Entries from January 2010
Today I just want to post a though-provoking quote about marriage as a promise:
“I didn’t marry you because you were perfect. I didn’t even marry you because I loved you. I married you because you gave me a promise. That promise made up for your faults. And the promise I gave you made up for mine. Two imperfect people got married and it was the promise that made the marriage. And when our children were growing up, it wasn’t a house that protected them; and it wasn’t our love that protected them – it was that promise.”
Thornton Wilder, The Skin of Our Teeth, a play that won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1942
Categories: Family · Love · Marriage
Tagged: Family, improve marriage, Love, Marriage, marriage quote, promise, Skin of Our Teeth, the promise of marriage, Thornton Wilder
I was very fortunate to get to know a military couple from Zionsville, Indiana, named Timothy and Tiffany Stoner, who will be profiled in my upcoming book. Tiffany managed well during her husband’s deployment to Iraq. Meanwhile, Army National Guardsman Maj. Timonthy Stoner served valliantly as a commander and helicopter pilot of Indiana’s first Black Hawk unit, which rescued both injured soldiers and insurgents, at times coming under fire. (His unit saved 1,500 people during 1,000 combat missions and suffered no casualties.)
On the home front, despite having four young children to care for, including two infant twins, Tiffany focused on what she was grateful for during Tim’s absence and developed some very useful strategies for maintaining a positive attitude. She also benefited from a large support network of friends, family and neighbors who continually helped her and her family. When Tim and his unit returned home after nearly a year (see family picture by Nathan Rowe), they had a renewed sense of appreciation for one another and for their family.
Unfortunately, this family’s success isn’t always the case. A new study from Washington says women whose husbands were deployed have higher rates of mental illness than other military wives. “There’s a very clear relationship between the deployment and these mental health diagnoses in these women,” said the study’s lead author, Alyssa Mansfield.
For women whose husbands were deployed 11 months or longer, their wives had a 24 percent higher rate of depression. This isn’t very surprising when you place yourselves in the position of a woman, likely with children, who is concerned every day of every month for the safety of her beloved spouse and the father of her children. In addition, she essentially becomes a single parent with all the stress that entails. It’s amazing that some women don’t get depressed, actually.
It really puts in perspective the small things we complain about in our home lives when we consider the challenges these military families face daily. The soldier isn’t the only one deployed on an unknown mission; the spouse and children face intense pressures and fears. My family sends our thoughts and prayers for the soldiers and families regularly. Also, remember that some of the spouses left behind are men; they need your support as well.
If you know a military family, offer your support in concrete ways, such as mowing the yard in the summer or shoveling snow in the winter, or offer to babysit or run errands so the spouse can get a break. Invite him or her over for a cup of coffee, and listen to what they are going through.
The Stoners maintained a blog during the deployment and have recently compiled posts and reflections, along with photos by Nathan Rowe, into a book called “FamilyPrint: A Family’s Unique Reflections During War.” For details, go to FamilyPrint.org.
Do you have any military friends or family you want to encourage? Feel free to praise them here on this blog, or send them a personal note of thanks. We owe them a debt of gratitude.
Tim Stoner with his son, Briggs, then 7. Photos by Nathaniel Edmunds Photography.
Categories: Communication · Divorce · Family · Love · Marriage · Marriage Research · Relationships
Tagged: Airforce, Army, Coast Guard, deployment increases mental health problems, Family, improve marriage, Love, Marines, Marriage, military mom, military spouse, Navy, support military families
January 20, 2010 · 1 Comment
I hope you had a chance to try the three love-building techniques from the last post, used to help increase emotional intimacy with your partner. Here are some other suggestions by Robert Epstein, PhD, psychologist and researcher. For more information on Epstein’s upcoming book, visit Making Love Book.
4. “Fall” in love or the trust exercise. Let yourself fall into the arms of your partner. Trade places. Repeat a few times. This activity helps increase feelings of vulnerability, even in strangers.
5. Share Secrets. You and your partner write down a deep secret then swap and discuss. Repeat if you like. Sharing secrets also increases vulnerable feelings and leads to a heightened sense of intimacy.
6. Mind-Reading Game. Think about a thought you want to convey, and write it down. Then, try to convey it silently while he or she guesses. If she can’t guess, reveal the answer, then switch.
7. Let Me In. This is an exercise of invading the other’s personal space, starting about four feet away, and moving closer every 10 seconds or so for a few minutes. Get as close as you can without touching. (I say, at the end of the exercise, if you feel like touching, go for it.)
8. Love Aura. Place your palms close together—but not touching—for several minutes. Feel the heat and energy.
As you can tell, all these exercises make a couple feel physically or emotionally closer (or both). I would add that any discussion that shares your deepest dreams or fears would also fall into this category. I think the reason these are successful is that we spend so much of our day simply accomplishing tasks and perhaps sharing an activity, such as watching a TV show. How often do we truly interact in a new and different way?
Plan an adventure, even if it’s just a treasure hunt in your own house with clues at each step. Learn a skill together. I think it would be fun to learn a language together then visit the country that speaks that language. You could even get kids involved in this activity. If you can’t afford to travel, plan an “Italian Night” or “Parisian Night” at home with decorations and food, and speak only that language.
One of the couples I interviewed shared when their kids are at summer camp, they like to go on long bike rides where they purposely get lost together. They also enjoy board games in the back yard. This has helped keep their relationship fresh after overcoming a life-threatening cancer (her) and an early drug addiction (him). Some couples may prefer reading a book together or taking a cooking class together.
What was your favorite technique, or were you too uncomfortable to try them? What activity are you planning to increase that loving feeling?
Categories: Books · Communication · Family · Love · Marriage · Marriage Research · Personal Growth · Relationships
Tagged: Marriage, Love, improve marriage, increasing intimacy, scientific studies about love, research about love, building trust, falling in love, staying in love, Epstein
Is it possible to increase your closeness or feelings of love by using scientifically tested techniques? Robert Epstein, PhD, thinks so. “There is a definite fix for our poor performance in romantic relationships,” he says. The psychologist and longtime researcher is writing a book on how people can learn to love. He recently shared some proven techniques for deliberately building emotional intimacy in a January/February 2010 magazine article for Scientific American.
Epstein says so many marriages fail in large part because we have poor skills for maintaining relationships and “highly unrealistic expectations.” He warns that physical attraction is sometimes confused with love, creating unsuitable unions. So, be careful with whom you share these techniques!
Epstein studied other researchers’ results on love builders and carried out some of his own. He plans to teach others how to use what is known about how people learn to love one another. The key to many of his recommended strategies is that they increase feelings of vulnerability, and that increases intimacy levels. Other intimacy builders include sharing adventures, secrets, personal space and jokes.
Here are the first three techniques. I’ll try them if you will. Maybe plan one of these activities on a date night, and let me know how it works for you. Keep an open mind. I’ll provide some of his other suggestions in a future post.
1. Two as One. Embrace each other gently. Begin to sense your partner’s breathing and gradually try to synchronize your breathing with his or hers. Epstein says after a few minutes, you may start to feel as if you have merged.
2. Soul Gazing. He reports excellent results with this technique, even with perfect strangers. One caveat is it must be mutual gazing; staring at someone doesn’t count! Stand or sit about two feet apart. Look deeply into each other’s eyes, trying to look at the very core of your beings. Do this for about two minutes, and discuss what you saw.
3. Monkey Love. Sit or stand fairly close to one another, then start moving your hands, arms, and legs any way you like—but in a fashion that perfectly imitates your partner. Epstein calls this fun and challenging.
See Part II with more techniques.
Share your experience if you are brave enough to try these. What do you think about using psychological techniques to increase your love and intimacy? Do you believe they work? Have you tried them?
Categories: Communication · Family · Love · Marriage · Marriage Research · Personal Growth
Tagged: couples, emotional intimacy, improving marriage, increasing intimacy, increasing love, increasing romantic love, Love, Marriage, romance, scientific studies about love, tips to build intimacy
January 12, 2010 · 1 Comment
After today we’ll get away from the stats. For the data-seekers, here are some top reasons Americans say they divorce (they could select more than one reason). Po Bronson’s web site has much more analysis on family issues, divorce rates and marriage trends, as well as international divorce rates. The info is a little out of date but Bronson gives real insight. I was surprised at the high rate of physical abuse toward women. Top reasons why American women said they’d gotten divorced:
communication problems (69.7 percent)
unhappiness (59.9 percent)
incompatible with spouse (56.4 percent)
emotional abuse (55.5 percent)
financial problems (32.9 percent)
sexual problems (32.1 percent)
spouse’s alcohol abuse (30 percent)
spouse’s infidelity (25.2 percent)
physical abuse (21.7 percent)*
| Top reasons why American men said they’d gotten divorced: |
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communication problems (59.3 percent)
incompatible with spouse (44.7 percent)
unhappiness (46.9 percent)
emotional abuse (24.7 percent)
financial problems (28.7 percent)
sexual problems (30.2 percent) * |
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In a U.S. study, more than 25 percent of the women said that their husbands’ unfaithfulness was a factor in their divorce. Less than half as many men (10.5 percent) said it was their wives’ infidelity which was a cause of their divorce. In fact, more men said that their wives’ in-laws were a reason for the divorce (11.6 percent) than said it was because their wives had had an affair.
Sources from PoBronson.com:
| * According to a 1985 study. Totals do not add up to 100 percent because respondents could select every reason that was applicable. Margaret Guminski Cleek and T. Allan Pearson, “Perceived Causes of Divorce: An Analysis of Interrelationships,” Journal of Marriage and the Family (February 1985) p. 179, 181. |
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*Margaret Guminski Cleek and T. Allan Pearson, “Perceived Causes of Divorce: An Analysis of Interrelationships,” Journal of Marriage and the Family (February 1985) p. 179, 181. |
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Categories: Communication · Divorce · Domestic violence · Family · Love · Marriage · Marriage Research · Relationships · Uncategorized
Tagged: alcohol abuse, communication in marriage, Divorce, divorce rates, emotional abuse, Family, infidelity, international divorce rates, Marriage, physical abuse, Po Bronson, reason for divorce, reasons Americans divorce, sexual problems, spouse, U.S. divorce rates, unhappiness
Someone asked me recently whether the often cited divorce rate of 50 percent was correct for Americans. The answer: Not really. That figure is a result of averaging a lot of facts together. In addition, the divorce rate has fallen some in recent years.
If you are interested, here are details on divorce rates. The higlights:
- 41% of first marriages in the U.S. end in divorce
- 60% of second marriages in the U.S. end in divorce
- 73% of third marriages in the U.S. end in divorce
There are also disparities in the age of the married couple. Those who married between ages 20 to 24 have the highest divorce rates.
Couples with children have lower divorce rates than those without. It has been reported that sociologists believe childlessness to be a common cause of divorce. The absence of children leads to loneliness and weariness and even in the United States, at least 66 percent of all divorced couples are childless. I researched this fact after interviewing a couple who was infertile for 14 years of marriage and later went on to adopt and have two biological children. While infertility did put a strain on their marriage, in the end it brought them closer together as they learned to focus on what they had, rather than on they didn’t have.
To learn more about why people divorce, read the best divorce predictors. Also, read the reasons Americans give for their divorces.
Interestingly, the vast majority of Americans still think marriage is worth the risk; 81% of men and 86% of women marry by the age of 40.
Categories: Divorce · Family · Marriage · Marriage Research · Relationships
Tagged: Divorce, divorce rates, Family, infertility and divorce, Marriage, marriage rates, Relationships
Divorce lawyers are reporting this month that 20 percent of divorce petitions cite Facebook as a contributor in the marriage’s demise. It’s unclear whether the numbers are accurate, but social networking can pose a new kind of threat to relationships if not used appropriately.
Facebook’s 350 million+ users find the site allows them to easily connect with friends and relatives, people they once knew, or new people with common interests. For some people, these connections can lead to curiosity, online flirting, wandering eyes, and the opportunity to rekindle old relationships or begin new ones.
The increasing use of mobile devices to communicate on social networking sites can make posts seem more private. However, nothing posted to the Internet is private, and these communications frequently become public knowledge.
Lack of trust by the offended spouse can result, and marriages may be splintered. Once relationships have been sparked, users may be tempted to cheat on their spouses, or may leave their marriages for a new or old flame. Temptation is as old as time, but some people may find this new type of temptation too alluring.
Some couples are opting to avoid social networks for these reasons. Others are putting in place guidelines for communicating with the opposite gender.
A helpful article at the Marriage Junkie gives 5 ways to protect your marriage if you use social networking.
A few tidbits they share include not sharing negative information about your spouse, choosing your “friends” wisely, discussing with your spouse what topics or people should be out of bounds, and avoiding private chats or the development of close relationships with members of the opposite sex. When in doubt, “unfriend” someone who is offensive or who sparks inappropriate feelings.
One tip I would add is to “friend” your spouse, or if they are not a member, provide your spouse access to your page at any time—not to “check on you” but so that you can chat about common friends and activities and have an air of openness.
A previous post details why emotional affairs can be just as deadly to a marriage as physical ones. Guard your mind and heart, and keep your focus and attention on your beloved spouse.
Do you use Facebook? Do you have any safeguards in place or do you see no need for them?
Categories: Communication · Divorce · Family · Love · Marriage · Marriage Research · Relationships · Uncategorized
Tagged: affair, causes of divorce, cheating, emotional affair, Facebook, Facebook and marriage, fidelity, improve marriage, Love, Marriage, preventing divorce, protect marriage, Relationships, sexual temptation, social media, social networking, spouse, successful relationships, trust
