By AMANDA CABLE

Last updated at 23:23 04 May 2007

The scene was so highly charged it looked set to ignite another explosive domestic row. There, her eyes smouldering with adolescent rebellion, stood a teenage daughter, next to her was her fiercely protective mother and, facing the pair, the girl's stepfather, who was attempting to admonish her for defying his will.

As Ali Tavassoli finished his scolding, he braced himself for the reaction he'd become all too used to over many years from his shrewish wife, who had always resisted his attempts to discipline her daughter, feeling that only she should take on that role of parental enforcer.

Yet instead of the expected belligerence, she hesitated and gulped before saying a little robotically: 'Ali, you are a sensible and intelligent man. I love you and it is my role in life to support you.'

If it is hard to believe that a woman with her character could be quite so subservient, the shock to her family was even greater. Both husband and daughter burst into tears of surprise.

Karen recalls: 'I think that was the moment I truly became a surrendered housewife - and actually saved my marriage in the process. I was stunned by my own reaction because I've been arguing and bickering with and nagging Ali non-stop for nine years.

'But I didn't actually realise just how much my behaviour had affected the whole family until I gave in to Ali for the first time, and both he and Yasmin started to cry because they were so happy and relieved.'

Given that until a few weeks earlier the house had been a battleground, Karen's extraordinary capitulation must have seemed too good to be true for her long-suffering husband.

The story of how this sharp-tongued working wife and mother from Leeds agreed to relinquish all control to her husband - swopping furious rows for sweet acquiescence in a bid to win back his affections - is the subject of a new Channel Five documentary, Obedient Wives.

The idea of the surrendered wife comes from a book by American Laura Doyle - a former marketing copywriter whose opinions make Ma Walton look like a feminist activist.

It has spawned a whole Surrendered Wives movement which goes far beyond the wildest dreams of your average Stepford Wife. Devotees agree to relinquish all control of their husband's life, allowing him to make all the decisions, never saying 'no' to sex, and finally learning to change themselves and not their men.

The idea is that men can't change - so women are the ones who need a radical re-think in order to preserve romance in marriages.

Surrendered wives even have their own website, complete with images of red roses and sugar-coated assurances from Laura Doyle that 'none of us feels good about ourselves when we're nagging, critical or controlling.

'Through surrendering, you will find the courage to gradually stop indulging in these unpleasant behaviours and replace them with dignified ones.'

In a conciliatory tone liable to make feminists froth at the mouth, she urges followers to ask: 'Which do I want more: to have control of every situation or to have an intimate marriage?'

But is there any substance to these claims? Could they actually make any difference to a modern-day marriage being torn apart at the seams by arguments?

Enter Karen, a 39-year-old mother-of-two and successful business manager, who admits to a lifetime of bossy behaviour.

She says: 'My father was a mild-mannered mechanic, and my mother was a stay-at-home housewife.

'She ran her home and five children with military-style precision, and took every decision there was about the house and money.

'She controlled Dad utterly, and even as a child I subconsciously copied her, always striving to be in control of any situation. In my 20s, I had a brief, unhappy marriage with a very dominant husband.

'It nearly destroyed me, and when we split up I found myself single with a two-year-old daughter, Yasmin. I vowed that no man would ever get the chance to dominate me again.

'I met Ali, a courier, soon afterwards. We bumped into each other when we were shopping, started talking outside and quickly fell in love. He is naturally gentle and romantic, while I am ambitious and strive for perfection.

'When we married nine years ago, I started to try to mould Ali into a perfect husband. Somehow, without me realising it, my attempts to change him turned into a hamster-wheel of nonstop criticism, nagging and inevitable arguments. Ali just couldn't seem to do anything right. If he expressed an opinion, I would immediately disagree and argue until I got my own way.

'I didn't trust him to do anything around the house, so I would come home from work tired and stressed, and start to cook and control the family.

'The worst conflict was when Ali tried to discipline the children. Our son Kia is three, and if Ali told him off I would often accuse him of being too harsh.

'But if Ali dared to tell Yasmin off, I would immediately leap to her defence, even if she was in the wrong.

'Each time, it would lead to an explosive row between Ali and me, while Yasmin would sneak off and her misdemeanour would be long forgotten.'

By last November, as documentary makers were hunting for a real-life shrew for their television taming, Karen's marriage had hit crisis point.

She says: 'I was in utter despair. My controlling became worse after I was promoted at work, becoming a manager with a team of staff working for me. I was so used to giving out orders that I would simply come home and treat Ali in exactly the same way.

'If he dared to try to defend himself, I would simply explode, and yet another row would erupt. We were rowing every single evening - almost every hour.

'I started to dread weekends because even a trip to the supermarket would end in a huge disagreement. Ali couldn't pick something from the shelf without me telling him to use another brand.

'Inside, I was desperately unhappy and insecure. I was terrified of losing him, but I couldn't stop the way I was.

'After one particularly vicious weekend of rowing, I sat down and looked at our wedding pictures.

'We looked so happy and carefree, and I couldn't believe the difference between the smiling bride and the nagging old hag I had become.'

That week, Karen saw an advertisement asking for volunteers for a television programme. She says: 'It came through on the e-mail at the call centre where I work, and when I saw the words "Is your marriage in crisis?" I started to read. It explained briefly about Surrendered Wives, and gave a telephone number.

'I didn't like the term surrender because it sounded like just giving in, but I was absolutely desperate and prepared to try anything to save my marriage.'

Karen was given two days of training by Surrendered Wives tutor Ellen Hale, a woman who (taking a stance that will infuriate many modern women) readily blames working wives for lack of marital harmony.

Ellen says: 'More and more women are working, becoming CEOs of companies and gaining status in the work world. It is very hard for them to come home and be a feminine person and a wife, and be loving and soft and caring - they just come home with this boss attitude instead.'

For her first lesson in Surrendering, Ellen handed an astounded Karen a roll of gaffer tape 'to help her visualise her own mouth being taped shut'.

Karen says: 'Whenever I was about to disagree with Ali, or to try and boss him, I had to imagine tape over my mouth to keep me from saying anything'.

Karen was asked to take Ali and their son Kia to the hairdresser's - giving Ali the say on how everyone's new style should look.

Watching with a look of sheer agony as her husband chose his own haircut for the first time in nearly a decade, she allowed him to arrange Kia's haircut, too.

Finally, it was time for her own - and she sat horrified in the chair while Ali cheerfully asked the stylist to 'curl' his wife's hair. 'He's so old fashioned - he wants me to look like Farrah Fawcett,' she hissed.

But Surrendered Wives allow their husbands to choose how they should look - and an hour later, as Karen inspected her new 'poodle' look in front of the mirror, she forced herself through gritted teeth to smile and congratulate Ali on his wise choice.

She recalls: 'It was hard to lavish him with praise all the time, because I simply hadn't ever done it before.

'He thought I was actually joking when I first started to compliment him. But praise and gratitude are two essential parts of the Surrendered Wife training.'

So, too, is apology. Ali, 38, recalls: 'After a few days, Karen sat me down and said "I'm really sorry because sometimes I'm really disrespectful to you. I apologise and I won't let it happen again". I honestly thought she was delirious - I was so shocked that I couldn't speak.

'Karen had never apologised once. But, suddenly, she was meekly saying sorry for the way she'd behaved in the past!'

By now, Karen was in full surrender mode - and next came the end to the explosive arguments.

She says: 'I learned to agree with Ali, to smile and say that he was an intelligent man whose decisions I respected. If he had an outrageous plan, like a hideous new colour scheme for the living room - I knew I wasn't allowed to erupt.

'Of course, it was hard at times not to give him both barrels but I felt that, if I was going to go through with this, I'd have to stick to it.

'Instead, I would pause and say "That sounds really interesting. Also, what about doing it this way as well - would you consider this idea?" Surrendered wives are not allowed to say "but" or be too negative. If your husband is clearly wrong, you can try to patiently offer him another alternative, while never criticising what he has said.'

If such verbal surrender was just about bearable, Karen struggled rather more with the thorniest element of her new role - sex.

As Ellen outlined this aspect of the challenge, Karen found herself bridling at the instruction 'never refuse your husband sex'.

She says: 'I was told to make myself available for lovemaking at least once a week.' She pauses, and adds: 'I don't like lying back and thinking of England - my marriage was in such crisis that we weren't even kissing and cuddling.

'But this was the area that surprised me most. Acting like a Surrendered Wife physically, cuddling him and putting my hand on his knee, have helped bring an easy intimacy that we had lost.

'If Ali does say anything that is hurtful to me I can't hit back with a witty and well-timed riposte like I always used to in the past. Instead, I look hurt and just say: "Ouch. Ali, what you said really did hurt me."

'He immediately looks really sorry and puts his arm around me - and it diffuses a situation which would have ended in a row.'

So what difference has two months of being a Surrendered Wife made to the Tavassoli marriage? Karen says: 'I have been raised as an independent woman and the Surrendered Wife movement goes against everything I've stood for.

'But, incredibly, it has saved my marriage. I don't do more housework - I do less, because Ali is so amazed to be thanked so nicely for every small thing he does that he has started loading the dishwasher for the first time in years.

'Before, I would just have criticised him for putting the dishes in the wrong way. He is so thrilled with the "New" Karen that he even told me to sit and watch a film the other night so he could do the ironing.

'He appreciates there is a closeness between us that we had lost.'

Ali himself - a husband so henpecked he still bears mental scars - agrees his wife's change of character altered the dynamics of their marriage dramatically.

Putting his arm around his wife's shoulders and giving her a hefty squeeze, he smiles and says: 'I like the fact that she has surrendered. I know it was hard for her - nagging is a bit like an addiction.

'But we were so unhappy before, and the rows were terrible. Now she smiles sweetly and asks me what I think about everything. We don't row, we just cuddle like teenagers - and it is wonderful.'

Ali might like the way his wife is behaving. But the question most women will be asking themselves is: just how long can she keep it up?

Obedient Wives is on Channel Five on Monday at 9pm.