Overall: Class and Readings

This class has been so great! It has truly been an eye-opener and such a great blessing. There are so many different ideas about the family and what works or what does not work. As you go about trying to improve your marriage and family life, read, read, read. Read journals and articles about marriage and family and then be the best marriage partner and parent that you can be. They will thank you and society will thank you too! 

Divorce

Divorce occurs to couples scattered almost everyone all over the world. It kind of seems like a pandemic. Most people get remarried after only two years of being divorced. 70% of couples that got divorced believed they made a mistake in getting divorced. A few implications of this are that they hunger for that intimacy again, they want emotional support from their spouse, or maybe they had a hope that they would have a better marriage next time.

In the 1970’s the divorce rate peaked (many thought this was due to the no fault divorce law that was passed in 1969). Another peak occurred before the 70’s. It occurred in about the year 1947. Is there a correlation here, or is it just random? It seems, at least to me, that the couples who got divorced in the 70’s were the children of parents that got divorced in 1947. Why would this be? One reason may be because the children were more vulnerable when their parents got divorced to get divorced themselves. In a National Affairs publication it stated: “From 1960 to 1980, the divorce rate more than doubled — from 9.2 divorces per 1,000 married women to 22.6 divorces per 1,000 married women. This meant that while less than 20% of couples who married in 1950 ended up divorced, about 50% of couples who married in 1970 did. And approximately half of the children born to married parents in the 1970s saw their parents part, compared to only about 11% of those born in the 1950s.” Maybe this is because:

-They didn’t have a good example to follow about what to do in marriage,

-Maybe they are afraid of marriage

- They are not good at communicating or well in their problem-solving skills

- They are afraid of continuing bad patterns in their own family

- Or are more focused on their careers

Divorce is very sad and does not always benefit the family in the long run. Divorce causes heartache. In the words of Elder Dallin H. Oaks, “Divorce is not an all-purpose solution, and it often create long-term heartache.”  

Divorce is a hard and sensitive subject. Couples need to be careful when they decide to get divorced. I personally feel there are very VERY few situations in which couples should get divorced. But couples need to realize the many affects it can have on themselves and their families.

http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-evolution-of-divorce

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2007/04/divorce?lang=eng

Parenting

Parenting is so HARD! It seems almost everyone has their own view on parenting and yet it seems we, as a world, do not agree on the best way to parents. I believe following God's way of parenting is most beneficial. So why do we parent the way we do? Well I have a few observations. Here they are: some parents parent as husband and wife, male and female, because

- it is God ordained

- it is the way He parents and is His example

- it is the example from Adam and Eve

- it is a (more) stable environment 

- both the father and mother parent in different ways; the father focuses outside the home while the mother focuses in the home

President Faust has said, "Each parent is necessary at various times in a child’s development. Both fathers and mothers do many intrinsically different things for their children. Both are equipped to nurture children, but their approaches are different. Mothers seem to take a dominant role in preparing children to live within their families, present and future. Fathers seem best equipped to prepare children to function in the environment outside the family." 

Continuing on with our list: 

- the relationship between parents and children can't be found in any other relationship

- parents have similar tendencies and temperaments, so they can better teach and help children learn the way they learn

- society is affected by how we raise our children

In The Family: A Proclamation to the World it states: "HUSBAND AND WIFE have a solemn responsibility to love and care for each other and for their children. “Children are an heritage of the Lord” (Psalm 127:3). Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness, to provide for their physical and spiritual needs, and to teach them to love and serve one another, observe the commandments of God, and be law-abiding citizens wherever they live. " As we follow these teachings, we can become better parents and teach them in the Lords way. 

Please, please, please! Teach your children in God's way and example!

http://www.lds.org/ensign/2004/08/fathers-mothers-marriage?lang=eng 

http://www.lds.org/topics/family-proclamation 

Work and Family

When you think of work what comes to mind? What do you think of when someone says "I'm off to work!"? When you think about family what are the first few things that pop into your head? We need to combine the image of work and family as one, once again.
Oftentimes, people think of the family as one type of work and as going to work a more important type of work. In the history of the world, people first worked on their own lands. In Moses it says, "Adam began to till the earth, and to have dominion over all the beasts of the field, and to eat his bread by the sweat of his brow, as I the Lord had commanded him. And Eve, also, his wife, did labor with him." This shows that Adam and Eve, husband and wife and family, worked together to till the earth in order to provide for themselves what they needed. Work and family went together.
Sometime during the Industrial age, things started to change. Fathers left the home and went to work somewhere else. They no longer worked side by side with their families in order to provide the necessities, but they worked outside the home away from their families for up to twelve hours a day. This accumulates to about 60 hours a week now away from their families.
This created the statement that family and work are two very different things. But these things should not be separated. When fathers went away from the home for work, it created a change in shape and dynamics in the family. The mothers had to then become the head of household and with their children pick up the extra duties that the father no longer did while he was at work. Then when children started being sent off to work, the family shape changed once again. The mothers had to do all the housework herself with no help or support from the fathers or children. Then women also started to work outside the home, too. In Marriage and Family: The Quest for Intimacy, it states: "Industrialization meant that some of the things women did in the home, such s making clothes, would increasingly be done in the factory or shop. Women did continue, of course, to cook and clean and nurture their families. But in the emerging industrial economy, paid labor became a primary source of income and the essence of the meaning of work. What women did in the home was no longer defined as work." So this caused women's work that needed to be done in the home as less important or not important enough to be called real work, so it become known as housework. Many referred to real work where you actually get paid for doing something. Apparently, housework was not hard enough labor to be considered real work. This caused a separation in roles and boundaries of the family.
As more and more people move away from working from the home and working outside (even though it is necessary for most fathers now), it creates a disconnection from the family and work. families need to continue to work on family boundaries and roles to create a unified and strong, working together, family like we used to be in history.

Work is what you do in a family, as a family, together. 

Communicate Clearly

Everyone has heard the saying, "Communication is key to a successful marriage", but I don't think just communication is necessary for a successful marriage. You need to be able to communicate clearly in order to have more success with your spouse in communicating.

One way to communicate more clearly would be to use a soft startup, as John Gottman would say. In his book, The Seven Principles For Making Marriage Work, Gottman states: "A soft startup doesn't necessarily have to be...diplomatic. It just has to be devoid of criticism or contempt." A soft startup is approaching a subject or discussion starting in a calm manner. This allows for the communication between spouses to be more open, less on the defensive, and more clear.

Some ways that we can communicate more clearly are:
- the feedback loop
- slow down when speaking
- think about what you are going to say before you say something you will later regret
- repeat/restate what the other person has said to make sure you understand clearly
- listen better --> active listening and validation
- ask questions to clarify
- be mindful of tone
- don't be afraid of silence
- don't beat around the bush
- Use "I feel" statements
- focus on one issue at a time and not several things at a time
- express love clearly and frequently to spouse

President Harold B. Lee once said the following, "You're to teach the old doctrines, not so plain that they can just understand, but you must teach the doctrines of the Church so plainly that no one can misunderstand." This is talking about teaching, but I think it applies to communication, as well. We need to communicate not just so our spouses can understand, but so clearly and plainly that they cannot misunderstand. Communicating clearly will definitely benefit your marriage and strengthen it.

ABCX Model

In class this week we talked about the ABCX model developed by Reuben Hill. I think that as this model can help us recognize how events in our lives have effected us and as we learn of this model, we can choose to have a more positive outlook on our trials and life experiences.

            In the ABCX model the A stands for Actual event, the B stands for Both resources and responses, the C stands for Cognition, and the X stands for the total eXperience.  In the book Marriage and Family: The Quest for Intimacy, it states, “There are numerous commonplace tensions and strains in most of our lives. If some additional stressors in the form of unemployment, serious illness, or severe personal or interpersonal problems occur, their cumulative effect can lead to illness in the family or to some kind of crisis of well-being.” Every family has crises or problems that arise. It is important to recognize where the stress is coming from. Once you know where the stress is coming from, you can appropriately deal with the situation. But every family will have stresses and crises.

When you recognize the actual event, you can use your resources to be able to better handle to crises. How you think of the situation also effects the total experience of the crises. You choose how you think and how you act and react to a situation. In Doctrine and Covenants section 58 verse 28 it states: “For the power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves.” We are all our own agents. We choose how we act or react to a crises. As we apply the ABCX model and remember it in our crises, we will be able to come out of them stronger. 

Sexual differences in men and women

I think it is very important that young adults know the differences in men and women and their states of arousal. I think the more adults that understand this, will better understand themselves and their spouse when they are married and engaged in sexual intimacy. The four phases are excitement, plateau, orgasm, and then refractory (for men). Some differences in these stages are that men get more excited quicker than women.

 During an orgasm, men build up fluid and then release it, which is not the same for women. In the Marriage and Family: The Quest for Intimacy book, it states: “The orgasm takes the least time of any of the stages. Usually it involves muscular contractions and intense physical feelings that occur in the matter of a few seconds and are followed by rapid relaxation. Again, there are physiological changes that occur in both men and women. Women have anywhere from 3 to 15 muscular contractions during orgasm. These contractions occur in various muscles through their bodies. They also have changes in their brain wave patters. Women my have multiple orgasms if they have continuing stimulation and interest. For men, orgasm occurs in two distinct phases. In the first phase, muscular contractions force semen through the penis. The man experiences a sense of having gotten tot eh point where he can no longer control himself; ejaculation is inevitable. In the second phase, additional muscular contractions lead to ejaculation.” As we can see from this, men and women react very differently during an orgasm.

Girls usually think about several things at once, while guys focus on one thing at a time. Women usually need to feel comfort and loved before they will have sex, while men will have sex in order to feel loved and comfort. In a scientific journal I read about this. In part of it, it said, “ A large body of scientific research documents four important gender differences in sexuality. …Women place greater emphasis on committed relationships as a context for sexuality.” Women need to feel secure and love before engaging in intercourse and men need to engage in intercourse to feel security and love.

Men’s anatomy is all outside while women’s anatomy is somewhat inside the body. So it is more obvious when guys are aroused than when women are aroused. In sexuality, men usually peak around the age of 18 while women usually peak around age 30. These differences are very important in understanding yourself and your spouse relating to intercourse.

http://cdp.sagepub.com/content/12/2/37.short