When You Can’t Explain to Your Spouse How You Are Feeling Unloved or Disrespected

Have you ever been asked to make out a Christmas list for yourself, or to give some ideas for what to get you for your birthday, and you come up completely empty? Or when your spouse asks you to choose anywhere you want to go out for dinner, or pick any movie to watch together on Netflix, do you ever struggle to come up with even a single suggestion? Chances are, when not put on the spot, you have no trouble whatsoever coming up with ideas for gifts or restaurants you want to try, so why are you having such difficulty now?

Much more serious, however, than choosing gifts and movies, is voicing to your spouse the ways you believe he or she could show you more love or respect. Most likely, when feeling unloved or disrespected, you have lain in bed or perhaps gone for a long walk by yourself thinking of all you would like to somehow share with your spouse about how they could better love and respect you. But when you’re suddenly put on the spot to share some ideas with your spouse, can you relate to this couple?

A husband wrote me:

I have tried to communicate my need for respect, even before I read your book. I have often told her she doesn't respect me. I admit the way I have been approaching this with her is wrong. I love her very much, and she loves me very much also. We are a newly married couple. My question is this: She asks me what she has to say and do. I tell her what I am looking for and what she can do. I feel like I am treating her like a child, teaching her what to do and say. How can I communicate my needs without being demeaning? What can I do? She loves me, and I love her. I have asked her what I can do to "love" her better, and she has no response. Nothing? Not one thing? Why is this? I get so frustrated and upset, and you guessed it, the Crazy Cycle! She shuts down. I shut down. We both look at one another and look and look, and I think of what I want to say to get her to understand. I ask why she doesn't get it?

At first reading, one might think these two have set themselves up for successfully getting on the Energizing Cycle, which says “His love motivates her respect. Her respect motivates his love.” She is asking him how she can respect him. He is asking her how he can love her better. Isn’t that what they should be doing? Why do they keep taking spins on the Crazy Cycle? Why has this loving, goodwilled wife shut down?

He’s Communicating More Than Just His Need for Respect

The husband wrote, “She asks me what she has to say and do. I tell her what I am looking for and what she can do.” But he’s communicating much more to her than just the ways he would like to feel more respected, isn’t he?

For one, he admitted to telling her often that she is disrespectful. Making accusations and sticking labels on someone rarely goes over well. Would not sharing that you are feeling disrespected go off better than telling your wife, “You are disrespectful!”? One of those ways invites discussion and shows your wife that you are trying to share your heart with her. The other is a judgment that cuts her to the core.

In addition, he even admits that the way he has been approaching the issue is wrong. The reason he feels he is treating her like a child is because he is. Having a demeaning, parent-child attitude toward his wife will never motivate her to respect the spirit of who he is as a man and her husband. Just as how when a wife treats her husband, as immature as he may be acting, like one of their children, this will not energize him to love and cherish her as his wife.

Husbands especially, who may be struggling with having a demeaning parent-like attitude toward their wife, because as Ephesians 5:23 says, “the husband is the head of the wife,” must read Paul’s very next words: “. . . as Christ is the head of the church.” Paul continues that thought a little later when he says, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (v. 25). Also, he says, “husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies” (v. 28).

The husband does not show authority over his wife by treating her like a child but by giving himself up for her and by loving her as himself.

Lastly, when the husband asks why she doesn’t get it, he is communicating that she almost has a learning disability. Most likely he is not ill-willed here and doesn’t intend to say such an insult, but his smart, intuitive wife is certainly picking up on that attitude from him. If a spouse believes his or her spouse is basically thinking they are dumb for not getting how to better love or respect them, will they be motivated to apply Ephesians 5:33 and get on the Energizing Cycle? Definitely not.

Focus on Your Part: C.O.U.P.L.E. and C.H.A.I.R.S.

He is having trouble communicating with love and respect how she can better show him respect. She has no response when he asks her how to better love her. Where do they go when they can’t seem to communicate their needs to the other?

They turn their attention to their spouse’s needs, instead of their own.

In my book Love & Respect, part II “The Energizing Cycle” is broken up into two halves. One on the acronym C.O.U.P.L.E.: How to spell love to your wife, and the other on C.H.A.I.R.S.: How to spell respect to your husband. Notice I didn’t say “C.O.U.P.L.E.: The ways in which to direct your husband to love you” or “C.H.A.I.R.S.: How to explain to your wife how she should respect you.”

When a couple finds themselves on the Crazy Cycle, as the husband who wrote me said they were constantly on, the way to start up the Energizing Cycle is not by focusing on what your spouse is doing wrong, but on where you are coming up short in showing the love and respect your spouse so desperately needs.

“But Emerson, isn’t that what this couple is trying to do? She wants to know how she can better show him respect. He wants to know how he can love her better.” Yes, that’s right, but let me ask you: Does it appear to be working? No, he is having trouble communicating well his heart. And she has gone completely silent.

And they’re not alone. Rare is the couple who can perfectly, clearly, and with love and respect, communicate well exactly how the other could more accurately reach their heart with the love and respect that they need because of how God designed them as a man or woman. That is why C.O.U.P.L.E. and C.H.A.I.R.S. have proven to be so effective for over twenty years now, because they give the husband and wife a behind-the-scenes, all-access pass into the heart of God’s unique design for their spouse.

While there are always exceptions when it comes to creations as uniquely designed as humans have been, the twelve concepts behind these two acronyms are scripturally based and have proven time after time to energize a spouse toward getting off the Crazy Cycle. The key is that the husband must focus on how he can energize his wife, not how she can energize him, and vice versa.

How a Husband Can Energize His Wife

• Closeness: She wants you to be close.
• Openness: She wants you to open up to her.
• Understanding: Don’t try to “fix” her; just listen.
• Peacemaking: She wants you to say, “I’m sorry.”
• Loyalty: She needs to know you’re committed.
• Esteem: She wants you to honor and cherish her.

How a Wife Can Energize Her Husband

• Conquest: Appreciate his desire to work and achieve.
• Hierarchy: Appreciate his desire to protect and provide.
• Authority: Appreciate his desire to serve and to lead.
• Insight: Appreciate his desire to analyze and counsel.
• Relationship: Appreciate his desire for shoulder-to-shoulder friendship.
• Sexuality: Appreciate his desire for sexual intimacy.

If you have not already, I encourage you to read Love & Respect, where I go into lengthy detail about all twelve of these concepts. For now, though, I want to reemphasize the importance of focusing on your part, not your spouse’s, in your attempts to get off the Crazy Cycle.

As you learn more about the scriptural truths behind C.O.U.P.L.E. and C.H.A.I.R.S., and learn to recognize God’s unique designs in both men and women, you may also be able to better communicate your heart and how you are feeling unloved or disrespected. That takes time, though, and even then the goal is still to focus on your part, not your spouse’s.

Feeling unloved or disrespected right now? Read Does Your Spouse Intend to Offend?