Marriage: It’s the Center Pole in the Tent.
* Marriages, like friendships, are made by people of the same or similar level of emotional maturity. Our friends, and our marriage partner, reflect our own level of emotional maturity.
* Couples who delay marriages until about age 28 seem to have far fewer divorces than do those who marry earlier.
* Psychologists have been able to predict whether a couple will stay together or divorce with 95% accuracy during the first year of marriage.
* Married men live longer, have fewer illnesses, and enjoy greater professional success than their single counterparts. Married men who share in household duties share similar benefits.
* Marital satisfaction is usually greater before the first child is born and after the youngest child leaves home.
* Husbands who are more likely to divorce have blood flow 17% faster than husbands who are not likely to divorce.
* The four actions that are most corrosive to marriage are: Criticism/Blame, Defensiveness, Contempt/Direct Insults, and Stonewalling.
* Direct insults to a woman predict how many infectious illnesses the wife will have in the next six months.
* In successful families, couples can pull together and respect differences. They can be apart, and they can be together. They can have choices.
* Good marriage therapy helps couples to live well without a therapist. Good therapists know how to work themselves out of a job.
Marital therapy can help individuals in a marriage…
…be separate as individuals and be together as a couple.
…take responsibility for their own goals, actions, and needs.
…find the courage to talk about whatever is hardest to talk about.
…identify and manage their normal differences in a non-blaming way.
…nurture and protect themselves and each other.
…enjoy and celebrate sexual affections.
…nurture and guide children.
…heal old wounds and recover from old hurts.
…identify and leave behind old ways that just don’t work any more.
…pull together and protect their relationship from the sharks that encircle every marriage.
