Written By: Steven & Hollie Ankney

My wife and I led a small group discussion series on the book “Love and Respect” by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. The main point of the book is that both men and women each have a need to be loved and respected. However, men have a deeper need to be respected than loved and women have a deeper need to be loved than respected. Chapter 3 of the book quotes a study where 400 men across the nation were given the choice of going through two different negative experiences and they had to choose one or the other.

Experience 1: To be left alone and unloved in the world.
Experience 2: To feel inadequate and disrespected by everyone.

Seventy four percent of the men said they would choose experience 1. Seventy four percent of the men would prefer to be alone and unloved in the world than to feel not capable and disrespected.

The main point was hard for me to accept at first. Is it that easy to differentiate a man and a woman’s emotional needs? As discussions with our small group of married couples explored this idea, it became very clear that every man in attendance did have a deeper need to be respected and every woman in attendance did in fact have a deeper need to be loved.

Acknowledging that fact about men and women can be extremely powerful. It can completely reshape how a husband speaks to his wife and how a wife speaks to her husband. Clearly, husbands should not speak to their wife with the same motivation as they would want to be spoken to. Husbands should give praise to their wife with words of love and affection. Wives should give praise to their husbands by using words of admiration at their capabilities and words that show they respect them.

This fact can also help us understand how our partner is receiving our behavior during a conflict. During a conflict the husband is most likely focusing on how disrespectful his wife is being. The wife is, however, more likely to focus on how unloving her husband is being. Before reading this book, I would take my wife’s criticisms as personal attacks on my intelligence or capabilities. Instead of communicating how her words made me feel, I would just retaliate by being unloving. This created what the book calls, the “Crazy Cycle”. Now my wife is more thoughtful about how she delivers her criticisms, and she makes sure to maintain respect while giving me feedback. I in turn make sure to communicate how those words make me feel before I retaliate with unloving behavior. If we start to teeter into disrespectful language or unloving behavior, we can now communicate it clearly to one another so that we can break the “Crazy Cycle” and deescalate the conflict quickly. Communicating these needs early on in the conflict expedites the path to reconciliation and forgiveness and hugging it out.

The next time a conflict arises between you and your spouse, posture yourself in a manner so that you are speaking to your spouse in the manner that meets their deeper need. This will allow you both to address the root issue of the conflict much faster.

The next time you want to have a check-in with your spouse, husbands ask your wife if she is feeling the amount of love she needs from you. Wives, ask your husband if he feels respected and admired by you. This will be one of the most effective check-in conversations the two of you have ever had.