Bored couples are not really bored. They are experiencing a kind of suspended animation. Boredom is a state of mind that occurs when wishes, fantasies, and feelings are being repressed because, if admitted into consciousness, they would cause anxiety.
Generally only one partner is feeling boredom, but on occasion both are. One of my patients, a man in his late thirties, complained to me of being bored by his marriage: “My wife is a very boring lady. She’s a complainer. All she does is complain, complain, complain. But if I say anything to her about her constant complaining, she accuses me of not being empathic enough. She just wants to complain but never wants to really examine herself. She can never be there for me. Even when we .have sex, which isn’t very often, I feel she’s just sort of taking a break between complaints.”
This patient’s boredom was a defense against both the anger he felt toward his wife for constantly complaining and shutting him out and the taboo wishes and fantasies he harbored of a sexual or violent nature. His wife was doing to him what she did to every other man (creating distance and desex-ualizing the relationship), and the patient was doing to her what he did to every woman (subtly rejecting her emotionally, and depriving her by withholding his anger).
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Tags: Men’s Health
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