Ten Things You Need To Know About Affairs - Michele Weiner-Davis

I can’t tell you the number of people who tell themselves early in marriage, “If my spouse ever has an affair, I’m outta here.” And then it happens. The spouse is unfaithful. That’s when reality sets in. It’s easy to think you will leave if your spouse betrays you, but when confronted with the reality of divorce and dissolving your marriage, the stakes are really high. It’s not that overcoming the devastation of infidelity is easy, it isn’t. But it can be done. In fact, believe it or not, most people decide to stay in their marriages after infidelity. The important thing is to address the issues that might have lead to the infidelity and get the necessary help to recover. Divorce isn’t the solution, particularly when the unfaithful spouse is remorseful and devoted to changing. Here are some things you need to know if you are dealing with the fallout of infidelity in your marriage

1) Betrayal is in the eye of the beholder
Many times people want to know the definition of betrayal. To some, it is about having intercourse and other sexual contact with another person. To others, betrayal is more about one’s spouse feeling emotionally connected to someone else- late conversations of a personal nature with a co-worker, or an on-going, intimate friendship with another person. To others, it is secrecy. This may involve secret email accounts, cell phones, Internet behavior, or an unwillingness to share information about whereabouts, spending habits, or life plans.

The fact is, there is no universal definition of betrayal. When two people are married, they must care about each other’s feelings. They don’t always have to agree, but they must behave in ways that make the relationship feel safe. Therefore, if one person feels threatened or betrayed, his or her spouse must do some soul searching and change in ways to accommodate those feelings. In other words, betrayal is in the eye of the beholder. If you or your partner feel betrayed, you need to change what you’re doing to make the marriage work.

The Tornado Analogy - Things People Do To Destroy their Marriages

“A junkyard contains all the bits and pieces of a Boeing 747 plane, dismembered and in disarray. A whirlwind happens to blow through the yard. What is the chance that after its passage a fully assembled 747, ready to fly, will be found standing there? So small as to be negligible, even if a tornado were to blow through enough junkyards to fill the whole Universe.” - Fred Hoyle 

Though Hoyle actually intended this as an argument against abiogenesis, anyone who is in an unhappy marriage will be unable to identify with this analogy. As much as a couple might want happiness and even possess certain keys to each other's joy, if they don't identify and consciously select the bits and pieces that make for a good relationship and  discard the junk, marital bliss becomes as elusive as pieces of a plane assembling themselves in the random motion of a whirlwind.

Should You Stay Married For Your Children? - Joe Beam

I came across this article by Joe Beam on the Crosswalk website and I do believe it is a relevant topic in these times.

Please read. It is instructive.....

“I know it would be wrong to stay married for the sake of my children.”

“Really? Who told you that?”

“Several of my friends.”

“I don’t mean to sound offensive, but what makes them experts on the matter?”

She stared at me for a few moments. I think she was trying to decide if I were a jerk, or if I had a point worth considering. Finally she spoke. Her advice from “several friends” mostly came from one.

“Linda tells me the best thing she ever did was divorce Tom. Says I should divorce Bill so I can be happy.”

“Do you think Linda’s kids feel the same way about her divorcing their Dad?”

“I don’t know.”

How to Cope With Parenting a special needs child

The birth of a baby brings lots of emotion — most would assume emotions of happiness, excitement, amazement and joy. But when your baby is born with a physical or mental disability — whether previously diagnosed or not — emotions often turn to shock, sadness, anger, bewilderment or anxiety.

What do you do with the swell of emotion? How do you handle the news and still operate as a good parent of a newborn? How do you cope when your child is born with a disability?

Identify what has died

Your baby is alive and you truly are thankful. Still, there are things that have died: dreams, expectations, hopes, wishes. Whether or not you have verbalized them, as a parent expecting a new child, you have them. And now those dreams are not to be. They are intangible deaths and are often hard to identify. Identify and verbalize them just the same.

Grieve the losses

Allow yourself to grieve as if there were a real death. While they can occur in any order, the stages of grief are:

• Shock and denial
• Anger
• Bargaining with God
• Depression
• Acceptance

7 reasons why your husband may no longer be romantic

One of the frequent issues women raise during counselling sessions is that their husbands are no longer romantic. They complain that the husbands do not tell them that "they love them", do not do romantic things anymore, e.t.c.

Unfortunately on another hand, most men do not know that they are unromantic unless their wives tell them or complain to them.

Here are some of the reasons that most men forget about romance months after marriage. Before we state the reasons, I will like to refer to the definition of "Romance" in light of this blog post. 

According to wikipedia, Romance is the expressive and pleasurable feeling from an emotional attraction towards another person associated with love.

1. After the wedding, the wooing stops. Men use every trick in the good ole trusty book to win their prizes - the women. Some of these tricks might include taking women to dinner, buying flowers e.t.c  However, when all is said and done and the woman is in the house, the "book of tricks" is tossed out of the window. The book has outlived its usefulness!
2. Romance is expensive. Haven't you noticed that almost everything boils down to money when a man becomes a husband or a father? So when some men think about romance, they visualise the cost of the dinner at the fancy restaurant; the cost of flowers. Some men equate romance with expenses.

Stop Giving Him The Cute Puppy Dog Face! Do the Needful.

There is a story that you may have heard about a man who once lost his valuable watch in an ice house. All of his fellow workers diligently searched the ice house looking for the watch. They combed every inch of it, but they couldn’t find it. A little boy, hearing about their search, slipped into the ice house and quickly emerged with the watch. All of the men were amazed and they said, “How did you find it?” And he said, ” 

Well I simply went to the ice house, closed the door, laid down quietly on the floor, and then I began to listen. After a while, I could hear the tick, tick, tick of the watch.” Are you training yourself to listen for that still, small voice of God?

At various points in our Christian walk, God gives us various instructions. Some time ago I decided to spend some time waiting on the Lord. I just wanted to hear from Him, I told my husband and the fast began. On the third day, I was given a very clear instruction. Funny enough, it was something that had been in my spirit for a while but this time I heard clear in no uncertain terms, what I was supposed to do.

What do you think your husband will say if you sent this text message "I love You, Sweetheart"? (Old Joke)

Credits: The Talk (CBS)

I came across this joke and I felt even though we may laugh, it may strike home in some marriages. If this is the same in your home, you have got some work to do.

There was a group of women gathered at a seminar on how to live in a loving relationship with your husband.

The women were asked, 'How many of you love your husbands?'

All the women raised their hands.

Then they were asked, 'When was the last time you told your husband you loved him?'

Some women answered today, some yesterday, some didn't remember.

The women were then told to take their cell phones and send the following text to their respective husband: I love you, sweetheart.

Then the women were told to exchange phones and read the responding text messages.

Here are some of the replies: