3 Ways Fictional Marriages can Sabotage Real Ones—and How to Get it Right

Last updated on: April 12, 2022 at 12:03 am by Shaunti Feldhahn

3 Ways Fictional Marriages can Sabotage Real Ones—and How to Get it Right 2022-04-12T00:03:00-04:00 Shaunti Feldhahn

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Fiction #2: If you do hurt your spouse’s feelings, they will forgive all and not pout, cry, or hold a grudge.

Truth #2: If you hurt your spouse’s feelings, there will be consequences you have to navigate.

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The novel I mentioned earlier was an action-fantasy-romance story, and the main character is a woman who meets and marries a powerful but kind king in disguise. (Yes, this book is purely a guilty pleasure; don’t judge.) One afternoon after she begins ruling at her husband’s side, she disagrees with a decision he makes and snaps at him in front of everyone in his inner circle. Things are frosty between them for several hours solely because of her irritation (not because he is upset), and by dinnertime he approaches her to say he is sorry he made the wrong decision, and that she has every right to question him.

How he approaches the situation is the very picture of grace, equanimity, and kindness—and represents how only a tiny fraction of real people would handle it. Not because he apologizes for his part so quickly (many spouses try to keep short accounts). But because in most cases a real-life spouse would not be okay with being undermined in front of others. Especially in front of those whose respect they most need. It would humiliate them. Their feelings would be terribly hurt, and they would struggle greatly with a desire to pull away, or to criticize back.

Fictional relationships (especially in romance-type-stories) very rarely show the love interest getting their feelings hurt—at least not for any length of time. In other words: there are simply no consequences for words and actions that in real life would be hurtful. So when our real-life spouse does have hurt feelings about something we said or did and withdraws (or gets angry or cries), something inside us believes they are being oversensitive. Maybe even “dramatic.” We subconsciously view them as unreasonable for having those hurt feelings. And although some people do indeed take their hurt feelings to unreasonable levels, in most cases we have to consider that their hurt is legitimate.

As we discovered in the research for many of our books, including For Women Only and For Men Only, each of us have deep insecurities inside. Triggering these insecurities is what leads to the hurt feelings. And unlike what we see on TV, we will need to navigate the consequences. Far better to avoid hitting the nerve of the person we love in the first place.

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