I hear you. I was saying the ideal goal and it sounds like YOU pursued it. Maybe your h did too, for awhile. Like FIB"s analogy, the "team" was playing and your h walked off the field. Sure, the first 5 innings were going your way, but for some reason...he quit. You didn't drop the ball or strike out, he just quit cuz...he didn't want to play anymore, or he wants to switch to basketball, or he hates being shortstop but forgot to tell you...(I love metaphors...)
I still say we go for the goal. But I'm "damned" if I know what to do when one is married to someone who suddenly walks off the field, or starts calling everything you pitch a "ball," when 2 innings before - the exact same pitch was a strike...
I get it. I really do. Guess what I want us to know, is what we are aspiring to. And our kids should know that as well. We aren't saying the journey will be glorious, but that we'll make it together.
As for teaching it in classes the only hurdle there is, who gets to teach it and what will they teach? That's always the rub. Of course there are church classes but that requires mutual faith and even then as you say, there are no guarantees.
I'll say one thing; I am NOT as afraid of divorce as I once was. I am stronger and more capable than I knew 5 years ago, and I am inwardly pretty content now, in a way that makes me confident that no matter what my love life does, I'll be okay.
Granted, taking the risk to marry again would be hard. But then, as my d11 said about dating, we only "have to find one right person to WIN"...and that's true.
There isn't much better in the world though, than the comfort of a lifelong loyal friend and mate, particularly if that mate loves your children as their own, or they are their own. That would be a beautiful thing. I know it's not impossible. That's all I "know" though. Sometimes I feel I "know" less and less as time goes on...
(( j ))
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
I get it. I really do. Guess what I want us to know, is what we are aspiring to. And our kids should know that as well. We aren't saying the journey will be glorious, but that we'll make it together.
I hope that D13 knows that I did all I could do to keep our family together (although that ended up being absolutely and completely irrelevant), and that it's worth the effort after all. And that, when someone fails to see your value as a person, or your beauty, or your wisdom--the world doesn't end. You continue to believe in yourself, you scrape up the pieces and put them back together and make a new life out of the ashes. Not the one you chose, not the one you wanted, but maybe even a more whole and healthy one than you had before. And maybe you'll run across someone else who does value you, who loves your children as their own, and you make a life together. But that's the icing on the cake, and the cake is pretty tasty even without the icing.
M60 H52 D20 M14 yrs OW-old gf from 1986 bomb-5/18/08 H filed for D-9/10/08 D final 4/24/09 xH remarried (not OW) 2012
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
Like FIB"s analogy, the "team" was playing and your h walked off the field. Sure, the first 5 innings were going your way, but for some reason...he quit. You didn't drop the ball or strike out, he just quit cuz...he didn't want to play anymore, or he wants to switch to basketball, or he hates being shortstop but forgot to tell you...(I love metaphors...)
laughing along.... are you playing the same game? 3rd and 1, HIKE! with innings and strikes? Mixing metaphors...remember to stay on for 8 seconds!
FWIW, I think it's too easy to get M, too easy to get D, and not many take either option serious enough. Someone decides to D and soon there is a whole rash of D's of people you know. Like herds and flocks the leader leads, the rest follow. Even if it's a trap.
Live your life while you are still living. Riding the trail less traveled.
More time is spent teaching kids to drive than to prepare for M life later. What to teach? Try starting with Mars-Venus type issues. We communicate differently. We think differently. We hear differently. We visualize differently. Even in high school. Kids need to become aware and in tune to this sooner.
One premise of that whole series of books is "What your mother couldn't tell you, and your father didn't know" Oh wait ... that is actually a title to one of the books.
Maybe the optional classes some schools have on Family Life should be required for a Drivers License. Kids need to have some incentive to attend and listen. Of course these days, they don't even need a driver's license to get each other pregnant.
Still, someone needs to explain old metaphors to them. "Marriage is a lot of work" apparently didn't just mean one of you has to have a job and one of you has to raise kids and decorate, and cook, and probably work too! I think it needs explaining, maybe even to some of us, that the "work" begins with a lot of effective communicating. Sometimes the most effective communicating is just hugging, and holding hands on a walk. Stop the whole world if you can, and gaze into each other's eyes a while before saying ILY. Then say why. Not cuz I want your britches on the floor!
What is that makes the other person special. Do we know? Do we tell them? Do they hear us? Our kids need to learn the new life skills required to succeed in a R or M. They may be easier to discuss than to execute. Does our MLC experience leave us wondering if we will ever succeed in execution? Or do we live in fear of failing to do so, resulting in causing someone else pain like we have lived?
Like FIB"s analogy, the "team" was playing and your h walked off the field. Sure, the first 5 innings were going your way, but for some reason...he quit. You didn't drop the ball or strike out, he just quit cuz...he didn't want to play anymore, or he wants to switch to basketball, or he hates being shortstop but forgot to tell you...(I love metaphors...)
laughing along.... are you playing the same game? 3rd and 1, HIKE! with innings and strikes? Mixing metaphors...remember to stay on for 8 seconds!
Damn! I mixed the metaphors...and I LIKE SPORTS!!! In fact, the most blatant sexism I ever experienced, (to my face) was when my devotion to, and knowledge of the Washington Redskins was seriously questioned...b/c I'm "a girl"....oh the outrage of it all...
My five brothers will attest to this, and be very disappointed to see my glaring error here...Apologies to all sports fans...I am a fool!
(( j ))
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
you are an evil man...(and how did we hijack this thread?) I remember the days my brothers forced me to learn of John Riggins and Joe Theisman and the Hogs, and Joe Gibbs (his first time around)...yes, I am a LOYAL FAN...unlike some peeps around here. Sheesh! Okay back to marriage, or whatever... (( j ))
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
But essentially it is a lifelong contractual obligation that most people make when they are very young. Consequently, people make mistakes.
I do believe that if both people are committed to growing TOGETHER, and are willing to do some very difficult self-examination that is not necessarily fun at all, you really can work through some of the toughest situations. You have to be willing to grow through and with someone.
The question makes me realize I am optimistic about marriage even now.
M: 16 years Bomb 4/07 OW 20s long gone Divorced 11/09 I remarried New Guy Cooperative r w/X regarding D
