Dr. Adam Sheck insists it’s not about a “trophy” wife or a caretaker . . . it’s not even all about sex!
It’s really not that complicated. From both personal and professional experience, I can tell you that what men want in relationships is pretty basic.
Hint: It’s not about having a “trophy” partner or someone to feed us and take care of us when we’re sick. It’s certainly not about having someone to “process” feelings with. It’s not even about sex, though sexuality IS an important part of relationships.
What men REALLY want in a relationship, is a safe place to recharge and renew themselves in order to go back out and face the world and “fight the good fight.” What men want is a safe, secure, STRESS-FREE environment where we can recover from dealing with the “rat-race” and just relax.
What men want is a place where we can be ourselves, without putting on the facade that the world sometimes demands. We want a place where we don’t have to be on our best behavior, where we don’t have to walk on egg shells and where we don’t have to pretend that we’re something we’re not.
We want a place where we can be accepted for who we are and for who we are not! What men want is consistency and routine, because that is what relaxes us. ”Same place, same thing” calms us down. Yes, we like change and excitement from time to time, but what we really want in our primary relationship is a place where we can be at peace, where we don’t have to have our “fight or flight” response triggered. We’re activated enough in the work world, we don’t want our relationship to be like a second job!
Why is this what men want? Why do men want to recharge in relationships? I believe it goes back to our early childhood development (I’m a psychologist, of course I’m going to go there!). Attachment theory tells us that one stage of childhood is that time where we have started to break away from mommy and become more independent. We play with our friends and have fun, but every once in a while we take a look back and connect to mommy, maybe just eye contact, to make sure that she is there and that everything is okay. And then we can get back to play. We need a “secure base” to launch from in order to explore our world and when necessary we need a “safe haven” to seek comfort from that world.
On some level, I believe that men still do this in our adult relationships. Not in that cliche, “I’ve married my mother” way, but hopefully in a more mature, more conscious way. We want someone around us, to make sure that it (we) are okay. We don’t necessarily want or need to interact with them constantly, just “check in” or “touch base.”
When I’m in a relationship, I’m happy just knowing that my partner is in the house, we don’t even need to talk. And yes, we do interact as well, but there’s something comforting in just knowing that someone is there.
There is the psychology, and then there is also the biology. Men are more susceptible to being physiologically aroused. Yes, THAT way, too, but I mean in terms of “fight or flight” and being ready to fight off attacks from the dinosaurs and sabertooth tigers. That’s what our bodies tell us to do and so we have relationships in order to take a break from that, in order to give our systems a rest, to renew ourselves.
As men we don’t want to multitask and we don’t want to speak in the language of feelings. We’re not built to do these things optimally. We can do them, and of course, sometimes we must, yet we’re just not designed to do them very well.
I’m not saying that we should use biology as an excuse, it just needs to be understood and accepted, so we that can optimize our relationships and have both partner’s needs acknowledged and met.
So there you have it, what men want in relationships. Not necessarily what their partners want (if they are partnered with a woman). And what do women want? And how do we reconcile the differences? That, dear reader, will have to be addressed in another post. Stay tuned!
And of course, it is certainly possible that I’m simply projecting what I personally want in a relationship and backing it up with psychological data, it’s happened before. Once again, it is up to YOU, the reader, to decide what is true for yourself.
If you have a reaction to this post, I welcome ALL of your comments. As always, I am grateful and stimulated by your interaction.
Thank you so much,
Dr. Adam Sheck
Originally appeared at ThePassionDoctor.com
Lead photo: Flickr/oliviavaughn’s photostream
Thank you for this thought provoking article. I hope to come back to this website tomorrow when I have more time to follow up. But for now I what to add these thoughts… this topic is probably something I really need to consider i.e. what is it that I really want in a relationship. My recently ended past LTR started intense, I continued to seek intensity but she wanted what I think you stated men wanted, Now we are both middle aged so I think roles change once we hit age 50. I am now for the 1st time in… Read more »
Well, I´m passing by a sad and hard divorce. And now I read this, I can´t believe it, you steal my words, – What do you want ?, my ex asked
– I just wanna come home, sit, listen some music with you by my side. Rest, feel peace, smoke some cigarretes with you, a beer, that you laugh of my stupidity jokes, (like before)
But, well every head is an universe, and of course I am NOT an angel from the sky. Anyway Thanks for this kind of article, thanks because right now I need some empathy.
I found this article to be quite insightful. I have a male friend that listens to me speak about my thoughts men. His response is usually, “we arealwaysgoing to disappoint you”!. Lol. So, I decided to learn more about the way men operate in order to understand our differences and one day have a successful relationship. Everything you’ve said makes total sense and I’ve seen it play out before without consciously knowing it. I’m excited for this new information and putting it into practice. I read some women get upset over this article in the comments and wanted to add… Read more »
I found your article to be a bit depressing. Certainly, most people, regardless of gender, would like to feel safe and comfortable in their primary relationships but there seems to be so much emphasis on this; home as a refuge and relationship for security. How about creativity and intellectual stimulation? How about being with someone who is passionate about their life and the excitement of watching them exist for themselves and not as an extension of oneself? How about living in gratitude for the the fragile human who you are sharing your life with, understanding that every relationship will eventually… Read more »
My greatest challenge with this article is the consideration of only external realities. Any grown person knows that going out into the world is hard work. However, there doesn’t appear to be any consideration that women have to face the same harsh world and then are expected to come home and create a “safe haven” for their man. Practically speaking, the house needs to be clean, meals need to be prepared, things break, children need to be cared for, laundry needs to be done. How can all of this get done, if both partners retreat to unwind? If this is… Read more »
The main problem I have with this article is this premise that men don’t want their relationship to feel like a second job – NEWSFLASH: it IS a second job. If it isn’t treated accordingly and not approached the way we maintain and the effort made as in any work job, relationship dies. UNLESS, the female partner is willing to accept “slackery,” due to her own self-worth issues. So, I do think this article is a little of a cop out and an insult to feminism in that it it clearly sending out a patriarchal, archaic subtext i.e.: men just… Read more »
This article rings so true and really makes me feel it’s time to give up on my relationship. My boyfriend treats our apartment as a place for switching off and re-charging & I am just apart of the furniture. He has no interest in making any plans or interacting with me. Everything of interest for him is outside of our relationship. No travel plans, no outings, only the occasional meal out. I am suggest new things we could do together, places we could go and I get treated like I am a total bitch. Yesterday I asked him to walk… Read more »
This is the very reason why at OcFilm we created a documentary movie on What Men Really Want. It’s so easy to misinterpret what men are looking for. Too many places in media online and offline that talks about men just wanting this, what’s obvious and expected of their nature but seriously there is more to it. I do agree with what you stated in this blog post. It’s NOT JUST sex and stuff like that. It’s like having a peaceful home for the heart.
Hi, I have been with my fiancee since march 16th 2012 but yet broke up on september 11th 2012 and got back together on janunry 10th and have been together since then. I’m scared that he’s going to cheat like he always did he has a record of cheating, and a record of lying. I’v gave him sex and as much love as i can. i love this man i don’t know what else to do!
Many thoughts and questions..I totally understand the need for a man to refresh after his day, but in this day so does a woman and I realize we are wired so differently. I saw this need for a refresh in my dad and in my own failed marriage, although at the time I didn’t realize it’s importance. I do now and want to provide that in a new relationship if that is what he really wants. Men, I have just found someone of interest, with common ideas as mine and I don’t want to blow it. Do I pursue or… Read more »
I still don’t know what men want after 17 years of marriage to an abusive controlling man. I stuck with it for over a decade after the abuse started. Hindsight is 20/20, and I am moving forward one day at a time. Divorce was the only option for me, and an awful experience. From my personal experience, men say they aren’t that complicated and that they want the simple things: Love, Trust, Respect, Loyalty….a Soft Place to Fall…. I found the opposite to be true with my ex husband. He demanded these things from me but didn’t give anywhere near… Read more »
I liked this article. As a woman, it makes me sad that so many women don’t “get” it. I’ve seen many women become the traditional needy, naggy, unsupportive housewife types…. When their husband arrives home, if he does something she perceives as “wrong” – he hears about it. If he can’t read her mind, all of a sudden it’s his fault. If there is a problem, it’s his fault. Complain, complain, complain…. It’s as though these women treat their men as children instead of adult men. This treatment creates a stressful environment which ultimately leads to the breakdown of the… Read more »
I have come to the cross-roads in a second marriage falling apart out of what I have come to understand now is my wife’s inability to or unwillingness to understand my need for the “safe place” to recharge myself. I work a full time job and have been diligently doing my best to met my obligations from my prior marriage all the while my wife didn’t work, had no “need” of my financial support to keep her at the level of living standards she established for herself prior to our meeting, dating and getting married. Keeping in mind also during… Read more »
Adam, I knew somehow that you would help me figure out why for Heaven’s sake I ate that apple ;)) When I first read your article it sounded very much like an excuse so I had to read it once again. I guess there’s nothing like our personal experience about a certain issue … That being said, I’ll lean over my 30 years(and still)’living’ relationship with my man which is from where my point of view will take its basic flow. The very fact of every man psyche in whatever relationship or context we put it, it’s his freedom. Men’s… Read more »
Hi Adam
You write : “issues (some society imposed) around admitting
vulnerability and the need for a safe place and express shame for having needs in general.”
Is these problems part of why we have higher sucide rate among men than women in the west?
I understand it is more complicated but is this issue an important port of the high sucide rates among the youngest and the oldest men?
Iben,
The highest suicide rates have always been adolescents and men in the second half of life and the latest data released last week shows an increase in rates for middle-aged men as well. It IS too complex an issue for me to speculate upon here, though the economic situation is certainly a factor I’d imagine. I will think about it and write something, as it is particularly relevant to my followers at http://www.menafterfifty.com.
Thanks for bringing it up.
Adam
I think this is absolutely true. From my experience men want someone that is like a mother figure in their lives. It all depends on how you were raised. If you were in a close family then yes, thats what your intent will be when you start to look for a significant other. There have been tons of TV episodes written about this very subject. Thanks.
T.,
I know that people don’t like the idea that we marry our mother, marry our father, psychologically speaking, yet there is more than a grain of truth to it in my psychological experience. It doesn’t mean we have to be at the effect of it in perpetuity, yet if we refuse to become aware of our psychological inclinations, we definitely will act out on them unconsciously.
Thanks for sharing,
Adam Sheck
Well, I have a question: who Doesn’t want to feel safety in their relationship? Ideally and hopefully that is what a relationship provides at its base, the safest environment in which to evolve- and deal with all that ‘schtuff’ that early unhelpful developmental years mucked up….but safety, like love, is a verb and something that does require communication of needs, expectations, boundaries blah blah blah- on a regular basis. Its reassuring to hear men aren’t necessarily seeking the trophy wife etc. Yet in a way those are exaggerated negative attributes of positive qualities for a relationship, too- trophy wife/partner- someone… Read more »
Hi Alexsandra, I really liked this. “using our mammalian brain conscious choices to see where our fight or flight reactions might not serve us and work towards- literally- towards partnering- without succumbing to our fears and wounds- with an other.” You start with a very tenuous assumption. Do men seek “safety” in a relationship? From my experience coaching men, no, for the most part they don’t. I believe that “emotional safety” is critical for most women in a relationship and that a man has a responsibility to *help* create the environment for that. We know that many women require this… Read more »
Steve
Have you been close enough to men to know what emotional needs are not met when men commit sucide or attempt to commit. Sucide ? The young and the oldes are vulnerable.
Great comment Steve…I agree on many levels. Particularly: ‘I think the problems arise when a person tries to give those gifts in ways THEY like instead of ways their partner needs.”
Looked at another way, when we recognize that we project onto others our own needs/wants/emotions, one could see the way that their partner is treating them and understand that that is they way they want to be treated. It takes real consideration of the other person and being unselfish, wanting to understand another’s needs and give, not just receive.
Carlo,
I completely agree with you on this. I do an exercise with most couples that I’m working with on “caring behaviors” to define what makes each member feel special and loved and then share that with their partner, as a remedy to the projections.
Adam Sheck
Steve,
I would suggest a distinction between men seeking “safety” versus a safe place to recharge. I can’t speak for the men you have coached, yet the majority of men I have conducted psychotherapy with over the last twenty plus years have issues (some society imposed) around admitting vulnerability and the need for a safe place and express shame for having needs in general. The deeper we have worked, the more these issues have come to the forefront.
Thanks for sharing,
Adam Sheck
Pretty good list but what about freedom? Men say that they don’t like women who keep tabs on them, and they don’t want to be nagged about the things that their partners think they ought to be doing.
Here is another good list of things men want in a relationship:http://blog.californiapsychics.com/blog/2013/12/5-things-men-want-in-a-relationship.html
Steve, as usual I believe you are on the mark especially about the tenuousness of Adam’s suggestion that men seek a “safety cave” from women. I would agree with yours and John Gray’s listing of male needs as respect, acceptance, emotional and physical affection. As Alexsandra said, “who doesn’t want safety in their relationship?” I would suggest that the real motivation for relationship is even deeper. Firstly, as Heather mentions, this isn’t the 1950’s. It has only recently that humans lived in nuclear families. In fact most of the world still lives communally. Traditionally a man returns home to an… Read more »
Alexsandra,
Thanks for your kind words as well as your deep thoughts on this topic. I would agree we all want to feel safe and that need is met in different ways for different people. My article is about a key way that men’s needs are met. The work of couples counseling in my experience is to help each partner self-regulate so that they an be less reactive and more loving and empathic with their partner, thus being more able and willing to meet each other’s needs as well as have their own needs met.
Adam Sheck
I too am curious… what happens when the mother figure was one that didn’t create a safe place for their son, does that then mean that they search out partners or relationships that mimic that lack of safety in their childhood which would essentially mean destructive non-functioning relationships?
Cheers
Alex,
I’ve blogged extensively on how we choose our partners on my http://www.thepassiondoctor.com website, so you can read my thoughts there. The short answer is that we absorb all of the data around us growing up and are attracted to someone who has the best AND worst qualities of our primary caregivers. Love looks like what we were exposed to, including lack of safety if that was the case. That’s what keeps psychologists like me in business, for better or worse.
Thanks for asking,
Adam Sheck
Iben, this is so priceless…so important for men to understand. ““I also think the bit about how men look back for their mommies in their safe space, but then can turn away once they see their mommy is there. I think that comes across as insulting to some. First, wives and girlfriends are not mothers and we want full partners, not giant sons. Second, it’s deflating to hear that someone wants you to be in eyesight, but doesn’t really want to interact with you. They just want to know that they’re safe. Nevermind about how the woman in this story… Read more »
My mother can be abusive, I never wanna meet a woman like her if I am dating someone. Fuck that. I want a woman, a life partner, not another mother and definitely not MY mother.
Archy,
Sorry, your mother forms part of the template of what you want in a life partner. It can be good though, as it gives us a chance to heal our wounds of childhood through another and they with us. The more conscious we become, the healthier we can be in relationship. See my response to Alex.
Thanks,
Adam Sheck
I enjoyed reading this because it stimulated me to consider if your sharing was applicable in my life. Some of it was and then I had a really great awareness about something that I process much differently than you…yet it was your writing that helped me become aware of it. It was the part where you said you experienced comfort just knowing your partner was in the house. Because that’s not true for me, it made me realize that when I really feel comfortable is when I am confident in my ability to self-sustain (produce income, take care of myself,… Read more »
If I am sharing a relationship and a home with another person, I would assume that what that person wants and desires would in general terms be much about the same as me. At least until the opposite has been clearly stated.
And so, maybe I’m a freak or just unique in my way of thinking, but as long as we can get along and share, I don’t see that my desire to have a stressfree home environment will by default in any way prevent me from doing my best to ensure that my partner also has one!
Hello Adam Sheck (Sorry, this is probably going to be quite long…too long, really. Sorry, mods), Now that I’ve had a couple days to think and not simply react, let’s see if I can’t explain why I reacted to your article the way I did. Archy touched on it when he mentioned how the article hits quite close to the idea that it’s a woman’s job to be seen and not heard. As I pointed out too, your article touches quite close to the old sexist idea that a woman’s place is in the home, and it’s her job to… Read more »
Hi HeatherN
Bravo!
You even made me cry…
Aw, thanks. 🙂
HeatherN, thank you for articulating better what i’ve been trying to say in my comments!
I try. 😀
Heather, I truly appreciate your thoughtfulness and depth in this comment. I’m feeling about done in this article comment thread, though appreciative of all that has come up. I’m happy to own my stuff and others are welcome to own their or not. Obviously EVERYONE in a relationship has needs and the work of relationship is knowing yourself and being able to express what you need. To me, relationships stimulate parts of us that would otherwise not surface, allowing us to learn more about ourselves and share those parts with our partner – the good, the bad and the ugly.… Read more »
When I mentioned the “gendered nature” of what you’re writing, I’m talking about the lack of acknowledgement in the article about how what you’re saying fits into larger cultural narratives about gender. A few sentences where you say, “hey I know how this sounds, but that’s not what I mean,” for example. Something saying, “I don’t mean to equate women with the home,” would help. Something, anything, in there that acknowledges that even if these particular gender stereotypes you’re using are true, it’s not up to the woman to ensure that a relationship is “stress-free” or whatever. Literally the moment… Read more »
Thank you Adam. I’m so tired of seeing criticisms of articles as “heteronormative” or biased toward one gender. It’s silly to expect every article on every subject to have caveats for every possible combination of relationship.
This article is about males in heterosexual relationships with women. There’s nothing wrong with having the article be about or addressing that audience alone.
Indeed, it’s so silly of me, as a woman, to expect an article that is talking about men’s relationships to women…to actually consider women’s opinions on the matter. (I’m being sarcastic, obviously). Let me point out I didn’t, actually, call this article heteronormative. It is…I mean it’s all about straight men, and yet it totally fails to address the straightness of its subject. Heterosexuality is so privileged it’s invisible…etc. Simply saying putting the word, “straight” in front “man” and “woman,” the majority of the times those terms were used would have solved it, by the way. An article doesn’t have… Read more »
This is the reason I think it would be beneficial to have this kind of a discussion in the terms of masculine and feminine. These don’t have to be associated with a gender and we can all relate ourselves to being some ratio between these two energies.
Do take into account this is a site for men, and that in modern days men’s opinions are becoming less n less valued to the point there are many men who simply give up trying to say what they want for fear of being silenced for fucking up. Jezebel tearing apart this article cuz omg a man describes what he wants, and how dare he want a warm n loving partner doesn’t exactly make other men feel like opening up on this shit. Will I be accepted in talking about men’s perspectives on a woman’s site, writing about what women… Read more »
I highly doubt that the characteristics listed in the article are dependent on the gender of the man’s partner.
FlyingKal,
I agree with you here and did my best to keep partner gender out of the discussion for the most part. I work with many gay couples as well and what men want becomes a big issue in the treatment. And yes, as was stated in an earlier comment, the masculine and the feminine reside in us all, yet this article isn’t about that, though certainly relevant and addressed a great deal when couples are wanting to reignite the passion in their relationship
“I read your article like I might read something at A Voice for Men, something that is knowingly trying to “put women in their place,” or how I might have read the “Deranged Sorority Girl” letter. ” Strange, I never get that impression from AVfM unless they’re doing a sattire article that usually says so in the article. I think the author has come across wrongly, I saw Jezebel also missed the mark bigtime on the article and tore it to shreds. Trouble is people really are reading what they want in his words far too much and because it… Read more »
Hmmm, while I do admit that this kind of strategy would’ve worked one particular previous relationship where I was unhappy, when I left that relationship I finally found out that I had been unnecessarily surrendering my own needs for what I thought was “the perfect relationship”. To be honest, I think this is a great strategy, but for people who are in relationships that need severe relationship therapy, which is the sample population you deal with as a psychologist and where you would have drawn most (if not all?) of your inferences (unless you also did studies with happy couples… Read more »
Hi Adam I took a look at Jezebel. It was interesting, and here is a little of what I found of comments to your article here: , “it’s simply not possible that the natural predators of early humans (saber-toothed cats and all that) were only interested in men. Lastly, when men are emotional and, dare I say, overly-sensitive, many of them like to call it “fight or flight” and “arousal”, yet when women have these same responses, we’re “hysterical” and “irrational.” Guess what, guys? Your emotional responses are our emotional responses. It’s very much the same shit. Sunday 5:36pm” But… Read more »
Iben,
Thanks for your thoughts. Just found out about the Jezebel piece, won’t say much about it. I had a therapist once who told me (and I share this with clients all the time) that in life we have the choice to respond with an intention to protect or with an intention to learn. I am interesting in learning and engaging with those that wish to as well. Though I’m feeling like reading comments on this article could become a full-time job 🙂
Adam
I never got my needs met in my marriage. I wish I had a place or a person with whom I could recharge. Maybe I needed a wife instead of a husband. Hmmmm….
WTF,
Wish you the best next time in expressing your needs and getting them met. Maybe you’ll even be in a reciprocal relationship where you’ll want to do the same for your partner.
Good luck,
Adam Sheck