Married at First Sight star Karen Landry says her husband Miles Williams was so eager to please her during the experiment that it didn't seem like he was being real and genuine.
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Miles, a 26-year-old who works with youth from Spartanburg, SC, and Karen, a 30-year-old consultant from New Orleans, LA, were matched by Married at First Sight experts Pastor Calvin Roberson, Dr. Viviana Coles and Dr. Pepper Schwartz to marry on Season 11 of the Lifetime reality series.
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During the October 14 broadcast of Married at First Sight: Unfiltered, Karen watched back a Season 11 clip in which she and Miles discussed the problems in their relationship while New Orleans was in lockdown amid the coronavirus pandemic.
"What do you feel like you have the capacity to give knowing what my needs are in terms of feeling wanted in a relationship?" Miles asked Karen in the clip.
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"I really do think that naturally I'll be able to give you what you need. Yes, you need more physical touch, like, is that something as simple as putting my hand on your shoulder? Is that literally us holding hands, is that us literally making out three times a day?" Karen asked.
"I'll take that! You know what I'm saying?!" Miles replied. "For real!"
On Unfiltered, host Jamie Otis -- who starred on Season 1 of Married at First Sight -- asked Karen how she was feeling after having that conversation with Miles.
"I mean, I felt good after having that conversation with him," Karen replied.
"I think that we were both honestly, like, holding on to a lot of frustrations that we hadn't really talked through. I know for me, it was like a turnoff that he couldn't tell me what he needed from me."
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Jamie said it seemed like Miles was just trying to make Karen happy all the time, and Karen responded, "Yeah."
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"He was almost so eager to please that it didn't feel real to me," Karen explained.
"It's like that caused some disconnects and, you know, that conversation was us -- for the first time -- being able to sit down and tell each other, like, how we were really feeling about everything."
Once Karen and Miles got on the same page about what they needed from each other, Jamie asked how the couple planned to adjust their marriage moving forward.
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"One thing I think that has been pretty good between Miles and I is our communication," Karen said.
"So I think just continuing to have that understanding and open-mindedness and just the commitment to figure it out."
Given marriage is all about compromise and communication, Jamie asked Olivia, who also appeared on the Unfiltered broadcast, whether her marriage could have worked out had Brett been more willing to compromise on certain things.
"It's hard to say one way or the other," Olivia explained.
"I feel like our relationship was never serious. I feel like we had had one conversation that was kind of in depth about his childhood with one of his parents, and I think a lot of who Brett is today stems from that."
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"I think he needed to do a lot of figuring out before marrying a stranger," Olivia added.
During last week's episode of Unfiltered, Miles admitted it was "really tough" when his wife rarely complimented him and showed affection.
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"That's not Karen's natural love language in terms of giving or receiving, and so it gets hard for her to be able to say, 'Hey, I think you're attractive,' or, 'I can see this going somewhere,' because she's been let down in the past," Miles explained.
"So I try to take it with a grain of salt, but it is hard. It's hard because you want to feel loved, you want to feel attractive, you want to feel wanted -- and at this point, I haven't necessarily felt that way."
While Miles once dated a girl whom he didn't sleep with for two years, Miles did admit on the September 9 broadcast of Unfiltered he's "used to moving a little bit faster" in relationships.
A recent episode of Married at First Sight featured Miles and Karen reaching a breaking point in their marriage about 10 weeks into the extreme experiment. ("Decision Day" was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic and the couples needing to quarantine in lockdown).
Karen, who was working at a hospital through the pandemic, said she felt "exhausted" physically, emotionally and mentally, and Miles felt bored, unwanted and seemingly depressed.
"She cannot say or has said, 'I want to be with you,' and if you can't say that, then in my mind, this isn't what you want," Miles explained to the cameras.
And Karen noted, "I can't necessarily give Miles or the relationship the attention I would like to and it just makes things between us even more tense."
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Karen told Pepper through videochat it seemed like Miles was building resentment towards her because he was suppressing his feelings and trying to be "Mr. Nice Guy" all the time.
"I feel like [the resentment] has happened. Last night, he said I wasn't trying in this relationship, and he even told me, like, 'If Decision Day was today, I would choose not to be married because I don't feel like you're putting in effort,'" Karen recalled in tears.
When the pair talked through their issues and Karen told Miles that she wanted to see more of his raw, genuine self, the pair agreed they needed to get back to having fun and cracking jokes.
Karen and Miles continued to bond during the couples' retreat in the latest episode, but Miles and Karen still hadn't reached the point of physical intimacy Miles had been hoping for three or four months into marriage.
"Do I know right now for a fact, like, 'Oh, I'm going to spend the rest of my life with Karen?' No, I don't know that," Miles explained to the guys at the retreat.
And Miles best friend, Woody Randall, told the cameras of Miles and Karen's romance, "To the naked eye, it looks like they're doing good, but to the core, I don't think they're doing good at all."
"Just knowing Miles, I think he needs more than he thinks he needs, and I think it's an absolute disservice to both of you at this point to not experience the best intimacy that you could possibly have with your wife or your husband. You were marrying a stranger -- do the process!" Woody added.
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