Tom Papa, "The Marriage Ref" on Jerry Seinfeld's show by this name, is definitely no marriage educator. He's a comedian, and a lot funnier than I will ever be. So he's going to make jokes about marriage issues. And I am going to ask, "How could these people enjoy being married a bit more?"

Earlier, I talked about the folks on the teaser episode who argued over a stripper pole. Today, let's consider the other couple. She hated his dog, who predated her in his life. He had the dog stuffed after it died and wanted to put it right in the middle of their home. She was creeped out.

She won the prize for meanest blow of the night, saying the day the dog died was the happiest day of her life. He adored the dog, but it had destroyed eight sofas and even peed on their guests.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the day he showed her the stuffed dog at the taxidermist's studio wasn't the first time they disagreed about this dog. What if he heard (or saw in her face) her pleasure in his beloved pet's death?

He probably felt the sting of her dismissal of his pain, her failure to appreciate what he had lost. What if he had, right then, tried the Assume Love technique? What if he had made a genuine effort to imagine what might drive a good woman who loved him to take pleasure in what caused him so much pain?

This is the right time to use the technique, when you're in pain or angry over something your spouse does or fails to do. The goal is stop your pain or anger from narrowing your thinking so you recall what else you already know that would help you understand the situation more clearly.

I don't know these people or live inside their heads. This is why only he could do this. But I expect he would realize pretty quickly that a loving person doesn't mock a loved one's tragedy just for sport. Her lack of compassion had to come from some deep wound of her own. He might then have remembered he loved the dog before he loved her and he defended the dog even when she expressed outrage over the furniture and the guest-spraying.

Now, maybe she no longer loves her. Maybe she has no morals or manners. But if you assume she's a woman of character who loves him, the most likely explanation for her behavior is jealousy, the fear that she did not matter to him as much as the dog did.

He might have thought her silly to feel such jealousy, but if he assumed love when she failed him in his moment of grief, he could have seen the jealousy. And then, if he really wanted to keep his stuffed dog, he might have recognized the best way to do so would be to first make it very clear she has no reason to be jealous.

This means making a bigger fuss over her than the dog. It means involving her in the decision about the role the dog plays in their home. It means not blindsiding her with his choice to stuff the dog. It means acknowledging her importance to him, so she can feel free to support him in his grief without feeling like she's being asked to keep his mistress's funeral urn in her home.

He probably could have kept his stuffed dog where he could see the dog daily, and gotten her empathy for his loss. Instead, he got an unresolved disagreement that drives a wedge between them.

She could have assumed love, too, whenever she was angry at the dog while it was alive or when she was angry at him for stuffing it. She could have stopped her jealousy on her own long ago and felt a lot better. I chose him for today's episode because, in addition to wanting to feel great about his marriage, he also wanted her approval for his dog memorial plan.

I don't imagine it would make great TV, but I think stopping the pain and anger and disagreements in a marriage is a lot more worthwhile than letting people know whether they are right or wrong when they disagree with their mates.

What's your take on this?

Posted by Patty Newbold at 6:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

UPDATE: It was as bad as expected (maybe worse, thanks to replaying the meanest two things said in each episode) and unfunny to boot.

Tonight's the night. Jerry Seinfeld's new Marriage Ref show debuts right after the Olympics closing ceremonies. It's the "Tell Me My Spouse is Awful" Game for others' amusement.

You know the game. Someone comes into the office or runs into you at the supermarket and wants your opinion on just how dreadful their mate is. Their spouse or life partner wants something or claims something is true. They disagree. You are asked to take sides. Right there, right away, with just one of the parties in front of you, in obvious pain.

You are asked to confirm their usually unjustified belief that the two possibilities laid in front of you are the only possible options for them, so this friend or colleague can feel justified in his or her anger or, worse yet, doomed to a painful marriage. If you refuse, you leave this sad or angry person even more so. If you play along, long after they make up, you are left with a negative impression of their mate.

But you will have lessened the chances of them making up just by playing along. Because you will have reinforced their fear that these two unacceptable choices are the only ones available to them.

Let me give you an example provided by NBC, courtesy of Access Atlanta columnist Rodney Ho.

He wants a stripper pole in the bedroom. He won't be the one dancing on it. He plans to tell their four kids (at least the two young enough to fall for it if they don't hear about this episode at school) that it's mommy's exercise pole. She does not want a permanent reminder of the things she's willing to do while playing in the bedroom.

If you've been reading this blog for any time at all, you already have thought of at least one obvious Third Alternative that might make both of them happy, like a private hotel room with a pole. Might even look a lot sexier than the $150 pole he's thinking of planting in their bedroom. And it might get a much sexier dance out of her, minus the embarrassment of his asking her mother to side with him on this.

Instead, a group of comedians will crack jokes about their dispute, cement it into a permanent either-or, him vs. her issue for them. Comedian Tom Papa will let them know who wins. (Their relationship always loses.)

If you're interested in the success of your marriage, and you still want to watch the show for the laughs, do it with a notebook on hand. Listen to what the spouses say they like or don't like about the two options and jot down two or three Third Alternatives for them. Your notebook could be invaluable if you and your spouse ever find yourselves in the middle of the same dispute.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 2:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Happy Valentine's Day, and thank you for this fourth anniversary of the Asssume Love blog. It wouldn't be any fun at all without you. If you've been lurking, I hope you will say hi in the comments on this anniversary of ours.

Today's topic is, of course, romance. When it gets this much advertising, this much aisle space in almost every store, you would think every husband in America would know exactly what to do today.

So why didn't your husband get you that luxury car with the bow on top and a box of chocolates on the leather passenger's seat? Or at least write you an original song and sing it for you while strumming his ukele in front of a roaring fire?

If you're feeling let down today, let's try this. It might keep you from doing something to him that you will regret.

First, Assume Love. Assume for the moment that whatever he did or did not do today was done with as much love as he's ever had for you. For those of you really smarting today, let's also assume you were not blinded by love when you saw all those great qualities in him, but that you are blinded by something else if you don't see them still.

Let's be clear. I do not want you to act as if this is true. I want you to just try on the idea for a what-if experiment.

What if all this is true? How might it explain your not getting taken out to dinner tonight? Or your receiving a new ironing board today instead of those flowers you thought all wives should get? Or my husband offering just a kiss and a hug to celebrate the day?

Option 1. (You should always consider this one first.) He has no idea you might be expecting some hint of romance today or that you believe romance is for married people, too. If you have ever whined at or insulted him about this in the past, mentioned gifts your friends received from their guys, or made a huge fuss over a past Valentine's Day treat, this is not your explanation. But if you are newlyweds or never said a thing about past unromantic Februaries, you might want to clue him in, even invite him to take advantage of the half-price sales tomorrow.

Option 2. (Another one you should always consider.) He doesn't know it's Valentine's Day. If he's involved in a Mardi Gras Krewe, the America's Cup Race, or the Olympics, he could forget the chocolates, even if he loves you very much and wants you to feel adored. Same goes if he's caring for a dying brother or trying to make sense of a recent diagnosis of a life-threatening illness. Or if he's suffering dementia.

Option 3. He knows you like to be fussed over and he knows today is the day, but he still sees romance as what you do to persuade a woman to love you. To show it now, after he has promised you everything he's got and received your promise to love him for richer or poorer, would expose his vulnerable soft underbelly, his fear that it's all still temporary and must be earned again and again. This is especially possible if he loves you, but you have threatened recently to leave him or have dismissed him publically as someone you have to look after like a child.

Option 4. He wants to shower you with romance, but nothing he can afford, nothing he knows how to do, seems like enough for the woman he adores. He thought by now he would be able to afford to give you something monstrously expensive. Or he shopped for days, but never found anything remotely good enough for you.

Option 5. He's frugal. He does not equate money with love. In fact, he feels most loving when he's protecting your financial future. And he expects you will gratefully receive that gift right along with the simple card or small box of candy.

You know this man, and there may be other explanations for why his way of loving you is to skip Valentine's Day or deliver less romance than you hoped for.

Of course, if he's vicious, showing you what he got his mistress for Valentine's Day or giving you a box of chocolates with the warning that he's put rat poison in two of the pieces, our what-if is over almost before it starts. Loving people don't do these things. They wouldn't even stand by quietly if they saw a stranger doing such things. There is no loving explanation for such behavior

But there are loving explanations for a lot of non-romantic Valentine's Day acts.

Second, Expect Love. I didn't ask you to go looking for loving explanations of an approach to Valentine's Day that upsets you so that I could talk you into settling for whatever crumbs you can get. I did it to help you check if you might have overlooked some of the love you were offered today, love that just happened to get in the way of playing along with Valentine's Day customs.

I think it is perfectly sane to expect love from your husband. But it is a mistake to expect it to show up in any particular shape or form. Looking for it in one place will lead you to overlook it in all the other places. And pouting at your husband because his love did not assume a romantic form is likely to keep the rest of his love for you under his hat.

Use what you discovered from assuming love to shine a flashlight into some of the corners of your marriage and see if there are bits of love you haven't yet enjoyed or thanked your guy for. What can you afford because of his frugality? Has he offered massage or kisses and hugs instead of searching for the perfect gift? Has he been creative in coming up with things to do together, instead of songs to sing you? Has he made every day a little bit romantic instead of making this one overly so?

Third, Find Third Alternatives. You tell him you want flowers, but something (maybe even his way of expressing love) keeps him from buying them for you. Could you enjoy flowers you buy for yourself? If not, it's not the flowers that matter. Is it the time it takes to stop and buy them? Is it having the money spent on you instead of something else? Is it the message you would assume flowers convey? Once you know the specs for what you're looking for, convey those, instead of asking for "a little romantic gesture" or "a bouquet of flowers if it wouldn't kill you."

You can do the same with any other sign of romance you are hoping for. You can also do it with whatever measures of love he's using that you are failing to deliver to him, because we all feel a lot more generous when we feel safe, loved, and respected.

Do say hi, please, in today's fourth anniversary comments. Let us know if your husband delighted you on Valentine's Day or if you found these steps helpful or if you are a husband or a life partner and have an opinion on this. Or send some virtual fruit, and we'll mix fourth anniversary tradition with today's technology. Thanks for reading!

Posted by Patty Newbold at 7:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Prescription for an Unhappy Marriage

• Keep checking if you are loved, if you are respected


• Keep checking whether you are getting all you expected

Prescription for a Happy Marriage

• Keep checking if you are overlooking loving acts or signs of respect


• Keep checking whether you are getting goodness you never expected

Simple, no?

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Are you one of those parents who did not have great role models for marriage as you were growing up? Did you have to discover some of the skills for sustaining an intimate relationship on your own? Me, too.

And as you know if you have read my Author page, it took a huge whack upside the head for me to catch on.

So, what would I teach a daughter if I had one still in middle school or high school now, whether straight or Lesbian? Here are some of the key things:

• How to end arguments without becoming a doormat or a bitch
• What to do when blindsided by unexpected, distressing behavior from a mate
• How to handle not getting what you know you need
• How to stay safe from abuse without analysing every action for signs of danger
• What to do when your marriage seems unfair, especially over money and chores
• Why looking for a soul mate to marry may actually reduce your chances of staying married
• What is wrong with seeking your friends' support in a dispute with your mate

You do not need to teach any of these as marriage lessons. You can teach them to look for Third Alternatives in their disputes with siblings or friends. You can teach them how to build a support network and reach out to it for ideas on meeting all their needs. You can teach them that fair is something to be negotiated, not unilaterally decided. You can teach them to test other assumptions when looking to explain a distressing interaction with anyone. And you can encourage a growth mindset, rather than a fixed one.

As a grandmother of two, I can tell you the benefits of having a happily married child and an open, unthreatened relationship with your grandkids' other parent make it worth whatever extra effort it takes.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 8:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"My mother always said when you get married, you stay married, and she meant that." That's what Verbal Isenhower has to say on the occasion of the 81st anniversary of her marriage to Vern Isenhower.

They married on Jan. 26, 1929. Verbal was 16, Vern was 17, and the two of them had grown up on adjoining farms in Arkansas. Now they live in Louisburg, Kansas.

Happy anniversary, Vern and Verbal. And thanks, Fox 4 in Kansas City, for sharing their story with us.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have two this year:

1. Find more creative Third Alternatives when we disagree - We disagree a lot, so I will have lots of opportunity here. A good Third Alternative combines delighting my husband with getting what I want, always a pure delight. I intend to reach out to my creative friends and my readers to come up with even better alternative whenever we think there are just two and we don't agree on either of them.
2. Finally launch self-study courses on our EnjoyBeingMarried.com website - How does this improve my marriage? Well, first it means more income, so we can do more of the things we love doing together. But more importantly, it makes me smile, even gets me dancing around the office, and that delights my husband a whole lot more than any self-sacrificial dish washing or floor scrubbing.

Now I really want to hear from you. Is there anything you intend to do this year to give yourself a stronger, happier relationship with that terrific person you married or pledged your life to? Click on that Comments link and tell us!

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Reba McEntire's hit song Consider Me Gone expresses a feeling many of us have experienced in our relationships. "If I'm not the one thing you can't stand to lose...consider me gone." Feeling unimportant to someone we love and want in our life is intolerable. Our natural first impulse is to run.

Yet, when I listen to this song, I don't hear a woman who has fallen in love first and realizes she's hoping for more than she's likely to get, someone who might do well to run. I hear a woman who has made a commitment to a life partner or created a lifelong bond by giving birth to a child together, a woman in intense pain who wants most to hold onto a loving bond.

"Consider me gone" may be intended to get a declaration of love from someone who doesn't want her to go, but it's more likely to set off the same horrible fear that her partner is not the one thing she can't stand to lose.

To her, I want to yell, "Assume love! Before you let fear take over your senses, try out the idea that what's got you worried is not lost love at all, but fearful love or even full-out, committed love being expressed in a way you're not familiar with."

An example: when I am very busy, away from home a lot, working when I'm there, my husband figures the best way to show his love is to keep himself busy and out of the way. I come dashing into the house thinking, "Oh, finally, a chance to spend some time with him," and he's so deeply involved in something that I cannot get his attention. And I never fail to feel rejected, unimportant to him — until I Assume Love and try looking at his actions as an act of love.

Then I smile, instead of running off to another room and pouting while I busy myself with something I don't really want to be doing. Maybe he doesn't care that I'm available, but maybe — more likely — he's being helpful, because my entrance wasn't any different from the last few, when I had 40 minutes to get something important done and run out again.

Gently, by joining in whatever he's doing or by quietly kissing the top of his head while he works, I make it clear this entrance of mine is different. My fear drains away. He smiles as he catches on, and he lets me know how soon he'll be done, or he welcomes me into whatever he's doing. Neither of us worries the other is going or good as gone. Life is very, very sweet. I like being married, and I love the calm that assuming love brings us.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For those who don't get excited about receiving gifts, giving them can be a chore. Worse yet, gift-giving can become a no-win trap, one in which they are certain to disappoint someone who matters a lot to them.

Here are seven ways to have more fun this month if you love giving and receiving gifts but your spouse doesn't:

1. Create a wish list and make it easy for your mate to find.


2. Find a designated shopper your spouse can turn to.


3. Invite your spouse to gift wrap an invitation to something he or she would like to do with you.


4. Cultivate friends who share your love of gifts and find a different tradition to share with your partner.


5. Wrap up a few things you would love and let your spouse choose which to give you when.


6. Pick something you always love that your husband or wife can give you ever year, like Godiva chocolates or your favorite fragrance.


7. Encourage your beloved to create coupons you can exchange for help with your computer, car, housework, or errands.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 5:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

One of my favorite sayings (I think it comes from Alcoholics Anonymous) is this: "An expectation is a premeditated resentment." December is a big month for mistaken expectations, especially for a new couple or for one whose circumstances have changed this year.

Do you want to spend this month angry about the help you expected, the gifts you expected, the attendance at family or social gatherings you expected, or the religious observances you expected? Or would you rather spend it enjoying the delights of a husband or wife you chose for the qualities he or she adds to your life?

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My preschooler nephew provided an unexpected reminder on Thanksgiving of how to make love last. After dinner, he helped decorate the Christmas tree, then announced we should all gather around it to sing, "We Wish You a Merry Christmas."

He grabbed me and said, "Aunt Patty, let's get the books!" I was surprised anyone keeps a set of Christmas carol song books in their home, but I followed him. He began pulling not song books but finance texts off the shelf and handing them to me, one for each of the Thanksgiving guests, the rest of whom ranged in age from 39 to 82.

It took me a moment to realize that, seen through the eyes of a non-reader, the subject of the books was irrelevant to the holiday experience. Carolers hold books open while they sing, and we could, too. If I knew the books held something other than the words to songs we all knew, my knowledge was irrelevant. Sharing it right now would be mean.

Everyone else caught on quickly and opened a book while my brother-in-law captured all of us on video, singing around the Christmas tree, looking just like his son expected we ought to look. And you know what? It was a lot more fun with the props, once we turned off our own stories about what qualifies as a song book or how you ought to use one.

Sometimes we forget that all of us see the world through our own abilities and mental images. When asked to participate in any meaningful activity, we would do well to try to see what we're asked to do through the eyes of the person asking, and turn off our knee-jerk criticisms to focus on what's truly important.

Have you ever caught yourself just before sharing irrelevant information that might ruin an important moment with your spouse or child? I would love to hear your story.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This blog gets cross-posted in my Facebook Notes, where I was asked an interesting question this morning (well, morning for me, afternoon for David, who asked):

Hey Patty, I get Assume Love, but what about expect love. Isn't that the opposite? Assume love is taking the onus on yourself while expect love is waiting for someone else to give it. Or am I reading too much into this?

This is such a great question that it deserves its own blog post. Neither Assume Love nor Expect Love is about your spouse. Both are things you can do for yourself to enjoy being married more.

I recommend you Assume Love whenever you get upset by your mate's behavior. It's not taking the onus on yourself. You do it to regain control over your emotions before they mislead you.

Because whatever happened looked at first glance like something scary, your overly helpful brain will jump into action and make sure you pay attention only to whatever danger you might be in. It will deliberately cause you to ignore a lot of others things you know or could see if your brain didn't smell danger.

Let's say you catch your spouse on the phone whispering, "I'll have to call you back" and quickly hiding the phone. Secretive behavior by your spouse is at first glance pretty scary. Within a split second, your brain chemistry will have you checking over recent events for other signs of an affair. It will have you scrutinizing your mate's face for clues.

If you Assume Love—just choose to believe those wedding promises long enough to check this out and ask yourself why a good, loving person might behave this way—you have a chance of recalling your anniversary or birthday is a week away. Or you two are on your way out, and you blew up at your spouse the last time you went out for continuing a phone call with her sister that made you late.

Assume Love does not ever mean Pretend Love, in which you tell your brain to just shut up about the fear so you avoid offending your mate. If you just Pretend Love, you won't get the relief of discovering everything's actually just fine.

Expect Love is all about your state of mind, too. This person married you. He or she brought a whole bunch of impressive qualities into your life, then promised to continue sharing them through thick and thin. It is perfectly reasonable to expect you will receive lots of love.

Then you make yourself miserable. You make up stories about what package this love will come in. If you're not aware of your stories, they usually begin not with "once upon a time" but with "if you loved me." If you loved me, you wouldn't have spent that money. If you loved me, you'd show up on time. If you loved me, you wouldn't ask me to do that. If you loved me, you would help me with this right now.

Every one of those stories prevents you from seeing the love you are offered. Every one of those stories keeps you tapping your toe, waiting to be loved, when you already are. Every one of them makes your spouse wonder just what it would take to convince you of his or her love—and whether it's still worth trying.

When you Expect Love, you don't put any onus on your spouse. Instead, you remind yourself to quit looking in all the wrong places and blaming your spouse when you find no love there. Showing you love is not a chore. It's one of life's greatest delights. What is unbearable is showing love and getting blame in return. You offer your mate a great gift when you Expect Love, even though you do it to make yourself happier. So Expect Love. Please.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Some folks scream bloody murder when things don't go their way in a marriage. Others avoid conflict. Neither works.

Both of these involve pulling away from your marriage, distancing yourself from your partner in life. Harder to do, but much more likely to succeed: lean in. Get closer. State your case and affirm your love.

Be sexier (not pushier) when you ask for more sex, even if it risks a harder fall if you're turned down. Be kinder, more generous (not more demanding or whining) when you seek favors, even though it means you might have a bit less to fall back on if you don't receive what you're after. Be more fair in other areas if you feel some area of your relationship has become unfair.

Why? Because we learn to handle our relationships like a dance. If one pulls away, the other follows at a constant distance or pulls back as a counterbalance. The way to change the dance is to lean in, inviting your partner to lean in, too, or to lead somewhere new.

Lean in and trust this person who fell in love with exactly who you are. Don't demand your mate solve your problems, but give him or her the opportunity to help you solve them. Lean in.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 3:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In tonight's Enjoy Being Married teleclass, I'll be talking about how to get more of your needs met (without cheating). Key to this is knowing what's reasonable to expect from your husband or wife and what's not.

Here are ten things you should not expect:

1. Vacations that involve being in a bass boat at dawn


2. Weekly tile grout scrubbing


3. Even one foot rub


4. A clean diaper on the baby when you finish your bath


5. Trash removal before it stinks


6. A home in the best neighborhood you two can afford


7. Home-cooked meals


8. Love notes in your laptop bag


9. A hug at the airport


10. Thoughtful birthday gifts

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My Husband Made Me Eat It is my new column for married folks trying to maintain weight loss, like me.

It's part of a fantastic web site filled with great tips and advice for anyone losing weight or keeping it off, SecondHelpingOnline.com.

Check out recipes like Turkey Burgers Garnished with Chopped Roasted Shallot, Catalan Mushrooms, and Maple Molasses Chipotle Ketchup or easy-on-the calories treats like Grilled Figs with Dark Chocolate and Sea Salt Bruschetta.

I'll leave it to Russ and Kevin to tempt you with delicious food you can safely eat. My column's about what happens to couples when one or both of you aim to watch your weight and stay fit. I need your input to keep it real. Tell me about the eating and exercising challenges you've faced as part of a couple, what's worked for you, and what hasn't.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A lucky few grow up able to see what love is and how their parents love each other, growing better at it every year. But most of us don't. We go into marriage with something like the Foreigner song lyric lurking in our heads: "I wanna know what love is; I want you to show me."

We meet a good man or woman, discover love, and marry. At first, we're fine. We feel so loved. We give love freely. Some of our attempts miss their target, but most are well-received. We feel confident this could last a lifetime.

And then we get angry or hurt or frightened, and we're not sure. We return to the old questions. How can I get more love? Is there something I should be doing to get him (or her) to love me? There are lots of books, lots of magazine articles, lots of friends with advice. Some will even assure us it's normal to feel abandoned at times. We just have to "work at it."

Usually, though, "working at it" doesn't help, because the problem is not how we love them. It's not even how they love us. It's how much love we are able to receive and how much we block out. Unless we are offered no love at all, which is seldom the case, we can have plenty of love if we know how to let it in. And once we feel loved, most of us do a pretty good job of loving back.

So what we need to know is how to let love flow in, how to avoid shutting love out.

When we're alarmed by something they do, we can Assume Love and check to see if perhaps we're unnecessarily alarmed and just being loved in an unfamiliar way.

If we feel something's missing, we can Expect Love and let go of expecting it will come in a particular package. Rather than divorce and meet our own needs, we can meet our own needs and stick around to see what other surprising forms love will take.

When we disagree, we can seek to Find Third Alternatives instead of defending our initial idea of how to get what we want. We can get what we want AND give what they want. The this-or-that choices we see at first glance are seldom all we can choose among, and defending this (or that) shuts out love.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When you're upset about any other part of life with your husband, wife, or life partner, it's likely you will start noticing your differences, too. How compatible do you need to be to keep the relationship going?

Compatibility has two sides: propriety and enthusiasms. Marry someone whose ideas of what's proper and what's not differ wildly from yours and you'll probably end up divorced. But few people leaving a pedophile or suicide cult leader would describe the reason as incompatibility.

Most who use the term refer to different enthusiams. One likes golf and the other wants to go sailing. One enjoys eating out, the other eating home-cooked meals. One watches TV and the other is always reading. One wants to raise kids and the other does not.

On this last item: if you already have kids, any differences over how to raise them have nothing at all to do with your relationship with each other. Stay married or get divorced and you will still need to deal with your different ideas about what's important for them. It's about your relationship with your kids now, and you can be sure they want you to really, really make an effort to like their other parent.

So let's get back to those differing enthusiams. How many do you need to share? None. There is almost always a third alternative to any two you choose to compare.

Here's how you find that third alternative, which I define as an option that each of you likes at least as much as you like the option your mate rejects.

Question 1: If you did the thing you enjoy doing and your mate doesn't, did it alone or with friends, would there still be enough time in your week to spend time together delighted with each other? Yes? Then stop trying to drag your spouse along.

Question 2: Is there any aspect of what your mate enjoys that relates to something you truly enjoy? Can you watch sci fi to appreciate the editor's or sound effects person's talents, instead of the screenwriter's? Can you use your time on the dance floor, even though you don't much enjoy dancing, to strengthen your softball or skiing muscles or to get ideas for characters to include in your novel? Enthusiasm for the dreaded activity may actually sneak up on you if you manage to have a good time while engaging in it. It happened to me with country music.

Question 3: What are some of the themes in your enthusiasms? Do you tend to enjoy things that involve a risk or thrill? Things that get you moving? Things that are intensely beautiful? Things that let you be generous or kind to others? Things with order or repetition? With your mate, brainstorm other options that share these qualities. You might find some new ones you will both enjoy together.

Question 4: If you have enough income or assets or skills that neither of you would need a sugar daddy or a room in your parents' home to survive a divorce, what would you do differently on your own? Be honest. Can't you do them right now, with this person who loves you? Can't you have separate homes or at least separate rooms in the house? Can't one of you travel and the other stay home? Can't one of you cook for your friends and family without requiring the other to play host or hostess or clean the house? Sometimes our image of what married folks do gets in the way of picturing the great life we could be living as a couple.

Let me know what you two have done to become more compatible. Or ask us all to help you find your own third alternative.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"I don't love you anymore." Those are really tough words to hear. Laura A. Munson's response to them is must-read stuff for anyone whose once-great marriage has hit a rocky patch in the road.

Munson's article in the NY Times is a great read. While she came to it down a different path, what she did is assume love. She asked herself why her husband would say those words if he still loved her. It took a lot of the horrible sting out of the words and showed her what she needed to do next.

It saved their marriage.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I heard today from yet another woman who found herself with a long list of unmet needs, divorced, and then found herself in the same position all over again after a few years with her next partner.

It would be very easy in this position to conclude men are to blame, and they're all alike. Some of the others I've known who reached this point decided after two rounds of this to live alone and keep from getting attached to any of the men they dated.

Lots of these women are following the same dumb path I was on unlike my husband's sudden death woke me up. They commit themselves to a man who meets a lot of their needs -- their current needs. Over time, they notice other needs go unmet. They ask (or nag) their man to meet these, too. He doesn't. He can't. She thinks he can, but his talents, his strengths, his motivations lie elsewhere, and he doesn't feel loving or loved doing these things for her.

So, she leaves. And the next guy she hooks up with is the one who can meet the items on her needs list that she felt so deprived of in the earlier relationship. She feels relief, until she starts noticing all those others on the list, including a lot her first husband or partner had been meeting. And this is where she concludes commitment to a single partner is worthless.

Commitment is not at all worthless. It's a source of some of the best feelings in life. Giving love makes us feel great about ourselves. Being cared for through a grave illness or a job layoff feels terrific. Getting our needs met feels great, if we focus on the ones getting met, instead of the others. And treating your children's other parent as the center of your universe puts you at the center of theirs.

So, what to do with that list of unmet needs? Start meeting them. And enlist your partner in brainstorming strategies for meeting them yourself, instead of demanding he meet them. Want more money? Start a business or take a job or ask for a raise instead of advising him to do any of these on your behalf. Living in his home and feeling like it's not really yours? Start saving up a down payment, because you'll need a place that's worth both the financial value of the current one and its sentimental value to his.

Want to travel and he won't go? Join (or start) a travel club. Want to ski and he hates the cold? Find some skiing buddies and hit the slopes. Don't want to get stuck with washing the dishes any longer? Switch to paper plates. Your anger and resentment over what he won't do is very likely leading him to want to do less for you, not more.

What you need has nothing to do with your marriage. Those needs go with you if you leave. And you could shop from now until your 64th birthday and never find a human being who could and would meet every one of them for you. So, unless he adds nothing to your life at all, pick one of those needs and get started taking it off your resentment list. You'll find your spouse looks a whole lot better without that list between you.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Read how John and Sherry brought 75 of their family and friends together for a very classy and fun wedding for less than $4,000. It looks like everyone had a great time.

Keeping the budget low is a good way to avoid family battles or the sort of debt that seeps into every disagreement a new couple must get through in their first few years together. For those with the budget to afford more, imagine spending the difference on education or a more comfortable home or perhaps launching a business. Ten years down the road, the investment in the marriage instead of the wedding will have paid off handsomely.

Thanks to Smart Marriages for the heads-up on their wedding story.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 3:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Any stressful event, like moving, a child's illness, or a visit from relatives you don't both adore, provides plenty of opportunities for getting angry at your mate or sulking in resentment.

"Where are my keys?" you roar. Your partner sits in silence, unmoved. You expected help finding them. You're late, and you're under incredible stress, and a little help would be appreciated...

You assume love. It's a stretch. This feels like betrayal. "OK, what if this silence is the chosen behavior of a kind and generous partner of enormously high integrity who loves me deeply? How would I explain it?"

So, why does anyone choose silence when they feel love and are being asked for help? Could be because they don't realize the question is aimed at them. Not the case here, though. It's just the two of you.

Could be because they think the question is rhetorical. Might be worth checking to see if you're looking directly at your keys as you ask the question. No, they're not here.

Could be silence is the most loving of the options available under the circumstances. Is there some reason your spouse might be under so much stress that the choices are between saying something mean and saying nothing at all? Oh, yes, that's a pained, stressed-out expression. It's not that you're being offered no help. You're being spared from dealing with expressions of outrage from a mate whose stress level is over the top.

You know what's causing all this stress. It's affecting you, too. By why would asking about the keys add to it? Being helpful to a loved one is, after all, calming.

You could use some calming yourself, so you try being helpful: "Did I leave them somewhere I shouldn't have?"

"You did! You left them on the sink again. I know you know that's where I clean my contact lenses, and I really need to keep it sanitary, and I can't use the guest bathroom this week when I don't feel like cleaning up after you, and it's really, really important I avoid getting any infections right now!"

"That was thoughtless of me. But it wasn't intentional. It's a rough week, isn't it?"

"Your keys are on the dresser. Want me to drive you, so you won't have to take time to find a parking space?"

Ahh. Much better.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 1:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tit for tat may make you happier for the moment, but always at the expense of your relationship. Falling in love made your heart sing, not because of what your beloved offered you, but because it made you want to offer so much more.

Happy Valentine's day! Be generous.

And thanks for three great years so far. Here's a post from that first Valentine's Day in 2006.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

That's not exactly how we put it. We ask for more time at home, more romance, more appreciation, more help around the house, or more evenings out.

Usually, what we ask for are things we received lots of us at the start of the relationship. We just want to go back to those good times, to feeling loved.

Feeling that loved again is a perfectly reasonable wish, definitely not out of reach for most of us, UNLESS we try to get there by pleading, "Love me better!"

"Love me better!" shuts off love. It doesn't get you more. The love is still there. Today, it might take the form of a steady drip into your retirement account, instead of chocolates and flowers. It might take the form of family time with the kids, instead of date time with you. It might even be lurking just below the surface, waiting for any sign you would actually welcome a hug or some hand-holding.

When you announce, "Can't feel it; love me better," it is a slap in the face. It's a denial of all you are being given. Because your mate cannot tell you want what you want instead of something else, that you are not even looking at all the other forms of love offered to you, it comes across as a demand to fill an apparently bottomless pit.

What can you do instead? Pay attention. Savor the love you are getting. Appreciate it. Say thank you, and be specific about why you are grateful.

"Love me better" creates resentment for both of you. You resent not having what you put on your marriage checklist. Your spouse resents being asked for more than what he or she feels capable of. And resentment snuffs out love. "Love me better" snuffs out love.

Get to work on filling the holes in your life that make you want more. Need more conversation? Make new friends or call the old ones. Need someone to appreciate your cooking? Invite your family over. Want to dance? Find an instructor. You may even find your wife or husband willing to help you find the people who can help you.

Get creative. Want more together time at home? Rearrange your schedule to be fully present when your mate is home. Pay someone to do the chores that cut into the time your spouse is not working. Learn a skill that pays better or take a risk, so less of the burden of paying the bills falls on your spouse. Instead of asking your spouse to spend less time at the office, make his or her time at home more enticing, more urgent to hurry home for.

Does it sound like work to give yourself what you need, on top of everything else you must get done each week? Then imagine how much harder it sounds to the love of your life, who knows a lot less than you do about what would actually please you.

Reopen the flow of love that made those early months so wonderful. All you have to do is pay attention to ALL the ways you are loved. You married someone very special, with his or her own way of loving you. The moment you appreciate what you are given, instead of resenting what you are not, love will rush back in. Enjoy!

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The Oprah Show is

"looking for couples who have grown closer despite tough economic times. If you've lost your job, your home, your car, or other possessions but managed to save your marriage in the process, we want to hear from you. Has the economic downturn somehow opened up new opportunities in your life -- perhaps the change to spend more time with your kids, or reassess your priorities? We want to know your secret to surviving a recession."

If your secret is to Assume Love, Expect Love, or Find Third Alternatives, I hope you will tell her producers I'm working on teaching these to married people everywhere. Thanks!

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Want to hear more about how to Assume Love, Expect Love, and Find Third Alternatives? Listen to this podcast, in which I was interviewed by Lee Rosen of Stay Happily Married.

Hats off to Lee for doing so much to discourage business for his North Carolina divorce law practice, and for being a great interviewer.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's January. Time for all those post-holiday arguments. You two have different goals for the new year. You have different hurts left over from last year. You have different fears, different challenges ahead. You have different ideas of how important those threats or challenges will be. You have different ideas how to deal with them.

Break out the arguments.

And crank up the stakes. Your spouse may well be the single most important person in your life. If you can't get him or her to agree with you, it feels scary. If you're human, you withdraw from your spouse to reduce the fear or you argue louder to get the agreement you need to feel safe.

So, how do you skip all the usual pain?

Jump sides and, TOGETHER, look for the Third Alternative that gives both of you everything you like about what you're arguing for and nothing of what you're arguing against.

In other words, win every argument, and be a hero to your spouse at the same time.

Here are some past posts on how to find your Third Alternative:
The Third Alternative
Disagreements Turn Into Gifts
Married to a Collector of Stuff? Don't Ask Dr. Phil to Set Him Straight
Weight Gain and Divorce
Three Tips for Getting the Most From Your Marriage
Doing What Your Spouse Doesn't Want You to Do
When Marriage Crumbles
David and Michelle Paige Paterson: What We Can Learn from their Admissions
Round Up the Usual Suspects

Have a great New Year!

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Rachel Cornell wrote a powerful blog post last week for the wives, husbands, parents, and friends of disabled war vets.

A blind artist, author, and speaker, Rachel gets it. When your limb, your vision, your range of motion, or half your intestines are gone, you don't "put your life back together again" -- you build a new life. You don't "get things back to normal" -- normal, as Rachel says, is just a setting on a washing machine. And no therapy can "make you whole again" -- because it's your dreams that make you whole, not your arms, legs, eyes, or guts, and no injury can destroy those. In the aftermath, you hang onto the dreams and deal with the new obstacles, or you focus on the losses and lose the dreams.

If you're married to someone learning to go after his or her dreams with a body that can't do some of the things it could do before, it's going to throw some new obstacles in the path to your dreams, too. People are going to treat your spouse differently now. And it's going to affect you. Your spouse must handle many things differently now. It's going to affect how he or she handles your relationship, too.

Expect love. It won't -- it can't -- come in the same packages as before, but it will be there. Find other ways to get the other forms of help and support you need to follow your dreams.

Assume love. Don't jump to conclusions about the meaning of a harsh or discouraging word or a change in daily rituals. You've both got a lot of adjusting to do, and you're going to overadjust a few times before you get it right.

Look for third alternatives. Honor the dreams. Respect the efforts. Don't ever think your first idea or two is all you get to choose from. Build the new rituals, the new furniture layouts, the new traditions, the new chore-sharing arrangements that build the new life and move toward the lifelong dreams that make you both whole no matter what.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 6:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I was asked on Twitter this morning by author Susan Kuhn Frost how to talk to your spouse about money. It's a great question. In a word: gently.

Prepare yourself for the discussion by counting your blessings. When we feel any lack of resources tightening its grip on us, it's so tempting to pass the fears off to someone else, instead of laying them to rest. But do you really want to tighten the grip of fear around your husband's or wife's neck? Your spouse surely shares whatever lack of resources you are feeling right now. Do you really want to add shame or blame to this?

So count your blessings. If your spouse were to disappear from your life tomorrow, would you really be at less risk? That's not what happened to me when my first husband died suddenly. All your debts, all your obligations, all your hopes are yours alone. All your underage children's debts and obligations and hopes are yours alone, too. If you are lucky enough to have someone sharing them with you for now, focus on how fortunate you are, and not on how much more you could have if he or she made different choices.

Even if your spouse brings in no money at all, count your blessings if there are chores you don't need to do on top of earning an income, or problems you don't need to solve for your children or your parents or your home. Write out each one on paper and take time to savor it. Then add every thing your spouse has done that makes you feel good or at least less stressed, because these are helping you make the money and the choices you need to make right now.

Don't talk about money until you've thought about how truly rich you are. It will change your voice and your body language. And these will change your spouse's brain chemistry. They will decide whether your spouse stays calm and free to think of creative responses or must answer in spite of a flood of chemicals whose very purpose is to narrow the range of options the brain will consider. Which options? Those that have worked repeatedly in the past in the face of a threat, which may include such gems as walking out of the room, calling you names, belittling you, or bursting into tears, all mastered while still way too young to think of anything better.

Start from a keen awareness of how rich you are because you have love in your life and a partner through tough times. If you do, the rest of the money conversation is just brainstorming with someone you admire, trust, and love. Be honest about what you seek, so when you disagree about strategies, the two of you can find third alternatives that satisfy both your goals.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"'Don't wait until your kids leave home to schedule quality time with your partner,' said UC Berkeley psychology professor Oliver John" in today's UC Berkeley News.

He and fellow researchers Ravenna Helson and Sara Gorchoff conducted interviews with 100 women starting when they were seniors at Mills College in 1958.

They might also have added, "Don't wait for Prince Charming."

[T]ypical of their generation...84 percent married before age 25 and 30 percent divorced by age 45. In some cases, the increased marital satisfaction they found later in life was due to finding more compatible partners after divorcing. Overall, however, the study found the marital satisfaction of women who stayed with the same partners increased significantly while the boost in contentment for those with new partners was not notable.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 5:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's a great quote from Jim Collins' book Good to Great that applies even more to marriages than to the businesses he writes about:

"Get involved in something that you care so much about that you want to make it the greatest it can possibly be, not because of what you will get, but just because it can be done."

What's your picture of greatness for your marriage?

Posted by Patty Newbold at 1:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After tonight's teleclass on Divers (people with one interest they keep going deeper into) and Scanners (people with so many interests they can't choose one) and how they can get along, someone sent me this question.

Diver and Scanner couple. My husband does not understand all my piles. He calls them my "droppings." I think of them as my "stations." I don't know if we will ever see eye to eye about them, and I might have to collect my "stations" and put them all in one place at some point. But I like to work on different things in different locations.

Hmmm how can we both get what we need?

You're only stuck as long as you see it as "keep my droppings right where they are" and "put her droppings somewhere else." As soon as one of you decides to jump the net and offer to deliver what the other wants, it gets so much easier. You just get clearer on what you really want in return. Then the two of you can work together to find Third Alternatives that work for both of you:

You're much smarter together than alone. And you're much more effecting working toward the same thing than working against each other, because you know each other's hot buttons way too well.

Here's what you might come up with if one of you jumps the net.

• "Keep my droppings right where they are" and "keep her droppings out of my sight" leads to the idea of droppings organizers. A big, square coffee table with 3" high shelves under it, large enough for trays that can be pulled up on top with ready-to-go projects. Covered wicker baskets in every corner of the house for stacks of papers, magazines, and books. Those new frames that hold 50 sheets of paper and display one. An easel all set up for painting, but with a finished painting displayed in front of the unfinished one (and room behind it for the one in progress to dry). A sewing machine table that folds up to hold one large knicknack. Great looking lined baskets with handles alongside the sofa and chairs, waiting to hold this week's handicrafts, a camera and mini-tripod, or stationery and nice pens. A giant bulletin board and/or white board near the computer. A clever and good-looking CD rack used for organizing notepad pages, journals, or origami supplies.
• "Put her droppings somewhere else" and "keep my droppings where I am reminded of the project and able to resume work on a moment's notice" leads to a droppings closet plus a bunch of those little stands intended to hold one photo aloft. Each one gets a colored index card with the name of the project, the current status, and which covered basket in the closet holds it. Your spouse might even be willing to fetch them as needed for the joy of seeing a neatly organized closet full of matched baskets.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Someone asked me recently for marriage tips. Here are mine, in a nutshell:
Assume Love when upset, Expect Love when disappointed, Look for Third Alternatives in a dispute.

These three things will make any marriage more enjoyable.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wishing a happy 80th anniversary today to Clyde and Marie Barnes, and thank to Salt Lake's Channle 5, KSL-TV, for letting us know what Marie says is the secret to their success.

"We just try to love what the other one does and do it together. If he suggests something, I try to go along with it. And if I suggest something, he seems to do the same."

Sounds to me like Marie listens to Clyde's suggestions as if he still loves her and wants the best for her, and vice versa. It's a great way to live.

KSL-TV adds

They also say you can't forget the second staple of a successful marriage: a sense of humor.

That's what Mark Gungor says, too. He's worth checking out. So is his Flag Page.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today marks the anniversary of the day Ed and I married. With each year, our lives have been woven more tightly together. We've shared some incredible high points and held each other close through some very difficult moments. We've watched each other grow as individuals and ourselves grow as a couple.

It is this complexity, this richness, this history that I missed when my first marriage unaveled. Falling in love is grand, but it doesn't hold a candle to feeling love from and for a partner who is part of your life's fabric, someone who knows you.

It doesn't hurt that my Ed is a handsome, highly talented man with a deep and comforting voice and a vibrant love of life and living. But what makes our relationship so great, I think, is our shared willingness to see our many differences and disgreements as stepping stones to a fuller life, rather than a threat to life as we knew it before we met.

All we have to do is expect love and assume love, instead of always testing love.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 2:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Before the wedding, we say we don't know exactly what to expect from marriage. We lie. It's not even a year before most utter the words, "If you loved me..." or "If he loved me..." or "Why can't she..." We know what we expect, and it is a disappointment when it's not what we get.

Picture yourself planning a garden tour. You have seen your friends' photos of their garden tours. You love the large, single-color clusters of red, yellow, or pink tulips. The sparsely planted arrangements of tulips, daffodils, and hyacinths delight you. And those azaleas! The variety is amazing. The colors are so perfect. You are really looking forward to your garden tour.

You look for tulips. You look for those translucent colors of the azaleas in the gardens they visited. But you have been robbed! In the gardens you visit, there are rust-colored chrysanthemums or orange and purple birds of paradise or spiky, purple hostas with more leaf than flower. This is not what you expected!

If you keep using your checklist of tulips and azaleas from observing your friends' garden trips through snapshots, your trip will be a huge disappointment. If you let go of this list of expectations and open your eyes, you will discover a wealth of nature's beauty. You can be disappointed, or you can crumple up your list of expectations, look for whatever delights your senses, and be in awe.

Your marriage is your garden trip. If you spend it looking for what you've seen in snapshots of your parents' or friends' marriages, you cheat yourself out of an incredible experience. Love comes in as many colors, shapes, fragrances, and seasons as flowers do. Live your marriage on the edge of your seat, always watching for the next, unexpected bit of love your spouse offers you, always savoring each one.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When you look for a Third Alternative instead of arguing over whatever you disagree about, two things happen.

1. You get what you want or something you like even more.


2. You give generously to your husband or wife.

It's a two-step process. (I do love the Two-Step.)

1. Type your name and email address at www.EnjoyBeingMarried.com and click on the Subscribe button.


2. Find the email from newsletter@enjoybeingmarried.com in your inbox a few minutes later and click on the link in it. (If you have spam filters, you might want to add the address to your list of approved senders.)

Posted by Patty Newbold at 8:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

White House Press Secretary Dana Perino says her predecessor, Tony Snow, "was the inspiration for her 2008 New Year's resolution, which was always to take her husband's telephone calls, no matter how busy she was at work," according to tomorrow's New York Times.

Tony Snow died today of colon cancer, at age 53, leaving a wife and three children it's evident he cared for deeply, and some great advice for all of us.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 1:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I will be attending a bridal shower tomorrow for an arranged marriage between two Muslims, and I wish both of them the very best, lifelong marriage.

So I was thrilled to receive a Google alert this morning about an excellent article in Pakistan Daily about preparing for a Muslim marriage.

For those of us who are not Muslims, it may seem remarkable that Muslim Americans, many or most of whom marry people they've never dated and didn't fall in love with before the wedding, and who don't consider staying marriage a religious requirement, have a lower than average divorce rate of 33%.

Whether you practice Islam or not, the article makes some very good points about preparing for marriage and not just the wedding.

I learned the divorce rate is slightly lower for Muslim Americans, but still a discouraging 33%. The author offers some good advice about preparing to remain in the other two-thirds.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On a beautiful summer afternoon like this one, I recall the pleasures of boating. I want to get out on the water. My husband does not.

Am I being cheated? Is there something wrong with my marriage?

Not at all. We promised to love each other "in sickness and in health," not "by boat and by bicycle." Our marriage is just fine.

He's a handy companion, and I love spending time with him. He'll even get in a boat with me from time to time, just because he loves spending time with me. But I have other friends who share and even amplify my delight with boating, and my life is blessed when I remember to spend some time with them, too.

The first time around, I expected a lot of things besides love, and I often felt cheated. Now I Expect Love and find my life much fuller and happier.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Five years from now, you will be a different person. You will have different interests, different tastes, different challenges.

Date, live together, avoid commitment, and you'll be free to move on to a partner who shares your new interests, matches your new tastes, helps with your new challenges.

That's the choice of many who were exposed to unhappy marriages or divorce while growing up or whose own first marriage ended up in divorce.

I think there's a better choice. Commit -- not to a person who shares all your current interests or tastes, but to someone who shares your most important values. Don't just promise to stay -- invest in the relationship. Build wealth together. Invest in each other's dreams. Make each other's family your own. Tend to each other's health and wellbeing. Set some joint goals.

What's the payoff? The excitement of new interests and tastes introduced into your life by someone who shares your values, cares about you, loves to see you happy, and sees the world just a bit differently from you. The grounded feeling that comes from being intertwined and rooted as you grow, instead of being blown this way and that by people coming and going in your life. The security of support through your rough patches from someone who knows they will be just a small part of your time together. The warmth of doing the same for a loved one. The extra time and money freed up by working together instead of independently and self-protectively.

This is big. It's not just worth the risk of divorce; it's the antidote protecting you from divorce. You'll never get even a glimpse of what's possible as long as you're focused on your current needs or on keeping your exit easy if your needs are not met.

You know how to Assume Love, Expect Love, and Find Third Alternatives now -- or you will as soon as you rummage through the archives here. You know how to take care of a marriage. You know how to avoid unmet needs, hurt feelings, and unnecessary anger or worry. You know you can't grow apart when you're growing together, when you're attuned to your spouse and your interests are changing in response to all of the wonderful new things this person brings into your life. You're all set to make the next five years fantastic ones.

And if kids enter your life, planned or unplanned, there's one more huge payoff. You get to offer them what you may never have had: a parent who loves and finds great happiness in the other most important person in their child's life.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

You want to work, take a class, quit your job, stay in touch with your friends, get your exercise by dancing, offer a relative a place to stay for the night. Your husband or wife isn't happy about this. What do you do?

First, remember to Expect Love. It's what you're married for. You need it. But when you demand love come in a particular package, you chase it away. Don't demand that your spouse agree with you about what's best for you. Don't demand that your spouse be responsible for running your life or take any blame for your choice to do things his or her way. And please, please, please don't demand that your spouse be pleased with what you must do to be true to yourself.

You may need to watch really hard for other signs of love while the two of you are dealing with a difference of opinion. It's worth doing. We can love and disagree at the same time.

Continue reading "Doing What Your Spouse Doesn't Want You to Do" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Long-term, stable marriages have at least five positive exchanges for each negative exchange. Drop below that, and you're in trouble. This comes from one of the best known marriage researchers, John Gottman. He has a remarkable track record of predicting the state of your marriage four years later based on watching only a 15-minute conversation about some problem the two of you face.

What does this say about where our attention is focused? It takes five smiles, agreements, shared laughs, head nods, or loving touches to make as big an impression as one critical remark, raised voice, or eye roll. We watch like hawks for the negative ones. The researchers watching the video replays watch for both.

Expect Love: Look harder for the positive ones, and it might take fewer to get you past the occasional negative. And when you notice a negative one, Assume Love and take a second look. You just might avoid sending the most important person in your life an unexpected and undeserved negative.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What's reasonable to expect from a husband? Or a wife? I had an interesting discussion recently with two single women. I told them I believe one of the keys to a great marriage is to expect only love.

Well, of course they both expect love. But only love? Shouldn't we expect fairness? If one cooks, the other cleans up? Unless there are kids at home to care for, both work? If she does the laundry, he mows the lawn -- before it's knee-deep?

Shouldn't we expect shared activities, shared hobbies, shared visits to the relatives, shared dinnertimes, a shared bedroom?

Shouldn't we expect date nights? Back rubs? Sex? Flowers? Jewelry? I love yous? Trust?

In my experience, the more expectations we can let go of, the more delightful marriage becomes. But they were skeptical. Is love enough?

Continue reading "Marriage: What Should You Expect?" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

In James Madison University's student newspaper, The Breeze, Katie King reported:

Though Valentine’s Day tends to be embraced more by those in relationships, freshman Nicole Carter is currently single and not sweating it.

“I think that there is someone out there for everyone, you just have to wait until you find that person or until they find you,” Carter said. “I know a lot of people who are in relationships and I also know a lot who are single. I don’t really think it’s a big issue though because college isn’t necessarily about finding your husband or significant other, it’s about having fun.”

I think it's great a freshman isn't yet looking for her life partner, but her expectations alarm me. I've heard them from lots of folks her age. I even shared them back when I was in college.

Continue reading "Having Fun" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On February 17th, I was interviewed on Barbara Sher's Live the Life You Love web radio show. Barbara is a wonderful interviewer, and the hour turned out to be great fun for me.

The interview is all about how to Assume Love, Expect Love, and Find Third Alternatives and why these help us Enjoy Being Married.

To listen, click on the link above and look for the 2/17/2008 show. You can play it over the internet or download it to your MP3 player or iTunes. You may also want to subscribe to the entire series. Barbara and Matthew Pearl interview all sorts of interesting people.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Valentine's Day is a magnificent day to expect love. Especially if you've had marriage problems recently, avoid the trap of expecting chocolates or dinner or jewelry or something romantic. Your chances of expecting the right thing are tiny. Your chances of missing out on love when you expect some particular sign of it are great.

The best gift you can give your husband on Valentine's day is to expect love and welcome it with open arms, no matter what form it might take. Genuine appreciation and acceptance means more than just about anything you could buy or make on February 14th.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

What an honor it is to walk into someone's life at just the right moment. I had a chance recently to talk about assuming love, expecting love, and looking for the third alternative with a woman ready to toss in the towel on her marriage.

Recent life events had created a lot of tension between her and her husband of twenty-plus years. Like me when I was 34 years old and frantic, she'd already written her version of the list. Thank goodness she hadn't presented it to him yet.

What's the list, you ask? It's all the things you ruminate about when life grows unpleasant and you desperately want your spouse to love you enough, respect you enough, cherish you enough, take care of you enough to make it all better. It's powered by a desperation to regain closeness, but it comes out like a laundry list of holes in your life you insist your husband or wife or life partner must fill. And it always ends with "or else."

Or, as she put it, "It's my way or the highway, buddy."

When she tried on the idea that he loves her fiercely and hasn't lost any of his best qualities, then tried to explain the upsetting incidents as if those things were not in question, she got it. Right away. She had known enough all along to find the path back to a close relationship, but her fears had shut out that knowledge. That's the power of assuming love.

Continue reading "When Marriage Crumbles" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How to feel more loved every single day:

1 - Assume love.

When your spouse's or life partner's behavior upsets you, stop, assume for the moment he or she is still the same wonderful person and still loves you very much. Now try to explain how he or she might have done this if this is true. You'll stop your knee-jerk reactions long enough to see the situation a lot more clearly. It's too easy to overlook love when we go with our first impressions.

2 - Expect love.

Expect your mate to show you love in many different ways, but not necessarily in the particular ways you imagined you'd be loved. If you're watching for one way, you'll miss all the others.

3 - Seek the Third Alternative.

When one of you wants one thing and the other wants something else, don't argue about which to choose. Look for the third alternative. It's one that makes both of you at least as happy as you'd be with your first choice. Make it clear you want your spouse to have all that and more, just not at the expense of your own needs.

To find it, you'll need to know what you hope to get from your first choice and what you hope to avoid from his (or hers). Then you'll need to ask for the same guidance from your spouse. Once you know what you're looking for, start brainstorming. Don't waste any time arguing for your first choice, because it won't make both of you happy, and that's the goal for a lifelong marriage.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The easiest way to feel unloved is to expect the wrong things. You live in a time and place when you can marry for love. You don't need a helpmeet to survive. You don't need to bolster your family's political position or status through marriage. You can choose to marry or not, and you can choose the person you marry.

So what should you expect when you marry for love? Love.

Continue reading "Feeling Loved When You're Expecting" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 8:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you, your spouse, and your kids are the only ones who care if your marriage is a happy one, count your blessings. Over a third (35%) of women in a September 2007 Ladies Home Journal survey said their vote for president in 2008 would be influenced at least somewhat by how happy they thought the candidate's marriage was.

Coming in second in perceived marital happiness, right behind John Edwards, whose wife supports his candidacy despite her own grave medical problems, was Barack Obama.

That happiness comes both from how much each loves the other and from how much love each is capable of receiving. Michelle Obama gets it. In 2000, she was furious about getting stuck with all the parenting responsibilities while he ran for Congress. And then she wasn't. From the November issue of O, the Oprah Magazine:
"'The big thing I figured out,' she says, 'was that I was pushing to make Barack be something I wanted him to be for me. I believed that if only he were around more often, everything would be better. So I was depending on him to make me happy. Except it didn't have anything to do with him. I needed support. I didn't necessarily need it from Barack.'"

Like the rest of us, when she quit being angry about what she wasn't getting, she got more. She started going to the gym before dawn. When she came home, he would have the girls up and fed before he started his day on the campaign trail. Looks like the 43% who believe theirs is a happy marriage are right.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 3:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Lots of folks say a good marriage requires a lot of hard work. I disagree.

The hard work comes in when we struggle to provide a spouse with more love by stretching our
abilitiies at loving and going beyond what we feel like giving. I applaud the effort, and it's saved lots of marriages, but I think there's an easier route.

Those newly in love also stretch to do more, learn new ways to love, find a few extra hours a week to outdo themselves at loving, but they never describe it as hard work. What's the difference?

Continue reading "The Hard Work of Marriage?" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 11:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Here's my reply to another question posed by my friend Tammy from Creating Success Stories.

Do adults who practice assumed love live separate lives (since they are meeting all of their own needs, bar one : -}), other than in the bedroom?

Continue reading "Meeting Your Own Needs" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Don Imus says he's "apologized enough" for his sexist, racist comment about the Rutgers Womens Basketball team. How many husbands and wives have you heard say the same thing?

Imus will have apologized enough when the state of his relationship is acceptable to him. And he hasn't yet tried the step most likely to rebuild it.

A husband or wife is fortunate to have just one relationship to repair after a particularly hurtful act. Don Imus has many. Here's how he might go about mending those relationships instead of bitterly accepting their end.

Continue reading "I've Apologized Enough" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 1:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (1)

My friend Tammy from Creating Success Stories sent me some questions this week about my advice to Assume Love. I'm going to answer one at a time.

What do you suggest for a couple where only one partner is willing to "assume love"?

This is the marvelous thing about assuming love -- it doesn't take two. One person can change the marriage. And this approach most benefits the one who assumes love.

Let me explain why this is true, because so many approaches to a better marriage really do require both partners to make it work.

Continue reading "When Only One Partner Assumes Love" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 2:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Most relationship research, therapy, and coaching focuses on how to give love. It assumes if we give more love, more respect, more kind words, more of our undivided attention, more help, more nurturing, we will receive more in return. For most couples, this is true.

However, giving more to get more can feel like work, hence the common wisdom that a good marriage requires hard work. Giving more because you've already received more feels joyful.

Is it possible to receive more before you give more? In most marriages, yes.

Continue reading "Receiving Love" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 4:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Many men and women report that they miss the spontaneity of their dating years and even the early years of their marriages. But when they look for an explanation, they often come to the conclusion their spouse has changed or perhaps was faking an interest in spontaneity back then. When they assume love, they can see another possibility.

Continue reading "Scheduling Spontaneity" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Folks often advise us to assume nothing. Take nothing for granted. Keep your mind open. Prepare for every possibility. Don't be disappointed when things don't go the way you think they should go.

Good advice. Except that life would be darn difficult without any assumptions. We'd need to be constantly on guard against danger if we couldn't assume what looks like a chair really is a chair and what nourished us yesterday will nourish us today. And we couldn't assume love.

Continue reading "Assume Nothing?" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 10:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If your wife treats you like part of the furniture or can't stop telling you how to earn more money, if your husband drives you nuts with his insensitive comments or misplaced laundry, it's time to round up the usual suspects.

Continue reading "Round Up the Usual Suspects" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 1:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So you Assume Love, and you realize that your beloved life partner objects to what you're asking for only because it conflicts with what he or she wants. Now what? You look together for what Stephen Covey, in The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People, calls The Third Alternative.

1. Commit to getting what you want and let go of the way you first thought of getting it.
2. Ask questions and pay careful attention to the answers, until you know for sure what your mate likes about his or her proposed use of the money, space, time, or resources and what your mate dislikes about your proposal.
3. Share the same information regarding what you like about your proposal and dislike about your mate's proposal.
4. Stop the tennis match and jump the net. Agree to work together to get everything on both of your likes lists and avoid everything on both of your dislikes lists.
5. Brainstorm! How can you get all of the things you each seek and none of the things either of you dislikes?

Here's an example from my first marriage.

Continue reading "The Third Alternative" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 9:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Before I started assuming love, I engaged in the very popular "Isn't my spouse awful?" game, as both instigator and player. To get it started, you ask your sister or people at work, or maybe even the stranger seated next to you on the bus, to confirm that there's something terribly wrong with your spouse. You plead with them to agree that you've married someone who's just plain wrong. Wrong about angels. Wrong about blue-green algae. Wrong about whether the right color ribbon is worth a two-hour drive. Wrong about evolution. Wrong about who ought to be elected. Wrong about what does and doesn't belong in a living room. Wrong about the value of television. Wrong about how to when to ask for a raise. Wrong about teal blue. Wrong about who's right and who's wrong.

Continue reading "The "Isn't My Spouse Awful" Game?" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 8:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

When KT married Ben last year, she loved to get a call from him during her workday. She'd look forward to 5:30, when she'd arrive home to a big hug and a huge smile. With her new job, she can't count on leaving as early. She's often rushing to get out of the office, then racing through traffic only to get home closer to 6:00, when she gets only Ben's icy greeting from the sofa.

Today, she returned from lunch to an urgent request from her boss. She's offered to take KT to lunch tomorrow if she completes the task by the close of business, a first in her two months here. KT's in a mad rush to finish in time when Ben calls.

As she reaches for the phone and sees his number, KT's asking herself, "Is he checking up on me again? Why can't he see that it's the job that makes me late? Why does this matter so much to him? Why is he so insecure and childish? Why can't he be happy to see me whenever I come home? I feel like he's got me on a short leash, and so does my job. He's wrecking my career chances!" No matter what Ben says now, KT will not hear any love in it.

Continue reading "When Will You Be Home?" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 3:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No, love isn't all you need to get through life. But when talking about your marriage, this song title serves as excellent advice. All you need from your husband or wife is love.

If you've got kids and a house and a job and a love of quiet walks in the woods, you probably have a lot more needs, but you don't need them from your spouse. You need them whether or not you've got a spouse. I discovered that the day after my husband suddenly died.

I seriously considered divorcing the man I loved because I didn't get what I thought I needed from him. I even convinced myself that he must not love me if he didn't provide all of those things. I believed that he owed me all of the things I needed, that as my husband only he could provide them. I was so wrong.

When his death handed me back my list of needs, I could see clearly how much he'd loved me. I could also see way too clearly that while I might find other people to help me with my list of needs, I still needed love.

Continue reading "All You Need Is Love" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 5:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Almost all of us crave love. A few seem to get by without it, and a few more claim unconvincingly to do without, but most of us will twist ourselves into knots to be loved. Married folks who don't feel loved enough can really feel deprived.

I've noticed that when we crave more love from a spouse, we have only three choices. The first one many of us try is what I'd call foot-tapping, waiting for your unloving mate to get with the program. You drop hints that you're not getting enough, that your beloved doesn't measure up, you nag, you beg. You tap your foot and wait. Maybe you even drag your spouse off to a relationship therapist or marriage workshop, hoping that a professional will make it clear that you deserve better than this.

If you're more action-oriented (or reading most relationship advice), you listen better, write poems for your beloved, cook your mate's favorite meals, go to that unbearable opera or rugby match together, stop criticizing, offer spontaneous back rubs, buy that sexy new bedtime outfit, show up with flowers between Valentine's Days. Surely, if you shower your spouse with love, more will flow back to you. You "fill your emotional bank account" so that you can start making some big withdrawals. But it's no more fun than making your IRA deposits. You're not giving love; you're investing it.

Maybe you've even swung back and forth between these two approaches--doing, doing, doing, then tapping, tapping, tapping. Perhaps it's even gone so far that you've begun threatening to leave if you don't start feeling more loved real soon. Threats, of course, produce more resentment than love.

Assume Love offers another approach. Before you ask for more love, you can try to receive more of the love your spouse already gives. Maybe there's already enough there to make offering more love in return a joy instead of hard work.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Here's how you Assume Love. Consider doing it every time your spouse does something or fails to do something and you feel anger, resentment, hurt, fear, shame, frustration, or superiority taking hold of your emotions:

1. Assume you are completely loved by a wonderful person.


2. Attempt to explain how such a person might come to do what just happened.


3. If you can think of one or more explanations that might possibly apply to your real life situation, too, decide whether you choose to react to the negative explanation or to one of these positive possibilities.


4. If you choose one of the positive ones, check whether it teaches you something new about how your spouse loves you.

Here's an example...

Continue reading "Four Steps to Assume Love" »

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

You Assume Love when you take a second look at what your spouse or life partner does as if you are well-loved.

You Pretend Love when you act as if you're loved even though you don't believe it.

When you Assume Love, you give yourself the chance to receive more love by looking beyond your instantaneous, gut-level reactions to events. You pay attention to what you know to be true. You stop yourself from jumping to conclusions. You do this for you, so that you don't miss any love being offered to you.

There's a good chance you'll notice love where you didn't see it before and want to show your spouse more appreciation as a result. That's great! But it's not required, and it probably won't happen every time. When it doesn't, pretending it did is not the solution.

Posted by Patty Newbold at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)