Balancing Families

When I was first married we lived near my husband's family. We were both the first to get married in our families so it was new territory for everyone involved. As soon as we were married we started getting invitations to every cousin/aunt/uncle/grandparent event within a 40 mile radius. I was immediately put off and overwhelmed at the thought of going to so many family activities. We both worked full time on opposite shifts; I worked days and he worked swing. I found it really hard to not only attend the events but to attend them with a good attitude. It was something we knew we couldn't keep up with as the years went on. We finally told his mom we needed our days off to be spent together. At first it wasn't well received but later on she admitted it was too much to expect with our schedules and newly married status.

 

In Helping and Healing our Families authors James Harper and Susanne Olsen give practical and sound advice to help all parties involved navigate new territory. They said, "Parents can help by genuinely not pressuring their grown children to be at every family gathering, even though they will be missed." Once the pressure to be at everything was released, we actually chose to attend some of the activities we were invited to without the intense feelings of not wanting to be there. At that point we were able to build our extended family relationships into something stronger.

 

The authors also share some ideas from Gloria Horsely that every parent-in-law should avoid. They are:

• Giving Advice
• Criticizing
• Pinning down children-in-law as to the specific reasons they are missing a family event
• Criticizing or taking over the disciplining of grandchildren
• Trying to control everyone and everything, including children's beliefs
• Unclear and indirect commuication

That about covers it, doesn't it? I am not a parent-in-law yet and wont be for quite some time. I hope to build trust and friendship with my children-in-law someday. I'm certain it wont be an easy, clear cut job. In fact, it might be quite difficult and different with each new family member added. I loved the suggestion to spend one-on-one time with a son or daughter in-law. The times we did that as mother and daughter-in-law our relationship grew.

 

Harper and Olsen close with this, "Improved relationships will require time, effort, patience, and a willingness to communicate about issues and past offenses with love and concern." All of this will certainly help these important relationships to grow into loving, eternal bonds.

Team Effort

Unity equals teamwork. There's a common phrase that fits this sentence- There is no 'I' in teamwork. Truly working together as a team means to think of the other players around you and how to help them succeed in their position. Is teamwork important in marriage and families? It wont be a surprise when I tell you, of course it is! I'm currently not married so to apply the message of unity to my situation, I'll focus on how I'm working to build up my family team.

I have five kids, one daughter followed by four boys. Quite often (every day actually) I'm breaking up arguments or fights and dealing with contention even though these kids are playing on the same family team! I know it's partly their ages and that it's a challenge for siblings to get along all the time. Still, it's frustrating! My lack of patience has gotten the better of me more time than I can count. Talking with some friends one day, I voiced my troubles with really feeling family unity among my kids. My friend was quick to tell how he pulls his kids together on a regular basis. He refers to their family as 'Team Andersen' and uses sports talk to encourage teammate behavior. If there's any sort of talk that pulls my boys in, sports talk is it.

I came home and went right to work. I started reminding them how important it is to work together and that without each other, getting back to our Heavenly Father would be much harder. Sometimes when I would hear them fighting I would simply say, "Team Bushman!" I quoted this song in an earlier blog post but it also applies here. In the primary song, The Family is of God we sing, "God gave us families, to help us become what he wants us to be." A gift. Our families are a gift from God. A crucible to refine and shape us into something better.

Henry B. Eyring said, "The sacramental prayer can remind us every week of how the gift of unity will come through obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel of Jesus Christ. When we keep our covenants to take His name upon us, to remember Him always, and to keep all His commandments, we will receive the companionship of His Spirit. That will soften our hearts and unite us." Unity in a family (or a marriage) requires commitment and patience. Elder Eyring said the sacrifices we make as a family when we pray for and serve one another will lead to hearts bound in love.

Safeguarding Your Marriage

Most infidelity in marriage starts out with small, deliberate choices when one spouse chooses to turn away from the other. I don’t think anyone makes the commitment to marry someone they love with anticipation of breaking those vows down the road. Yet, here we are in a society that deals with broken marriages from all different aspects of infidelity.

So, how does it happen? In his book Drawing Heaven Into Your Marriage, Wallace Goddard writes, “Satan attacks us with subtle and indirect means. He gets us inappropriately close to someone who is not our spouse under the guise of missionary work, friendship, or helpfulness. He subtly builds inappropriate emotional bonds while quieting our consciences with weak rationalizations.” Some of these weak rationalizations might include telling yourself that you are in control and it’s no big deal to have a good friend outside your marriage relationship. Satan merciless leaves no stone unturned.

Goddard offers several guidelines to safeguard against behavior that might lead to troubling behavior. A few of his suggestions include: ~Do not allow the seeds of lust to germinate. ~Never make excuses to spend time alone with a person of the opposite sex. ~ If you find yourself making excuses for continuing the relationship, you are addicted. ~Spend more enjoyable time with your spouse. ~Renew your spiritual efforts. Turn to the Lord in prayer.

I have seen the heartache and sadness brought on by infidelity in marriage, whether emotional or physical, it doesn’t matter. It destroys trust and can cause lasting hurt. Goddard warns of Satan’s devious plans. He said of Satan, “He offers love, fun and a satisfying life. But it is a lie. He wants to get us to violate our covenants. But he has no joy to deliver on is grandiose promises. He is the master of misery. That is all he has to offer.”

The Nose Knows

Have you ever had to sniff around your kitchen to find an offending smell? Was it the garbage? The sink? The fridge? At my house it's usually a rotten potato that fell back in the cupboard and man, do they stink! An unknown smell can really throw off the mood of your entire house. I like my house to smell good and I'm not happy until I eliminate the nasty stink. Are you asking yourself why I'm writing about a stinky kitchen on a blog about marriage? Well a good 'sense of smell', so to speak, is an essential tool in marriage as well. Dr. John Gottman call is a Marital Poop Detector and defines it as a "built-in early-earning system that lets you know when you marital quality is in jeopardy." He goes on to say it's another way of recognizing something doesn't smell right in your relationship. The one who speaks up, or 'smells a problem'  is not willing to live with the offending behavior.

Most of the time a wife is the one using her nose to figure out the stink and asks why her spouse is withdrawn or grouchy more than usual. Gottman encourages both partners to use their nose. He suggests asking yourself questions once a week to check up on your marriage. Questions such as: Do I feel distant from my spouse? Have I been feeling lonely? Is my partner irritable towards me? Are we lacking fun or joy in our life? These self-reflecting questions and more suggested by Gottman can help you decide if there are issues you need to bring up with your spouse. Putting issues in a marriage out in the open is a chance to clear the air, be united in purpose and work together for the strengthening of your marriage.

I'd like to close this post with what I want to take away from Gottman's book. I've read it before and both times have felt the counsel and suggestions to be helpful and insightful. More than once I felt emotion catch in my chest when I was reading the book this time around knowing there was a way to save my marriage had both partners been willing. It definitely takes two people to heal and mend what is broken. Unfortunately, sometimes that isn't an option. Even though I am divorced, I believe in marriage. I know it's an essential part of God's plan. I often ask myself, "Where do I go from here?" Gottman closes his book with the words my heart needed to hear. It's a message about forgiving yourself and letting go of your inner self-critic. Essentially, the last page is about loving yourself for who you are- flaws and all. Easier said than done, right? The best way to move forward is to look for the good and be grateful for a spouse by your side willing to build a stronger relationship. President Monson said, "We can lift ourselves and others as well when we refuse to remain in the realm of negative thought and cultivate within our hearts an attitude of gratitude."

A Choice

In his talk Agency and Anger, Lynn G. Robbins discusses ways Satan uses anger to destroy family relationships, specifically by separating anger and agency. He said, "A cunning part of his strategy is to dissociate anger from agency, making us believe that we are victims of an emotion that we cannot control." He goes on to say the terms, "losing my temper" and "you made me mad" are words chosen to displace the responsibility of anger in the first place. It simply couldn't be one's fault if someone else provoked your anger or you lost your temper ' accidentally.' Instead Brother Robbins is clear; anger is a choice.

 

I know a woman that in her 90's now and this is still how she deals with her anger. She is consistently displacing it on someone else or not taking responsibility for her own words and actions. I don't understand how she couldn't see the wake it left behind her. Through the years she has damaged relationships with her children and siblings, along with plenty of mistrust from other relatives. She has lived a long life and allowed anger to be in the forefront of some important events and people, blaming them that they "made her angry." Satan waits for these actions and plants seeds of more anger to build and grow on top of one another. When left alone, anger can multiply and grow like a rampant weed.

 

David O. McKay said, “Let husband and wife never speak in loud tones to each other, ‘unless the house is on fire’ ” It takes incredible self-control to keep our anger in check. Daily, or multiple times a day, we must turn to God and ask for His help to turn away from anger. Brother Robbins closes his talk with these words, "Understanding the connection between agency and anger is the first step in eliminating it from our lives. We can choose not to become angry." Anger is a choice. We can bring peace and long suffering to our families when we turn away from Satan's attempts to 'stir up' the hearts of men.

The Postscript

In H. Wallace Goddard's book, Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage, the fourth chapter is centered on humility and repentance to rid yourself of pride. He wrote a very specific postscript at the end of his thoughts that has been with me since I finished reading it. He said, "If, as you read this chapter, you found yourself thinking how much your partner needs it, I encourage you to re-read the chapter with yourself in mind." Pretty direct, right? Almost an 'ouch' factor if you were, in fact, thinking about your spouse when you read it. Much of the time we are able to see the pride in others but are quite reluctant to admit the pride we have in our own hearts.

 

Earlier in the chapter Goddard writes, "When we are feeling irked, annoyed or irritated with our spouse, we have our backs toward heaven. We are guilty of pride." Whoa. Those are feelings stemming from pride? Relationships everywhere deal with these issues, sometimes on a daily basis. We accuse a spouse and defend ourselves. A never ending cycle begins when these behaviors are set on repeat. A perfect description of pride and a clear call to repentance comes from President Ezra Taft Benson in his conference address titled (read it here). He said, "Pride adversely affects all our relationships—our relationship with God and His servants, between husband and wife, parent and child, employer and employee, teacher and student, and all mankind." Thankfully pride is not a terminal illness we are powerless to stop. President Benson taught, "The antidote for pride is humility—meekness, submissiveness. It is the broken heart and the contrite spirit"

 

Goddard used the visual of a flat tire in a struggling relationship. Most relationships experience bumpy times on a rough road. He said, "Appreciating is more powerful than correcting. Appreciation inflates the tires on which we travel. Criticism is a slow leak in those tires." The important questions we need to ask are more about the changes we need to make within rather than the ones we see in our spouse. How can I build my partner up? What good qualities do I see in my spouse? Is my will aligned with God? When we seek answers to these questions our hearts can be softened.

Hit The Nail On The Head

Have you seen this video? It's one of the first things I thought of when I was reading John Gottman's book... Funny, right? I couldn't resist the blog title either. In my opinion, it's a fairly accurate representation of a principle we read about this week in my marriage class. First let me back up a little bit and share what Dr. Gottman wrote in The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work and how it applies to this video.

Principle 3: Turn Toward Each Other Instead of Away.

How does Dr. Gottman define turning toward each other? He says couples are always making what he calls 'bids' towards one another for attention, affection, humor and support. "Real-life romance is fueled each time you let your spouse know he or she is valued during the grind of everyday life." Yes, yes, yes! I hear husbands and wives everywhere agreeing with this statement. Feeling valued in a relationship builds trust and connection much more than flowers and chocolate. When a spouse acknowledges your 'bid' it helps you want to continue those bids. Gottman says these bids, whether big or small, gain momentum like a rolling snowball. They might start small but the results will be great.

One way to successfully connect with a spouse is to make deposits into their emotional bank account. Gottman shares a long list of ways to make different deposits that feel important to your spouse. The most effective suggestion he gave is, "Reunite at the end of the day and talk about how it went." That sounds pretty simple, right? The problem with many couples is they tackle this conversation over dinner, in front of the TV or with their children still awake. In that context, these conversations add more stress and leave a spouse feeling more frustrated than before. Why? Usually because they feel their counterpart wasn't really listening to what they had to say.

Dr. Gottman give suggestions for ways to talk each day so both husband and wife recognize the deposits into their emotional bank account and the benefits of taking time for one another each day.

1- Find an ideal time for each spouse to spend 10-15 minutes each talking about their day uninterrupted. Take turns.

2- Don't discuss marriage problems at this time. Support each other in areas outside your relationship.

3- Actively listen to your spouse. Be kind, eliminate judgement. Listen to the vents, victories, worries and the happiness they share.

4- Stay focused on your spouse. Ask questions. Make eye contact. Be genuine in your communication,

5- It's not your job to solve every problem your spouse presents (see... The Nail).

6- Support, love, give affection and validate your spouse.

I love this principle and all the great information about emotional bank accounts. I am currently not married so I've thought about how I can apply this principle now. This is an easy one to work into my life right now. I still have  relationships I need to strengthen every day. The emotional bank accounts of my kids are also very important. By nature I want to fix things similar to the husband in the video. I want to call out the obvious and do my part to 'help remove the nail'. But, it's not help! I'm learning how important it is to actively listen to my teenagers to build trust in our relationship. When they want to talk, I need to stop and listen!

Gottman said, "If there is a silver lining to your partner's sadness, fear, or anger, it is that by listening to it you strengthen the trust between you." Though this class is focused on marriage, by applying these methods to other relationships in my life, I feel like I can reap some of the same rewards.