This is a guest blog by Jared Black. Jared is a good friend and a marriage mentor of sorts.

As married men, we are husbanding something.  It is how we are wired.  The trouble is, most of us young men husband something other than our wife.

Often it is our vocation that gets our full husbanding energies.  We accidentally fall into the trap of husbanding our life instead of husbanding our wife. We do it with gusto because, after all, we have been taught and had it modeled that this is our provider function.  Quite frankly, it is all we know to do.

 And as our young marriages suffer from the pressure that “everything should be ok….look at all I am doing to make my family and marriage work!” We are left to silently conclude that the problem must be our wives. She just can’t be satisfied so it seems.

Although you can point out to her all the specific times that you have re-arranged your life for her, spent money on her, sacrificed your time for her, you just can’t get away from the nagging undercurrent that this thing called “marriage”, your marriage, is not working out so well.  Your wife isn’t thriving. As a result, neither are you.

May I suggest the problem isn’t her?  It is you (and me).  More specifically, it is our husbanding.

We have been husbanding something other than her; and SHE knows it.  She may not know to say it in those words, but the tension between our wives and us husbands (even if it is subtle) is there to instruct us…if we will listen and learn the unique language of our marriage.

I was taking my wife to the hospital yesterday for a routine pregnancy checkup. We were well in to our typical conversation about how many kids we plan to have when the topic of our dog Franklin’s life span surfaced. All at once at the thought of our dog not being around someday far far away, my wife began to cry. But this wasn’t just a casual eye watering. Those are old news and happen too often to even consider writing about. This was more in line with uncontrollable weeping.

My emotion came uncontrollably as well. I laughed so hard I began to cry with her. Fortunately, my wife’s very aware that her pregnancy causes bizarre breakdowns and slowly transitioned her sobbing to a chuckle.

You ever felt like your wife’s emotions are entirely too irrational?

I often find myself insensitive to my wife in her moments of emotional vulnerability. And though I’ve developed a bit in my sympathy, there have been a few realities involving women and emotions that my slow learning curve has made it hard for me to miss…

1. Women are emotional.

The sooner you accept it, the sooner you’ll see the beauty of it. Even if you got one that seems to stay balanced most of the time, you’re promised at least 4 to 5 less fortunate days a month. It’s an extremely special part of them.

2. Women’s emotions aren’t always as irrational as they seem.

Next time your wife goes on a emotional binge, try something. Dig. Try digging to the next layer of why she feels the way she does. No matter how crazy it may seem in the moment, there’s almost always -minus pregnancy & periods- a significant reason she’s feeling what she is.

3. Women’s emotions are a gift to men.

Men tend to see the world purely through the lens of logic. Unfortunately, the best way to live isn’t always navigated by rational thought. In fact, much of the best decisions made in life demand an emotion influence.

Anyone relate? Any stories or lessons learned from women’s emo binges?

“Am I your priority” does not mean “am I your everything?”

By about a year in to marriage, I had made my peace with the fact that I had married “one of those.” You know the kind you hear about. The extra needy wife. It felt like no matter how hard I tried to love her or how much I gave, it was never enough.

Then I learned about THE QUESTION [see previous post] and it all became wonderfully clear.

My wife isn’t extra needy and her love tank isn’t a bottomless pit. I simply wasn’t filling it right.

It’s the 80/20 rule.

If you’re not informing your wife from day to day -with words & actions- that she’s your priority, you will spend 80% of your energy trying to love her and yield 20% fruit in your marriage. 

Here’s the beauty of it though. And I’ll put a guarantee on this one.

If you make her feel like your priority, you will spend 20% of your energy and reap 80% fruit.

Unfortunately for all parties involved, I spent the first year of my marriage ignorant of THE QUESTION. Once informed, the female breed almost made a little sense.  

Spoken or unspoken, THE QUESTION your wife is ALWAYS asking is “Am I your priority?”

If you can answer her [in words & actions] with a Yes – you may just find the marriage you dreamt of before you went and got married.

However, if you can’t answer her question with a yes – no matter how hard you try to love her, she will undoubtedly and eventually find her rightful role of a priority somewhere else.

*Pt 2 to come.
* Special thanks to Jared Black for the Marriage 101 on this one.