He isn't interested in or capable of taking you in hand?

[This is an FAQ question (answers to frequently-asked questions). Click here for the FAQ index.]

Many wives who discover this site want their husbands to take them in hand, but if their marriage has not been a Taken In Hand one in the past, this change is not always easy. People tend to keep interacting how they always have. To make a dramatic change, it is necessary to overcome the ‘momentum’ of the antecedent relationship style.

That does not mean that such a situation is hopeless. Couples can and do make this change. But it sometimes takes a lot of time and trial and error before it feels as though it is working.

Some men are not actually interested in taking their wife in hand, or don't really understand what their wife wants or how to do it, or they are attracted and appalled in equal measure. Some experience their wife's request as an onerous demand instead of an exciting opportunity to increase their own joy and pleasure in the marriage.

But another problem some couples have is that the wife who wants to be taken in hand makes it difficult or impossible for her husband to do so. She does not intend to sabotage her husband's attempts to make this change, but that is what she does. She does not see that that is what she is doing, but she is. To her, the explanation for the fact that she is not being taken in hand lies not within her own conduct but in what she sees as her husband's lack of ability to master her. She thinks that he doesn't have it in him or isn't dominant, and this further undermines his efforts and his desire to take her in hand.

“But I would never tell him I think he's a wimp,” you protest. Or “But I don't think he's a wimp, I think he just isn't interested in this stuff, so can't get his head around it.”

Do you think that you manage to keep your disappointment and damning judgements to yourself? If you are able to successfully hide these things from your husband, you are an unusual woman. The chances are that if you think that your husband doesn't have it in him to take you in hand, or isn't interested in taking you in hand, you are inadvertently systematically sabotaging the very learning process that could lead to what you want.

One of the biggest barriers to any kind of change in a relationship is that people naturally interpret events in the light of their view of the other person. You think that your husband is a little mouse without a dominant bone in his body, and that is how you see him, even if he has actually changed or was never a mouse in the first place. When you interpret his behaviour in the light of that damning picture of him, you interact with him as though he were the little mouse you think he is. And when you do that, you tend to push him into the very role you are hoping he will change.

How would you feel if your husband were constantly disappointed in you? Constantly wanting you to be like the women in movies, or like his mother? How would you feel if even when you tried to make changes accordingly, he didn't even notice? If your every effort was not good enough? How would you feel?

Think of it from his point of view. You've been married a while, and you have not previously given him any indication that you want him to take you in hand. He, being a decent man, has thus not done so. But now you are saying that you want a Taken In Hand relationship. He may be interested, or he may feel cautious, or he may wonder if you really want it, or he may not be sure exactly what you want, or whether or not it is for him. He loves you and he is prepared to give it a try, but he needs to think about it and find his own way to take you in hand, he does not want to be dictated to by you. He also (very wisely, in fact) wants to take it slowly, and he doesn't necessarily want to talk to you explicitly about it. Creating a Taken In Hand relationship is an evolutionary process, not a recipe he must follow. Were he to follow your recipe, you would not be satisfied, because you would be in control!

You interpret his refusal to follow your recipe as him not being interested, or as him not having it in him, and you start trying to push him. This really annoys him and makes the whole thing seem like a real chore and of no possible benefit to him, and he stops moving towards taking you in hand. Worse, you seem completely blind to the changes he has already made. What he has done to take control and take you in hand not only seems to be not enough for you, you have not even noticed that he has changed at all. You are still interacting with him as though he has made no effort whatever to take you in hand.

This is painful to him, or very annoying, or both. He has made himself vulnerable by trying to give the woman she loves what she wants, and she hasn't even noticed. He feels your dissatisfaction and disappointment, and he is discouraged and annoyed. He stops bothering. What's the point? You are blind to his efforts anyway. Why bother? To him it seems as though it is not him you want but a fantasy hero marionette who will act a part in your play, with you pulling all the strings. If he does have a dominant bone in his body, he is likely to find this completely unacceptable! Think about it! It is insulting. It is disconnecting instead of connecting. It is any wonder that he has misgivings?

So he retreats back to how things were before. And you are even more frustrated.

If you are just beginning your Taken In Hand journey, how can you avoid undermining your husband's attempts to learn to take you in hand?

By being patient and positive. By noticing and enjoying the smallest changes in a Taken In Hand direction. By noticing and enjoying the things he is already doing that are masculine or masterful. By giving him the respect he deserves as a man and as your husband, whether or not you think he deserves it. By thinking about him for a change, instead of yourself. By giving him the time and space to do it his way. By accepting and appreciating his small changes rather than feeling frustrated and dissatisfied with them. By striving to see him as the dominant man you want him to be, and letting that more positive view of him inform all your interactions with him.

And when I say that you should strive to see him as the man you wish he were, I do not mean that he is not that man, I am just using that form of words because that is your perception of him. But actually, as I have said above, the chances are that what you see in him may not be accurate at all. He may well already be the man you wish he were, but you just haven't noticed. Or he may be moving in that direction, but you haven't noticed. Or there may be many things about him that are that man you wish he were, but all you see is the glaring gaps where he is not – or seems not to you.

Interacting with him as though he already is that man will give the two of you the best possible chance to make positive changes. It is the best way to minimise the chance that you will inadvertently prevent him expressing the dominant side of him that may have been hidden for a long time. It is also the best way to open your eyes to the man he already is.

See also Effect positive change by acting as if...

the boss

Return to the FAQ index.

Taken In Hand Tour start | next

Have you seen the following articles?
The Night Porter: movie review
Safewords
What is a Taken In Hand relationship? (In BDSM terms)
Accommodating needs can't be done by the book
Each relationship is a unique work in progress
On being the servant-leader in my relationship
Si vis pacem, para bellum
Tradition, feminism, Victoria and Albert
Is he head of the household?
Saying things for effect

2005 Nov 11 - 09:18 | login or register to post comments | latest article | previous article | next article |

Getting a new viewpoint

It feels as if you wrote this article expressly for me. It's hard to imagine you didn't with the comments I've been posting here lately. I flinched through almost the entire article. I didn't get defensive because you are right. And I know I'm not the only woman dealing with this issue either.

I posted "An Update" for CC in the forum under "You think your woman is too much of a control freak to want to be taken in hand", but it was more of a history lesson than an update.

I've realized, and I've verbalized to J, that I need to be more vocal about the many things I like about him, the many things he does that make me feel cared for.

I love the way he wants me to lay on his shoulder every night and fall asleep with him, the way we tangle up in each other all night while we sleep. He likes me to be up late with him at night, and when I do, he will get the children off to school and tell me to sleep in till I feel rested. He has never complained, in 13 years, what I have or haven't put on the table for dinner. There are many more little things he does for me.

An example of the way I've been trying to change. He works late one night a week and I was expecting him in at 9:20 or so. I had been watching the clock, eager for him to come home because I wanted to see him and I wanted to make love. He called at 9:50 to say how pleased he was to get as much work done as he had gotten done and where he was in the process of closing up. I was disappointed he wasn't already home, and more disappointed that he wasn't ON his way home. Normally, I would've gotten pissy or closed him out and then complained that he didn't take me in hand for my bad behavior.

Instead, I thanked him for working so hard for us. I think at first he thought I was being snide, but I told him again that I appreciated all his hard work, and that we were lucky to have a man to work so hard for us. I said it would probably be too late to make love when he got home, and that I was going to go to bed. He said he was going to finish up and come on home.

I decided to wait for him so I could tell him again in person and just chat a bit before we slept. He didn't come home till after 1:00 am. When he finally came into the bedroom, I didn't pretend to be asleep, and I didn't verbally attack him. I tried to explain to him how I felt. I told him he didn't do what he said he'd do (finish up and come home) and he didn't say since I was going to bed he might work later. He held me the whole time I talked, and I never once got nasty. I made no accusations. Once he understood how I saw it all, how disappointed and rejected I felt, he apologized and felt badly I think. We slept all tangled up and close, with none of the stubborn, angry space around us that would've been there in the past.

We are heading off to a marriage seminar this weekend. When I mentioned the possibility of us going to him, he wasn't overly excited, but he did say right off, "It can't hurt, can only help, so register us". Maybe not the completely enthusiastic reaction I would have hoped for, but it was a positive reaction all the same. We're both looking forward to going.

I've also been more honest than I've ever been with him before. Not to say that I've been lying, because I haven't, but I would hesitate to tell him of my feelings and shut him down. It was easier to say nothing was wrong than it was step out there and tell him. It still is easier, don't get me wrong, but I'm working on not doing it.

It's still hard not to feel a little rejected and unimportant over things like him not mentioning the articles I've put together for him that we were supposed to talk about last Friday and we still haven't talked about them. I know he's been busy and I know a good memory isn't something he's been blessed with. I hesitate to bring it up to him because I don't wan to push it if he isn't ready or doesn't want to talk about it, but I don't want to let it go in the event he is willing to talk about it but has just forgotten. I've been thinking of printing them and taking them with us and maybe mentioning it in a very casual, non-threatening way. I don't do casual very well though, especially when it's important to me, but I think that would be a good approach. We've had some very good talks while driving somewhere, so maybe that would be a good time.

He has recently been much stronger and unwilling (physically and emotionally) to let me push him away when I get a little overwhelmed and try to shut down. He hasn't been letting me. The more he does this, the more I want him to and the less I want to close down on him.

J spanked me again last week. This spanking was as good as the first, if not better. He disrobed me completely, put me over his knee, and spanked me more lightly but longer than he has before. He talked to me while he did it, telling me what I was to do to or not do and what he expected. He told me I was his and that he loved me too. The spanking stung, but it wasn't overwhelming pain that I couldn't hear what he was saying. Towards the end I told him "harder", not trying to be submissively dominant, but realizing that he didn't realize he hadn't brought me to *that* point yet, and I wanted to get there. I wanted him to finish it. (When I read Noone's post about bringing a woman to the edge of orgasm and leaving her, I knew exactly what he was talking about it). J obliged me, and hit harder. A couple of those and I started loudly voicing "that's enough!" and "ok, ok!" but J didn't stop till he was ready to stop. It made me think of the 10 extra hard whacks Louise gets at the end of her spankings, and that was exactly what J needed to do. He held me afterwards, and I asked him to rub my tush, and we talked together, and then we prayed together, and then we made love, and it was good love.

This spanking was different than the other three and I asked him why. He looked very surprised at my question and said we had talked about this very thing, hitting longer and lighter to give me what I needed, and him talking a little to highlight his disappointment and expectations. That he was trying these things to make it better. I told him it made it a lot better.

He IS trying, and I'm trying to get my head of out my own pocket to see all the ways he is trying to make it work. I'm also trying to be different. I'm going to print this article and keep it close to use as a reminder that he isn't the only one who needs to do things different.

He is a very easygoing guy, always has been. I've been starting to think that being easy-going by nature and HOH by my need may be just the mix J and I need to make it work.

Thanks for the article; the timing was perfect, and I *really* needed this right now.

J's Girl

by J's Girl on 2005 Nov 11 - 15:34 | login or register to post comments

Making progress

J's Girl, I am so sorry to have made you cringe! The article was not aimed at you, I assure you. The reason I wrote it is that we all tend to see what we expect to see instead of what is there, and we all tend to have rather fixed views of those we love, even if we don't intend to, and this can cause real problems when couples are moving in a Taken In Hand direction.

When people feel helpless to change things, and they are blind to the good things they already have, their misery has bad effects on the relationship. Realising that you are not powerless to effect change, and that there are good things in your relationship even if it currently lacks X or Y, can make you feel much better. And when you feel better, you are less likely to see everything negatively, and that can make all the difference.

The purpose of the article was not to make anyone feel bad but to empower them to make positive changes. You might think that you, as the woman, can do nothing to change anything, because you want him to be in control, but you can do a lot, even in the privacy of your own mind.

Your story about your husband coming home late is very human. You managed to be appreciative instead of grumpy – that is fabulous! That was a real achievement. WRT the issue of him then not coming home until 1 a.m., I am sure I'd feel just as you did! However, you did say that you were going to bed, so it is not unreasonable of him to have decided, in that case, to carry on working. It might be worth asking him to let you know if there is a change of plan even if he fears waking you, because it is important to you that he does what he says he is going to do. But given that you had said you were going to bed, it is understandable that he carried on working.

He might have been a bit disappointed that you had said that you were going to bed and that it was too late to make love. That might be partly why he did not return until very late. He might not even be aware of having felt rejected and disappointed, yet still be thus affected. If it happens again, it might be worth not suggesting that it will be too late to make love, and not saying that you are going to bed, because saying those things are a bit rejecting and give him less reason to return home.

But what you said to him was clearly so much better than what you might have said before, so take joy in that progress rather than beating yourself up about the other stuff. It is worth noticing your own progress just as much as it is worth becoming more aware of his. Help yourself feel better about yourself as well as about him. Best of luck, J's Girl!

by the boss on 2005 Nov 12 - 07:28 | login or register to post comments

A huge THANK YOU for this article

To the boss:

Thank you so much for this article. My husband and I have been in and out of this type of relationship for years. I only now realize that I am the reason it never works! I get frustrated and impatient with him and wind up sabotaging the taken in hand relationship I want so badly, everytime! I thank God that I have found your website and now have a place to come to gather information. Little did I know that while being a 'smarty pants' and trying to educate my husband, I would be the one getting the education!

Tonight I am up late because we just had one of those frustrated moments. My expectations not being met by him and me being hurt because I don't think he really cares enough to do the reading he should. So, I came downstairs to look for information for him (I really do have a serious problem with control) and lo and behold, I'm the one doing the damage!!!

I've printed out this article and the follow up article, Effect positive change by acting as if... to read and reread until I get it through my thick skull! I will also share it with my hubby, after I apologize profusely, in the morning. It will probably mean a much deserved trip acrossed his knee, but I least I can show him that I've gotten the message.

I hope this makes sense to you, because I'm so elated to have found this article I'm probably not being very articulate. Anyway, thank you so much to the site owner for Taken In Hand. It is a godsend for me.

by flpanther007 on 2005 Dec 31 - 06:11 | login or register to post comments

That's so me!

For the first time since I discovered this site my man really took me in hand and gave me what he thought I needed. It was real though, not some game I had strung together by acting bratty, or whiny.

It woke everything I had read on this site up in my mind. So I found myself back here reading the new articles and discussions.

When I started reading this article, I simply saw it as a very good truth and example, but in the middle I realized this article described me and how I try to make him a puppet in my play and dictate everything to him. Because I don't think he is that interested of his own accord. So I was being pushy and exactly what I was trying to get I was really pushing further away.

Thank you so much for writing this article and making my mistake so obvious to me. I am going to try to quit being a control freak and truly let him take me as he wants me. Thanks again.

by Little Mrs. on 2006 Apr 1 - 03:54 | login or register to post comments

Thank you

Thank you for this wonderful article. I described me to a T. I have been browbeating and bullying my husband for sometime now, trying to 'force' him into being a dominant man, never realizing how deeply I have been hurting him and damaging our relationship.

He IS a wonderful, masterful and dominant man. I have been thinking of myself and my needs, and not considering his.

by a Taken In Hand reader on 2006 Jun 10 - 06:30 | login or register to post comments

hehe. What I could have done

hehe. What I could have done with this article forever ago! ;) I finally figured it out, but it took a long time. The funny thing was, in my case, HE introduced the M/s part of things and I STILL was absolutely convinced that it wasn't truly his "thing" and he was just doing it "for me."

The belief being, if he was doing it only for me that he would get bored and it would fizzle out, but then I realized how constant it was, and how much he really really really liked messing with my head (in the good way) and it got much easier after that. Wanting him to be in control, means actually wanting HIM to be in control.

I'm subject to his whims, not the whims of some "group" who is competing for the extremeness of freakyness award. :)

by Z on 2007 Mar 14 - 08:25 | login or register to post comments

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