Why Do Men Get Married, and What Do They Hope Marriage Will Be Like?

Most men marry because they love one woman and want her in their life for good, because they want children and a home, or because someone pushed them. What they hope for is a calm house, a woman who is glad to see them and a sex life that stays easy. Some of that picture is realistic. Some of it is a fairy tale, just as the one women carry is.

There is no single reason, and many men have two or three at once.

• Love and a decision. He meets a woman he cannot imagine replacing and wants it settled.
• Children. He wants kids and wants them raised in a home with two parents who agreed to be there.
• Peace. He is tired of dating. The texting, the first dates and the uncertainty wear him out, and a wife ends all of it at once.
• A push. She says the relationship goes forward or ends. Or her family, his family and his friends keep asking until proposing is easier than explaining.
• Practical life. A shared home, shared bills and someone to call when a parent gets sick or a job ends.
• Fear of losing her. He thinks she is the best he will get and he does not want to find out.
• Doing it for her. He would have been fine as things were, but she wants the ring, and he wants her happy.

The first three tend to end well. The last three are where trouble starts, and the next section explains why.

Two men can stand at the same altar for opposite reasons. One picked her out of many and is glad. The other is gripping the only woman who ever said yes.

A man who has never had much choice often marries out of scarcity. He is afraid the offer will not come again, so he accepts terms he would reject if he felt free. A man who has met a lot of women, and knows he can meet more, can say "I choose you" and mean it, because leaving was a real option.

That is why men who practice approaching women in person often choose better wives. They do not pick her to escape the fear of being alone. So they can watch how she acts under stress, how she treats a waiter and whether she wants the same life.

Ask a man to describe the picture and a few things come up again and again.

• A home that feels like relief after a hard day, with no guessing about where he stands.
• A woman who looks pleased when he walks in, and stays attracted after the novelty wears off.
• Sex that is frequent, warm and no longer awkward.
• An end to performing. No more auditioning, no more worrying that he will lose her next week.
• A teammate. Someone who takes his side at a family dinner and covers for him on a bad day.

Those are reasonable hopes. A man who wants them is not shallow, and most of the women he marries want similar things.

The fairy tale part is the belief that the wedding delivers all of this by itself.

Women often picture a husband who stays as attentive as he was in the first year. Men picture a wife who stays as available, as playful and as easy to please. Then a baby arrives, or a business fails, or her mother moves in. The woman he married now has less time and less patience than she had on date five.

Sex is a good example. It does not die at the altar, but it does depend on rest, warmth and who is carrying the housework. A man who hopes it will take care of itself is hoping for a thing that needs work from both people.

The same goes for peace. A calm home is built by two people who handle conflict early. If you bring your bad day through the door and expect her to read it, the house stops being a refuge.

coach describes every relationship as running on an implied contract. It covers who pays, who cooks and whose parents get the holidays. It also covers who earns the main income, how often you have sex and what counts as cheating. Nobody signs it. Everybody assumes it.

Trouble arrives when two people hold different versions of it. He thinks she will stay home with the kids. She thinks they will split everything. Neither ever said so.

Before you propose, say the terms out loud.

1. Children: whether, how many and who gives up what.
2. Money: who earns, who controls it and what happens if one income drops.
3. Where you live, and how close that is to each of your families.
4. Chores and who does what, which also affects how warm the bedroom stays.
5. What you each expect from sex and from each other after ten years.

If any answer surprises you, you have just learned something a ring would have hidden.

A man can want marriage and still be wrong to hurry. My advice is to look for the right woman rather than rush the first one, and the way to find her is to date and see what is out there.

Meet a lot of women, face to face, and your picture of marriage gets sharper. You learn what you actually enjoy in a week with someone, not just what excites you in an hour. Then when you do propose, you are choosing her, and you are not escaping the market.