WEEK 9 Some realness

This week has been particularly busy for me.  The kids are home from summer, and my husband started an amazing new job two weeks ago.  This was unexpected, and a huge blessing, but it has caused us to quickly revamp our summer plans.  While the new job is a blessing, it is requiring him to be gone a lot more than usual.  Couple that with taking eleven credits over the summer with four kids at home, things are getting a lot more stressful.  The lessons that were taught in chapters eight and nine of ‘The Seven Principles for Making a Marriage Work’ could not have come at a better time.  There are some major things happening that I need help with, like hiring a nanny for three hours a day on the days he is traveling so I can get school done.  I can say from practicing the soft start-up, and adding a sense of humor and lightness to the topics that I needed to discuss with my husband, we were able to reach an outcome that was favorable to both of us.  As an added bonus we both left the discussion feeling great and even deepening our friendship and love for each other. 

If you read the book, the exercise can seem super cheesy.  However, they work like a charm.  The first exercise is the soft start up.  I think that it actually helped in getting my husbands attention more because it was different than how I usually start a conversation.  I realize now that it started with a complaint about how tired or stressed I am, instead of saying, “Hey babe, I am feeling very stressed about getting everything done with school.  I would really like to figure out a way to have some help.  Can we look at the budget and see if we can move some things around?”  I was anticipating some resistance, but he got right on it and we made it happen!  It works!  The second exercise was in making repair attempts, and receiving repair attempts.  I like the humor aspect of this strategy.  Things are lighter when you laugh.  This one might not work all the time, but it works for us.  It also helps us avoid gridlock, as it kinda yanks us out of our current situation and helps us separate from the topic and gain some perspective on what we are talking about. 

My favorite exercise this week was learning to soothe yourself and each other.  I am a yoga teacher, and all the exercise Dr. Gottman suggested you practice with yourself and with each other was straight out of my yoga nidra training.  It was a much simpler form of yoga nidra, but I can say from personal and professional experience that these simple practices will be a game changer in how you regulate your reactions to life situations.  One of the classes I teach is at a drug rehabilitation facility.  They request yoga nidra because you are training your mind and body to not react to stressors, as well as internal and external stimuli.  You can see how valuable this skill would be if you are learning how to maintain sobriety.   In a marriage using these techniques you can training yourself to not react to emotional stress.  Instead, you will take a moment to look at the situation from a calm place instead of a flooded emotional place.  What a powerful tool, right?  Try it.  It works.  Steps four, compromise, and step five, dealing with emotional injuries, are far more likely to happen if you can calmly look at the situation and realize what you are actually fighting about, and where it may be coming from.  Little things can trigger deep emotional wounds, and knowing what those are for yourself personally, as what those are for your spouse make it much easier to realize that some hot button issues have nothing to do with you or your spouse at all, and everything to do with an emotional injury that may have happened before you even met them. 

  (Sidebar- if you need help relaxing, find a yoga nidra class.  You are welcome.)

Week 8 PRIDE has no place in a marriage.

n a marriage, even a strong stable marriage, your faults and weakness become glaringly apparent.  Very quickly.  Sometimes the way your upbringing has something to do with it.  Sometimes its just learning to live with and love you spouse now that you are under the same roof.  What I learned from this week’s readings is that marriage is either a fight to the literal death of the marriage, or learning to yield and change.  I could be very wrong in my assumption, but I don’t think that I am too far off. 

First of all, no one loves to be corrected.  No one relishes in being told that they are doing something wrong.  And no one loves a know it all.  This applies to marriage and yielding to one’s spouse.  There are times where doing certain things a certain way is important to the wife.  In Dr. Gottman’s book “The Seven Principles of Making Marriage Work”, principle four is called “Letting your spouse influence you”.  Dr. Gottman uses the proverbial example of the toilet seat up or down.  He writes, “So a man can score major points with his wife just by putting the seat down.  The wise husband smiles at how smart he is as he drops the lid.”  What struck me is that the husband in this example is still winning, even though he is giving in to what his wife wants.  Could she put the seat down?  Sure.  But knowing that her husband made the effort to yield to something that was important to her will score him major bonus points. At the same time the wife feels valued and validated that her husband loves her, and knows her needs and wants are important to him. 

In my own marriage, I have been very blessed to have a husband who is very aware of things.  More importantly, he is very open to suggestions and needs that I have, especially when I am struggling to get everything together.  Last night was a long one, and we were so tired that I didn’t get the dishes completely finished before going to bed.  I woke up to find that my husband had cleaned the rest of the kitchen this morning, because he knows I like waking up to a clean kitchen.  I didn’t ask him to, but he did that for me because he knew it would make me happy.  This is the win-win situation.  I win by having a clean kitchen and a huge smile on my face.  He wins by cleaning the kitchen and having a super happy and affectionate wife all day long (wink wink :P)  

Letting your partner influence you is in no way giving up your power to your wife or your husband.  I look at it like this:  You can listen and reflect what the person is saying.  You can validate and be there for them.  Then your partner has the opportunity to listen, reflect and validate you.  From that place of listening and understanding, and detaching pride from any of it, together the couple can work together to find that win-win situation like the toilet seat. 

Week 7 Turning towards each other

This week I loved the readings so much.  Turning towards each other in a marriage has a lot to do with building on the friendship and fondness that a couple has for each other.  If you aren't fond of your partner, you aren't going to want to turn towards them, and actively listen to their day.  The metaphor that really helped me conceptualize the idea of turning towards your spouse was the emotional bank account.  By turning towards each other, and prioritizing your spouse and the relationship, you are investing in long term and short term benefits.  Long term benefits are likened to a savings account, a safety net that a couple can pull from when times are tough.  Short term benefits of turning toward each other are the enhancement of the immediate relationship by strengthening trust.  I think that the hardest part of this is learning to read a bid for attention and connection when your spouse is frustrated or angry.  I think it is important in a marriage, and any relationship for that matter, that you never take anything personally when things are said in frustration or anger.  In stead, use that outburst as a little window into your partner's mind or past experiences.  Figure out what you can learn about your partner from this instead of taking it personally.  In the talk it out exercise it has a lot of questions that have to do with an individuals past experiences, as a way of helping a person learn more about themselves, as well as their partner's history.  I think that one can learn a lot about themselves by analyzing their reactions to situations, and where that reaction is rooted.  For me, I react very strongly when I feel like I am not being appreciated.  At the beginning of our marriage, I naively thought it was just that my husband was not good at husbanding.  After a while though, and some individual therapy, I realized it was because growing up I felt like I had to do everything for my younger brothers, and I felt that they did nothing.  I even had to clean the bathrooms that they used and it was so gross.  This was the real root cause, and thank heavens my husband had the good sense to know that there was something more going on than him forgetting to pick up his clothes.  

Marriage is a balancing act of knowing when it is something to do with you, your past, or if it really is an issue that needs to be resolved within the marriage.  

Week 6 Cherishing your spouse - You know too much, and that is a good thing

So many thoughts about this week.  We read in Dr. Gottman’s book Seven Principles of Making Marriage Work chapters four and five all about deepening our relationship with our spouse, as well as creating in-depth love maps.  One thing that I loved about all the questions and activities in the book is that it required a lot of emotional effort and vulnerability.  Some of the questions went to difficult places, like childhood experiences that were difficult, or about how they strengthened and healed themselves after hardships or grievances.  In some ways, it is very similar questions that my husband and I asked each other when we were going through couples’ therapy.  We got married, and I felt that we had a solid marriage, but after engaging in exercise like the ones in Dr. Gottman’s book I felt that I had a new appreciation and affection for my husband, and vice versa.  Some challenges in marriage in maintaining a love map is that it takes real effort.  This isn’t a one-time round of questions and then you and your spouse are done.  It takes constant updating.  Similar to an app, it needs to be improved, and the kinks and bugs worked out.  It also takes using the app to figure out where the weak spots are, and listening to feedback from your spouse to see where improvements can be made.  Marriage takes work, but it is so rewarding when both the husband and wife are engaged in making their relationship based on love and appreciation for each other.  My husband and I say, I like you, and I love you.  We want to be with each other, because we have a solid base of friendship.  The meme that says, "You will always be my best friend, because you know too much" definitely applies to me and my husband.  We know everything about each other, because we are vulnerable with each other and trust each other to not run away when the hard stuff comes up.  

Week 5 Negative Behaviors - The hubby is my bestie

  

Damon and I have been married for almost 16 years.  We have four kids.  We have been through hard times, easy times, and everything in between.  I would categorize us in the positive sentiment category.  We have arguments, for sure, but the example of a couple sticking out their tongues at each other over what car they should get made me laugh because we have literally done the exact something.  It breaks the tension, and ultimately checks us back into reality.  I think I need that a lot.  I dose of perspective, with the idea of “Does this really matter in the grand scheme of things?”  As I read Dr. Gottman’s book about how a marriage can go wrong, it made me so sad!  The examples of the arguments that he listened in on were horrible to hear.  I downloaded the audible version of the book as well because of time constraints this week, and hearing it was way worse than reading it.  I thought it was really interesting that he coined the term ‘flooding’ when the couple’s physiological responses were evident.  The body was literally flooding itself with stress hormones resulting in raised heart rate and other stress indicators. I noticed the same results happening in myself listening to them. 

In a marriage, friendship is everything.  If you aren’t friends with your spouse, then what is the point of marriage.  I view my husband as my ultimate confidant, who I can be myself with and there is no judgement or criticism.  He is my best friend.  I can tell him anything, and he tells me everything, and it is so beautiful.  Allowing someone in like that takes some bravery and vulnerability.  It is worth it though.  My husband and I share everything, we know everything, and we laugh a lot because of it.  Neither of us are perfect, and we have things we can definitely work on.  But we do work on them.  Because we know it is important, and actively working on yourself signifies to your spouse that you are trying.  Knowing that a person is trying to become a better person helps the other give the benefit of the doubt, which is so important in any relationship.  If we were to quick to pounce and glaringly show a mistake, eventually the marriage would deteriorate.  If there is an incident of something gone wrong, I usually start with, “Hey, are you okay?  (What ever the event was) wasn’t like you, did something happen today?”  More often than not it was something that was totally unrelated to me or the kids, and most of the time we don’t even know what was bothering us until we talk it out. 

What ways do you and your spouse maintain the friendship and support eachother?

Week 4 Doctrine of Eternal Marriage - Marriage and the Three Wolves

ElderHafen's talk about marriage facing the three wolves really resonated with me this week.  I know everyone thinks of marriage as the start of an awesome life, and it is.  It is also really hard at times.  The three wolves that Elder Hafen explains are 1. Adversity 2. Individual Imperfections 3. Excessive Individualism.   In a covenant marriage, this is explained in the talk that the perspective is different.  There is more accountability, because the couple goes into the marriage knowing it is for eternity.  To me, this means that there is sufficient skin in the game to make the fight worth it.  

I remember when I got engaged, my grandmother, who was a feisty lady, told me, "Oh little girl, you are going to grow up the hard way."  I was actually really offended.  However, after 16 years of marriage, I can see she was speaking from an experienced perspective.  If a couple is not able to look inward and hold themselves accountable to any shortcomings that will definitely be exposed in a marriage, then it will be a very unhappy one.  This is hard to do!  No one likes to be wrong, and most people don’t like admitting that they are flawed.  It takes the marriage to a vulnerable and wonderful place when one or the other can say, “Yes, I see that I was wrong.  I know I need to work on that, and I am sorry.”  I wish I had learned this sooner in my marriage. Damon and I are best friends.  We love each other, and we laugh a lot.  We also have been through a lot.  We lost everything, essentially, about ten years ago.  Damon lost his job, we lost our home, and I was pregnant with our second baby.  It was a humbling year, both individually and as a family.  It took a lot to come up from that blow, but through adversity we gain so much, like the ability to ask for help. We lost things we didn’t need like pride.  We realized that God’s plan for us isn’t always known, but that we will always be taken care of.  Adversity exposes weakness, individual imperfections come to a glaring head.  I think this is make or break for a marriage. 

You have a choice with the individualism.  If a person keeps putting him/herself and interests first, the marriage will deteriorate.  If you learn to love and serve your spouse, the marriage will thrive.  Your needs will be met if your spouse is doing the same.  Both spouses put in 100%.  It is a constant giving and receiving.  One must learn to serve, and also allow their spouse to serve them.  That can be difficult too!  Knowing your partner’s love language is key in making this a success. That is another post for another time.

I would love to hear your thoughts on the three wolves.  How do you think adversity, individual imperfections, and individualism affect a marriage?

Week 3 Threats to Marriage - This is a hard one.

I learned a lot.  I read (okay, more like labored through and understood a fraction of) the ruling of Obergefell v. Hodges written by the supreme court justices Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito.  Maybe I was dreadfully unware, but the four dissenting supreme court justices ruled against the case not because of any morality issue, but that of it not being within their power to make sweeping legislation, thus overturning the states right to define marriage, as well as depriving each state of there electoral and legislative process. 

I’d like to share some back ground on my family.  I have two openly gay brothers, one of whom is married to his husband of nearly five years.  I love them.  It has been very difficult at times to be a Marriage and Family Studies major at BYU-Idaho, with some of the articles I had to read, and discussion boards I have to participate in.  This week though was not the case.  In one of the videos this week, it talked about two different cases that the supreme court had ruled on that changed the American culture.  Brown vs Board of Education, and Roe v Wade.  One resulted in being a racist equal to a social pariah, and the other, while still facing some criticism, is still able to voice dissenting opinion.  I feel that this is the way it is happening with gay marriage, in part because of the Christian values we uphold, but also the gay community.  I have had a lot of experience within this community, and they are such wonderful people who welcome anyone and everyone with open arms.  I can say the same thing for the Christian community. I think that one can be for traditional families, and not be a social pariah, if it is handled with respect and love.  One can be for gay marriage, and still be friends with one who is openly against it.  I have seen it in my own family.  Tolerance of both sides is key. 

What is your take on this?  How can both sides be heard and mutual tolerance reign supreme?