Thanks NewDave for pointing out that when Retrouvaille is misspelled in the weblink you can end up at a porn website. This thread is to correct any misconception that people may have gotten -- Retrouvaille does not have anything to do with porn.
So what is Retrouvaille? The word retrouvaille is French and means rediscovery. From the verb trouver, to find.
Retrouvaille is an organization with support from the Catholic Church that holds weekend retreats around the world to help people heal their broken marriages. They have a website, http://www.retrouvaille.org. The program works by example. Couples who have experienced misery in their marriages present their stories. They sit in front of you, with occasional tears in their eyes, holding hands and giving each other support, telling you openly and honestly about their lives, what went wrong, and how they fixed it.
Then they teach you a communication technique called Dialoguing and you practice doing dialogues with your spouse, in private. They give you questions to dialogue about. These questions help you and your spouse understand each other at a deeper level than you ever could by simply talking.
The initial program takes a weekend. You can do it in your home city or go somewhere else and make it a mini-vacation. There are follow-up sessions locally. These help you to continue the openness and understanding with each other. They teach concepts like, love is a decision. Or, marriage is like a building supported by four posts: love, commitment, trust, and forgiveness. If you break one of the posts, like trust, and the forgiveness post is also weak, then the building comes crashing down. To rebuild the marriage, you must rebuild the four posts.
While it is sponsored by the Church, Retrouvaille is open to all. My husband and I are not Catholics, and we benefited tremendously from the experience. We did not find the presentations by the priest to be slanted to Catholic doctrine. He was there to be of service to the Christians in the room who wanted his services. We were told not to confess new things to each other -- the priest was there to take confessions. I found that interesting. At Retrouvaille you do not focus on the past, you focus on building a new future together.
Retrouvaille is different than counseling because you meet alone with your spouse. You do not dredge up the past and confront old problems. Instead you spend the entire time learning to listen to your husband or wife with your heart. This is a skill, and it can be learned. Once you learn to listen with your heart, and to speak from the heart, you will find that getting along with your spouse is easier.
So be careful when searching for Retrouvaille -- http://www.retrouvaille.org. Spelling it correctly is just the first step.
Thanks Sara. I've been interested in this site for quite some time, and following the threads of those of you who have been. Unfortunately, there is NOTHING in my state. I'm willing to travel for a weekend, but cannot reconcile how to do the followup work recommended.
There's contact information for a retro group about 3 hours away, but there's no event scheduled for that city at all
I emailed the contact people for that city and look forward to hopefully hearing from them.
Anyway, just a thanks for putting the information out there.
Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Is 43:18-19
If it seems slow in coming, wait. It's on its way. It will come right on time. Hab 2:3
I'm sorry there isn't a group closer to you. I hope that the one 3 hours away can offer some help. I'm not sure what year the Post sessions were added, but the original Retrouvaille program was only the weekend. And all of the people who were presenters at the weekend we attended went at that time. They said that it was harder without the Post sessions, but it still worked.
You would have to get the workbooks at the end of the weekend and go through them yourselves as best you could. It would still be a very worthwhile experience.
I hope that you will find a way to attend a weekend somewhere. I'm sure they would be willing to do some email correspondence to help you through the workbook. If not, then I could try to help you informally, as I am not trained as a presenter.
