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Letters to Joy
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. In July of 2015, Michelle’s best friend, Joy, was diagnosed with breast cancer. She shared the news via text and after sharing the details she said, “I love you and can’t talk about it right now. Call me later…” Michelle: My response, “This is when living 1,000 miles away becomes really inconvenient. If I were there, I would be taking you to appointments, sitting with you just because and everything in between. I’m here. I will figure out what to do.” As I hit SEND, I had an idea. Joy, I have this crazy plan. Each week, I am going to send you a package like this filled with seven days…
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F.I.N.E.
We all know the scenario . . . How was your day? Fine. Yours? O.K. (Silence . . .). Where’s the remote? There’s no shorter lie than F.I.N.E.
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Just
Michelle: When our daughter was in the second grade she was asked to write about what her parents did for a living. She wrote three (front and back) pages about Chris’s job as a research scientist. She went on and on about the inner-workings of his day to day life in the lab, entering data and what his research could lead to. As I read, I was proud of the work and influence that Chris had on her and I couldn’t wait to read about my own. However, I began feeling concerned as the pages were becoming fewer and fewer. Then, there it was. The last line of her paper, “And…
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Us Against the World
Marriage is not a 50 / 50 proposition. The weight of responsibility in marriage will vary unevenly between husband and wife from day to day. But what do we do when the load is not balanced for a long time or when we both don’t have much left to give each other?
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Recreating Your Relationship
JOHN: We just returned from two separate camping trips about a week apart. The first was the annual family camping trip with our young adult kids in the tent with us and 17 members of the extended family on nearby sites. The second was just the two of us. Wow, what a difference! While we love spending 24/7 time with our kids and extended family, we also love the calm and freedom that come with camping as a couple. It reminds us fondly of our early years together.
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“Just Let Me do That!”
Resentment, frustration, bitterness. Where do these come from? Sometimes, they’re a result of treating our spouse as “inferior” (due to our own attitude of superiority). Superiorities are something we all have, even if we don’t realize it.
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Beyond biology: Where Do Babies Come From?
The focus of our last post, “Sex — Naughty or Nice” was our learned attitudes about sex. We hope you ventured into exploring your own attitudes about sexuality. If not, there is not time like the present to dive in. As promised, we will focus this post on Beyond Biology: Where Do Babies Come From?
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Boosting the Bright Side
CHRIS: Michelle has the great responsibility of helping me to see the bright side of things. While I sometimes get frustrated with her eternally rose-colored glasses, I also know that my negative outlook can use some pinkish tint every now and then. Here’s some things we have done to boost my ability to see the bright side.
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Sex — Naughty or Nice?
Sexual Expression is Everywhere Think: TV, Billboards and Music videos. So, why do we struggle to express our sexuality until the kids are asleep, and the bedrooms shades drawn? Answer: Perhaps, we were taught sex was taboo. This is sexual sabotage, likely unintentional. But unless we rid ourselves of these ghosts from the past, we will pass them on to our children.
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Trash Talk
Our first heated “discussion” as a married couple wasn’t about what people call the “important” stuff – our values, family, money, jobs, or kids. Instead, our first “couple argument” was a top of the lungs, door-slamming, Tupperware-throwing, window rattling discussion about – our trash cans. We weren’t discussing color, size, number, or shape of our trash cans. We both pretty much agreed that a trash can is a trash can and should definitely look like a trash can. No issues there. Our fight was about who, of the two of us, would be deemed (for eternity and thereafter) the primary trash can “dragger” each and every week – 52 times…
