What Your Husband's Anger Might Be Telling You

A friend recently mentioned to me that things were really tense with her husband. That he was mad all the time and she didn’t know why.

I asked her to give me an example of what was going on, and when she did, I knew exactly what her problem was.

I bet you have experienced it too. You see, There is something that women unknowingly do that feels like the ultimate betrayal to their husbands.

It causes husbands to react with defensiveness and anger, which further exacerbates the problem.

In this week’s podcast, I am going to teach you what this betrayal is and how to fix it.

My friend did it and reported that things felt better in her marriage the next day!

For more inspiration, download my free guide: 3 Simple Things You Can Do To Speak To Your Man’s Heart Today!
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Join me for more positive inspiration on Facebook in the A Life Designed Community.

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to A Life Designed.
 
My name is Tina Haisman. I help women who are struggling with the overwhelm of trying to balance being a wife, mother and career-woman.
 
When they work with me, they discover how to design their life so they can feel happier and more connected to their families.
 
The topic of today’s podcast is …
 
What Your Husband’s Anger Might Be Telling You
 
But before we get started, I have something for you that will most definitely help with this topic. It is my free guide called 3 Simple Things to Speak to Your Man’s Heart Today. I will put the link in the show notes for you.
 
I would also like to invite you to my private group on Facebook where you can come to get positive inspiration for your life. Search A Life Designed in the facebook search bar.
 
Now let’s Dive IN and talk about …  
 
What Your Husband’s Anger Might Be Telling You
 
A very sweet friend and I were talking on the phone the other day. I was asking her about how things are going at home with her family.
 
She spent a few minutes telling me about what is going on with her children, then mentioned things were difficult with her husband.
 
I asked what she meant, and she explained that he is so mad at her all of the time.
 
Little bells went off in my head. I knew exactly why he was so mad. But sadly, my friend did not.
 
I asked her to give me an example of a time when her husband was mad recently.
 
She recounted an incident where her daughter spilled milk getting her cereal ready to eat and how her husband was overreacting about it and being too hard on their daughter.
 
She didn’t like how he was treating her about this. So she told him so, then he got mad at her and now the tension was high in the house. She said it has been like this for a while.
 
Now, I don’t normally do this with my friends, but in this case, I felt compelled to put my coaching hat on.
 
Because there is a difference in a response from a friend and a response from a coach.
 
Normally, if one of my friends shares a problem with me, I listen to her, tell her that I hear her and that I am sorry that she feeling bad. Acknowledge her I just show up and be present with them.
 
But as a coach I can help my clients see their way out of it. I can help them get to the root of the problem. I can help them solve the problem. And this is why you need a coach.
 
Because with my friend, the spilled milk is not the root of the problem. The root of the problem is that my sweet friend was unknowingly making her husband feel like he was less than. Like he wasn’t good enough as a father. Like he was wrong. Like she didn’t respect him. And she kept doing it over and over and over.
 
And this, my friends, is the ultimate betrayal for men. It is worse than them thinking you don’t love them. It hurts them deeply.
 
This need for respect is hard-wired into our husbands by God. Consider Ephesians 5:33 says, “However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
 
Did you ever notice it tells our husbands to love us, and us to respect our husbands. Interesting, right!!
 
So, that’s a great clue. The problem is this. Women do not understand what respect looks like to men. They think they ARE being respectful. Every single woman I have ever talked to about this thinks she is being respectful. Our intentions are pure. We just don’t know, because no one has taught us.
 
And unfortunately, our husbands reaction of anger isn’t helping us learn. So we just get stuck here in this cycle of disrespect and hurt feelings.
 
So today, I want to share with you what your husband means by respect so you can have more connection and fewer conflicts in your marriage.
 
So. I’m going to give you the information directly and quickly. I’m not gonna sugarcoat it. Get ready to take notes. Are you ready? Here we go.
 
Men feel disrespected when we criticize them. Interrupt them. Contradict them. Try to teach them something. Point out a mistake they made. Or try to help them.
 
Also, all of this is magnified if it is done in front of other people. Even your children.
 
How you know your husband feels disrespected is that he gets defensive or angry.
 
Because to a man, the most troublesome question that lives in his mind is: “Am I good enough?”
 
This question keeps him up at night … and is the culprit of his defensiveness when you criticize, interrupt, contradict, teach, help or point out mistakes.
 
Your husband deeply, in the innermost fibers of his being, wants to be respected for who he is and what he does. He wants you and the entire world to see him as fully capable.
Author Shaunti Feldhahn did a research on this subject and found that 75% of men said they would rather feel unloved than disrespected.
 
Whaat? As women we can’t fathom that. Because for us, it is LOVE we are after. Women want to be loved for who they are on the inside. But Men are different. Your husband is after your RESPECT. Which means he wants to be respected for who he is on the outside. For what he accomplishes.
 
This type of respect comes to men a bit more easily in the workplace than it does at home, and in Shaunti’s research, men told her they felt respected everywhere but at home. Ugh.
 
So if we truly want our husbands to feel loved …
 
They need us to respect 3 things about them -- their knowledge, opinions and decisions. When we criticize, interrupt, contradict, teach, help or point out mistakes, they feel disrespected.
 
You know the old joke about men not wanting to stop and ask for directions. That’s because they think it would make them look stupid. They have to figure it out for themselves, so they can be respected.
 
 
Crazy, right?
 
Girlfriends, your husband needs to feel like you think he Superman!! I know this is difficult when you are feeling frustrated, but it’s worth working on!
 
So, if you find yourself realizing you may need to work on this, I would recommend a couple of things.
 
First, apologize to your husband ASAP. Tell him you recently learned something about the way you have been approaching him. You learned that you were really hurting his feelings, and that was not your intention. Your intention was to bring peace to the situation, but you can see that your response brought the opposite. It brought more tension. Tell him you are going to be working on that.
 
In the future, when you have a problem with his parenting or something he is doing, just let it be in the moment and set a different time to talk to him about it. Then, during that conversation, be prepared to start by asking him questions to understand where he is coming from before you give your thoughts and feelings.
 
The third thing I would recommend is reading a marriage book on the topic and work with a coach to help you with your specific situation.
 
That’s the way I often work with my clients – we usually read a book together and work on the teachings in the book one week at a time to practice them. Then we work through any specific instances and situations that are coming up in the home. This approach is better than you just reading a book at home alone, because when you do that, you just become a consumer of information. That information doesn’t do any good if you aren’t applying it. So that’s where your coach can help you.
 
I know it might feel easier said than done, so if you need help, please, reach out to me.
 
Thank you so much for listening in. Please let me know if you have any specific questions.
 
Remember! To download your free Guide helping your husband feel your love and join us in the Life Designed community on Facebook.
 
Thank you! See you next week!
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