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Ultimatum
- Thread starter JustUs
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It's a tough battle, but PM is not meant to be easy.
http://www.biblicalfamilies.org/forum/threads/ultimatums.14210/
Welcome. Hope to hear more about your journey.
http://www.biblicalfamilies.org/forum/threads/ultimatums.14210/
Welcome. Hope to hear more about your journey.
Do you have children? It will help a lot with her understanding.
1. This is a common fallacy. I think it's easy for a man to understand that he could love two women, it's built into him, but for a woman she is bombarded with culture that tells her this is cheating, adultery, sleeping around. If a man wants another woman then it's because the first isn't enough, and most often he will leave the first wife for the second. This is what we often see in society when polygyny isn't allowed or understood, marriages break down or a man has to make a decision. It's difficult. But, the truth is that it's not about not being enough. It's just about love. It's a compliment that a man loves his first wife so much that he wants to have a second as well. He wants to double the joy that he has.
Thinking about it in terms of children helps. You have one child, and it feels like you couldn't possibly love another child as much as you love the first. Another child comes along and you find that the love you have is multiplied. You didn't look at your first child and think that child wasn't good enough at something and so you wanted another to fill the gap. You didn't think that child wasn't good enough and wanted to replace them. Instead you had so much joy and love from one child that you wanted that again.
2. She's not going to be with you 24/7. The same way your first wife isn't with you 24/7. There will be times she wants to cuddle, times she's pissed off at you and doesn't, and times she's busy or tired. What is most important is communication. If first wife needs some cuddles because she's feeling down, then she needs to communicate that to second wife who can let her have time alone with hubby while she does something else for a while. And vice versa. The same with kids, sometimes one needs a bit more attention, sometimes the others have to be generous and let that kid have a bit more mummy and daddy time for a while. It sounds like a big deal in your wife's head, but it really can be overcome quite easily. What it does require is to be selfless, caring, generous, understanding, and kind. Yes, your wife will be giving up total uninterrupted time with you, and she will have to make allowances for the fact that there will be another woman in your life that requires attention. I bet she did the same when she had kids, right?
3. Well, she doesn't have to be in bed, she could be up watching TV or doing some baking, or a hundred other activities to keep her mind off it. But yes, this is the hardest thing for most women to get their heads around. But remember that the next night she'll have you in her bed, and it will be the second wife who is worrying and feeling lonely.
I am not in a PM and I have no experience aside from what I've learned over the years from God and through others on this forum, so if I'm wrong then hopefully others will speak up.
If your wife is up to it, then you could encourage her to be on the forum. The ladies chat is a great place to be to have time just with the women and so she can see there are other woman who are happy doing PM, happy to do PM in the future, and ones who are struggling just like her. She can ask as many questions as she likes. There's no chat for a few weeks because of the holidays, we come back on January 8th, she will need to have her own account to enter. Until then she could just read the forum. I spent 3 days just solidly reading the forum when I first signed up, I learned quite a lot.
1. This is a common fallacy. I think it's easy for a man to understand that he could love two women, it's built into him, but for a woman she is bombarded with culture that tells her this is cheating, adultery, sleeping around. If a man wants another woman then it's because the first isn't enough, and most often he will leave the first wife for the second. This is what we often see in society when polygyny isn't allowed or understood, marriages break down or a man has to make a decision. It's difficult. But, the truth is that it's not about not being enough. It's just about love. It's a compliment that a man loves his first wife so much that he wants to have a second as well. He wants to double the joy that he has.
Thinking about it in terms of children helps. You have one child, and it feels like you couldn't possibly love another child as much as you love the first. Another child comes along and you find that the love you have is multiplied. You didn't look at your first child and think that child wasn't good enough at something and so you wanted another to fill the gap. You didn't think that child wasn't good enough and wanted to replace them. Instead you had so much joy and love from one child that you wanted that again.
2. She's not going to be with you 24/7. The same way your first wife isn't with you 24/7. There will be times she wants to cuddle, times she's pissed off at you and doesn't, and times she's busy or tired. What is most important is communication. If first wife needs some cuddles because she's feeling down, then she needs to communicate that to second wife who can let her have time alone with hubby while she does something else for a while. And vice versa. The same with kids, sometimes one needs a bit more attention, sometimes the others have to be generous and let that kid have a bit more mummy and daddy time for a while. It sounds like a big deal in your wife's head, but it really can be overcome quite easily. What it does require is to be selfless, caring, generous, understanding, and kind. Yes, your wife will be giving up total uninterrupted time with you, and she will have to make allowances for the fact that there will be another woman in your life that requires attention. I bet she did the same when she had kids, right?
3. Well, she doesn't have to be in bed, she could be up watching TV or doing some baking, or a hundred other activities to keep her mind off it. But yes, this is the hardest thing for most women to get their heads around. But remember that the next night she'll have you in her bed, and it will be the second wife who is worrying and feeling lonely.
I am not in a PM and I have no experience aside from what I've learned over the years from God and through others on this forum, so if I'm wrong then hopefully others will speak up.
If your wife is up to it, then you could encourage her to be on the forum. The ladies chat is a great place to be to have time just with the women and so she can see there are other woman who are happy doing PM, happy to do PM in the future, and ones who are struggling just like her. She can ask as many questions as she likes. There's no chat for a few weeks because of the holidays, we come back on January 8th, she will need to have her own account to enter. Until then she could just read the forum. I spent 3 days just solidly reading the forum when I first signed up, I learned quite a lot.
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C
Cap
Guest
The greatest thing you could probably do for your wife at this stage is to get her to review some of the content on this forum and get in touch with women such as @FollowingHim2 and many more who could help her understand it from a woman's point of view. What she said is correct and difficult for us men to fully understand. But we are called to love and patiently wait for this calling to be revealed to all in the family. I would say, her asking questions is a good start.
Your wisdom really shows though. I always appreciate your responses to topics like this.
C
Cap
Guest
Speaking of retreats ?!?!
I noted that you'd visited the thread @Cap mentioned. I remember posting on that thread also regarding ultimatums. Again I'm reminded that fear is often what generates and fuels ultimatums--fear of rejection, of the unknown, of inadequacy, of ignorance, of the flesh fighting against the spirit of man. Ultimatums can be seen as a last ditch effort to control, or seen at the trump card to win an argument, or even used as a tool for further required communication on a topic. I feel the key to ultimatums is to ACT and not REACT. Praying as one moves forward frees you from taking the ultimatum personally and feeling the need to defend onesself thus paving the way for thoughtful action which is productive offense.
The fact that your wife gave you 3 very specific questions that are troubling her is extremely valuable and places the ball in your court. Any question is an invitation for relationship. I hope you will stay on the forum and get connected with some of the men who have already navigated these waters or are currently in the waters but a little bit further out into the deep than you are having just put your toes in the water.
Patience is one of the most difficult virtues to develop but nets more than most of the others. Blessings to you and your dear wife. I hope you will keep us posted.
Plural marriage is not just about being "Biblical". It is also about male headship being "Biblical". Until you can establish your headship you will probably lose her by trying to gain another. Not an easy choice for sure. Establishing your proper role as to headship is a prerequisite to successful PM. As a husband of two wives, I found that my calling to be a "king" i.e. a man, a leader of my home, had to be in place first. Without my authority being established in love first, I could not be even a proper husband to my first wife. This is hard, but if she can see the fact that PM is Biblical, does she not also see that a wife's submission is also Biblical? Without that being in place, you are not yet a "real" husband and she is not yet a "real" wife and you do not yet have a "real" marriage. It is sad that in our society there are so few "real" marriages in God's eyes. I am not suggesting that you have no responsibility to teach and guide in LOVE! However, when you stand before God it will be as a Man first and as a husband second, because being a "man" is not optional, being a husband is. True your husband-ship depends upon her submission. She does get to choose. However, if you are the one "in submission" then she is the acting husband and head. It is not easy today to make the transformation to a God type of marriage. All the forces of darkness are against the idea. If you chose this path make sure you can stand before God with a clear conscience, that if the proper marriage relationship cannot be established, make sure that you did your part in LOVE.
So very well explained! I really enjoyed reading your words of encouragement to this brother as a man to man. Thanks!
My wife knew my views on the subject before we got married and it still took her four years to accept it. No one can give you an easy answer but the advice that always seemed the best to me was to go slow and then slow down. The goal is to have two wives. That means you have to keep the first one.
Double gold in this post, @JustUs. Go slow and then slow down. And, can't have two if you don't keep the first one. But @Jim an Apostle fleshes it out with what could be the central issue: one must establish oneself first as the head of the household. Maybe I see it that way because that is the stage that I'm currently in with my wife, but remember that it's a dance that involves being in charge while remaining respectful. She is, after all, your life partner, not your pet or domestic servant.
What I have learned is that another wife may never be a possibility for me, but the rewards from having gone most of the way toward fully establishing headship with my wife have already been bountiful in ways I never imagined.
Seek ways in which you can avoid resisting God's Will in this matter.
And I agree that conferences are the cat's pajamas.
Keith
C
Cap
Guest
Praying and hope you guys are doing well.
Not surprised , it’s a cliche but “she won’t care how much you know until she knows how much you care”
As to your headship, her compliance or agreement is not a good measure of this.
IMO a better measure of your headship is at 2am when someone is in the backyard uninvited.
If she has to tell you to do something , you’ve got bigger problems than what’s going on in the yard.
I believe being the head means We will do what is needed for the future of our family.
Hurt and pain are an inconvenience and have little bearing on wrong or right or what’s best.
The logic of the no hurt/pain idea leads to she will never want children , after all it could be painful..with no consideration to the blessing that they are.
Be the best man you can be so that sharing you is a better option than having 100% or someone else
It will mentally break her. That's not a bad thing. That's not an encouragement to go ahead and mentally break her to get it over with just that to be a Godly wife in any form of marriage requires a mental breaking as does being a Godly man.
This may not be the best way to ease my way back into participation at this web site after a 3-week full absence and a couple months of mostly being absent . . . but . . . I know I can't possibly be the only as-of-yet-non-plural husband here who has heard these same door-slamming statements from his wife. Some of it is nanny-nanny-boo-boo territory (if you think I'm being too harsh, just visualize a woman drowning out the world with her fingers in her ears saying she won't read more, that a particular lifestyle will send her to the looney bin, or stating that he can't make her even if it is in Scripture), and in my own case I associate hearing those you-can't-make-me-think-this-is-OK statements with my own insufficiently-developed status as a proper leader; I have left undone responsibilities of mine related to the full nurturing of the family I already have. However, that last one about how we're supposedly just trying to use God and The Bible for our own benefit no matter how much it supposedly hurts our loved ones just begs for me to risk being redundant by restating something many of you have already heard, which is my response to the accusation that as a man I'm just unfairly distorting Scripture to satisfy my desire to have approved sexual variety; it has two parts:
- There is always something disingenuous about a female human being throwing out the victim card when it comes to how to properly structure the family in modern-day America, especially as concerns the husband/wife relationship, because both women as a gender and women as individuals have, generally speaking, not shied away in recent decades from regular reworking of the supposedly appropriate structure of the family for the purpose of advancing the interests of women over those of men. Everything they want is portrayed as falling into one of the following categories, all of which are good reasons:
- Because it's good for the children.
- Because they just want to avoid social stigma.
- Because of past oppression of women.
- Because men are insensitive brutes.
- Because women are emotionally superior to men.
- The assertion itself is a trap, designed to inspire a man to prove that he isn't doing it for the sex, and it's quite common for men to get sucked into articulating all the ways in which he has righteous (read: female) rationales for wanting to expand his family with another wife. Some men even go so far as to first convince their (1st) wives that sex has nothing to do with why they want (more) wives, which has the risk of being followed by actually believing that nonsense themselves, which leads to choosing wives those men don't even really want to be married to in order to prove to their (1st) wives that they weren't doing it for the sex. My vote is to refrain from engaging in any discussion about sexual desires until many other issues are untangled and fully processed, but before those get accomplished, it is wholly appropriate to point out something that apparently gets lost on most women: as men, we do not take on wives primarily for the purpose of getting laid. This is true even with our first wives. Certainly, both partners enter into marriage to a significant extent due to the motivation to establish a sexual relationship, but even in randier-than-average relationships sex takes up far less than 10% of the potential time a couple has together.
@Keith Martin --well stated!