“MATRIMONIAL EXPLOSIONS”

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25610, 27 September 1948, Page 2

“MATRIMONIAL EXPLOSIONS”

MINISTER’S ADVICE TO WIVES

Wives who told all their troubles to their, husbands as soon as the husbands came home from work caused “matrimonial explosions,” said the Rev. C. L. Oliver, in an address in Sydney recently, according to Reuter’s correspondent. Mr Oliver, who is rector of a church in one of Sydney’s suburbs, is a Master of Arts and a graduate of psychology and psychotherapy. He considered psychological education for young married couples was more important than sex education. Too few married couples were given any training in psychological and spiritual relationships before marriage, he said. Too much emphasis was placed on sex education for engaged couples. The sex factor rarely ruined marriage. People could usually adjust their physical differences; but it was harder to adjust differences in temperament without proper instruction. “Although young people will swarm to sex lectures like bees to a honeypot, you can’t get them to listen to lectures on psychological or spiritual issues,’? he said.

Mr Oliver gave this advice to wives: “A husband returning home after a tiring day’s work is in no mood to listen to bis wife’s troubles. His emotions have been conditioned by his work, and he feels quite detached from domestic affairs. This state of mind is jarred bv a catalogue of household worries, shonping difficulties, and other minor mishaps. The husband may be nursing some irritation, perhaps caused by a row with the boss, and a gloomy reception by his wife may only aggravate him more. Nor does a husband want to be quizzed about his day’s work immediately he steps in the door. “Husbands and wives must realise that they automatically adopt different emotional approaches to their different daily occupations. To avoid friction they must allow a little time for the effect of their different experiences to simmer down. No matter what small worries she may have, the wife should greet her husband cheerfully. While eating they are subdued, but afterwards their love becomes more important than their previous emotional pattern. They become adjusted to each other and they are able to show a sympathetic interest in each other’s troubles.”