How Do I Get My Husband To Change His Bad Behavior And Be A Better Husband To Me?
By: Leslie Cane: I often hear from wives who are at the end of their ropes with their husband’s behavior. Many of them are in a situation where they don’t want to or can’t get a divorce so they know that they are going to be stuck with this person through thick and thin. But, that doesn’t mean that they always enjoy how he acts or treats them. And many find that, over time, their tolerance for their husband’s annoying, nasty, or downright rude behavior and treatment of them begins to wane and they want to take some action.
I recently heard from a wife who said, in part: “my husband is not a bad guy, but sometimes, he is a bad husband. When we met, he was loving and outgoing. Today, he is neither. He is sarcastic. He can be mean. And he’s very often lazy. His attitude is that he works hard all day and, when he comes home, he should not have to lift a finger. In the meantime, I am juggling my job, my parents, this house, and our kids. But he would never think of doing anything to lighten my load and when I’m reluctant to have sex with him because I’m just tired and frustrated he makes comments that show he thinks most of this is my fault and that I’m letting him down in some way. He is rarely loving or complimentary towards me. I might fall over from shock if he gave me a compliment. If you would have told me 10 years ago that the man that I loved would turn into one of those bad husbands from a sitcom, I would have never believed you. But that’s almost exactly what I have. I don’t want to leave him or get a divorce. I love him and we have kids. But I don’t know how much longer I can stand his behavior. When I call him on it, though, he acts as if I’m an overly emotional female, shrugs it off, or makes some joke. How can I get him to change?”
To start, I asked this wife how she had been attempting to get him to change his behavior in the past. She said that most of the time, she would call him on it and either tell him that she didn’t appreciate it or point it out and then withdraw altogether, hoping that he would “get the hint.” This obviously had not worked because, in response, the husband would either bump up his negative behavior or paint that wife as overly critical or overly emotional. So, I felt that the first step was going to be to change tactics, which I’ll discuss below.
Continue To Call Him On His Bad Behavior, But Do It In A Completely Different Way: I would never suggest that you allow your husband to continue on with his bad behavior without any comment or reaction. But I have to tell you what I often hear from the husbands that are on the other side of the equation. If you talked to them, what you would hear is that their wife always paints them out to be the “bad guy” and seems to take great pleasure in constantly pointing out their many faults.
I often hear comments like: “my wife acts as if I’m an evil ogre or something. I can’t do anything right in her eyes and she seems to just love to tell me that as often as she can. There’s no winning with her. When I try to do better, she doesn’t even notice, so what is the point?”
And this is why you will often have better results if you try to find a way to paint your husband as the good guy rather than the bad guy. Because if you do, you are going to get a much more positive response and more cooperation from him. He will feel appreciated and you will get what you want. It truly is a win/win. But if you continue to handle it with more criticism and disappointment, you’re likely to experience more of the bad behavior and even resentment which can motivate your husband to want to continue to push your buttons.
I’m certainly not suggesting that you ignore his behavior or even try to make the best of it. What I am suggesting is that you approach this in an entirely different way and hope that you get a different (and better) result.
Changing His Behavior By Making Him Want To Do Better: In my experience, the whole key is to give your husband a positive payoff for which to strive. If you can compliment him (and reward him) when he exhibits the behavior that you want, then he will be much more likely to repeat it without complaint. One reason for this is that he feels validated. You are seeing him as the good guy that you both know that he, deep down, truly is. Men love to play the role of the hero. So allow him to play the hero rather than the bad guy. He will be much more enthusiastic as the result.
My suggestion would be this. The next time that the wife comes home and the husband starts with his negative behavior, the wife might say something like: “I can see that you probably had an exhausting day just like I did. Why don’t we order in and take turns giving each other a back rub? We’ll both feel better and everything else can wait.” Normally, the wife would have torn into her husband and, waiting for a fight, he would have responded in kind.
But this way, both people are getting some relief and a fight is avoided. Another strategy to use is to find your husband doing something right and to react even more strongly than you react when he does something wrong. Not only should you praise him to his face, but you should praise him to whoever will listen right in front of him. He will feel pride instead of frustration and he will look for ways to repeat the same positive behaviors. It doesn’t hurt to praise him with your own physical affection when he is acting in the way that you hoped. This is a huge motivator for him to continue on and, in the meantime, you are both connecting with one another and making it more likely that both of you want to be kind and supportive of the other.
Basically, you are giving him the chance and encouraging him to do things right rather than waiting for him to do things wrong and then pouncing when he does. It took me way too long to learn this myself. My husband and I were constantly focused on the bad in each other and on pointing out these and the flaws in our marriage. Things got so bad we separated and were on our way toward divorce. I finally realized I had to make some drastic changes if I wanted to save my marriage. If it helps, you can read more about what worked for me and what didn’t on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com
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