Search Results for: blog the biggest challenges to marriage

Don’t Let Chronic Illness Harm Your Marriage

There is a very interesting article in the September issue of More Magazine that talks about how marriages change once chronic illness enters the picture. According to the story, couples who consist of at least one spouse with a chronic illness have a divorce rate of 75%! And other couples who stay together say that they are only still married because of the insurance. This is some pretty scary information. So how can you prevent a chronic illness from taking down your marriage? The couples that do stay together and are happy may have a few secrets up their sleeves. … Continue reading →

Top Four Marriage Myths

We absorb a lot of marriage myths in our lives. By the time we are ready to get married, our heads are full of these myths that make it hard to maintain a happy marriage. Here are the top four marriage myths that you should avoid. 1. Marriage is like the media Remember all of those family friendly shows were grew up with on television? What about the movies? The mom is smart and sassy, the dad is clueless but dependent and the kids’ biggest behavioral problem is that they broke a lamp and then confessed out of guilt. If … Continue reading →

How Much Effort Should Marriage Take?

Since I have begun writing in the marriage section here at Families.com, I have read and researched many relationship articles and topics. There is one thing that I have found that most articles have in common. In many articles that I have read they talk about how marriage is not easy and being in a relationship takes work. My thoughts today are on how much work should it take? How difficult should it be to stay in a relationship? While I know that there are many cases of give and take in a serious relationship and it does take effort … Continue reading →

Discuss Values and Beliefs before Marriage

I have always known that it is important for partners to have common beliefs and ideas. One of these commonalities I feel is in the topic of religion. I have always heard and believed that couples should share the same religious beliefs and values. However, I have never been a hard core person when it comes to denomination. I have the idea that as long as you believe in God and Jesus Christ then the church that you worship in is just a building. I realize that some denominations have very different beliefs. However, I felt that those beliefs mainly … Continue reading →

Things to Talk about before Marriage

Deciding to get married is a big step in a relationship. In some long and lengthy relationships, it seems that marriage is the only step left to take. In other relationships, marriage comes quicker and more as a surprise. No matter how the decision to get married comes about, there are some things that a couple should consider and discuss before taking the plunge into forever together. When we make other important decisions in our life, we weigh the options, research, and give it much consideration. However, it seems that some people put little thought into spending the rest of … Continue reading →

The Stages of Marriage

Our life, in general, is created of stages. We begin as an infant and then advance to a toddler. We then enter childhood. Soon the teenage years creep in. After that we are young adults and advance into adulthood. We then become elderly. In addition to our life cycle of stages, we also go through many stages as we travel through life. We cycle through stages when encountering the death of a loved one or another tragic experience. When angered we usually go through many stages also. Marriage and relationships are no different. They are full of stages. The stages … Continue reading →

The Marriage Blog Week in Review for Jan 27 – Feb 2

Welcome to our look back on the Marriage Blog Week in Review, this is our way of helping you catch up on the week’s worth of stories. We’re all busy and it’s easy to overlook articles when they are posted all day long – the week in review provides you with a summary of our articles in the past week. So without further ado, let’s dive into this week in review. Saturday, January 27 Reaffirming or Rehashing? is that what you and your spouse are doing when you argue or debate the same point over and over again? I’m sure … Continue reading →

Is Your Marriage Like a Pair of Scissors?

Marriage resembles a pair of shears, so joined that they cannot be separated; often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing any one who comes between them. — Sydney Smith Marriage is a wonderful opportunity to love someone and to be loved in return. When married you have a playmate, a confidant, a partner, a lover and hopefully a friend. Some however enter into marriage and begin to feel lost about who they are and what they have become. Recently I was talking with a man in his forties. His wife gave birth to twin boys eight weeks prior and … Continue reading →

Marriage Stress: Coping with Burnout

Have you experienced burn out before? It can happen to us because of our jobs, our lifestyles and our commitments. One of the biggest jobs we have as spouses is to protect our spouses and to look after them. Part of looking after them is watching for these signs of burnout and providing them with the assistance and the support to recover from it. Burnout I’ve gone through burnout before. It’s a state where you’re exhausted, overwhelmed and lacking the will to continue facing the challenges that happen. This happened to me once when my daughter was an infant, I … Continue reading →

The Biggest Challenges to Marriage

You may think I’ll bring up the marriage debates, but in my opinion it’s not related to the greatest challenges facing a successful marriage and successful interactions between the couples that are married. The challenges I want to talk about here are the challenges that can leave your relationship precarious and potentially lead to the dissolution of your marriage if you and your spouse aren’t equipped to handle the challenges. I like to call these challenges the final five, because when you and your spouse are capable of overcoming these challenges, then you are usually in a stronger place in … Continue reading →