.

In California all lawsuits for divorce, annulment, and separate maintenance now are to be accompanied by a comprehensive questionnaire completed by both the husband and the wife. The state hopes to find out what factors are particularly important in divorce. Religious differences, ages of the spouses, race, and finances, and so on, will be examined.

The resulting statistics may also have other uses. In January, 1966, in San Francisco, a young widow and her son sued the city for $500,000 in damages because her husband of one month had been killed in a traffic accident on the city’s streetcar system. However, the city called in an expert from the University of California. He examined the case, considering such factors as the different religions of husband and wife, the fact that the girl was pregnant before/marriage, and the fact that both she and her husband were teenagers and that both had been raised in Marin County, where the divorce rate is exceedingly high, and concluded that the marriage would probably have been doomed even if the man had lived. The jury, deciding that the expert knew at least something about the matter, awarded the widow $145,000 instead of $500,000.

There soon may be a constitutional proposal in California for the creation of a State Department of Family Relations. This amendment, generally known as the Sitton-Winterfeld Initiative, is backed by a number of people throughout the state who feel that the present divorce procedures are terribly unfair and create more dissension among divorced people than is necessary. In particular, opponents of the existing divorce laws object strenuously to the adversary system, in which one of the separating mates, usually the husband, must be found guilty of some degree of cruelty-”extreme,” “mental,” or whatever-before a divorce can be granted. (Desertion and adultery are also grounds for divorce in California, but are rarely used.) The resulting courtroom confrontations produce perjured testimony and lasting bitterness that forever precludes reconciliation and leaves the children caught between two parents, who remain bitter and antagonistic even though divorced and living apart.

The backers (largely male) of this bill are also concerned about the monetary considerations involved. In particular, they feel that citizens are at the mercy of avaricious lawyers who provide quick divorces for couples with limited financial resources, but manage to introduce long, complicated procedures, with correspondingly large fees, when their clients are wealthy. They feel that the child-support payments in general are fair, but that provisions for the settlement of the estate and for alimony are way out of line.

The proposed State Department of Family Relations would have a governing board of six elected directors and regional boards in family-relation centers which could establish educational programs in family-relations matters. The department would have exclusive jurisdiction, subject to an appellate-court review, over divorce, annulment, and separate-maintenance proceedings. Parties could be represented by agents who were not attorneys. Divorces would be granted without regard to “guilt,” and they would be effective immediately; the current one-year interlocutory decree would be abolished. Alimony and support payments would be based on the ability to pay and on need.

The sponsors of the measure say the plan would work as follows:

The plan operates on a local basis in the county with a board of three county directors. These will be psychologists, sociologists, marriage counselors so they will have related educational backgrounds with experience in human relations.

A staff of referees-investigators, accountants, social workers and other specialists will handle individual cases. The emphasis at this level is on premarital and post-marital education and direct aid in altering problems.

Individuals in need of help may come to family arbitration center for informal discussion of their problems. If reconciliation methods fail and it is found advisable to terminate the marriage, divorce, annulment or separate maintenance will be granted by the three members of the Family Arbitration Board in an equitable and just manner. The rulings would have the same force and effect as a court of law.

The sponsors of the bill feel that obtaining divorces will not be “easier” under their proposed setup, and no increase in the divorce rate is anticipated. They claim instead that a complete and thorough investigation will be required, and divorces will be granted only when it is determined that the marriage should not continue. Counseling prior to the initiation of divorce proceedings should, by all accounts, act as a deterrent to the irresponsible or impetuous divorce begun in an escalating breakdown of communication. The sponsors feel that the program will be geared to prevent family breakups, and that there will be savings in welfare costs, juvenile-crime costs, legal fees, and other related costs. Operating revenue will be obtained from fees charged by the department.

It is likely that the proposed bill will stimulate great opposition. It is also apparent that many of the bill’s proponents are males who have been burned by the financial inequities of the present legal system. Nevertheless, it is a healthy and important sign that people are looking critically at the divorce situation. Under a brilliant and facile attorney, Robert Furlong, the judicial committee of the state assembly in California recently held hearings on divorce procedures and accumulated a great deal of evidence about current methods, trends, and inequities.

There is little doubt that the present system in most states strongly favors the woman as far as financial matters are concerned. Consequently, a man may enter marriage already on the defensive, since no one gets married without at least thinking about the possibility of divorce. The legal situation thus encourages the battle of the sexes. The popular idea that making divorce financially punitive for the man will reduce its frequency is an ill-conceived notion, to say the least, and belongs in the same destructive social category as capital punishment. ‘”

Psychiatrists, psychologists, and marriage counselors have recognized for some time that often the process of marital separation is relatively smooth, with due consideration shown by the spouses for the children and for each other, until attorneys enter the picture and the man and woman are forced to squabble over money. One of our acquaintances who were arranging to get a divorce attempted to be extremely fair to his wife and children, and was thoroughly rebuked by his attorney for being too generous. He had only recovered from this lecture when his wife’s attorney called to ask how he could be such a cold-hearted skinflint. In this case, the behavior of both attorneys was so untoward that the spouses finally came together to discuss their problems in person, and worked out their own settlement. Then they looked hard and long for a single attorney to represent them both.

In war, we encourage the bravery which leads men to get themselves killed, for example, by superb performance in the face of enemy fire, and then we go to fantastic lengths to save the lives of those who are wounded. This behavior is not paradoxical; we are saying, ‘We want you to be brave, and you may thereby die; but if you are brave and live, we will see that you receive all the rewards we can offer.”

Marriage too, is encouraged by the culture, but there have been little compensation for the wounded; they are just told that they shouldn’t have been hurt in the first place and it’s their own fault if they were. Even the “cooling-off” period provided by the interlocutory decree is of little use; by the time it is obtained, the preceding legal maneuverings have so stirred up the roaring fires that it is often too late for cooling off.

The Australian system seems far more realistic. In Australia, divorce is not permitted until a marriage has been in existence at least three years (annulments may be granted sooner under certain unusual circumstances). Thus people are not able to rush in and out of marriage. Before a divorce is granted, conciliation is attempted and every resource which might help save the marriage is utilized. But if a divorce is obtained, it becomes effective immediately. Our system reminds one of capital punishment; we cling to it despite years of testimony that punishment does not serve as a deterrent.

When a divorce is necessary, the separation should be amicable.

This is particularly important if there are children, since they become cross monitors; that is, all unawares, they transmit messages from one parent to the other-s-often hateful messages.

The traditional practice among psychiatrists and marriage therapists has been neither to recommend divorce nor to stand in the way of a couple wishing a divorce. This canniness is desirable. There are so many complicated factors in any marital breakup that it is difficult to see the situation as a coherent whole. Often it is only after a person has been divorced that he can look at the marriage and decide realistically whether he is better or worse off than he was before it was dissolved. If a third person enters the picture, he is apt to be blamed for causing the divorce, even if, in fact, the couple had wished it but lacked the guts to go through with it until they were on the brink and called in the third party to act as a go-between.

In our opinion, there is one fact that stands out in most family breakdowns. The best reason for divorce is that the man and wife cannot function together without serious damage to one or both, physically or emotionally.

Harry Swenson is a patient man-or so it seems. His blood pressure indicates he is more restrained than patient. Living with Shirley is one cause of his difficulty, for Shirley is a master of conversational finesse and timing, particularly in the art of “cross complaining.”

For example, when Harry brings up what he believes is a reasonable complaint, such as, “Dear, can’t we ever have lamb any more?” Shirley quickly replies with something like this:

“Harry, you can’t keep nagging me about the money I spend and then tell me to buy lamb at today’s prices. You are terribly inconsistent.” (Shirley knows perfectly well that Harry actually only brings up the question of spending money when she buys expensive clothes impetuously and without having budgeted for them.) If Harry begins to complain about Shirley’s arranging a bridge party on Sunday afternoon, she says something like, ‘What’s the matter, Harry? Don’t you want the girls to see how sloppy you are on weekends?”

So Harry retracts and the subject is changed.

Society has created artificial standards defining the good marriage, the bad marriage, the normal marriage. Many spouses are upset because they are afraid their relationship doesn’t “measure up.” This fear is unnecessary; it diminishes the value of their real assets and limits the spouses’ functionality.

Psychiatrists, psychologists, and others laboring in the arena of mental-health research or service, constantly make judgments about the relative degree of sickness of an individual. The public, too, accepts the concept of normality and assumes that personalities and relationships can be classified as normal or abnormal. Yet, surprisingly enough, there is no standard of normality which can be used as a yardstick.

For some years, the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto, California, has been studying average families, obtained at random either from the phone book or through the school system. While no absolute standards have been determined, a few generalizations relevant to the consideration of normality and abnormality can be drawn from these studies. There appear to be many different styles of family living, and many different childrearing practices, so that it is meaningless to say, for example, that spanking is or is not good, or that the child should or should not be treated in some particular fashion. There are families with whom one would prefer to spend Christmas Day, and others who would be better company on News Year’s Eve, but one cannot conclude that some of these are therefore superior, or more normal, than others. There are parents who appear to live together in extreme harmony but have nervous children, and parents who get along miserably but have children who seem to function quite well. The underlying currents in the family are often subtle and not discernible by talking to the family members individually.

Much child-rearing advice is based on the individual’s reconstruction of his own childhood. This is an unreliable approach not only because the years disguise what actually occurred, but because family living is a game where not all of the rules are known to the players. Much of the research on marriage and the family has depended heavily or entirely on retrospective data (the individual is asked, for example, to describe various aspects of his childhood). Yet mothers have been known to have almost totally unreliable memories concerning such relatively simple matters as the ages at which their children walked,. were toilet trained, spoke, and so forth-even when the events occurred as recently as five years earlier, and even though the mothers were certain of the validity of their answers.

So, once more we caution spouses not to feel that their marriage is a failure because it does not measure up to the “normal.” There is no such thing.

Nevertheless, even when artificial standards of judgment are abandoned, it is of course evident that some marriages are less successful than the participants would like them to be. In the chapters that follow, various common difficulties are discussed. Some of these, if allowed to persist, may eventually have a deeply corrosive effect on the marital relationship. However, once the spouses become aware of these destructive elements, they may take steps to eliminate them; specific suggestions about how to do so are included in our discussion.

The Fallen Domino
Some marriages are so fraught with nagging, destructive behavior, and the imputation of motives, that they seem to smoke from discord. The spouses appear to be on the point either of obtaining a divorce or of murdering each other. Yet, even in such cases it frequently happens that the relationship is reasonably sound. What has happened may resemble the collapse of a line of dominoes when the first one is hit-except that in this case the behavior is reversible. If the head domino is straightened up, the others may jump back into an upright position on their own. The problem, then, is to get that first domino straightened up.

In other words, in many instances of marital difficulty one powerful irritant has poisoned the relationship, and because both parties are perhaps stubborn or defensively rigid, this one destructive element contaminates the entire spectrum of marital behavior.

An example is the case of Cynthia and Joseph Special. Cynthia and Joe had been happily married for four years. They didn’t have much money and they had no children. Cynthia worked as a librarian and Joe worked for a paper-manufacturing company. Very slowly during the first four years they furnished their own home, paying cash for everything.

At the end of the four years, two things happened. A child was born-followed in a year by another-and Joe became assistant” manager of the paper plant. Now Cynthia had of course left her interesting job at the library and was home all day with two infants. Joe, as assistant manager, no longer was able to leave the office at five o’clock. He had to stay behind to check up on that day’s production, or to see about personnel, and attend the executive meeting at six o’clock.

When Joe came home at about seven thirty, he was fatigued.

Cynthia was also fatigued. With two young children, the small house was always untidy, and Cynthia didn’t have time to prepare the kind of meals Joe was fond of. They no longer spent a pleasant hour drinking a couple of cocktails, discussing the interesting things which happened during the day, followed by a simple but elegant meal, eaten in leisurely fashion, and then a play or a motion picture. Joe had his drink at the executive meeting, and when he arrived home he was eager to eat quickly and go to bed. Slowly, Cynthia began to believe that they no longer were companions or equals, that Joe had more interest in his business than in his family. Joe felt that Cynthia was being selfish when she wanted to go out after the children were asleep. He became irritable when she asked him to skip having drinks with the executives and, instead, go back to the old system of spending an hour before dinner with her in the evening.

The situation is one with which most people are quite familiar.

Slowly, Cynthia began to take less interest in preparing even reasonably fancy meals for dinner. Joe gulped his food and no longer commented on her efforts. And when Joe was amorous in bed, Cynthia said she was too tired from looking after the children, feeling vaguely angry that Joe seemed to be interested only when he was in the mood, and was unresponsive to her needs when she showed the initiative.

Joe started eating out with other executives two or three times a week. Slowly, their needs became divergent in one area of their relationship after another, and Cynthia and Joe were about ready for a divorce.

Cynthia and Joe decided to consult a professional counselor before they saw a lawyer. He recognized the falling-domino pattern almost immediately. He perceived that one basic, relatively small irritant was poisoning the whole marriage system, and he was able to suggest a solution. Here is what they did.

At the executive meetings at six o’clock, Joe abstained from having his cocktail and instead had what Franklin Delano Roosevelt called a horse’s neck, ginger ale with a piece of lemon in it. Joe found he could now enjoy a drink a little bit later with his wife.

Instead of eating immediately upon returning home from the office, Joe took a hot shower and rested for almost an hour. The children were already asleep, and Cynthia too was able to shower and nap. When they got up, both put on fresh clothes and had a cocktail and dinner. What difference did it make if they ate at eight thirty every evening instead of seven thirty? The delay enabled them to refresh themselves and enjoy the evening.

When Joe had his two-week vacation, Cynthia visited her mother for two or three days while Joe stayed at home and took care of the children. The experience gave him some perspective on what a time-consuming job and intellectually unstimulating day Cynthia usually had.

At one of the office executive meetings, Joe pointed out that the problem of working late and getting home tired was probably common to all executives. He suggested that the wives be permitted to spend a day at the office, one at a time, to gain some understanding of their husbands’ work and responsibilities. The president thought this was a good idea. Soon Cynthia spent a day watching Joe.

One night a week Cynthia hired a responsible baby-sitter and she and Joe went out to a restaurant. They gussied up, and had a gay evening just like old times.

Cynthia and Joe had a discussion as to whether his particular job with its extraordinarily long hours was worth keeping. Should he quit and find another one? Cynthia volunteered that since Joe had been promoted quite recently, it seemed normal for him to have long hours in the new position, but presumably when he became more familiar with the routine he would be able to maintain a more normal schedule again. Cynthia recognized that this was the difficult period in Joe’s career, and she was happy to share the extra hard work. Joe responded sincerely that he knew caring for two small children was the most trying part of the family-raising cycle for Cynthia, and wondered what he could do to make life easier and more pleasant for her. In their discussion neither of them came up with any suggestions for making

How to Handle the Falling-Domino Pattern

To determine if a falling-domino situation exists in their own marriage, spouses should sit down together and each answer the following question (after tossing a coin to see who will go first):

‘What is the one thing which annoys me the most about you?” If the major complaints involve physical circumstances or clearly defined ways of behaving, the spouses may be able to correct them without outside help. Here are some examples of such complaints.

“I can’t stand to make love when you’ve been drinking too much. It destroys your attractiveness.”

“You always eat with your mouth open at the table, and it makes me sick to my stomach.”

“Your bad breath drives me crazy.” “The house always looks like a pigsty.”

“You’re a slob. No matter how much I clean up the house, you always drop your clothes and ashes all over.”

“Half the time you’re late for dinner and you never telephone to let me know. Half our meals get burned.”

“You’ve put on twenty pounds and I’m repulsed by fat people.” All of these complaints and annoyances are reasonably correctable. Yet if they are not corrected, they will cause problems in other areas. If a person registers a valid complaint of a correctable nature and the spouse-from stubbornness or lethargy refuses to alter his behavior, it is likely that the complainer will in turn refuse to make changes requested by the other. The message here seems to be, “If you won’t change for me, then I won’t change for you.” Most people actually fear giving in to another repeatedly because they sense that this will become a one-sided pattern and they will have to give in on everything henceforth. In many cases, this fear is justified. Only when the fear is proven to be ungrounded in fact, when the other party evidences an equal willingness to compromise and to change, can the fear be relinquished and relaxed flexibility take its place.

Once reasonable complaints are remedied, quite frequently other negative factors disappear. Just the act of getting together and discussing how to improve the marriage has a general therapeutic effect on many areas of behavior. The spouses are trying to have a functional relationship and that’s half the victory. It’s one big step toward realistic trust in a responsible partnership.

How to cultivate fidelity presents one of the most difficult problems for marital living together. Unfortunately, we are uncertain not only of our partners, but of ourselves. So long as both partners have the confidence to face problems together and squarely, no problem actually will disturb the marital relationship. No matter how difficult a problem may be-and the problem of infidelity certainly is not an easy one-it should and can be solved jointly, provided both have faith, courage, and the desire for a solution. The greater the problems which people manage to solve together, the closer grows their relationship, because in their troubles they need and may find each other. After the danger is over, a sense of gratefulness for the mutual help and understanding deepens the all-important feeling of belonging.

Many regard jealousy as an adequate response to philandering tendencies in the mate. They feel there is no alternative, save to close their eyes deliberately and maintain an imperturbable ignorance that might prove to be more comfortable, but does not solve the problem. They forget that jealousy does not ever solve any problem either. Instead of bringing back the straying mate, it only increases the distance and endangers the unity. Suspicion and fear which lead inevitably to open hostility merely aggravate the problem which first tempted the mate to look outside the marriage for erotic adventures.

Shall we then ignore the danger of losing our mate? Or permit him to be unfaithful? No one could recommend that. But actually neither danger is avoided by jealousy. We can easily recognize the foolishness of a woman who is constantly afraid that her healthy husband may die someday, and envisions in every slight ailment potential complications. It seems obvious that her fear expresses other perturbations than actual concern with a possible and far distant loss. The same is true of jealousy. The fear of losing one’s mate does not in itself provoke jealousy. Neither does the loss of a mate. A husband suffering intensely because his wife has left him for another man may rationalize his emotions by insisting that he cannot live without her. The fallacy of this conviction would immediately become apparent if he were asked how he would feel if she were dead. He would then admit that alternative to be terrible, and yet . . . Here he might stop and discover that it is a peculiar kind of love which makes him actually prefer her death to her living with someone else.

Infidelity often is just a bugaboo. Every look one’s husband casts may foretell potential fatal complications. Slight tendencies to infidelity are certainly not less frequent or more dangerous than a common cold. It can lead to fatal pneumonia, but generally does not. Putting a person to bed at the first sniffle is as foolish as letting him go out in the rain when his temperature rises. A simple cold needs proper care; either neglect or over anxiety can be harmful. The first signs of undue extra-marital interests indicate disorder. Neglect or overzealousness can complicate the ailment. A clever and understanding mate will find many subtle ways of drawing an adventuring partner back without oppressing his feeling of freedom and independence. Jealousy is neither helpful nor necessary.

If fear of loss and fear of infidelity do not necessarily entail jealousy, what then are its causes? In order to understand any human emotion we must discover its actual accomplishments and hence its purposes. Jealousy never prevents loss or infidelity. This fact alone proves convincingly that it is psychologically not concerned with either. But what is actually achieved by jealousy?