Wednesday, August 5, 2015

The Life Cycle of the Wife of a Beta Male

One of the reasons I set up the San Diego Man Camp project was to mitigate some of the common relationship patterns I discovered in my years as an ultrarunner (you get into some pretty deep conversations with random strangers after mile 65 at three in the morning) and during my research for No Bone Zone. Since I have had a long interest in sex, gender, and relationships, I figured it might be a topic worth studying.
It didn't take too long to discover the root cause of that pattern, which I outlined in this post. As it turns out, A LOT of relationships fail because dudes fall into the beta trap. They mistakenly believe the key to female arousal is to essentially mimic the behaviors of a woman. And they couldn't be more wrong. Unfortunately, those behaviors are exceedingly hard to recognize and change

While this sucks for the beta male, it also SERIOUSLY sucks for the beta male's female mate. In almost all cases I've encountered, the woman had no idea why she felt the way she did toward her beta husband. When left as-is, the outcome was almost always really, really sad mostly because it destroyed families. That also has a tendency to make the husbands exceedingly bitter towards women in general and their ex in particular. My sincerest hope is that posts like this open up dialogue between men and women, or at the very least plant a seed that can then be used to research the topic in more detail. 

So... here we go.

How This Process Plays Out


The following description is obviously a generalization, so individual results may vary. This is a rough approximation of the common experiences the wives of beta males experience.
  1. Courting. In most cases, women choose a beta male somewhere between 25-30 or so. They've dated casually, maybe had some wild random hookups, and probably had a few longer-term relationships that didn't work out because the men were too immature and not ready to commit. The beta male, with his sensitivity, "niceness", attentiveness, and loyalty, is a welcome change. The sex probably isn't as hot as her earlier relationships, but it's pretty good. She begins feeling like he could be "the one."
  2. Marriage. They decide to get married and both are excited about their future. They finally get to "grow up." She gets a stable, committed partner; he gets a woman that finally understands him and appreciates his willingness to do anything and everything for her.
  3. Kids and career building; the honeymoon ends. Depending on their age, they may begin building their careers, building a "nest" (house with a white picket fence), or having kids. The frequent sex they had in the beginning starts to taper off. When they do have sex, it tends to feel a little mechanical. Both typically blame this on the rigors of their lifestyle.
  4. Something is missing. Despite having everything she thought would make her happy (house, kids, career, loving husband, etc.), she begins to get a sinking feeling that something is missing. This usually happens after about three to four years into the relationship. She doesn't make the connection that her husband's beta personality characteristics are the reason she is losing sexual interest in him. Because this is what we've been taught would bring us happiness, she tends to think there might be something wrong with her. Most women at this stage to not confide in anyone (except me, apparently), especially their husband. In almost every case, the husband is blissfully unaware of her sense of lacking. 
  5. There must be something wrong with me. This feeling continues to grow. In almost every case, the woman will take some steps to self-diagnose and treat her lack of arousal OR seek the guidance of her doctor. This is a very common time for women to be diagnosed with Female Sexual Arousal Disorder. At this stage, she will almost always go out of her way to avoid situations where he may want sex or even any type of intimacy. She has likely went from a lack of desire to beginning to feel what is usually described as disgust at his touch. This is a tough spot because the relationship could probably be saved at this point if the beta could change, but he's generally still blissfully happy... and completely unaware.
  6. She gets male attention from somewhere. At this point, she's probably not seeking out male attention, but she gets it from somewhere. This stirs up A LOT of feelings she probably hasn't felt since the honeymoon period ended or even before meeting her beta husband. This experience is almost always both exhilarating and terrifying. 
  7. She feels guilt, lavishes hubby with affection. Most women at this stage do not act on the impulse to give in to the male that gave her attention. Furthermore, the encounter or encounters cause a great deal of guilt. She genuinely loves her husband and hates that she has these feelings of arousal for another man and not her loving husband. She usually goes through a period where she starts doting on her husband and flooding him with attention. In the age of social media, this is the stage where she begins publicly professing her love for him and "bragging" about how wonderfully perfect her life is. Beta males usually take this as a powerful reinforcer that yes, their relationship is doing just fine.
  8. When that doesn't increase her desire for her husband, she begins feeling resentment and justification. To this point, she thought her lack of arousal was her fault. When the lavish attention fails to change anything, she begins (correctly) to attribute her lack of desire to her husband. This is a stage where she begins closely observing his behaviors and making mental pro and con lists. Outwardly, she probably seems a bit aloof and cool, but not negative.
  9. She becomes negative and sarcastic towards her husband. She eventually starts focusing more and more on his negative qualities, and her negative behaviors increase. She begins nagging a lot, is rarely positive, and often becomes exceedingly sarcastic. In almost every case, this change in behavior seems to come out of nowhere to the husband. He usually thinks everything has been perfect up to this moment. Even after her behaviors turn decidedly negative, he often attributes it to "the stress of work or kids." He has no idea what she's been going though, which has probably been several years of dissatisfaction. 
  10. She contemplates having an affair and/ or divorce. At this point, she's ready for a change. If she perceives other men as options (which usually depends on her sexual market value and/or independent income), she'll probably initiate an affair before divorcing. It's kind of weird, but women rarely divorce if they don't have at least one other option lined up. In almost every case, these affairs are supposed to remain "just physical", but she dramatically underestimates the strength of the "love neurotransmitters." She usually falls for the other man. Hard.
  11. Falling in love with another man makes for a painful limbo - which man to choose? At this point, she will probably be putting her family at risk if she ends the marriage. What she decides to do will be entirely pragmatic. If she can support herself and kids or the new guy can support her and her kids, she'll leave her beta husband. If not, she'll likely stay.
  12. Sensing the distance, the clueless husband (she's just not into sex) lavishes her with attention which makes him even more beta (and even less sexually arousing.) It's almost comical, but this is the stage where the clueless beta husband finally gets that there might be something seriously wrong with the relationship. In true beta fashion, his response is the worst thing he could do - flood her with attention by placing him on an even higher pedestal. This is almost always the nail in the coffin because it essentially drives her closer to her other man that arouses her.
  13. She initiates a separation. Separations in this situation are almost always initiated by the female. She rationalizes it as needing time to assess the situation because she's so overwhelmed, but the separation almost always results in her spending all her time with the new dude. This often brings up an interesting scenario where the other dude may bail. If he's an alpha, he probably has better options. If he's more beta, he'll be more likely to stay.
  14. If the affair ends, she becomes extremely depressed until finding a new love. The beta husband will almost always interpret her despair as being caused by their marital strife and rarely understands it's actually caused by the physiological effects of a lost love. Either way, she'll usually stay in the marriage until she finds another dude.
  15. Those that do not get divorced tend to find one or more ongoing relationships, usually with married men. This is the brunt of the "regulars on affair sites like Ashley Madison or, for the more brave, more mainstream dating sites like Match.com or Tinder. In many cases, the decision to stay in the marriage is practical. The beta husband makes a lot of money, she doesn't want to disrupt the kids' lives, or she can't find another man that's willing to leave HIS family to commit to her. This marriage may last until the kids leave the house, or they may just stick it out until one of them dies. 
  16. Those that do get divorced tend to repeat the cycle. In the event she DOES get divorced from the beta husband, she usually gets a lot of the marital property (house), alimony, and child support. She usually repeats the pattern from her youth - date around casually, maybe enjoy some random hookups, then eventually settle down with another beta male. In that case, the cycle repeats itself. 
I know this is a really cynical take on many modern relationships, but it's a pattern that appears to play out like clockwork. As I mentioned before, the saddest part is neither partner really understands what went wrong. Both, at one time, thought they had met their soul mate. The sex went south. The relationship soon followed. They then endured a few years of bitter resentment that often ends in a really shitty divorce. 

Can this be prevented? Honestly, I don't have a great answer for that simply because I don't have enough longitudinal data. I DO know, however, that the root cause is his inability to sexually arouse her much beyond the honeymoon period coupled with her inability to figure out the root cause. Some people like to use marriage counseling, but I'm not a huge fan in this specific scenario. I've found most schools of thought on relationships do not correctly diagnose the problem and often suggest "more communication" as the cure. The problem, of course, is that too much closeness is what killed her arousal in the first place. 

In THEORY, if the dude were to learn how to exhibit "alpha" traits and act more masculine, the problem could be avoided. I've yet to meet a woman married to a beta male that wouldn't want her husband to get more fit, more confident, more decisive, more assertive, less supplicating, and more goal-driven outside a singular focus on her or the family.

It might not work in all situations, but the early returns seem favorable. Teaching that "manning up" process and requisite skills are a major focus of the SDMC project. As of right now, this is a journey only the men can take. If you're interested, join our Facebook group here



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