Trust in Australian-Filipina Marriages

Trust in a marriage! Vital, most would say. And you’ll get no arguments from me, because my Australian-Filipina marriage is based on it and I reap the benefits every single day.

Yet I also know how much damage can be done to a relationship when trust doesn’t exist, or when it’s something easily compromised when the pressure is on to please others particularly.

I’ve said before in BLOG posts on the FilipinaWives site about the Philippines and how “moral flexibility” is not so uncommon. Different cultures have different ways of defining and practicing honesty, and we give different weight to different things.

Germans will stand next to a DON’T WALK sign even if there isn’t a car in sight. An Aussie will just cross.

A Filipino will drive through a red light, as long as it’s reasonably safe and there are no Traffic Enforcers around. An Aussie will not.

Paying tax? Next example please!!

Australia and Philippines – Differences

The issue I want to cover is that a MAJOR difference between Australia and the Philippines is the weight to which an Aussie will put on “his word”, and everything associated with how we treat friends and family. We expect to be trusted, and we expect that we can trust others…..especially those who are close to us. And this matters more in a marriage than anywhere else. We expect absolute trust, no matter what. If our wife or husband hides something from us, or tells us a lie? This is about as bad as it gets.

Filipino culture sometimes doesn’t look at this issue in the same way.

Am I about to go into a long explanation on why not all Filipinos have the same attitude about truth, and how we need to compromise and to adjust and to understand this and get used to it? Hell no! Definitely not! Yes, sometimes they have mothers and relatives who are sneaky and have set a bad example, and sometimes they allow themselves to be bullied. It’s still not OK!

The Solution

I will say that all Filipinas need to understand that if they wish to have a marriage that’s worth something, they need to be 100% trustworthy at all times, and anybody who expects them to hide things or to lie or to sneak around your husband? You need to tell them in no uncertain terms that this will not happen. And you Aussie husbands? You should make your expectations 100% clear right from the start so there are no problems later on.

I benefit from this every day, as I said. We had somebody trying to borrow a large amount of money from us just yesterday (with little hope of seeing it again). Her face dropped when my wife Mila explained to her how she and I are totally transparent about money matters, and that she would be discussing it with me. In other words, it wasn’t going to happen.

And at other times I’ve had our kids say to me “Don’t tell mum!”. Of course I told “mum” at the first opportunity, because that’s what we do. It works both ways, and we both know it. So make sure you set the same standard that you expect in return, or it won’t work.

Make sure that both of you act in a completely trustworthy manner with your spouse at all times, and never compromise this even if you have family pressure. Do this and you will have a marriage that means something. Lie, cheat and sneak around, and at the very best you will have a marriage where the two of you just “exist” together. The “spark” that made it magical will be gone. At worst, you will break up, and you will have nobody to blame but yourselves.