Honey, honey, HONEY? Oh, what? You never listen to me! Is this a common occurrence in your marital conversations? I bet if I were to do an informal poll, this would most likely be right at the top of the list complaints! Well, here is a video that might just give you a bit of encouragement – enjoy!

http://www.wimp.com/mastertroll/

About the author: By Julie Hellstrom

Julie and Matt have been married for 23+ years and have the belly laughs and wrinkles to prove it! They are also awesome parents to five adopted kiddos and the owner of the How To Fix My Marriage website.

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The blame game! We know what it is and we know how to do it. There is no denying it. This little maneuver can be destructive at best and show stopping at worst.

Why? Why do we blame our spouse? Well there are a couple of reasons. First, it is easier to see another’s faults instead of our own. So many times, I have heard a couple go into counseling with at least one of them saying, “I will go to help them”. Well the good news is IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO. No marriage problems are only one person’s problem. I am not saying fault, I am saying problem. If your spouse has been unfaithful, they are responsible for their behavior, and this has now become a marriage problem that both spouses must invest  in to it to fix.

Second, blame is a way to discharge pain and discomfort. This really ties to #1 because it is painful to be introspective. And it takes effort, honesty and humility. Those cause discomfort. Much easier to not even go there.

What? What does blaming look like? That is easy – You did this, You didn’t do this, You forgot, You said, You, You, You! Whenever you hear this word repeatedly in a “discussion” with your spouse, red flags need to be waving! This is commonly referred to by our marriage therapist as “being on their side of the street”. Now hear me here, you can name the behavior (you forgot to pick up the kids) but you cannot say why they did that. This is called assuming and we are not mind readers.

How? Ok we know the why and the what, but how do we handle an argument without blaming. Try this for starters.

1. If  there is a behavior behind the problem, name it.
2. Then, tell them how their behavior made you feel. Not “when you forget to let the dog in last night and I had to, I know you did that on purpose and it made me feel mad”. (see the you in the 2nd part, the your feeling part).
3. Then listen. Without any presuppositions. Listen and repeat back what you heard to be sure you got it.
4. Don’t be afraid to start #1 in the middle of an argument gone sideways.

Let me give you an example – “when you didn’t lock the doors last night, I felt unsafe”. This hopefully starts the ball rolling without defenses up right from the get go.

This takes practice and I promise you, there will be ample opportunities for that!

About the author: By Julie Hellstrom

Julie and Matt have been married for 23+ years and have the belly laughs and wrinkles to prove it! They are also awesome parents to five adopted kiddos and the owner of the How To Fix My Marriage website.

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I’ve been married twice. The first time I was married, I never had a fight with my spouse. Never. Our marriage ended up in divorce after 5 years, with infidelity, alcohol, and drugs contributing to the problem. I’m not saying that it wouldn’t have happened if we had fought often, but one thing I know for sure – it’s not only healthy, but necessary to have fights with your spouse.

I’m not saying physical fights – that’s never appropriate, obviously. What I am saying is that a good argument at least once a week is necessary to the sustained growth and closeness of a marriage.

That doesn’t make sense, you say? Well, not only did I hear this from a marriage program I’ve recently been watching, but I also heard it from a counselor we’ve seen over the years. In fact, he says he would like to see us have 10,000 more fights!

What??? 10,000 fights??? I couldn’t believe it when he told us that! This was right after a two or three day argument my wife and I had been having, and at that point I felt like I’d been dragged through a knothole. And here was this smart-aleck counselor telling me he thought we should go through this 10,000 more times. Great.

Well, I’m starting to see what he means, I think. Every time we have a fight, we come out of the other side of it a little closer, and know each other a little better. At least that’s if we resolve the conflict, and don’t just sweep it under the carpet.

If you go through your whole marriage without any fights, you will certainly not have the depth of relationship that God desires for you and your spouse. It hurts at the time, and can be extremely messy, but in my opinion it is one of the most worthwhile things that can happen in a marriage.

So next time you have a fight with your spouse, remember that it’s helping you to have a better marriage, and it might not hurt quite as bad.

Do you fight with your spouse all the time?

Learn how to resolve those conflicts in a healthy way.

Click here for more ideas on how to make your marriage the best it can be!

About the author: By Matt Hellstrom

Matt is the parent (along with his wife Julie) to five wonderful kids. He has been self-employed for 25+ years and is the owner of the How To Fix My Marriage website.

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I’ve recently been attending an adult Sunday School class at our church where we’ve been working our way through the Love and Respect DVD series by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. This DVD series has been a real eye-opener to both me and my wife, and it’s really helped us to identify some problems in our marriage and start to correct them.

The premise of the Love and Respect DVD (and of the Love and Respect Book for that matter) is that women need love and men need respect, mainly. This is not to say that women don’t need respect, and men don’t need love, it’s just that the way women and men are wired, these are their primary needs to feel fulfilled in their marriage.

The Love and Respect DVD starts out by talking about what Emerson Eggerichs calls “The Crazy Cycle”. The way this works is that without love the wife reacts without respect, and without respect the husband reacts without love, and without love she reacts without respect, and without respect he reacts without love, and on and on and on. It’s a cycle we get into as couples and it can be very, very destructive to a marriage.

Dr. Eggerichs goes on to talk about out to change “The Crazy Cycle” to “The Energizing Cycle”, which says the husband’s love motivates the wife’s respect, which motivates the husband’s love, which motivates the wife’s respect, and on and on and on. This is the cycle we want to get on in our marriage, and he gives us the tools to do that. It’s not really that hard.

Dr. Eggerichs also talks about how men and women see, say, and hear things differently. He says women see through pink sunglasses, hear through pink hearing aids, and speak through pink megaphones. Men see through blue sunglasses, hear through blue hearing aids, and speak through blue megaphones. He also says this is not bad, it’s how God created men and women. He says the way each of us think is not wrong, just different.

I find the Love and Respect DVD to be extremely insightful and accurate. Many marriage tools are more general and don’t offer that much help. Dr. Eggerichs is hilarious in his way of presenting the material and he really drives the point home well. My opinion is the DVD series and/or book are essential resources for all couples. Click here to read the product information, and don’t forget to read the reviews you’ll find there.  It would also make a great wedding present. In fact, there is nothing better that you can give a couple just starting out.

About the author: By Matt Hellstrom

Matt is the parent (along with his wife Julie) to five wonderful kids. He has been self-employed for 25+ years and is the owner of the How To Fix My Marriage website.

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Last night, I watched the season premiere of Jon and Kate Plus 8.  Since then, I have been very reflective on the hurt and anger exhibited by all. And I must say, they have seemed to reach a crossroads in their marriage. I must also say I disagree with Jon about the kids being “fine” if they, Jon and Kate, present themselves as a team and love them. And I also disagree with Kate’s remark, the kids don’t know what is going on (oh, they know!). In my humble opinion, the best thing you can do for your children is love and work through your differences with your spouse. As a child of divorce, it is very seldom that anyone wins or comes out fine. If they really are thinking of the kids, a viable answer here is work on the marriage. And I do speak from experience.

Three years ago, after 17 years of marriage, it appeared ours was headed for destruction. We had reached a point in which Matt wanted no more and I didn’t know what was happening or what to do. Don’t get me wrong here, I too knew there were serious issues, but we had limped and patched along for 17 years so what’s the biggie now? We too were at a crossroads. In a moment of desperation and fear, I threw out “let’s get counseling, if not for us for our kid’s sake”. Matt, thankfully, reluctantly agreed. And what happened then was astonishing.

We learned that the very basis of our problems started with our horrible communication skills. I was able to see how my “parenting” (yuck!) style of communication was belittling and demeaning. I had recognized this in other women, including Kate, but not in myself. I was broken and saddened.

Matt (if I may be so bold) saw how his choice to withdraw and not communicate in these situations did not help but added to the hurt. And it accumulated and accumulated until he was ready to burst and the only way to make it stop, leave. He felt empowered when he found his voice.  This too is common among men. Some, like Jon, find their voice and say “goodbye”. Some, like Matt, find their voice and say how they are feeling and why.

Then we learned the next big lesson, listening. And I had to do a lot of that and try not to be defensive. And we both, had to CHANGE. Because we were living out the definition of insanity in that we had been doing the same thing over and over and hoping for a different result.

There is more to this story, of course. I have only addressed the symptoms of the underlying problems here. And these things we have and still are facing and addressing both individually and together. This is important to healing and growing stronger together because without it the above is just bandaids.

Yep, they are at a crossroads. I hope and pray that their desire for their kids is real enough for them to jump off the treadmill their marriage has been on and into help that will prove their actions speak louder than their words.

About the author: By Julie Hellstrom

Julie and Matt have been married for 23+ years and have the belly laughs and wrinkles to prove it! They are also awesome parents to five adopted kiddos and the owner of the How To Fix My Marriage website.

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