Are You A Normal Sexual Male?

Am I normal?

I’m going to go out on a limb here and just say that I don’t think I’m the only one who has ever wondered that. Specifically, wondered that about my sexuality.

When I was young, I wondered if I was the only one in the world who masturbated. After I was married, I wondered how my sex life compared to other “normal” people. I wondered if I was more obsessed with my sexuality than the average man. I wondered if other men wondered the same things that I wondered.

I recently read an excellent book on male sexuality called The Sexual Male by Dr. Archibald Hart. The book itself was based on some well-known sexual studies, as well as a personal study and clinical observations by Dr. Hart himself. What was different about this book was exactly who Dr. Hart was examining:

By design, I have used a select sample of men. It does not in any way represent the general male population. It samples males who, by and large, consider themselves to be religious and of high moral standards.

What was intriguing to me about this is that who he was analyzing could be considered the “typical” American male: upstanding citizen, faithful to his wife and kids, believes in God. Dr. Hart’s point was not to push a “Christian agenda” but to say, “Look, this is the ‘normal guy,’ and this is how he deals with his sexuality.” Dr. Hart said that he wasn’t interested in examining the extremes, he simply wanted to know how the average American male fit into all of this.

Do You Have A Husband Mentor?

Men, for whatever reason, live on an island during trying times. When we get frustrated or hurt or are just simply lost, we retreat to a lonely place and wallow in our sorrows. If we do happen to open up to our friends, it’s only to complain. This is especially true when it comes to problems in the marriage. This is not healthy.

My question for us today is: Do you have a husband mentor? What I mean by that is, do you have a friend in your life whom you look up to as both a man and a husband who you can go to during times of trouble and frustration in your marriage?

Marriage is hard, and often we encounter problems we just did not expect or have no idea how to deal with. Why did she say that? Why is she upset about this? Is having sex ____ times a week normal? As we learn how to be married, and as we continue to encounter new stages in life (newlywed, moves, jobs, parents, parents of teens, etc.), it is extremely helpful to have someone to go to whom we can confide in, and seek guidance from. We unfortunately live in a time where we’d rather go to Google for marriage advice before we’d go to a man happily married for 25 years. We’ve lost faith in finding wisdom in our heritage, and find it in our cell phones instead.

Next time you and your wife encounter a problem, instead of going to your friends to complain about the “old ball and chain” everybody-loves-raymond style, think of someone you could go to who could actually contribute to you fixing the problem. Retreating to jokes about how nagging/condescending/demanding/confusing our wives are is not healthy for you, for your friends, or for those who look up to you (see my post Bad Marriages Aren't Funny).

Opening up about personal things isn’t easy because we feel that admitting failure is the same thing as admitting defeat (it’s not). Finding another husband who has been down your road before and lived to tell the tale is worth its weight in gold.

If you happen to have a friend who’s been a husband mentor to you, I’d love to hear an example or two about how that person positively affected your marriage.

Celebrate An Unofficial Special Day

As I mentioned around this time last year, celebrating the day you and your wife met can be a great way to create something special between the two of you. Especially if you aren’t in the habit of celebrating this special day, it will be a very sweet surprise to show your wife that you remember such a seemingly unimportant day.

This doesn’t have to stop with celebrating the day you met, however. I was thinking about all the unofficial special days a couple can share together. Don’t just remember the days your supposed to remember (the days Wal-Mart reminds you of two months ahead of time). Do your best to celebrate off-the-wall moments you and your wife have had over the course of your relationship.

Here are a few I’ve thought up:

• Celebrate the day you first kissed.
• Celebrate the day you found out you were going to be parents.
• Celebrate the day her parents said it would never work out.
• Celebrate the day your wife completed something big. The day she received her Master’s, for example.
• Celebrate an awful event that you both went through that you laugh at now. That vacation where every possible thing that could have gone wrong did go wrong. Let it be a celebration of the ability you both have to get through anything together.

If you’re having trouble remembering the exact date, just do a little research. Usually you can get pretty close if you just think about the events that surrounded that date. Was it summer or winter? Were you celebrating someone’s birthday? Whose? If you remember it was the first Saturday you had off that June, you can use the internet or even the clock on your computer to go back and see what date it was. If all else fails, ask for your wife’s help in a casual conversation and then record it for later.

Just think of the fun you can have with this. Tell your wife that you’re going to take her out on Thursday to celebrate an important anniversary with her. If it’s an event she hasn’t thought about for years, she’ll be racking her brain to figure it out. But all the while, she’ll be loving you for it.

Surprise her with remembering an off-the-wall (but special) date and your wife will be touched that you’ve made that day an important one to remember.

International Women's Day

March 8th is International Women's Day. That may sound funny to hear in America as we do not officially celebrate such a holiday. However, March 8, 2011 marks the 100th year anniversary this day has been celebrated and is being recognized by more than 100 countries.

The Wikipedia article describes it as somewhat a mixture of Mother's Day and Valentine's Day. It's a day that men get to express to all the different women in their lives (wives, mothers, daughters, co-workers, etc.) how grateful they are for them. Personally, I love the idea of Women's Day and wish we did celebrate it in the states. I am so very thankful for the women in my life, and I believe that women deserve a special day all to themselves.

So, in honor of International Women's Day, I encourage you to celebrate the most important female relationships you have today. Do something extra special for your wife and daughters today. Unexpected flowers with a note about how much you appreciate having them in your life will go far. Telling them how much you value them as women and how much you need them in your life will be big. And telling them that you wanted to celebrate this special day even though your country does not will be a very sweet gesture.

Just think about what they'll tell their co-workers when flowers show up on this non-American holiday.

Do Things You Don't Have To Do

After you’ve been married a while, you and your wife naturally fall into a routine. You both learn what each other likes and dislikes, and you both settle into your routines of who does what around the house. Getting into this routine is not necessarily a bad thing; with familiarity comes a routine, and there can be wonderful comfort in routine. But, in thinking along the lines of the key to woman’s heart being an unexpected gift at an unexpected time, one of the best ways to show your wife that you’re thinking about her is to do something for her that doesn’t fall within that normal routine.

Doing things you don’t have to do are always a big win in a relationship. You wife knows you don’t like going to the grocery store with her on Saturday mornings because it’s your only time to really rest. She’s okay with that, she understands, but she does love to do things with you like you both used to. So, what better way to break that routine of not going and do the thing you don’t have to do for the sake of showing your wife how much you care?

Consider some of these other examples:

• Your wife hates to go clothes shopping by herself and has a few years’ worth of birthday money piling up. Since she knows you don’t like it too much either, suggest going with her one evening.
• Your wife understands that you need to get back upstairs and start working on that report right after dinner, but show her that you really appreciate all the work she put into the meal by insisting on doing the dishes. Don’t take no for an answer.
• You’re not expected to get the kids to their different activities since your wife always takes care of that. Offer to make the rounds and drop her off at a coffee shop for some reading time. Meet her back there for some good alone time together.
• You enjoy going on date nights with your wife, but the planning always seems to fall on her. Surprise her this week with a very well-planned date night to show her that you don’t need her initiation to actually spend time together.

Doing something you don’t have to do always shows those around you that you’re really going the extra mile. Since it’s not expected of you to take that extra step, your wife will be surprised and appreciate your thoughtfulness. Showing her you still think about ways to help her out like you did in the beginning of your relationship will go a long way.

Can you think of any other good examples we husbands could reach out and do what we don’t have to do?