Episode #1165
Has your marriage started to feel more like a partnership built around schedules, kids, and responsibilities than a real relationship? If you feel like you and your wife are simply roommates with rings, you're not the only one.
In this episode, Doug Holt and Christopher Hansen break down what happens when couples lose connection, intimacy, and the spark that once brought them together. They talk about the resentment that quietly builds over time, why so many men avoid coming home, how unspoken expectations create distance, and what it really takes to turn things around.
You'll also hear why trying to win arguments only pushes you further apart, how covert contracts damage relationships without either person realizing it, and why working on yourself is often the first step toward rebuilding your marriage. If you've been wondering whether your relationship can get back to where it used to be, this conversation offers practical insights and a clear path forward.
If this episode hit home, get your free copy of A Man's Guide on How to Save Your Marriage Without Talking About It. Just cover shipping and we'll send you the book. Get your free copy here: https://thepowerfulman.com/free-book-bundle. It gives you practical steps you can start applying right away to rebuild connection and strengthen your marriage.
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Doug Holt 0:00
"But a roommate with a ring, the arguments are different than with a roommate."
Christopher Hansen 0:03
"I think a lack of intimacy, lack of connection."
Doug Holt 0:07
"You know, I was like, 'Hey, this may not work out. Like, I better start talking to a divorce attorney.'"
Christopher Hansen 0:13
"Where am I in this situation?"
Doug Holt 0:17
"Sex out of obligation from the wife is almost worse than no sex at all."
Christopher Hansen 0:22
"You can't win a fight with your partner. You're on the same team."
Doug Holt 0:24
"This is the way it should be when I do this, but it's never agreed upon."
Doug Holt 0:39
Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of The TPM Show. We asked Chris to stick around because it's a topic that we want to define with you guys: What is a "roommate with a ring"? Chris, thanks for being here, man, sticking around.
Christopher Hansen 0:53
Yeah, thanks, man. Appreciate it.
Doug Holt 0:54
Yeah, so this is a concept we came up with at TPM a long time ago. Now, whether somebody else has talked about that beforehand, maybe... I know a lot of we've had a number of people go through our program or through TPM, start their own men's coaching business, and they'll just copy the things that we're talking about. So I want to make sure that men out there understand that concept of a roommate with a ring. What does that mean to you?
Christopher Hansen 1:18
Roommate with a ring. So when I think of roommate with a ring, I think a lack of intimacy, lack of connection, going through the day-to-day routines of life without a level of polarity in a relationship, lacking excitement. Excitement... I think of roommate with a ring as I get up, I go to work, I come home, I eat dinner, I sit down on the couch, I watch Netflix with my wife. She falls asleep, I go to bed, and then I do the same thing again over and over and over.
And I take the kids to soccer practice, and I do all of the things that are required of me, but I don't have any real passion or fire or intimacy in the home, and it feels like I might as well be living with a guy, really. That's just we're just kind of functional in this relationship, and not really like in this relationship, and there's lacking that spark, that fire, that passion.
Doug Holt 2:28
Yeah, I love that. I think that's all correct. Each time I think of this idea, I think about in college I had roommates, and I remember coming home one time. Couldn't tell you what class it was, but I remember walking in the door, and guys having ESPN on. And as soon as I walk in the door, one of the guys turns to me, Brian, goes, "Yo!" and tosses me a beer, right? And, "Come sit down," like invites me, and we sit there watching, crack a beer, watching SportsCenter, talking trash, laughing, having a good time, right, as soon as I walk in the door.
When I think of roommate in the ring with a ring, I think of a roommate, but not the cool one. Not the one that tosses you a beer, greets you at the door. This is a roommate that, to your point, it's just logistics that you talk about, and there's no passion. In fact, it's a roommate you probably don't even want to be around.
I remember when I was going through my crap with Erin in our marriage, the doorknob felt like kryptonite to my Superman, if you will. Like, "I don't want to go in there. Do I have to? Okay, open the door." Put this... compartmentalized to a previous podcast. "All right, let me act happy. Let me act this way." And you know, when you feel the energy in there, and right away it turns into an argument over something stupid the dishes, the trash.
Christopher Hansen 3:43
She feels that, too. Yeah.
Doug Holt 3:46
And you're just like, "Man, I don't want to be here. Oh, the weekend's coming. What do we want to do? How can I find something to do with my friends, right, and get out of this house?"
So, yeah, roommate with a ring. It's a sexless marriage, typically, or even worse for men which surprises women when I tell them this for most men, sex out of obligation from the wife is almost worse than no sex at all, because you feel worse afterwards. You might as well go jerk off.
Christopher Hansen 4:14
Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. And yeah, I've definitely lived that, for sure. Definitely been in that situation in my relationship. And yeah, the kryptonite piece of just like that not wanting to just be in that space. Yeah, it's a good description.
Doug Holt 10:34
Well, yeah. So there's a distinct difference, right? There's a difference between pulling away and ignoring the person versus being so into your own world and working on yourself that you become intriguing, right? "I'm not pulling away at all. I'm just creating my own space in my own universe. Would you like to come along for the ride?"
That's a very different energy. That's a sexy energy. That's the dating energy.
And what happens? We get married, right? We start to put our energy into our wives, as we should, but then you throw some kids in there, you throw in work, and stress, and life, and soccer games, and dance recitals, and parents getting sick, and ill, and all that stuff... you miss that.
And men... what men tend to do, the men we work with, is, "You know, just give me your problem. I'll take care of it. It's just easier. I got it. I'll handle it. I'll take care of your car, I'll take care of this." And they deplete themselves so much, and then eventually they're so run down, they look around and they're like, "Well, where is everybody? Where are people for me?"
And they become resentful, not realizing that they spent all this time pushing those people away.
So I have a group of guys right now that are in The Brotherhood program, which is a one-year mastermind program and most of these guys have been in for a couple years. They have to post every day this week something they're doing to fill their own cups, and it's so cool. And the funny thing is, some guys don't know what to do! "What do you do to fill your own cup?" They've been so busy for so many years and decades filling other people's cups, filling their energy, taking care of others, that they haven't done it for themselves.
The thing that most men hate when I tell them: you are doing this as a covert contract. You're filling other people's cups. So it'd be like me going, "Hey Chris, you know, don't worry about it, I'll just take care of your truck. I know I'm stressed, I know I got my kids, I haven't been feeling well, my brother's sick, but you know, I'll just take care of it. Just leave it for me."
Really, what I'm doing is I'm like, "Hey Chris, I'll take care of your truck because I want you to like me more. I want you to think how great I am, appreciate me. You're going to do me a favor later on." That's transactional! And we get transactional with the people we care about our wives and everybody else. "Hey, I'll take care of it. I'll go to work and provide. In return, when I come home, you give me a blowjob, love, respect, whatever it is that guys have in their heads," but it's never communicated.
Christopher Hansen 13:04
Yeah, for sure. I mean, one of my mantras is just in any given moment, I stop and I ask myself: "Where am I in this situation?"
Doug Holt 13:26
What do you mean?
Christopher Hansen 13:26
Well, what piece of me is being fulfilled? Like, where am I in this situation right now? Even in this podcast: am I here out of obligation? No, because I made the choice to to come, and I can, like, kind of anchor back to, like, even just filling my cup in the moment with whatever I'm doing.
Doug Holt 13:49
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Christopher Hansen 14:42
...But it's like it's taking an inventory of why you're in the situation you're in in this very moment, and just being able to to peel back and understand the layers. Because it's very easy for me to get lost in other people's worlds. I'm surrounded by a lot of very big personalities. My wife, yourself... I have a lot of big people in my world, and I know for me, easy to get lost in other people's worlds. And if I step back and I take that inventory of like, "What... where am I choosing from? What... what is... where am I in this?" I just find that to be very helpful for myself.
Doug Holt 15:19
Yeah, that's interesting. I don't think I've ever done that before in that way, and I can see that. I can see how that could really help somebody.
Christopher Hansen 15:26
When it helps you to see yourself.
Doug Holt 15:28
Yeah. The way I look at it is: am I getting... am I trying to get something out of this? Is there a covert contract?
So, covert contracts for those that don't know are contracts that you have made with somebody else, but didn't tell them, right, Chris? "You come onto this podcast, and in return..." You know, that's the other way around, right? "But you come... you come on this podcast, you're going to help me move all the exercise equipment out of my garage, right, or whatever." But I never tell you that! You show up to this podcast, and then I call you two days later and go, "Hey, man, I need some help moving the gym equipment." You're like, "I just can't make it." Then I get resentful, right? That's a covert contract. It was never an agreement, right?
Conversely, if I go, "Hey, you come on the podcast, but in return, you're going to help me move my gym equipment." Then, great! That's two adults agreeing to something or disagreeing.
Men do this in their marriages all the time, right? So, covert contracts... and women do, too, right? So, my wife had one with me that she cooks the dinner, I do the dishes. And when I wouldn't do it, she'd get resentful, but she wouldn't say anything. She'd pout and get upset. Now, obviously, we're at a stage where we can recognize this stuff. She can laugh at it, I can laugh at it, we talk about it, and then I can make a decision: "Is that fair to me? Or do I want to do it, or whatever we want to do? Do I want to cook?" Whatever there is becomes an agreement between two loving adults.
But we have so many covert contracts: "This is the way it should be when I do this," but it's never agreed upon, and we do that a lot. That's how the "roommate with a ring" situation comes about, because you start having this this covert contract. You know, "I'll take the kids to practice and I'll take them to the reading sessions and things like that, and then you go do that work while your wife goes out with her girlfriends," as an example. And maybe she wants to go with her friends, and you start to resent the fact that when you go, "Hey, I want to go watch the World Cup with the guys," she's like, "Oh no, I... you know, I got something going on." And then it's like, "Well, wait a minute, I did this thing for you, why aren't you doing this for me?"
That happens in a lot of relationships. And the roommate with the ring situation where it gets tough is you have two people that love each other and can't figure a way out. They don't know how to come back to each other. That distance has grown, and so even intimacy... when they both know or want sex, they don't even know how to start the sex process, right?
And I often say that for men to feel connected, there needs to be sexual intimacy, right? For women to want sexual intimacy, they need to be connected, right? So who goes first, you know? And I'm... why they should... doesn't always happen, but... I mean, if you want to if you want to be intimate with the person you love, offer some connection. If you don't know how, take a course, right? Connection and relationships are learned behaviors. Most people don't know that, though, right? I didn't know that. It's a learned behavior. And the way that you're acting now in your marriage is most likely the way your parents acted, you know? And probably not pretty, is my guess.
Christopher Hansen 18:47
Those are the biggest influences.
Doug Holt 18:50
100%. It's the worst thing as you get older, man. All the things you swore you wouldn't do, you start seeing yourself doing, like, "Son of a bitch, just like my mom, just like my dad."
My my son, he's only nine, and like I said, I always joke around, and I'll walk around the house... I don't know, I'll say something, I'll flex in front of the mirror in front of him, and I'll make a joke, and he'll be like... he's like, "Man, you're ugly, Dad," you know? And I'll be like I look at him, I go, "Dude, you're gonna grow up to look just like me, so I'd be careful what you say about me." He just goes, "Oh, you're gonna act like me, buddy. It's the way it's gonna be, bro."
So we as men... like, that was a big thing for me with Erin. Is when we had my son before we had my son, I went to Colombia, actually, and did an ayahuasca retreat, because I wanted to show up as the best father I possibly could and make sure if I had any baggage or anything going on, I wanted to make sure I cleaned that up. I did a 10-day silent meditation retreat, I did all kinds of work on myself, even though I'd always been doing work. I doubled down because I wanted to break all the familial patterns, and I wanted to give my son and now my daughter the best representation I could of what it was like to be a man, a father, and a husband. And I wanted them to have positive role models versus... and they'll say this, "But I'll never be like that."
Christopher Hansen 20:22
I lived the first journey of manhood from the place of not being my father in that energy. "I don't I don't know who I am, but I know I'm not that," right? That's a really weird existence to be in until you you start to, you know, come into yourself and do work on yourself and and break those patterns and, you know, get to a place of loving your father for who he is and, you know, the work that comes with that. But that's kind of what I knew was just like, you know, I see the positives in this thing, but I'm I'm just not going to be this thing over here.
Doug Holt 21:02
Yeah, very common.
Christopher Hansen 21:04
Yeah, super.
Doug Holt 21:06
So, The Alpha Reset is our four-day transformational event. You've been through it, you've you've helped at it as well. Very common for that to come up for men when they start digging deep. It's an extremely transformational experience, and father wounds, for lack of a better story, come up, and those get carried out with this roommate with a ring situation. It did with me. It's like, okay, my dad's... mine was more like, "Oh, I'll show you." You want to see... you know, my competitive edge starts coming out within the marriage, and you know, "You're gonna miss out on me," that kind of attitude, which is so egotistical, right?
And then... so that pushed my wife further away. And sure, we're married. Sure, we live together. But neither of us wanted to be in that place with each other, and now we're both roommates with rings. And just a shitty place to be. And the best part is, it doesn't have to be that way.
Christopher Hansen 22:04
For sure. You can't win a fight with your partner. You're on the same team.
Doug Holt 22:08
Exactly. I used to remember my wife saying that, "We're on the same team." "Not right now we're not."
Christopher Hansen 22:15
Man, that phrase... that was years of just reminding one another, really, of like, "Hey, we're on the same team here. Let me remember that."
Doug Holt 22:25
"Nah, I traded you. Free agent. Draft season's up, babe."
Hey, man, as always, I appreciate you. One piece of advice... because I know you've been in the situation as I have. What's one piece of advice or hope that you would give a guy who's like, "Crap, when I reach for that doorknob, I don't want to turn it and walk in"?
Christopher Hansen 22:46
Oh, man! Well, first and foremost, you're not alone. I think that's the biggest thing. I mean, I think guys just think that they're the only ones going through something like that, and they're not. Find resources to better yourself, whether it's through TPM... we live in the age of the internet. I mean, there's so much information out there, and find some resources around relationships. Find some guidance. You're not reinventing the wheel in this, right? The the information is out there.
Go down that path for yourself. Give yourself... bet on you. Invest in yourself. Have grace with yourself. Don't judge yourself too hard. And the the gap between the idea and the action... if you can close that gap as much as possible, right? "I have an idea that I should work on myself." Just go take... in the moment of insight, take massive action.
Doug Holt 23:55
It's good advice. I like it. I'm gonna use that sometime.
No, I think that's that's spot on, right? I would... I'm going to say one thing: is it doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be that way. If you and your wife were passionate and loved each other at one point, you can get back there. And in fact, because you have more wisdom and more more more time on the road, so to speak, it can be better a lot better.
Love it, man. Thanks as always for being here, buddy.
Christopher Hansen 24:26
Yeah, thanks, Doug.
Doug Holt 24:27
Yeah, gentlemen. As Chris said, in the moment of insight, take massive action.
And guys, I just want to let you know, doing this with TPM, we've been around for over a decade. So this is not our... a website we just threw up and just doing this on a whim and throwing some ads on Instagram or whatever. We've done it for a long time. That means I've seen thousands of guys go through this process. There's hope at the other end of this. This can turn around, but it only turns around if you, as the leader of your home, take action. Do something about it.
Doesn't have to be with TPM I'm biased just because I believe it's the best program out there but do something, man. Just do something. Put in the work. Investigate. Ask other men to be in the program if you'd like to. Whatever it is, take action and do it today. Don't wait until tomorrow. You deserve better than average, and this is me calling you forward to take that to take your place at your throne in your kingdom and live the life you're meant to live.
We'll see you next time on The TPM Show.