Marriage Moats

Published: Sat, 04/03/10

Marriage Moats Caring for Marriage
28:365 - At Dusk by charamelody.

The Divorce Remedy: The Proven 7-Step Program for Saving Your Marriage

by Michele Weiner Davis

We have heard Michele present several times, and she has a lot to say. She is a fast talking, witty woman with decades of experience and she says she has seen every possible problem in her practice.

I think I believe her.

In her book she outlines the obstacles and the ways to navigate them. Reading her descriptions fits the experience of many people we have talked to about their aching marriages. Michele has no interest in indulging you in sympathy.
 
"Yeah, yeah I know it's hard. Let's start changing it."

She begins by debunking a lot of myths, like good couples never argue, major disagreements get resolved over time, both partners will have the same idea of what love feels like, and people can "fall out of love". All of these potholes can catch us when we are not looking, and make us fall. 

 Michele has a startling answer for her clients who claim to have fallen out of love.
"When you first got married if someone said to you that in a number of years you would fall out of love, you would not believe that person. Your positive feelings for your partner at that time would have prevented you from even entertaining the possibility that love would die. Well the same is true in reverse. Your current negative feelings are blinding you to the possibility that you will ever feel different again." p 55

 I know as a new mother I was devastated the first hundred times my child said "I hate you Mommy!" Once a nursling added, "I hate you Mama, can I nurse?" After awhile I realized that those feelings, however genuine they feel at the time, are no more real than the sunrise. It sure is a convincing production... the sun slides up the horizon, in a splash of golden and rosy rays after having deserted me. It was gone, unavailable... but oops it was really me that turned away. 

 A friend told me, "If you are feeling far away from God, guess who moved." Sometimes when I am feeling far away from my partner it is me who has built a wall around myself of self righteous arguments, resentment, self pity and blame. The walls come crashing down in the face of compassion, laughter, forgiveness and touch.