Should Your Spouse Be Your Best Friend?
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Absolutely no one. I've been married for 11 years. My wife isn't perfect of course, but she's still pretty fantastic. She is my best friend, for which I'm thankful. I don't and won't gossip about her.
As a second- or third- hand observer, I can't count the number of times I've heard someone gripe about their spouse and felt sorry for them. Marriage, and relationships generally, are so much richer when you can either get over a minor injury without even mentioning it, or respectfully discuss a more serious one. I know it isn't "cool" to quote scripture around here but the Bible says "Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense." Amen.
I agree with you, with just one small tweak: if your spouse is your best friend, you should complain to your spouse about her. That's in fact what separates a "real friend" from an acquaintance for me - the presumption that my friend really cares about me and is willing to modify their behavior to improve my happiness, within limits.
And I hope the author didn't really mean the "with whom do you complain about your spouse" line. If people respected and worked with their spouses instead of complaining about them to other people, there'd be a lot fewer failed marriages.
Men are from mars, women are from Venus was helpful, and what wives wish men knew about women - learning that sometimes you just need to listen (always need to listen, sometimes that's all she needs me to do), and recognizing that it's ok to need space sometimes, etc.
But do people complain about best friends to spouses? I unfortunately know of many people who complain about spouses to friends.
> Dr. Bader said that she wished popular magazines would challenge the notion that you shouldn’t get married to change someone.
Most of the relationships I've seen where one partner has a goal of changing the other person have failed. I would bet that this would bear out in a well-designed study as well.
I am not innocent. It's a lesson learned in time.
And, yeah, a strange choice of article for HN. But, here we are.
You might even see it as positive to be challenged in your ways, as it helps you to move yourself forward. For example, if you're a couch potato, you might actively look for a sporty partner in hope of being motivated to do sports.
People change, and in a good marriage, the spouses should absolutely push each other to change in ways that are healthy and positive.
It's simply ridiculous to assume that whomever you're marrying, right now, is the person they will be for the rest of their lives, or that you shouldn't try to influence those changes.
In fact, that goes beyond just marriages... I would hope that, in all of my relationships, be it as friend, brother, husband, or son, I am a positive influence on my loved ones, and that those people are a positive influence on me.
Never complain or otherwise say anything bad about your spouse to anyone but a therapist. Never.
Your therapist doesn't have to forgive your spouse. A therapist doesn't have to like your spouse. While you may forgive them, your friends/family won't be so quick to do so, if they do so at all.
I personally think my marriage could have been ruined many times over if I leaned on someone other than my wife during times of difficulty.
I really can't see why this has to be the case. There are things my wife should share with someone close that she can fully trust, and sometimes that can't be me. Same is true in the other direction.
That said, I'm curious to hear what kinds of things you're referring to. Do you have some fictional examples?
My wife and I each have our own best friends, but in my own marriage (14 years... since we all have to publish our credentials ;), if there's something I can't tell me wife, it's something I wouldn't tell anyone, best friends included.
The only obvious exception is if it's something about the marriage itself, but in that case, I'd speak to a friend first only if I needed to work out my own thoughts and emotions before I then talked to my wife. So even in that case, it's more a matter of timing than keeping certain things from her entirely.
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> if your spouse is your best friend, then whom do you complain to your spouse about?
Complaining about your spouse to your friends is a wonderful way to damage your relationship; the unthinking assumption that you should be venting about your spouse is harmful and should be challenged.
> Dr. Bader said that she wished popular magazines would challenge the notion that you shouldn’t get married to change someone. “I think that’s what marriage is about,” she said.
That sounds like horrifying bad advice if taken literally. I hope there was some context that was omitted from the article. People certainly can and do change, and obviously spouses should help encourage each other to change for the better. So sure, marriage is, in part, about change, inasmuch as marriage is a part of life, and life is about change. But to get married in order to change someone? As in "wow, I hate how extroverted this person I'm dating is, I know we'll get married so I can make them introverted"? That's the opposite of a good idea, and warning people off it is a staple of popular magazines, unpopular magazines, relationship counselling, and dating advice because it's a really dumb notion.
Just on this point, I couldn't agree more.
The problem with "venting" is that whomever is listening is almost certainly part of your personal echo chamber. And when dealing with a problem in one's marriage, the last thing people need are mirrors reflecting themselves.
I can't tell you the number of times I've come out of a fight with my wife where, some time later, I realized I was a total ass and needed to apologize for my behaviour.
If I'd "vented" to someone, odds are it would've just hardened my resolve.
It seems to me that people to whom this makes a difference are both extremely insecure in their partner’s loyalty and extremely secure in their partner’s exclusive heterosexuality.
Take away the former and the concern disappears, take away the latter and the concern remains without the gender disparity.
Better to spend quality time with your spouse and re-enforce the bond the two of you have for each other.
This article is all kinds of horrifying. The above paragraph plus the phrase "maintenance sex" = ick. What does that mean? "We are just going through the motions cuz we gotta. Kind of like plunging the toilet."?
Maybe you should go read a book like "Lovers in marriage" before you go trying to write anymore marriage advice.
My ex was my best friend. That in no way suggested it was platonic.
In other words, I read it as descriptive, not prescriptive.
I don't feel I am misreading the article. I stand by my horror. Downvotes for saying it don't make me less appalled.
In many perfectly healthy, normal marriages, there's a disparity (sometimes significant) in sexual interest/appetite between the spouses that has absolutely nothing to do with their love for each other and everything to do with basic biological, sociological, and psychological differences.
In such a marriage, sexual intimacy actually requires focused effort to maintain. Not "work". That makes it sound transactional in nature. But effort. Like, you have to prioritize it.
To suggest that marriages in which this is necessary are somehow broken is simply unfair. Every marriage is unique and beyond basic expectations of love and decency, it's unreasonable to use ones own experiences as the template by which to judge other people's relationships.
Sorry if my remarks bother you, but your assumptions are completely out of line. My marriage was neither easy nor a case of good fortune.
So how about if you try to abide by HN guidelines and leave out the condescension, etc.
This article is all kinds of horrifying. ... "We are just going through the motions cuz we gotta. Kind of like plunging the toilet."?
Maybe you should go read a book like "Lovers in marriage" before you go trying to write anymore marriage advice.
Or, you know, you can make time for each other because this is the most important person in your life. Instead of making excuses.
I could go on.
I did not set the tone, here, and I stand by my comment.
In a sense, perhaps. A lot of people get into a pattern where they're busy with other things and unable to have the kind of romantic setup they had before. But, on the other hand, people generally enjoy sex even if they have to do something unromantic like set a time on a calendar and just stick to it, and it has the effect of deepening their relationship.
Firsthand experience suggests to me that such an approach leads to better experience over time, not going through the motions.
I was married for 22 years. Setting a date and keeping an appointment was not how we handled it. I had a friend who would call me to bitch about how her and her husband did it once a month, they were just too busy and did not have time, etc. My husband would walk in and start making snarky remarks while I was on the phone and I would shush him.
When they were busy, this couple recorded their favorite shows during the week and watched them together on Saturday night. They did not lack the time. They just thought X Files was vastly more important than having a love life.
That was not at all how my marriage worked. I quit being sympathetic. I made polite noises and tried to change the subject.
Never, ever go to bed mad. Settle it. This is usually followed by makeup sex.
Never tell your spouse to sleep on the couch. If you are so mad that you can't imagine sleeping next to them, grab a blanket and take yourself to the couch. Argue over who gets to declare "No, I'm sleeping on the couch!" (It gets funny at this point and hard to keep a straight face.)
Kiss each other good night every single night, even if you just had a fight. This often initiates makeup sex.
Talk.
Actively look for sexy activities to share, like oil massages.
Shop for naughty lingerie together.
Share your fantasies.
Being a lover in marriage is about trust and intimacy. This requires ongoing efforts at communication. It also requires that you invest time in the relationship. It takes at least 15 hours a week to establish and maintain intimacy. Intimacy is the font of good sex when novelty is no longer your shtick.
Remember that all is fair in love and war and this is love, not war. Make up caring exceptions to the rules you were raised with and to hell with what other people think.
Always fight fair. This is your lover. It undermines the relationship to be nasty to them when you disagree and the price you pay for that often shows up in the bedroom.
When you have trust and good communication it makes it easier to get together without an appointment at times when you genuinely are busy and exhausted. You make it clear you need 15 minutes with your wife more than you need that extra 20 minutes of sleep on a night when you have to get up in 5 hours. You humorously agree to The Sedate Thing when you want sex but are not up for The Wild Thing.
You also work at resolving the issues keeping you too exhausted to have quality time. Life happens, but if issues like that never improve, it is often an excuse for people who aren't really comfortable being close for some reason.
That may sound lecturing. It isn't intended to be. It is intended to be empowering. My experience was career military, a very demanding job. We had two special needs kids. I was chronically short of sleep the first 7 years of my oldest son's life and I had chronic health issues.
My husband and I didn't have cushy lives. But we set a high bar for certain things and it paid off.
Best.
I guess if I had kids I'd have to think about a life insurance policy (I occasionally think about doing that just for my wife).
Actually it's sometimes shocking when you see some being better off unemployed while working people can't find an affordable place. But that's another story...
I have friends who really aren’t, but they seem to have a rewarding relationship anyway. Not my cup of tea, but other people’s marriages aren’t any of my business!