1. You experience greater OBJECTIVITY and can “see” your most important relationships as if looking at them through someone else’s eyes.
2. Despite any pain, any trauma, any uncertainty, you can see some HUMOUR in what you are experiencing even if it is short lived.
3. You are progressively gathering a small community of friends who know everything (or almost everything) about you and their SUPPORT is becoming easier to trust.
4. You are seeing with greater and greater CLARITY what are and what are not your responsibilities within your most important relationships.
5.”No” comes easier and it is not accompanied by guilt. “Yes” is your response when you really want what you agree to. You begin to BELIEVE the words you say. Your words reflect you, your desires, and are not said from guilt or the impulse to keep the peace or make others happy.
Indications of becoming healthier in an intimate relationship
Affairs are seductive, they seduce you from what’s important
Extramarital affairs are very seductive. They appear to offer better, more intense passion than the marriage. Hide and seek will do this, spawning the kind of relationship we wished was possible with a spouse. It’s amazing how “attractive” someone can sound, look and feel when you add large amounts of adrenalin. The secrecy idealizes the other, not love or truth. Deception, the “ducking and diving” past family can give vitality to the stolen hour.
What is so ridiculously seductive (and hurts so badly when the truth comes out) is the belief that affair is about you. Actually, it is about who you are not. It about what you do not represent. You are not the wife or husband; the “routine.” Yours is not the other name on the mortgage, you are not one who owns the other car in the garage. You are not the one whom the children sound like when they are at their worst (and best). It’s not your beauty. It is not your charm (although you might be both beautiful and charming). It is the difference from, the contrast with, what your affair knows. In his or her boredom and selfishness, you become so very appealing in the heat of it all. It’s the contrast he or she “loves.” The secrecy, the chase, the conniving makes it all so surreal and convincing and such a turn on. It is not you. It is not he or she who has met you here in this rendezvous, but the secret itself, the fact that you will share this secret, that’s lighting your fire.
The seductive thing is that for a period of time one or both of you actually believe in the affair as if it is a real and enduring relationship, able to offer you each something you really want. For a time you will give so unreservedly, so wildly, and be sucked in by passion. Every meeting will feel like you were meant for each other and that it is a cruel world forcing you apart. The really sad thing is that even your children will feel, to you, as if they are in the way, obstacles to your freedom, hindrances to your finding true love. When you are with your lover the first hours will slip past feeling like heaven. The approaching absences and those times when you are apart, will begin to fill with suspicion, heaviness and demands that come with cheating. You will think your love is cheating on you (even when with his or her spouse) every time the cell-phone is off, a call is not returned or a weekend happens without you. The moment the clandestine activity began with you, the scene was set for it to occur around you and to you. He or she who cheats on a spouse will most certainly think nothing of doing the same to you.
The affair itself, born in secrecy and lies, itself begins to lie, making the participants believe they have been short-changed, deceived in marriage and that a fling can offer what’s really wanted. It is not so. Affairs seduce the participants from what is real, what is important, what is enduring and significant. If I cannot talk to my wife, talking with someone who is not my wife (or who is someone’s wife) doesn’t help anything one iota. Learning to talk with my wife is where the real action is, it is not in talking with some other lost person looking for a temporary shelter from her own storm.
Affairs are always a poor substitute for a relationship. No matter how intense, how willing each person is, inevitable pain and suffering lies ahead for each person in the seductive cycle. If this is your dilemma break it off today. Go cold turkey. See a professional. Change locks. Change phone numbers. Quit your job if you have to. Run home to your parents! Get out of it. No, you do not owe him or her an explanation or closure. Everyone you love, or thought you loved, will be better off for it.
Copyright 2002, Rod Smith, MSMFT
Achieving MUCH with YOUR life is a profound act of mothering
1. Enriched is the woman who does not lose herself to her marriage or motherhood. She has a strong spirit of independence while being a loving wife and mother.
2. Enriched is the woman who does not accommodate poor manners (being taken for granted or being victimized) from anyone (not husband, children, in-laws, siblings, or her parents).
3. Enriched is the woman who lives above manipulation, domination, and intimidation. Her relationships are pure and open; her boundaries are defined, secure, and strong.
4. Enriched is the woman who does not participate in unwanted sexual activity. She honors her body as her private temple and shares it, even in marriage, only by her own deliberate choice.
5. Enriched is the woman who has developed a strong, clear, identity. She regularly articulates who she is, what she wants, and what she will and will not do. She is unafraid of defining herself.
6. Enriched is the woman who knows that pursuing her dreams to be educated, to work, to accomplish much, to expect much from her life, are profound acts of partnership in marriage and profound acts of mothering. She knows that the woman who “takes up her life” does more for herself, her husband, and her children than the one who surrenders it.
Son (8) asked if boys can marry boys and girls can marry girls….
My son (8) recently asked me if girls can marry girls and boys can marry boys. I didn’t know how or what to answer and so I changed the subject. I know that avoiding his question is wrong and I am mentally preparing myself to answer his question soon. I am not homophobic. One of my close friends is a homosexual.
Relax, and then talk about anything
Tell your son that in South Africa (origin of Email) men and women can love and marry whomever they want to marry. Inform him that one day he will be old enough and wise enough to marry anyone he loves and who, in turn, loves and wants to marry him.
Now, before I am pummeled with both hate and love mail from all sides, please remember that your answer to your son’s question will not determine or change his sexual orientation. Parent-son conversations are simply not that powerful.
Your openness and comfort in having meaningful conversations about personal topics with your son will not determine his sexual orientation, but it might determine if he keeps talking with you and asking you questions about personal and important matters for many years to come.
A mother writes about the power of medication to help her ADHD son….
“My son at 7 seemed fine – he was articulate, self-assured, and mature beyond his years. In the classroom his frustration and anxiety would build. His preschool teacher had commented on his anxiety. His kind teacher wondered whether his hearing had been tested. By first grade he started hating himself for not being able to do what a bright boy should. When my son became more and more anxious, I knew there was an underlying cause. A developmental pediatrician congratulated me on being so astute. My son had a sub-type of ADHD. When he started medication the difference was astounding. At 3pm he’d jump into the car and actually had a spring in his step, instead of the exhausted slump. On medication, he’d jump into the car and ask how I was! Then he would animatedly chat about his day and share all the wonderful and interesting happenings of the day with me. It was astonishing. His reading rate increased by 2 years within 6 months, and then another 2 the next 6 months. My little boy was transformed from a sad, despondent, anxious little boy to a positive, enthusiastic, confident little man. Three psychologists and one GP said my son did not have ADHD but my gut feeling told me otherwise.”
Therapy (counseling, family therapy, individual therapy) works best when…..
Take UP your life - it is an act of LOVE
2. You are motivated to see change in your life and understand that it could mean an increase in your discomfort and some disruption to your relationships.
3. You are willing to recognize your sacred cows even if you are initially unwilling to lead them to the slaughterhouse.
4. You read widely about ordinary people who have done extraordinary things with their lives.
5. You are willing to see the fruitlessness of blaming others (parents, boss, your ex, the economy, and politicians) for what you are facing.
6. You are willing to shift your focus off the behavior of others and be fully responsible for your own behavior.
7. You are willing to understand that others can only entangle (trap, manipulate, bother) you to the degree you allow.
8. You understand your therapist is a person just like you – but for his or her training. Elevating your therapist will prove to be unhelpful to you and it will obstruct the very process you wish to assist you.
9. You understand that all desired and healthy growth requires some loss, pain, and grief.
10. Your goal is to grow up and to fully live your own life – no matter what your age.
He dropped the bomb and said he doesn’t love me anymore…..
“My husband and I have our three-year anniversary this month. Our son is 9 months old. Two weeks ago he decided to drop the bomb and said that perhaps he doesn’t love me, doesn’t want to wake up in 20 years and be miserable, that kind of stuff. It was so sudden. We hardly ever fight and our baby is so perfect and beautiful and we have been so happy for these years. I don’t understand. When we talk about it he goes farther with saying that perhaps he never really loved me and maybe he had these feelings before we even got married. What? I saved myself for him. I gave myself to him. I made sure he was the one. We both agreed that we did not believe in divorce. This is too painful to even think about. He is not even acting like he wants to save the marriage. I don’t understand. I’m terrified. This is not what I signed up for.”
Unhook your wagon
Your husband’s misery now, or in the future, is his issue – don’t try and rescue him from it or take any responsibility for it, or, and here is the tough part, let it take you down.
There’s great hope for this marriage but it will not emerge until you get out of his way and he does what he needs to do to solve his own problems.
If he avoids this fabulous dilemma (he is not the first person to face it) by walking away, he will be much more miserable more quickly than he ever imagined.
If he faces it well, he will grow up, and to boot, have a chance at even being somewhat happy, you will have a man for a husband and your son will have an adult man for a daddy.
I want you to speak to my group…..
I want you to speak to my group (church, school, class, retreat, company) how do I do it?
Sometimes I bring the boys, sometimes I don't.
I do not arrive and “dump” my routine on you or try to sell you or your audience anything. I tailor every event to the perceived needs of the church, group, company, or training event.
I look forward to hearing from you. I have lectured an taught in over 30 countries to groups from 5 people to 5000. I can speak for 40 minutes or for 10 days at 6 hours a day.
My seminars (workshops) are highly interactive and usually result in participants wanting to live more powerful and complete lives.
Write to me. I look forward to hearing from you. Yes – I will travel anywhere in the world, or drive to your event if it is possible.
Rod Smith
Is it okay to hate my mother
Is it okay to hate my mother? She is loud, inappropriate, pushy, and demanding. I know I can’t change her but I must be able to change how guilty I feel about not being happy to see her. She barges into our house. She talks crudely to my children. She is mocking of any attempts to talk on any meaningful level. I am a single mother of two teenagers.
Hate is an emotional toxic spill
As long as you are able and willing to face the consequences, you can do anything you want.
Of course, not everything you are able to do is helpful, wise, or accompanied by helpful outcomes. This is something we are repeatedly told as children and sometimes fail to learn even as adults.
So – yes, you are free to hate your mother. The consequences of doing so are unlikely to be helpful to you. Hating anyone is usually harmful to the one who does the hating, but hating a parent, is especially personally damaging.
Hating a parent erodes essential, vital, invisible connections that help us all to remain somewhat sane.
Hating anyone allows the hate to do a number on our insides. It distorts our responses, reactions, perceptions, and attitudes to ALL other people, and not only our relationship with the person whom we have chosen to hate.
The hate may be targeted; the results are generic. Hate is an emotional toxic spill. It ruins the host more than the victim.
While your mother’s repertoire is jam packed with unattractive themes, hating her will ultimately destroy you, burn your house down (figuratively, of course) and alienate you from your own adult children.
You will move toward greater, and real love for her if you increase your capacity to be rejected by her and stand up to her and refuse to be her victim. Do not give your mother free passage to pollute your family yet, at the same time, offer her some manner in which to remain connected with you on terms that are acceptable to you.
Yes, hate is an option, but it is not an option that will result in the kind of growth (not all “growth” is helpful) within you that will be helpful.
Walking powerfully toward her (initiating, defining, declaring, welcoming, clarifying) will empower you with ALL other people.
You are no longer a child. Use your adult voice and do not allow her to manipulate, dominate, or intimidate you. Strive for an equal, mutual, respectful relationship with your mother so that she will learn how to behave herself when she is with you and your family.
I know this is a tall order, but the results, of even failed attempts on your terms, will result in the kind of empowering and growth you want, rather than lead you ever deeper into the shame you are already feeling.
Rejecting her will diminish you. It will rob you of your voice. It will enlarge her power to dominate and control you.
If you hate your mother she won’t have to barge into your house to upset you, she’ll be living in your head, even if you never see her or have nothing to do with her.
Children and happiness
“I see my first responsibility, as a parent, is to make my children have a happy childhood so they can have a happy life. Please comment.”
Good luck. While it is a nice ideal you are setting yourself up for disappointment.
Your children’s happiness is ultimately their responsibility and not yours. The sooner they assume it the better.
If you, the parent, work hard at your own life and make the very best of your skills and talents it is more likely that you will have children who will do the same.
If you focus all of your attention on your children and on trying to make them happy it is likely you will create insatiable, demanding, and entitled men and women who are more than a challenge to all who know them.
Of course I am not suggesting parents ought to intentionally create tough lives in order to amplify challenge – this would be ridiculous.
I’d suggest you focus on providing a loving and challenging platform for your children to achieve well in all areas of their lives and get out of their way as much as possible.
Success, and reaching for success, is what results in fulfillment. I’d take “fulfillment” or “useful” or “purposeful” over the illusive state called “happiness” anytime.
difficultrelationships.com 