Rough 1st Draft
It's important to learn the skills for successful marriage. When things are not well between a couple there are only a few choice. The couple could divorce, stay together and be miserable, or learn the skills necessary successful marriage. Rather than list the things that should not be done, let me list of things that can be done to improve any marriage.
Each of the couple should learn to say positive reinforcing and encouraging things to their spouse. This is even more helpful if it is done in front of the children, friends, and neighbors. We learn how to do fun things, especially those things you did when 1st married. Praise each other publicly.
Make big decisions as a team. Try to work cooperatively. Learning the skills to De-escalate disagreements before they get to the points when things are said and done which make an indelible mark. Put effort into creating a total marriage make over. Try really hard to press the restart button and reboot the marriage. Don’t entrench yourself in a win loose competition.
For restoration to occur through counseling, it’s not only God’s grace and the counselor’s knowledge, skills, and abilities, but the couples hard work. Both client’s hard work. When one of the couple or is unwilling to do the hard work toward restoration, the probabilities of divorce greatly increase. Retrovaille is an important part of restoration. It is a healing ministry of the Holy Catholic Church and has much power to heal.
People interested in the pursuit of holiness can spend a lot of time in practices to foster their holiness. Married people also practice the pursuit of holiness. Since we know we are to present ourselves as living sacrifices, and since we know that after the sacrament of marriage the two become one, those interested in holiness, best practice, is to present our marriage to God as a living sacrifice. Presenting the marriage to God reduces self interest and is more unitive. It is a good prayer to ask God to make you holy. It’s a different type of good prayer to ask God to make your marriage a holy and acceptable living sacrifice.
I’m not going to speak at length about separation. Just know there are two types of separation: separation as the precursor to divorce and separation as a strategy to reset the marriage. Sometimes separation to reset the marriage is exactly what God wants the couple to do. This is evidenced by their healing and restoration which didn’t occur prior to the separation. (Bad Separation)
A True Story
A Catholic priest told the following story at a marriage conference. He and another priest, both wearing priestly garb were taking a plane ride. It was a large plane with three seats on his side and two seats to his left. There was a woman sitting next to them who he did not pay much attention to until the flight attendant started serving food. The flight attendant asked her what she would like from the available choices. They went back and forth for a while until the woman said she did not want any food because she was fasting. The priest continued his story saying that this caught his attention and he struck up a conversation with her. When he asked her what she was fasting for her response shocked him. She knew he was a priest by how he was dressed. She looked into his eyes and said that she and her friends were fasting for the destruction of Christian marriages. She didn’t say Buddhist, Hindu or atheistic marriages or even Jewish marriages, but Christian marriages. What are the odds of two priests and a witch sitting together on a plane? The friend she referred to were her coven. Even the dark side of spirituality knows about the power of fasting and practices it. Some where in the Bible it mentions that sometimes when we meet someone it is actually an angel, so I guess sometimes we can be sitting by a witch, warlock, or Satanic high priest without knowing it. If we are exposed to these evil souls, what hexes or curses are they inclined to put on us? That is why as Christian soldiers we must pray a lot, because they enemy hates our guts and our marriages.
Post Abortion Marriage Problems
The previous section explored intra psychic grief. Intra psychic grief is grief exclusively within only one persons mind, will, emotions, spirituality, etc. This section focuses on grief from an inter psychic perspective. More specifically, griefs inter subjectivity between a couple.
Even the best of marriages, those that are a match made in Heaven, have problems. When there is premeditated abortion, there is a very high probability that divorce is in their future. When they don’t divorce, the marriage becomes more like a skeleton marriage, an unfulfilled marriage, they sense the spark is missing. What is missing is the aborted child. Abortion plagues their relationship, sometimes indefinitely. Most married post abortive’s eventually realize that their abortion experience compromised their marriage because it had a terrible impact on their emotional, physical and spiritual intimacy. All other sources of marital problems aside, when a couple is grieving an abortion loss, it often pounds a wedge between them.
Men and women have been socialized differently regarding grief. When a young boy cries he might be hit and told, "Be a man." "Don't be a sissy.""Boys don't cry." So as the boy grows up he concludes that sharing his tears and his feelings are not in his best interest. He learned, it’s not wrong for women but it is wrong for men. This may be unconscious but it rules his male thinking. Men don’t like talking about their grief because they feel embarrassed and ashamed. His sense of manhood is compromised by crying, so in order to keep his own self respect he does not wish to share his feelings. Men possess the ability to outwardly contain their emotions and often cry in private. Even at a funeral men don’t usually cry. They talk about the deceased’s medical condition, their “legal will,” or how the deceased are in a better place etc., but never about their own personal feelings of loss, with the exception of, “We will miss him.”
The grieving processes between men and women will never be 100% calibrated. St. Francis’ Prayer for Wisdom, colloquially known as the Serenity Prayer tasks us to accept that men and women grieve differently. Grief calibration can be likened to the,”Love languages.” It is important that the love language of each partner be known to the other. When they don’t synchronize, havoc reigns. For example, one of the spouses whose love language is acts of service, may not feel loved by their spouse who has a different way of showing love. This being said, men grieve the way men grieve and women grieve the way women grieve. It’s not that since men don’t grieve like women that they are unable to grieve. Likewise, women don’t grieve like men, it’s not that women don’t grieve. The two gender styles don’t match and each could have hurt feelings because they don’t understand or know each other’s heart. Men and women, each with their gender specific grief style, can learn to synchronize their different grieving styles. Ideally, this would bring a couple closer together. They can be the best support for each other by talking with each other about their aborted baby. This quells each other’s pain since sharing their grief is a form of intimacy.
Men usually process their grief through their cognition, and women through their affect. Women process grief by expressing feelings by talking, often with tears. Men prefer to “think through” rather than “talk.” Men also naturally grieve through activity. They start projects, jump into hobbies, exercise harder, put a cross on the side of the road, etcetera.
Men can process grief faster than women. This complicates the wife’s grieving because it seems her husband is insensitive. He may make statements like, “It’s been three months just get over it.” His unspoken subtext being, “Please stop hurting me by bringing it up.” His unconscious motivation is, using suppression, “out of sight out of mind.” The wife feels hurt because she concludes he does not care about the aborted child. Problems arise when the wife wants to talk about her emotional pain but the husband tries to fix her grief instead of empathize. In many cases the wife feels isolated and ignored in her grief. Sometimes men don't want to talk to their spouse about their aborted child because they simply don't want to upset the mother. He naturally desires to be the rock that she leans on. It’s an unconscious motivation, which he feels good about being that way. Even though it is hard for many men to talk about their grief, even to their wives, to do it for their wife’s sake, in patience and kindness, is showing her love.
Couples who had an abortion may never ever speak about their abortion for the rest of their lives. They may not disclose this secret to any living children. There is no direct abortion trauma in the children caused by the abortion except for the increased marital discord. Since post abortion trauma takes a toll on the parents they may act out and treat the children in ways that are different than if they did not have the abortion. Since the shame of abortion keeps the abortion a secret, even a new spouse may not ever find out.
Post abortive men and women can drag a lot of post abortion trauma into a second marriage. The post abortive’s emotional baggage from a previous marriage can create damage in a second marriage. Non-post abortive spouses who know about their spouses abortion sometimes find it difficult to understand that their spouse did not get over it yet, that they are still suffering, and this impacts their present relationship. Spouses who have not personally experienced an abortion don’t fully understand how their spouses abortion trauma can effect their own marriage. Because the spouse doesn’t understand the ramifications of abortion’s trauma they may wonder what they are doing wrong. For example, the new husband did not get her pregnant or contribute to her getting the abortion, but her abortion trauma reaps havoc in his marriage. Another example, sometimes the abortion trauma prevents the wife from engaging more deeply than superficial intimacy. Another example, someone may unknowingly marry a post abortive depressed person. They don’t see their depressed spouse’s challenging behaviors as being from a psychiatric disorder. They perceive their spouse as being mean to them. Very often when the depressed spouse gets on an antidepressant many of their marriage problems go away.
Marriage Work
For some reason it doesn’t cross either spouses mind to grant mutual forgiveness. Forgiveness will set both free from all types of stinking thinking as well as prevent additional problems. This is easily resolved with communication. What is it that prevents them from asking their spouse for forgiveness? Often the pain of the loss makes them just want to be alone. That becomes tricky when married.
When the over demanding family member will not put effort into improving it comes down to the healthier family member to cope. Discernment requires the wisdom to know the difference between what one can change and what one can’t change. If the healthy family member correctly discerns that the pathological family member will not change, best practice, beg God for a miracle. Bring it to the spouse once or twice. If they don’t change, refer it to God, don’t be a nag.
When a spouse puts an inordinate amount of effort into helping their spouse, inordinate meaning beyond God’s will regarding effort, it can bleed their soul dry. Burnout to the 10 millionth power. This is why in the divine office several times a year it says in order to take care of other souls you must first take care of your own soul. This is not selfishness, this is the word of God.
Many post-abortive people report they experience a lot of healing through the unconditional love from their family members especially their spouses.
During marriage counseling a counselor would assess if any marriage problems are directly attributable to an abortion.
Remember the person is not the problem, the person’s problem is the problem. You are not married to the problem but to the person. It will be a much happier marriage if the problem could be expelled from the family system. This way it wouldn’t be a threesome. It would reduce from being you, your spouse, and the pathology to a simple husband-and-wife dynamic
How does the death of the aborted baby fit into a family that has other living children. There are many different ways. Sometimes the woman never tells her husband that she had an abortion with a different man or she aborted his child.
In a healthy family system it is normal to help each other. Dysfunctional family systems are different. Often the more we help someone, the number of units of help per day increase in frequency, intensity, and duration. This can reach the level of pathology. The person needing help can become dependent on that help which puts the helper under increasingly difficult pressures. This often goes unnoticed because it happens little by little over a long time.
Sustaining this unsustainable family system requires a lot of grace. Clearly, the accommodation of family system pathology must be halted and reversed. When an individual in the family has problems there is a spread of dysfunctional effect into other family members.
Couples With Mutual Allegations.
Learn to Take Responsibility for Their Own Part and Stop Blaming the Other.
Love is Patient, Kind etc
State of Emmnity and Reactivity
Turn Gaze Within
There are some predictors of divorce: no premarital counseling, unrealistic expectations, ignorance of the other persons personality and behaviors, and when you’re trying to change the other person. Another criteria a predictor of divorce is constant criticism .
So many people going into a marriage thinking that they can once married change the other person. This is not the case. The object is to look inward toward yourself not outward toward the other person. It is hard enough to change ourselves. We often try and fail. So, if we can’t change ourselves how can we change our stops?
In the 12 step programs they have a term called, “working your program.” This means that you’re following the program and doing the hard work. Now when two people in a a be a get married they are still supposed to keep on there program. It is a common phenomenon in a a, and not a good thing, when one of the spouses begins to work the other spouse’s program. This is a taboo thing to do a a councils against working someone else’s program. It really just means you get into someone else’s business and you take the focus off yourself which is where it ought to be directed
living together: generally there is a commitment problem and more abuse and infidelity.
Generally women went together to secure a man for marriage. While a man lives to get the benefits of marriage without commitment. An argument could be made that he doesn’t really love you until he buys a rain and before God and family marries.
A woman with strong self-esteem would probably think that she is to valuable and that she is not giving herself to any man who is unwilling to marry. That he should move out for marriage.
Helping women feel secure isn’t made by money that men put things in front of her she knows where her man’s heart is. Turning your heart to her makes her feel secure.
Women need her husband to be open. A woman trust a sacrificial man man trusts and honoring woman woman can’t because she doesn’t want to go first. Men shut down because wife is critical, judgmental, not respectful, and sometimes talks to others.
For a happy marriage God is first, then each other. The most important issue in a marriage is a personal relationship with God.
You are giving everything to ministry, I am second. Don’t blame me on the altar of your success. You may say your spouse is first of where are you giving your time and energy.
Objectifying women: a man could say he is pursuing his wife but it’s really just only to satisfy his sexual needs. It’s not being loved for the whole entire being. It’s like using the wife as a tool. I have heard many women say that when they are having sex they are not making love and really all he is doing is masturbating inside me. Basically she believes she is being used.
Counseling can save the marriage, but God can help the couple work through the contamination of an affair.
Tell them you not going to save the marriage, but you are going to help them work through the old marriage that became contaminated by the affair. Working through it is important to whether they stay married or not. Working through the marriage is important because as you are going to be in each other’s presence in the future. The goal is to stay focused on the target which is to work through the trauma of the infidelity. Another goal would be to get them talking about their marriage and less about the affair.
Everything the betrayed spouse knows he will have to forgive. Will also have to work on healing visual images. The spouse who had the affair can’t pay for this. There is no way to pay for adultery or betrayal. When couples can’t recover from adultery it usually comes from one of two sources: personal history and incomplete forgiveness. The perpetrator should take some time and list everything that he wants forgiveness for. Only does one chance to do this. Be thorough.
The betrayed spouse has the right to know anything and everything they want to know, if there is any chance to save the marriage there needs to be full disclosure with no restrictions.
So many times in a marriage counseling up spoken to wives and asked them to describe how they feel about their marriage and they come up with all kinds of different answers, usually the ones that aren’t good but then I asked him the question, “do you feel numb in your relationship?” In their eyes light up in a safe yeah that’s what I’m feeling was never able to put my finger on it. Without going into the psychology behind that just know that that happens they are kind of delivered and set free by being able to articulate it. Another woman was talking about how her whole entire family is in each other’s business so much and it causes so much from a and causes her so much pain. I asked her has she ever heard the word enmeshment. She said no we talk about it briefly and as a homework assignment I told to go home and like Google it. Next session she said things like I never knew there was a word for what I was experiencing I thought I was going crazy understanding the definition of the word enmeshment help clean out so many cobwebs in my thinking.”
In marriage counseling I ask the spouses how they feel. Once they finish I ask, Do you feel numb?” Very often their eyes light up and they rerspond, “That’s what I’m feeling but I wasn’t ever able to put my finger on it. Another woman was talking about how her whole entire family is in each other’s business so much and it causes so much drama and pain. As homework I tasked her to google enmeshment. Next session she said things like I never knew there was a word for what I was experiencing. I thought I was going crazy. Understanding the definition of the word enmeshment help clean out so many cobwebs in my thinking.”
If the wife requires the husband and her to attend counseling to stay married instead of getting a divorce over the adultery the husband is initially very compliant. The things heard in counseling by the husband are as follows, “I’m sorry. I love you very much,” “I’ll never do it again,” “I’ll do what ever it takes to save my marriage.” Eight sessions into counseling the husband’s tune changes. He is now saying things like, “It was two months ago why can’t you just get over it?” He becomes aggressive complaining that she is not responding well. Well how can she, the sword is still in her heart and the wound is mortal.
When a husband consistently commits emotional abuse to his wife one of the consequences of emotional abuse is that the wife begins to think she is crazy. There are several reasons for this. It could be identification with the aggressor but more likely it is that anytime she starts to speak sense to him, it puts him in overload and his quick response to diminish the overload by saying, “ your crazy.” Being called crazy for so long she starts to believe it. When a person finally begins to truly and actually experience their stunted grief response they also sometimes wonder whether or not it is they or their spouse who is crazy.” This reasoning that they are crazy is a thinking error and the mom just really needs to talk to other moms and she will realize that she is not crazy that her thinking, postabortion is very common. Not normal, but very common.
Wake up emotionally distant men are actually pushing their wives away.
Marriage... The person who needs help can more easily proceed with healing when their spouse agrees to help. If you don’t help there is a good chance that you’re only making matters worse.
Guilt can serve a very good purpose in a marriage. When we do something wrong it makes us repentant and apologetic. With forethought guilt helps us realize that something we want to do will hurt the other person and it therefore prevents the hurt from occurring.
When we have sex with someone, regarding STDs, we are having sex with everybody that they had sex with. Similarly when we are engaged in a relationship, our partner brings into that relationship something in addition to their purified self. They bring into the relationship their family of origin issues, emotional baggage from previous relationships, their own subclinical psychopathology as well as any clinical psychopathology, and they bring in their own fallen nature.
Marriage... In order for marriage to work, both have to learn to responsibly manage their anger.
Marriage... It seems that shame specifically attacks marital intimacy because intimacy requires vulnerability which a shameful person does not have. They can’t be genuine because nobody wants to talk about their shame. People will talk about the depression, anxiety, and failures etc. but people do not want to talk about their shame. Talking about shame is experienced as shameful.
Marriage ... Shame can place a wedge between a couple and drive them away from each other. This can happen because they find themselves in a shaming relationship. Their perceptions can become distorted so that they are only interested in people who will shame them.