Written by Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists, the Marriage in a Box blog shares insights into common relationship struggles, gives ideas for moving beyond the roadblocks, and helps you find your path to happiness – both individually and within your relationship.
Are you bored with your marriage? Does your marriage feel stale? How in the world does that happen? After a few years of marriage, couples settle into a routine. If both spouses work, they put in long days at work, run an errand or two on the way home, make dinner together, and relax a little before bed. Once children come along, work, chores, kid’s activities, errands etc. seem to consume all energy and sex doesn’t happen much anymore. Before you know it, you are stuck in a passionless marriage.
When a couple loses their passion, they tend to replace it with something else. Criticism and fighting, lack of interest in each other, or becoming married roommates. If you don’t want your marriage to become another divorce statistic, you need to find a way to build emotional intimacy and closeness again. It’s time to fan the flames of passion in your marriage.
Reconnect Emotionally
Partners that have been turning away from each other need to start turning back toward each other. Start taking an interest in what your partner is doing, what makes them happy, what they like to talk about, and what turns them on. Begin with a conversation. You need to address the elephant in the room.
“Honey, I love you and I believe you love me too. However, we don’t seem to cuddle or tease or have sex anymore and I want to understand how we can change that.”
You don’t lash out at your partner and start telling them what is wrong and what they need to do. That just pushes them further away. By reassuring your partner of your love and desire for them, you are drawing them into the conversation and asking for their help in solving the problem.
Reignite the Spark
Remember when you were dating and couldn’t wait to be alone so you could start holding hands, hugging, kissing, cuddling, and you can take it from there. Try to recreate that sexual attraction. Take every opportunity to touch, hold hands, hug, and cuddle. Use those little signals that used to drive ho or her wild link a sexy wink, or a wry smile, lock eyes, linger in the kitchen over doing the dishes and lock fingers in the soapy water. Playful physical affection often reignites the spark.
Get Your Sexy On
When was the last time you flirted with him or her? Well start it up again! Everyone wants to feel like they are desirable to their partner. Find a flirty, sexy song on YouTube and email him or her the link. Write a little naught note and stick it in his wallet or her purse. Give your partner a long, lingering kiss goodbye for work in the morning. Sweep your spouse up in your arms when you get home from work at night.
Carve out time to spend ALONE with your partner
Get up a little early in the morning and meet in the shower for a soapy interlude. Meet for an intimate lunch. Put the kids to bed early, turn off the TV and put on some soft music to cuddle to with a glass of wine. Hire a babysitter or take the kids to Grandma’s and go enjoy a night out together. The important thing is to make time for each other to talk, share your hopes and dreams, romance your partner, and focus on US.
Revisit Your Sexual Relationship
Initiate affectionate touching such as a backrub, then a massage. Ask your partner what they like during foreplay and take your time building the tension and anticipation. Let yourself be vulnerable and encourage your partner to do the same by sharing your desires and fantasies.
Keep the Passion and Intimacy Alive
Never stop planning time for each other and time for intimate sex. Take every opportunity you can to take turns initiating sex. Experiment with ways to bring each other pleasure and get to know each other on a more intimate level. The greater your emotional intimacy is, the deeper your marital bond will be.
When two people exchange their wedding vows, they promise to love, honor, and cherish, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, for as long as they both shall live. The vow is stating that you pledge unconditional love to each other no matter what the circumstances are.
You pledged your love and support forever to your spouse. However, when life takes a sideways turn, one spouse can fear that the other spouse may not be there for them. All human beings need the reassurance that their spouse will love, care for, respect, and support them even in their lowest moments.
What is a supportive spouse?
Being a supportive spouse does not mean that you will wait on them hand and foot or do whatever they tell you. A supportive spouse is not someone who gives into your every demand. A supportive spouse is a true partner. It means that you support your spouse by:
- Giving them space to make their own Choices. No one likes to be told what to do or to have all their decisions made for them. Whether they are trying to make a major life decision such as whether to change jobs or start a business or smaller decisions such as whether to attend their high school reunion, be supportive by listening to them, discussing the matter with them, and allowing them to make the choice.
- Encourage your spouse to tackle something new to them or important to them. Support your spouse by becoming their biggest cheerleader in whatever they undertake to do. Pump up their self-esteem and let you know you believe in their abilities.
- Respect your partner and let them know they are important to you. Listen to what your spouse has to say and make them feel like you are truly interested by participating in the conversation. Ask for your partner’s opinion before making decisions about things you both will use, share, do.
- Give of your time to be with them and attend functions important to them. People’s lives are busy, and in many families, both spouse’s work. Make sure that you make your spouse a priority in your life. Schedule date nights, keep a calendar of events or functions that you both want to attend together. If you say you will be there, be there.
How to become a supportive spouse?
You support your spouse by how you communicate and show your support.
Communication involves:
- Listening to your partner without judgement
- Participating in the conversation
- Trying to Understand your spouse’s opinion
- Respecting their Point of view
- Being honest
- Expressing gratitude to your spouse
- Being a Cheerleader
- Making time to sit and talk
- Apologizing when you are wrong
- Praise your spouse often
Showing your spouse support means:
- Paying attention to your spouse
- Being considerate to your spouse
- Helping your spouse
- Viewing your spouse as a partner
- Taking time to be with, play, laugh with your spouse
- Respecting your spouse’s time and individual plans
- Viewing your spouse’s needs as equal to yours
- Give your spouse their space
- Be thoughtful and empathetic
- Let your spouse do things their way
- Give your spouse the benefit of the doubt
Even if you have not been supportive in the past, you can start being a more supportive spouse today by doing better at communicating and showing your spouse that you love, care about, respect, and want to support them.
When you feel safe enough with your spouse to be yourself, you know you are in a supportive relationship. When you trust your spouse and believe that you can count on them in any situation, you have built a solid, supportive marriage.
Life is full of ups and downs. As often as life brings happy moments, it can deal out disappointments. Everyone is wired differently. Some people are flexible and open. They can “go with the flow” and maintain healthy relationships. Others can be somewhat rigid and closed. They may have difficulty navigating fluctuating circumstances.
In most relationships, especially ones that are longstanding or close, there are going to be differences, arguments and hurt feelings. Most times, people try to work through the rough patches, apologize and forgive, and then move past the issue. But sometimes a relationship gets stuck in a hurtful place and a grudge develops.
A grudge is a longstanding feeling of disappointment, resentment or anger toward another person which interferes with trust and openness in a relationship. Most grudges stem from an inability to express anger directly to a person who has been hurtful or unkind.
How to Handle a Grudge
If you have done something to hurt your spouse, you need to apologize sincerely. Try to understand why what you did was hurtful to your spouse. Acknowledge that you hurt them and ask for their forgiveness. This lets your spouse know that you are taking ownership of what you did and acknowledging your regret for causing them pain.
When you have hurt your spouse, you need to reassure them of your love for them. If you do not understand why they were hurt by what you said or did, you need to gently reassure your spouse that you love them and never meant to hurt them. Ask them to talk to you about their feelings and give them a chance to talk through their hurt.
Don’t expect forgiveness. Depending on what was said or done, you may have to be patient and give your spouse time to work through their pain. Forgiveness often takes time. Be patient and gently remind them that you care.
How to let go of a Grudge
In a marriage, when your spouse does something that hurts you deeply, you must eventually make a choice. Either turn inward and away from your spouse and hold on to that anger and hurt or find a way to move past it and forgive your spouse.
Holding a grudge does not hurt your spouse. It hurts you. Holding a grudge does not make you strong, it makes you bitter. By holding onto your anger at being hurt or betrayed, you are choosing to play the victim.
Holding a grudge is unhealthy and stands between you and intimacy with your spouse. You are choosing to shut your spouse out of your life. If you choose to continue to hold the grudge, you risk losing a deeply meaningful relationship in your life—your marriage.
Try to remember all the reasons you married your spouse and forgive them.
Forgiveness does not mean what happened was OK. The process of forgiveness is learning to let it go and move on.
Forgiveness is not given because your spouse deserves forgiveness. Forgiveness simply means that you are putting your grudge against the other person to rest.
Forgiveness does not make you weak, it sets you free.
Forgiveness is not for the benefit of your spouse. Forgiveness is for you because you deserve peace. Forgiveness frees you from negative thoughts about your spouse and makes room in your life for happiness.
Your marriage is tested when you go through a rough patch and come out the other side. Because you choose to work it out together rather than just give up, your marriage will likely be stronger, and you will regain the love and happiness that brought you together in the first place.
Did you know that the divorce rate is highest in January? Too often couples think it’s the holidays, big events, and vacations that make marriage work. It is not the big events, special occasions, or vacations that make a relationship strong or happy. Those things are fleeting. When the holidays or special events are over, you get back from the get-away, and things fall back into the same ole routine. Soon frustration sets in and the marriage begins to deteriorate……again.
If you leave you the dishes in the sink every day, the kitchen will begin to smell. Don’t mow the lawn or weed the yard for a month and you’ll soon see grass and weeds taking over your yard. To keep anything in strong working order requires maintenance. The same is true of your marriage relationship. Here are 10 healthy habits of happily married couples that will change your relationship…permanently.
- Talking is giving each other your undivided attention and being truly interested in what your spouse has to say. It’s not about the information; it’s about the connection.
- Kisses are sometimes more revealing than words. A kiss has a familiarity, an intimacy, and a connection that says, “you are my love.”
- Compliments are the flirtations of married couples. They let you know you are still attractive to your spouse. They let you know you are appreciated by your spouse.
- When we share intimacy with someone, when we tell them secrets, share values and passions with them, we connect on a deeper level. We “know them.”
- When you sweat together, there is an animal magnetism that is released. The exertion releases adrenalin that energizes you both.
- When you do things that you both enjoy together, you relax, enjoy each other’s company, and bond from a simple sharing of life.
- Work Together. When you work on projects or home chores or errands together, you learn to value each other more. The shared purpose and comradery can build an emotional connection.
- Touch often. When you have a headache, rubbing your temples can ease the pain. A backache is often relieved with a muscle massage. Touch has a relaxing, healing affect that belies trust. So, hold hands, gently touch your spouse’s face or arm.
- Laughter can diffuse tension, soothe arguments, fill an awkward silence. When you can laugh with your spouse, you can approach difficult situations from a better angle. Laughter is the best medicine.
- Show them you Care. Caring means letting someone know that you see them and value them. Say hello in the morning and give them a hug to let them know you want their presence. Say goodbye and wave when they leave to let them know you will miss them.
Start building these health habits unto your marriage daily and watch the positive changes in your relationship flourish.
Tis the week before Christmas and the cookie baking is done, and most of the holiday parties are over. This is the week that most people focus on family and spending time with loved ones. Have you gotten that special something for your spouse yet? Have you and your spouse carved out any time to spend together?
So often, most of use become so busy in the traditions, rituals, parties, and decorations of the holidays that we forget to make time for “us”. It’s not too late to deliberately connect to your spouse and make the holiday special.
Set the Scene for Cuddling.
Put the kids to bed and build a warm, crackling fire in the fireplace. Turn the TV off and put some music on low. Light a few candles and sit down with some steaming mugs of hot chocolate or tea and snuggle up together. There is something comforting about just relaxing, decompressing, and snuggling up in the arms of your sweetie.
Get Out Together.
Who doesn’t love the twinkling Christmas lights, wreaths, nativity, Santa, and his reindeers, and all the other decorations that reminds us that it is Holiday time? Go take a walk through a Nativity or drive through a Holiday light display and enjoy strolling hand in hand with your spouse. If you are feeling more ambitious, go ice skating together.
Go shopping together.
Perhaps you still have more items to get on your Holiday shopping list. Enlist your partner’s help and go have lunch at a sweet little café, spend some time just talking and the go shopping together.
Have a wrapping party.
Pour two glasses of sparkling cider or wine. Get out all the wrapping paper, boxes, ribbon, tags, scissors, and tape. Put on Mariah Carey or Michael Bublé’s Christmas album. Then, have fun wrapping the presents together and putting them under the tree.
Give each other a massage.
After all the stress of working and trying to get ready for the holidays, a relaxing, sensual massage sounds heavenly. Get a jar of coconut oil at a local health food store. Go in the bedroom and lock the door. Put few scented candles around and play some soft music.
Give your spouse a slow massage with the coconut oil first working deep into the muscles and then gradually getting softer. Next, it is your turn to get a massage from your spouse. Who knows where this could lead to?
Don’t forget the romance.
Have a quiet dinner together and lean in as you talk to each other.
Turn on some music and slow dance in the living room.
Put on provocative lingerie and seduce your spouse.
It doesn’t really matter what you decide to do together, as long as you are doing it together and connecting without distractions. Take some time this holiday season to tune out the worldly noise and to-do lists and spend some quality time with your spouse. It will do wonders for your marriage and make your holiday spirits bright.
The holidays bring out both the best and the worst in people. It is a time for thinking of others, reaching out to family, and spreading good cheer. Unfortunately, it can also be a time of focusing on what you don’t have, grudges you have against friends or family members, and all the work you must do. Don’t spend the holiday fighting with your spouse! Plan together on how to avoid holiday fights, so you make the holidays a time of togetherness, fun, and getting closer in your marriage.
How to handle those holiday fights
With a little planning and compromise, you can make sure that the holiday stress won’t have you screaming at each other for no good reason.
You love to get in the holiday spirit with all the decorations, activities, baking and wrapping that goes along with Christmas but your spouse could care less.
Spend some time together talking about what the holidays mean to you both. Your spouse may not have had a good holiday experience as a child. Tell them about how doing things together as a family creates memories that you want to be important to you both. Your Spouse may be more likely to participate if they feel that it is a way to build a deeper connection.
Every year, you do all the buying of Christmas gifts, and your spouse complains about the money you spend.
Sit down and make a gift list and a detailed budget together. Set a shopping date you can go and buy the gifts together. This way, your spouse can feel like they have a say in what gifts are bought and how much is spent. It’s also a good way to get in the holiday spirit together and get some “together time.”
All the stress of holiday events and parties leaves no time for the two of you.
It is essential that you and your spouse spend quality time together during the holidays. You both must make time for your marriage. Go to a holiday party but leave early so you two can have a little date night. It’s okay to say no to a holiday invite so that you and your spouse can spend a quiet night in relaxing and cuddling. You need to work together to reconnect and take a break from all the stress.
Your spouse loves spending time with his family at the holidays, but your family wasn’t very close, so you are a little resentful.
Build in escape time where the two of you can go for coffee, talk, repair, and clear the air. That way, when you say something inappropriate to your brother-in-law that irritates your spouse, you'll have a time to talk it out. Escape time will help you get through the holidays without letting things build up, so you end up fighting with your spouse.
You dread having the in-laws for holiday dinner because your mother-in-law always manages to push your buttons and your spouse gets irritated with you for not getting along.
Before you host the in-laws, talk to your spouse about how their mother-in-law treats you and ask them to help you keep a calm gathering this year. Agree that when you had all you can take of his mother-on-law, you will give a signal -like sneezing twice-and your spouse will respond by asking you to help them in the kitchen. Having your spouse remove you from the situation avoids a confrontation with his family and brings you closer together as a couple. You are the damsel in distress, and he is the knight in shining armor.
The best ways to avoid a conflict or quickly end an argument is planning and communicating.
Everyone remembers that scene in the movie “The Santa Clause” where Tim Allen is watching a TV video of how to cook a delicious turkey dinner and then the camera pans to Tim’s actual kitchen where the turkey is on fire in the oven, and he is spraying it with a fire extinguisher. Often, that is how it turns out in real life when we try to live up to unrealistic expectations for the holidays.
When our dreams and expectations of the holidays don’t turn out like we plan, we are disappointed, depressed, stressed out and feeling anything but festive. Those family and friends that are spending holiday time with you don’t get to enjoy the real you. Avoid setting yourself up for disappointment by getting rid of these five unrealistic expectations for the holidays.
- Creating the perfect Holiday. This year, you are going to create the perfect holiday by inviting all the relatives for Christmas dinner and choosing the perfect gift to fit everyone’s tastes.
Everyone has one or two relatives they don’t really get along with. There is no rule that says you have to buy a gift for every relative in the family. No family is perfect, so there are no perfect holidays. Ask everyone to bring a dish and make Christmas dinner a potluck. Don’t serve alcohol so drunken behavior will not be a problem. Take a group photo and let that be the gift for every relative.
- Expecting people to change because it is the holiday. We are programmed by TV and movies to expect people to be cheerful and have a giving spirit at holiday time.
Unfortunately, a leopard does not change its spots. If someone is usually grumpy or sees the glass as half empty, they will likely continue to do so through the holidays. There are people that are tight with their money and somewhat selfish, so don’t expect them to open their wallets and go out of their way for others during the holidays. You cannot change other people, so focus on your own behavior and hope it will be a model for others.
- Expecting to be Super Woman. When you try to do too much, you end up stressed out and exhausted. Then you don’t have time to spend with your family. Don’t forget the reason for the season. Determine what’s really important! You don’t have to do or get everything single-handedly.
Most of the fun of the holidays is getting everyone in the family involved in the baking, decorating, shopping, wrapping, etc. Many hands make light work and happier spouses.
- Becoming Martha Stewart. TV and magazines blow up holiday expectations by showing videos and pictures of perfectly decorated cookies and beautifully dressed Christmas trees and mantles.
You do not have to bake the perfect cookies. Choose one or two recipes that everyone will like. Stop trying to be the decorator on the front page of the magazines. Look through what you have and do enough to be festive. Forget about the rest.
- Unlimited finances for Holidays. During the holiday season, too many couples spend like there is no tomorrow to create a magical holiday. When January comes, many find themselves buried under a mountain of debt.
Money does not grow on trees. Just because it is Christmas, does not mean your finances suddenly improved. Set a holiday budget with your spouse and stick to it. You don’t want sticker shock when the bills come due in January.
Before the Holiday season gets too far along, sit down with your spouse, and decide what you can realistically do for the Holidays, determine the cost, and stick to it. Make this holiday happy, stress-free, and affordable by focusing on what counts—being together with family and friends.
Most American adults (65 percent) have at some point combined their finances with a spouse or partner, according to a recent study by the National Endowment for Financial Education.
Of those couples, one out of every three have lied about or kept secret some of their financial details. For nearly half of the couples surveyed, the deception caused an argument. Thirteen percent ended up separating their finances. For 18 percent of the couples, the financial deception ultimately broke them apart.
Financial infidelity is when couples with combined finances lie to each other about money. Examples of financial infidelity can include hiding existing debts, excessive expenditures without notifying the other partner, and lying about the use of money.
Just 5 percent of people in relationships report having secret bank accounts, but women are 50 percent more likely to do so than men. And women aged 45-54 are more than four times as likely as their male peers to have a secret bank account.
When you’re married, your partner’s debt becomes your debt. It could also impact your credit score. If one of the people in the relationship is not honest about what is happening in your joint financial lives, it’s a huge breach and is difficult to overcome. “It begs the question ‘If you are lying about that, what else are you lying about?’”
How Do You Repair Your Finances and Rebuild Trust in Your Spouse?
Lay it All Out on the Table
The best way to start repairing the damage is to come clean with your partner. Lay out all your assets and your debts. You both need to get on the same page, and to do that, there cannot be any hidden loans or debt or hidden assets or accounts.
Take Responsibility for what you have done.
Apologize for putting your partner in this position and reaffirm your loave for them. Commit to take all necessary steps and measures to work with your partner to get the situation cleared up. Commit to make sure the behavior does not happen again.
Give Your Partner Time to Absorb it All
Your Partner has been wronged. Trust has been broken. He or She will likely feel betrayed or violated. You need to give them time and space to absorb the situation and process their emotions. Don’t offer up excuses or worse lie about how it happened.
Communicate Regularly
Start talking about your feelings about money. Most people have a hard time talking about money. However, if you are going to rebuild your life together, you both need to be able to discuss ALL financial issues. Depending on the amount of Debt or financial Damage that has been done, you may benefit from third-party financial or debt advisors. You should also agree to sit down once monthly and discuss your finances.
Reframe Your ideas about Money
What are your financial goals? Do you want to buy a home, save for your kids’ college, retire early? To reach your goals, you both need to work toward them together. Perhaps a budget would help keep you on track and give you a blueprint to check against. A budget would also help rebuild a sense of safety and togetherness, which strengthens your relationship.
Relinquish control to your spouse.
The partner than financially unfaithful should not oversee paying the bills or keeping the checkbook. Until they can demonstrate that they have a handle on their spending, the other partner should take over those functions.
Don’t neglect the intimate connection with your spouse.
It would be easy to be put off making love or being intimate with your spouse while you are furious with them for damaging your finances and betraying your trust. They feel embarrassed, unworthy, and unloved. You both need to try to reconnect to rekindle the love in the marriage.
Financial infidelity is not uncommon. The key to rebuilding trust in your partner and your marriage is Open Communication, Reconnecting Intimately, and Sharing financial responsibilities.
