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Marriage
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Twelve misunderstandings about marriage and intimate relationships I’ve discerned through readers’ letters after almost 6 years of writing a daily column:
08 Jan 2006 by Rod Smith / 6 Comments
1. A little controlling behavior (manipulation, intimidation or domination) between people is a necessary part of love;
2. Living together without being married is the same as being married, because marriage is “just a piece of paper”;
3. In a good marriage, the couple always knows where the other person is, and always knows what the other person is doing;
4. The responsibilities of marriage, and the birth of a few children, will make an irresponsible adult into a responsible one;
5. All relationship problems can be traced to problems in communication;
6. Once married, your extended family, especially in-laws, should be kept at a distance;
7. If you love someone enough they will eventually change into what you want them to be;
8. It’s worth staying in a bad marriage for the sake of the children;
9. Any partner is better than no partner at all;
10. Sex before marriage is necessary otherwise a person will feel cheated after they are married and have only had one sex partner;
11. Men need sex more than women need sex, and it therefore “normal” for men to be unfaithful;
12. Good sex will keep a relationship from ending. -
Betrayed while pregnant: Should I feel betrayed?
08 Jan 2006 by Rod Smith / No Comments
Reader’s Question: In the early stages of my pregnancy, I found out that my husband was accepting phone calls and gifts from an ex-girlfriend. This hurt terribly. He agreed it was not right and, although he would not be nasty to her, he agreed to cut off all contact. By chance, now months later, I overheard my husband on the phone to his ex and have now found out he never severed the contact and still has not. Am I crazy to feel betrayed?
Rod Smith’s Response: You are not crazy: you have been doubly betrayed. I amazed how often men will protect a woman they are NOT married to, while being quite comfortable with hurting a wife! Your husband would have been wise to shoo off the ex the first time she reared her destructive, seductive head.
I’d suggest face-to-face help with a mediator capable of asking your husband difficult questions. Were I contracted to assist, I’d demand a meeting with the woman, your husband and you, all in the same room. Understandably, having just delivered a child, you might not feel quite up to this.
Then, come to think of it, your husband probably would not agree to such a meeting. Men who deal in deception seldom welcome open dialogue. Besides, it might get nasty long before it gets nice!
Thanks for reading YOU AND ME with Rod Smith
see also:
difficultrelationships.blogspot.com
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Some things just have to be repeated about “love” and control…
29 Dec 2005 by Rod Smith / 1 Comment
The content of my Email suggests there are broad principles that deserve repeating:
1. Love and control cannot coexist in the same relationship. Love appreciates a person’s absolute freedom, or it is not love. Controlling another, even for their “own good,” is never loving. People who love with authenticity resist any desire to exercise controlling behavior. Healthy people are vigilant to exorcise controlling tendencies from within themselves when such tendencies rear their very ugly heads.
2. Monitoring another’s behavior: wanting to know what they do all the time, who they talk to, what they eat, who they phoned, who phoned them, what they are thinking, are not indications of love, but of jealousy. Early in a relationship such behavior can be perceived as interest, or as signs that someone cares, but such monitoring is not caring or loving behavior. Love increases freedom. Love doesn’t box people by policing their thoughts or actions.
4. Too much too soon is a sign of doom in a relationship. Feeling very close very quickly, telling everything to someone on a fist date, falling in love “overnight,” having sex because it felt like a person was an instant soul-mate, are signs a relationship has jumped ahead of important developmental milestones.
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Do I have to lie for my husband?
28 Dec 2005 by Rod Smith / 1 Comment
Q: My husband is an alcoholic. I have to lie for him. He gets angry if I don’t
You don’t have to lie for anybody; not your husband, boss or mother. It’s always your choice. At the same time, I understand how telling the truth might be difficult.
Decide to tell the truth, first to your husband. Tell him your days of lying on his behalf are over and that you will tell the truth as clearly and as kindly as you are able, to everyone. Tell him he can lie for himself if he so chooses but you will no longer cover his tracks. You will probably face some short-lived backlash but, hold onto yourself, stand firm. Get the support you might need from a close friend.
Most alcoholics have people who unwittingly support their habit. Without blaming you for his behavior (for it is his arm that takes the glass to his mouth) I’d encourage you to see that every time you lie for him, you are making his behavior possible. You are supporting the very thing you know is ruining him and hurting you. Such behavior on your part serves no one, least of all the alcoholic.
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Verbal log-jam
When I was a boy I’d endlessly practice the fluent delivery of my name but it seldom flowed easily from my lips. As if it was new news to me, adults pointed out my stutter. Perhaps they thought I was beginning, at that precise moment, for the first time in my life to spit from the mouth, twist at the neck, jig my head back and forth trying to expel some inane statement log-jammed between my gut and my throat.
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Life in our beloved 122
If the inside of a house (outside, too, I suppose) is a metaphor of the lives of the people who live in it – which is something I once read somewhere – gosh, are we in trouble. Our house is a mess.
I consistently clean it room by room, thinking often of the legend that the Golden Gate Bridge that says there’s some guy constantly painting it. I feel for him. While I am sure the view is wonderful I must believe that the poor guy whose doing it daily from one end to the other must find the wind and the weather quite a challenge.
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Being a white South African can come with complications
Being a white South African reared under Apartheid is no simple matter. It permeated everything for me. While I do not pretend to have been a political activist, I was always cognizant that my privileges, simply a result of being born white, were unmerited, and most unfair especially when enjoyed at the expense of others who were not. I think this unsettling truth (for I took advantage of my station in life) was somewhat of a companion to me from the age of about six or seven.
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Location, location – remembering winter in August
We live very close to our school and church, so close we can hear the school bell from our kitchen and the church bells in my bedroom.
Sometimes we walk to both and we don’t see the car for days.
I like it. I like not having to get in and out of the car. I like not having to negotiate traffic, something as synonymous with life in the USA as Disney, Fast Food, and the Fourth of July.
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Ready to adopt?
If you wait until you are ready to adopt a child you never will because you will never be ready. The baby, and only the baby, will make you ready. Reading the right books will be helpful, but “ready” magically comes upon you when a real baby is sleeping in your arms or crying in the middle of the night. If you are not ready to change diapers – and I always am amused at the big deal about this non-issue – being unprepared will last only as long as a clean diaper.
Life inside the Smith household
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