LiveWorld Transcripts

HBO presents

Dr. Perelman
"Sex and the City"-Shrink Talk

October 11, 2000

Dr. Perelman answers your questions about sex, relationships, and dating in relation to the latest episode of HBO's "Sex and the City."

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HBO: Welcome to Shrink Talk! Did this week's episode bring up some familiar issues for you? Dr. Perelman is live, and ready to field your questions about relationships, sex, and dating.

Dr. Perelman: We need to just take a moment to, again, remind our audience that this broadcast is brought to you for purposes of education and entertainment only. Tonight, we will take a slightly different tack and try to make a few of the answers refer in order to have the opportunity to try and respond to more questions that you have sent in. Let's have the first question.

Me: My husband and I have been married for 12 years, and while we are still very happy, I feel at times that things are getting a little boring. We are both very busy people, so we don't have a lot of time to spend getting away. What do you suggest to keep the spice in this relationship?

Dr. Perelman: Well, there are many things that you may try to do that would be available to read in the self-help section of your local bookstore. Since you don't have a lot of time to get away for a vacation, what I would suggest, presuming you are both interested, is to spice up your love life with a quick hotel stay in the city you live in. Changing venue will help create some variety and novelty, which should be of some assistance. It could either be for an entire evening, day or weekend, or just a few hours if that's all you have time for. Let us know how it works out. This is essentially what people do when they are having affairs, which is to take a few hours in a private place secluded from everyone else. Remember Big and Carrie at the Standhope Hotel--elevator and all.

Liza: Carrie's decision to confront and apologize to Natasha seemed more about her own need to relieve a guilty conscience, not make Natasha feel better. What do you think?

Dr. Perelman: I think that's a recently perceptive conclusion. While I do think Carrie was certainly sincere in her attempt to share her true feelings with Natasha in order to alleviate her sense of future negative karma and guilt, clearly her behavior reflected, in part, the same type of impulsivity and lack of consideration of likely consequences of her actions that characterized the very behaviors that got her in trouble in the first place. No question, however, that despite her pain, Natasha wounded Carrie quite deeply as she asserted her own response prior to being joined by her attractive date.

Icee Mocha: Why is it that women go for guys that they think they can change? Is it the mothering instinct in a woman or a controlling issue?

Dr. Perelman: I think it's not just the women, and I don't think it's only about control. Most of us have a tendency to both put our best foot forward in this situation with a romantic partner. Reciprocally, the other person tends to hope that 'you are the one', meaning that if you don't exactly meet the template in their mind, just a little nudging will help slip you perfectly into place. Both men and women make this mistake. In therapy, we tend to resolve this issue in the following way with the following prognosis. If what the individual wants to change about themselves in terms of maturation and growth happens to be what the other person also wishes to be changed about the first individual, there actually is a fairly positive prognosis and possibility for such change. Unfortunately, this tends to be more rare than we would prefer. Quite often, what one might prefer to be different about one's spouse and/or boyfriend or lover are quite deep core characteristics that are frequently resistant to change. More to the point, the individual often has no desire to change them at all, or finds the only reason for considering the change to be gaining the approval of their partner. That really works. Even in what would be considered good long-term marriages and relationships, people often find that when they do fight, it's essentially around the same issues that they may have argued about some 25 years earlier. So by all means, put your best foot forward, but don't be surprised if she'd like you to change your shoes.

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