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Hey there! Welcome to The Marital Intimacy Show. My name is Laura Brotherson. Thanks for tuning in today!
Well, we get to talk about marriage and such today, one of my favorite subjects! The topic of this show is: ?Affair Proofing Your Marriage part 3 ? Dealing with Your Issues.?
So, in our last two episodes we discussed the following: 1) Being introspective/Developing greater self-awareness; 2) Communicating more openly in marriage about any subject; and 3) Acknowledging and discussing attractions to others with your spouse.
Now in this episode, and in the next one, we?ll continue with the rest of our eight ways of protecting your marriage.
These include: 4. Meeting each other?s needs more effectively; 5. Developing a satisfying sex life in your marriage; 6. Dealing with personal insecurities and issues from your past; 7. personal relationships with others of the opposite sex, while building friendships with persons of the same sex and 8. Setting mental boundaries.
So, lets get started!
Now first of all, just to let you know, some of the resources that I?ve used for this podcast come from a couple of women who have both experienced affairs.
Their husbands both had an affair. The first is Peggy Vaughan, she?s the author of ?Preventing Affairs,? and the original founder of the Beyond Affairs Network (BAN).
And then Anne Bercht, she?s the author of ?My Husband?s Affair Became The Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me,? and she?s now the current director of the Beyond Affairs Network.
Both of these women are members of the Smart Marriages Coalition, which I also belong to. It?s a great organization for learning lots of great things about having a smart marriage and strengthening your marriage. You can find them at SmartMarriages.com.
Work at Meeting Each Other?s Needs
So, let?s start with #4 ? Work at meeting each other?s needs. Now, we know no one is perfect. We know no marriage is perfect.
No spouse is perfect. Nor will they ever be able to meet all of our needs. But being aware of what makes each other feel loved and striving to do those things regularly is a great way to affair proof your marriage.
Every spouse is different and each of us has individual needs. But you need to know what those needs are in yourself, and in your spouse.
So, some homework here would be simply for each of you to make a list of the top ten things that make you feel loved. And then work on doing those things for each other regularly.
You could also get a copy my talk on CD ?Love 101 ? Learning to Love More Meaningfully? to go into more detail about this concept.
It?s interesting that in all the resources and information that I researched for this, just about everybody agrees that meeting each other?s needs is an important part of preventing affairs.
And you know it?s an important part of just being married, and being married well. So it certainly something that we need to be sure we understand each other?s needs and that we are doing everything that we can to meet those needs.
Be Willing to Stretch to Meet Each Other?s Needs
Sometimes meeting those needs is difficult, and sometimes the needs of our spouse are a real stretch for us. But this is part of what marriage is all about, and it?s part of what ultimately makes marriage a really wonderful thing too.
Your most important resource for figuring out how to meet each other?s needs, is obviously going to be each other. You need to find out specifically what they want and need and do the best you can to meet those needs.
Show Respect and Admiration
But, in preventing or affair proofing your marriage there are some common needs that come up that we want to be attentive to. Number one is respect and admiration. This is one of the basic needs in a marriage, and we want to be sure that we are treating our spouse with genuine respect and admiration.
You know, I remember seeing Anne and her husband Brian on the Oprah Show. I had a friend call me up and say, ?Laura, you better turn on the Oprah Show, they?re talking about affairs and infidelity.?
How Do You Look at Each Other?
I turned it on, and it was a good show. It was quite eye-opening. I still remember one of the husbands, I don?t know if it was Brian or not, explaining that one of the factors that pulled him into the affair that he had was just the way the other woman looked at him.
You know, and of course they put this image of this woman looking at the camera and she just had this inviting look of admiration and adoration and longing. And I thought, ?Wow, that?s a pretty big draw! Especially if there?s already vulnerability going on in the marriage.?
This is something that we can all develop by consciously thinking about all the good things about our spouse, and then striving to communicate that thought and those feelings through our eyes.
Have Fun Together
Another need that is frequently mentioned is the concept of couples having fun together. Sometimes life gets so busy that we neglect to just have fun.
You?ve got to make a little time for fun and play, because the routine of life needs some playfulness thrown in to keep things interesting and thriving.
I believe a regularly scheduled date night is a great way to do this. Related to this concept of fun is recreational companionship. It?s another way to have fun together especially for a lot of men.
They love the idea of their wife also being a biking buddy or fishing partner. This can be anything that just gives you both another opportunity to be together.
Whether it?s watching a sporting event or working out together at the gym,? recreational companionship is something that is especially brought up by men. But whether this is true for your spouse or not, you can find out by asking your spouse if that?s important to them.
I remember one of the women talked about how she previously had been kind of critical of her husband when he would sit around and watch football and such.
But she came to learn that she could enjoy sitting and watching a sporting event with her husband and not need to be upset with him about that.
She said she actually learned to enjoy watching hockey, which I thought was a pretty amazing accomplishment. So miracles do happen, or can happen!
You Don?t Have to be a Super-Human Need-Meeter
Now in talking about meeting each other?s needs, I really like what one of the authors said about making sure that each person understands and takes ultimate responsibility for their own happiness and for their own behavior, and in some ways for their own needs too.
The point is that it isn?t fair for people to assume that the spouse of the person who had an affair just wasn?t meeting their needs.
Certainly we want to be doing all that we can to meet each other?s needs, but we don?t have to be super-human need meeters in order for your spouse to not have an affair.
In talking about this concept of meeting each other?s needs with my husband, he also brought up the point that it?s also important to keep in mind that it?s not exactly fair or wise to expect that our spouse will change in ways that might really go against their core personality in order to supposedly meet our needs.
My husband and I are pretty different. We have pretty different personalities. When we marry someone, we marry the whole package, their strengths and their weaknesses.
Certainly we hope that each of us will work to overcome our weaknesses, but if you happen to be holding out hope that your spouse will change in a real core-personality-trait-kinda-way, then that may not be the best use of your energy.
My husband may never have a wife that likes to spend a lot of money on things, like new cars. He is always wanting a new car.
I?m not a fan of spending the money on something like that. And, he may not ever have a wife that doesn?t talk so much. I?m a talker! These are core things.
Now I certainly can work on these things, but it?s just not likely that I will ever be a real quiet or reserved kind-of person, or a big spender if these are things that he feels like he needs.
Nor would it be fair for me to be waiting around hoping that my husband will change in some real major ways that go against his core personality.
Develop a Satisfying Sex Life
Now number five is developing a satisfying sex life in your marriage. This is related to the concept of needing to be meeting each other?s needs. We need to have a mutually fulfilling sexual relationship in our marriages. It?s a major protective factor against infidelity.
This isn?t an area of marriage that can just be ignored. Nor should it be an automatic excuse for having an affair either.
That reminds me of a woman who, when learning about this concept of marriage having three dimensions of intimacy?emotional, spiritual and sexual, she said they?d have a great marriage if it wasn?t for sex.
She wished that the sexual dimension would just go away and then they?d have a great relationship. But you can?t just ignore one dimension that you don?t particularly like.
They all go together and we need to be working on all dimensions of our relationship to have a healthy, intimate and mutually fulfilling marriage.
There may be times when a spouse understands that sex might be an area where they are called upon to exercise a lot of patience or endurance and maybe even making some sacrifices. This can happen if a spouse is unwilling or unavailable for such intimacies, due to life stressors or past traumas, or other circumstances.
I don?t like to see people use this as an excuse for infidelity or divorce. But neither do I like to see people ignore this vital dimension of marriage, and not understand how it creates real invulnerability in a marriage, for both husband and wife.
We?ve discussed this topic of strengthening your marriages sexually in the first two episodes of The Marital Intimacy Show podcasts, so be sure to check those out for more specifics in this area.
Deal with Personal Insecurities and Issues from Your Past
Number six in Affair-Proofing Your Marriage is to deal with personal insecurities and issues from your past. This is a very important issue in marriage, and goes along with the notion of being self-aware and introspective. We all have issues.
We all have strengths and weaknesses. We all have areas of our personalities and such that can be improved. We all have un-met needs that we bring into marriage from our past that can also make us vulnerable to temptations and other outside influences.
I have personally dealt with post-partum depression and know how damaging that, and other psychological issues can be in a marriage. A lot of personal weaknesses came up for me, and a lot of internal re-programming was needed.
Ignoring our weaknesses and areas of insecurity is just not a good idea if you want to have a strong marriage. There is much to be gained from working on our personal issues before they become destructive neon signs for us.
Anne Bercht, one of the authors I?ve mentioned, believed that if someone had just asked her about issues from her past or what personal insecurities she might have that might be affecting her in a negative way, she thinks that that may have been enough for her to wake up to the potential dangers that existed in her marriage.
In hindsight, she did feel that her insecurities contributed to her husband?s affair. And that that was something she could have seen the value of looking into to prevent potential problems.
Another woman, who had also had an affair, talked about being 15 years old before she had ever heard a compliment about herself. She said her dad was just not expressive, and had never said anything nice to her or about her. She remembers the first time at age 15 that she heard from a stranger that she looked pretty.
Looking back she could see that that need for affirmation and validation produced a hole in her heart that created a susceptibility in her to succumb to the enticing of an affair that fed her need for commendation.
Common Childhood Wounds
It?s interesting that there are some common childhood wounds that we may want to think through and see if they might apply to us. These come from Dr. Harville Hendrix?s work, and his great book called Giving the Love That Heals.
Here are some of the common wounds for us to consider:
- Fear of rejection
- Fear of abandonment
- Feeling unwanted or unaccepted
- Feelings of incompetence
- Fear of closeness or being dependent
- Fear of being smothered
- Fear that their needs won?t be met
- Feelings of not being good enough
- Feeling invisible
- Fear of disapproval
Think about whether any of those might be hiding inside you somewhere that might be causing a potential susceptibility to temptations. We often have negative thoughts playing through our minds that can be a real Achilles heel in our marriages.
If we have things like, ?I?m not good enough,? or ?No one could really love me if they really knew me,? playing in our head, then we do have some areas of weakness that can affect how we behave and how we interact with our spouse and where we might be vulnerable.
On-going Personal Improvement
Working on our personal stuff and becoming more whole as a person is time well spent. I think we can all benefit from having an on-going personal growth program going on in our lives to help us to continue to root out our imperfections and strengthen our weaknesses.
Just imagine if our spouse is seeing that we are always trying to work on our stuff and improve and get better and overcome our weaknesses. Just think about how much easier it makes it for them to be more patient with us, and more willing to overlook our inevitable weaknesses.
It takes real humility to exist in that state of continually trying to do and be better. You need to be teachable. You need to be willing to change. And a lot of people don?t want to change. They want somebody else to make the changes.
Let?s break here and we?ll continue with this discussion in part 4 of Affair-Proofing Your Marriage. This has been episode #7 ?Affair-Proofing Your Marriage, Part 3 ? Dealing with Your Issues.?
So stay tuned for part 4?the final segment of this ?Affair-Proofing Your Marriage? series for more specific steps to safeguard your marriage from infidelity. And we?ll do a final review all eight steps as well.
See you then!
About the Author ? Laura M. Brotherson, MS, MFT
Marriage and intimacy expert, Laura M. Brotherson, MS, MFT, is the author of ?And They Were Not Ashamed ? Strengthening Marriage through Sexual Fulfillment,? and host of ?The Marital Intimacy Show? on The Women?s Information Network (The WIN).
Laura has an M.S. in Marriage and Family Therapy (MFT) and was also trained at the Institute for Sexual Wholeness (ISW) as a Christian sex therapist.
To learn more about Laura, visit her website www.strengtheningmarriage.com
To download this podcast, please visit, http://thewinonline.com/episode/affair-proofing-your-marriage-part-3-dealing-your-issues
Related posts:
- How To Affair-Proof Your Marriage
- 5 Tips On How To Affair Proof Your Marriage
- 8 Tips To Affair-Proof Your Marriage
- Revenge Affair- How To Survive An Affair
- Surviving An Affair- Can I Stop the Affair?
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