The factors which lead to the choice of a partner are correlated with the conflicts which later result during the marriage. The relationship is not merely one of conscious choice and logical conclusions; it is based more profoundly upon the integration of the two personalities. At the instant when two persons decide to marry, they sense the congruity of each other’s life styles. Even a marriage contracted as a thoughtless incident of drunkenness and sexual excitement represents a deeper agreement of two personalities than is generally credited. Although such a choice is considered purely accidental and generally leads to disappointment and quick dissolution, it is a true reflection of the two personalities involved. Their general directions in life have merged, regardless of how long their agreement lasted.
Agreement between two persons and congruity of their two life styles do not mean identity of the life styles. On the contrary, they demand complementary differences. Two individuals each of whom wants to be dominant hardly fit together. Neither would two martyrs. The distinction must be made, however, between psychologically insignificant qualities and the all-important life style. Husband and wife may both be ambitious or both resentful and yet may get along; their identical qualities may unite them more closely. But the decisive point is neither the qualities nor, we may add, the common interests, as many believe, but actually the basic pattern of life, the method by which they strive for superiority or suffering, for success or security. This explains why so often an oldest child marries a youngest one; a dominant individual a submissive one; why the brute finds a saint, and the rogue his protective victim. These types, paired as shown, constitute in varying degree the average married couple. And the extremes are not as exceptional as one might believe.
Mrs. F. developed her personality in competition with a younger sister, whom she surpassed mentally, scholastically, and socially. She maintained her own position as the first one by pushing her rival down and thereby gaining the approval of the parents. Without knowing it, she thereby contributed to the utter deficiency of her sister. She married a man who grew up in the shadow of an over-ambitious older sister. Despite the constant quarrels and profound misery of their marriage, despite their mutual complaints about their “incompatibility,” they fitted perfectly into each other’s life. Although the wife found her husband’s lack of intellectual interest and social gracelessness unbearable, it was obvious that she gained by it-and probably got what she had looked for.
Mrs. O. grew up as an only girl among several brothers. She had a strong masculine protest and always wanted to play the role of a man. Her husband, on the other hand, had an older brother of very masculine tendencies. He developed early the idea that he was not a “real man:’ While he ran away from any masculine competition and found his refuge in art, his wife fought his battles with the masculine world, not without blaming his lack of strength and effeminate nature for their mutual dissatisfaction and social, as well as financial, difficulties. They were constantly at odds with each other, although they certainly fitted together.
The following marital history may sound fantastic, and yet it concerns a couple regarded by their friends and associates as an ordinary middle-class family. Both husband and wife are highly intelligent and keep their secrets well. The girl had married her mother’s lover. Why did she fall in love with him? She hated her mother, partly; it is true, because she resented the mother’s infidelity and her disrespect for the father, but chiefly because her mother ostensibly preferred a younger sister. Since childhood, she had felt rejected and neglected in favor of her sister and had sought compensation in merely sensuous gratification of various kinds. Although she professed high regard and admiration for her husband, she probably recognized the exact caliber of this man who “seduced” the daughter of his mistress. She could have suspected what was in store for her when she used every possible means to make him marry her.
Immediately after their wedding, he expressed strong resentment toward her, told her bluntly that he did not care for her; he felt she had tricked him into marriage. She accepted this attitude quietly, kept her love burning, and waited for his return when he left her shortly afterward. Sure enough, he came back-because they fitted together. But he brought her a gift: gonorrhea. Even that did not disturb her love for him. Then he left her a second time, shortly after she had borne him a child. She still waited patiently until he returned again-this time with syphilis. Even that was no reason for her to leave him. The few persons who knew the situation could not understand her patient submission. Some tried to explain it on the basis of sexual bondage. Of course, sensuousness was her only ideal and she was willing to suffer for it. But, at the same time, she used her suffering as a means to punish her husband, as previously she had punished her mother with the same trick. She thereby gained superiority over her guilty torturer. Many little incidents revealed how she provoked mistreatment from her husband, when a little use of common sense could easily have put him in his place. Her secret intention to be the “innocent” victim was the reason why she selected this man as a husband, and why she clung to him time and again after he had brutally mistreated her. Actually, in this marriage the cardinal problem was not the husband as one might think, but the “saintly” wife.
