How many times have we heard this from grown men?
My needs, my needs, my needs. The book His Needs, Her Needs, really inflates an individuals sense of entitlements to My Needs.
Oh my heaven's I've had it, I've had it.
The next person who says "My Needs" and isn't a nursing baby is getting a metal bat.
So, 14 years ago, the end of my first marriage. I had 3 and 6/9 children, and a workaholic, husband. Being great with child, and essentially a single mother taking care of the three, I was pretty exhausted by the time my honey came home. Every bone ached. Every muscle ached. My emotions had it. But I didn't take it out on him. When he came home, he didn't see how tired I was, or how much I did, or what challenges I faced in the day. He wasn't psychic, and I didn't expect him to be. I wanted to meet his needs, but I was just so tired and exhausted. But I still tried.
But all I heard from him was lectures on his needs, and how his needs weren't being met. He would lecture me on his needs. Two weeks after #4 was born, it was 2 in the morning, I hadn't slept yet. I'd scrambled all day to care for all four children. At 2 in the morning, he lectured me on "My needs aren't being met." He lectured me on his needs. His demands, emotionally, physically, sexually. Oh it was far worse than that.
How did he not see the needs of his wife and children. His children were begging him to be a part of his life. He was needed so badly by all of us, his family, but all I heard from him was, "My needs, My needs."
Every day, every night, every moment of my life was focused on every else's needs. It's all I knew. It's what I did. I didn't even know any more, how to take care of, think about, or even consider any of my needs. There was just no room for that in the lives of my family.
So years later, my second husband. So there I was, a single mom with four children, at least 1 special needs child, caring for them all to exhaustion. Each child had and has unique challenges and adversities to face and help through. Every day was a challenge. Some days, after facing an emotionally and physically, and spiritually challenging whatever on my own, after the challenge passed, I would just collapse and cry to the bottom of my soul. Oh dear heavens, how can I meet all these needs of others when I feel so broken.
So along came my second husband. The prospect of temptation of having someone in my life to help take care of me, and help as a loving father was wonderful. Every week for a year, he kept fresh flowers on my table before we married. He seemed to love me and genuinely care about me. I wanted to be sure he knew how challenging my family and children are, so I hid nothing from him. I wanted to come into the marriage with full knowledge of what challenges there were to faee.
Why and how in the world does a man, look at a single mom with 4 children, exhausted and still going on bravely, how does a man, think he should marry that woman so she can fill all his needs?!
Immediately after we married, "My needs aren't being met." Seriously! Who does that? Who marries an exhausting single mom to fill their own needs! Even during the honey moon, he began lecturing me on his needs. Every sentence, every moment, every hour. He lectured me at the cabin on his needs, I begged him to take a break from it and go to the beautiful lake with me. When we got in the car, he lectured me on his needs, when we arrived at the lake, he lectured me in the car of "His needs". He was a "gentleman" so literally wasn't allowed to open my own door. So when I reached for the door to get out, he came around, opened the door, blocked it with his 6'2" 350 pound body, and continued to lecture me. "We have to work out our problems, my needs need to be met." "Can we please go to the Lake and enjoy our honey moon?" I asked.
As he lost his job just before we married, (he worked the same job 15 years thus I had faith in his ability to work.) he was able to keep me in my room, when he returned home. He would lecture me for the next couple of months on, "We have to work out our problems. My needs aren't being met". I would beg him to let me leave the room and care for my family, to make dinner, to do something enjoyable. "We have to work our our problems. My needs aren't being met." He was obsessed with his needs and his appetites, and had no view or consideration for the needs of others. He wouldn't even allow me to leave the bedroom for the first two months, for more than a few minutes. When I did finally open the door, and walk into the kitchen, he would stand against the wall glaring at my sons, with his hands in his pockets.
Instead of being the loving, helping father I'd hoped for, he was obsessed with his needs, and interfered with my ability to care for my children, and set a terrible example for my children.
He tired to drive my sons away so I could meet "His needs." He did a pretty good job. Repairing those relationships is hard.
I felt like I was caring for a 350 lb 6'2" nursing infant.
"My needs, my needs."
I guess the book His Needs, Her needs at least covers the other persons needs. But I still hate the book as a "You're not meeting my needs, thus it's your fault I'm unfaithful" book.
So a few years back a friend of mine needed my help. She has 4 disabled children, and she herself is physically afflicted. When the best surgeons in the country meet with her, to discus how they can surgically help on of her children, they, the Doctors, literally cry in discouragement.
So she is a woman physically, emotionally, and spiritually exhausted and broken, but still caring to her dying breath for her children.
Anyway, so she, the mom, had major surgery. She was in the hospital for a week. When she returned home she was expected to take care of her home and children and husband, at least by him.
She called me one day, just one week after surgery. She needed help to the grocery, and the bank. I reprimanded her repeatedly through the trip for over working, as she could barely move.
When we returned home, she insisted on stocking the freezer on the bottom of her fridge herself. She sat on the floor cross legged, while emptying the bags of frozen food into the freezer. Her husband came in after a long hard day at work.
"I need dinner."
"The church brought us this dinner here."
"I don't want that dinner, I want dinner."
"We have this frozen food I can make"
"I need dinner."
He bent down put his arms on the door of the freezer, brought his head down to her face.
"I am home from work. I don't want freezer food, I don't want the dinner the church brought. I want dinner." He said with a stern commanding voice.
I should have just handed that man a baby bottle, a blankie, and metal bat to the head.
People who are obsessed with their own needs become intensely abusive as they pursue their own needs through you. They are consumed by their appetites. They're abusively blind to the challenges others face. They become abusers who think they are victims!
Time to grow up and be a man.
Some people are obsessed with their own needs and appetites.
Some people are obsessed with meeting other people's needs.
Put them together, and abuse is going to happen baby!
I see all of them as 6'2" 350 lb men with binkies.
No one is going to meet all our "needs" and it's cruel to demand it from others. When we grow up, its our turn to serve. So quit being a bunch of babies and help the mother of your children and to love and care for them.
Seriously! How hard is that!
