Week 13: Transitions in Marriage: In-Law Relations

This week we learned about relationships in marriage, specifically that with the in-laws.  For me, this has been one of the hardest weeks to collect my thoughts on this topic.  I look at my sisters who are married and see the type of relationships they have with their in-laws.  They aren't perfect by any means, but they certainly are a lot better than how mine is with my in-laws.  I wish I could say that I had a great relationship with mine, but to be honest, that is far from the truth.  I married my husband and he was married previously.  He had a very strained marriage and his parents didn't get along with his ex-wife.  My husband will be the first to admit that the reason his parents don't like us-- is because of what his ex-wife has done.  His parents can't move on.  They have literally ostracized his own children, simply because they are from his ex-wife.  They have done it to ours that we have had, but not like the first kids.

I have tried hard to have healthy relationships with his parents.  I've tried emailing them.  They won't let us stop by, unless we "schedule a time".  They don't even call us for Birthdays, only my husband.  They will send a card in the mail only to the kids.  My children never talk about his parents.  They refer to only one set of grandparents, and that is my parents, 2,000 miles away.

We have realized, that we can't change someone.  Everyone has their own choices to act how they want to.  If we focus on our own marriage and how we can try to make it improve, then we can only hope and pray with time that others will follow in accepting us.

This year his parents celebrated their 50^th Wedding Anniversary.  It was interesting how there are 4 children, and only 3 with children.  Ours has 10, his brother 8 and the other 3.  All of the grandkids kept away form each other, due to the way they have been treated.  They had pictures up of kids on the walls, and our family only had only pictures and missed one of my husband's children.  But, his brother's family had multiple--recent, pictures of each of the kids.  Its hard to not be offended, especially the children.  However, we have done our best as the author states, "Where there are strong differences, personality clashes, or even past offenses, it is important to lay those aside at extended family gatherings and treat each other with politeness, dignity, and respect."  (Harper, J. M. & Olsen, S. F. (2005). "Creating Healthy Ties With In-Laws and Extended Families.").

This week was a good reminder to me, that I need to be the better person and to work on my relationship with them.  Even though I don't agree with how they have treated our children and even my husband and myself.  I need to make sure to have "regular contact and communication with in-laws", as it "sends messages that couples value their relationship with them."  I suppose it is my responsibility to open the door of communication and "disclose information...communicate openly, accept differences, use empathy", so these tools can help me have a better relationship with my Mother in Law, as our reading suggests.

Week 12: Transitions in Marriage: Power Relations and Children

          I found a quote online that says, “A great marriage is not when the ‘perfect couple’ comes together.  It is when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.”  I’m not sure who said that, but I appreciated this quote.  After the honeymoon phase is over, which to be honest, happens to most people, you start to not see your spouse through those rose-colored glasses.  You tend to realize that, hey, they may not be as perfect as we initially thought. ☹


            When we get married, we are no longer focused on ourselves.  In order to have a successful marriage we need to have a partnership and work as a team.  You know the saying, there is no “I” in TEAM.  Sure, you can take the letters ME out of it, but to work together, it isn’t one sided.  You are working and learning about one another and are finding out differences that you never even realized, perhaps this will come as a challenge in your marriage.  As a couple, you must work together and express your feelings to one another.  Simply assuming the other person knows what you are thinking or playing the silent game, will not help anything.  You must express yourself to one another and what you feel you should do as partners and parents, once you have children.  I know this is something that we still struggle with—after 12 years of marriage (and having a blended family).  Communication is key in marriages and trying to move forward.


            I love the wisdom of Elder M. Russell Ballard, who spoke about councils not only within church but by having councils within our family.  I will say this is something that I feel my parents did well.  Often, we had family councils on Sunday’s, when our entire family was home.  We discussed things as a family and often would plan upcoming events or vacations.  We counseled with one another and learned from each other.  This is something that we need to do with our spouse—couple councils.  How much better would our families be, if we took part of this?  I’ve tried this with my husband, and while, at first, it seems odd (especially when you aren’t in the habit), it is something that has benefited us.  We can talk about our hopes, dreams, goals in life.  We can talk about things we disagree about and how to solve problems that are happening.  One thing I’ve noticed is if we start and end with a prayer, the Spirit tends to reside more often within them.  Elder Ballard said, “Inviting the Spirit of the Lord to be part of your family council brings blessings beyond description”.


            Weekly councils with my husband are something we struggle with.  Often, when we have councils, they are when we have issues.  I feel that if we focus on trying to do them sooner rather than when things are going to burst, we can save ourselves a lot of frustration and miscommunication down the road.  If we truly can focus on what we can work on and work together, than it will benefit our family greatly.  Councils are there for us to learn and grow from and to be closer to our spouse and to the Lord.

Week 11: Transitions in marriage: Fidelity and Physical Intimacy

I feel that we need to protect not only our husbands and wives in marriage, but also our children from the damaging influence of pornography.  However, since this is a marriage class I will talk about things we can do to help protect ourselves.

I feel that the first step that we must do is to is first make sure that we are not personally viewing pornography.  These days, there are so many things that are sexually explicit in nature.  While perhaps your intent was not to view pornography, you may fall into a grey area of "soft porn".  Satan tries to gives us these grey areas, which will then turn into black areas.  In the grey areas, you initially don't think there is an issue and often it isn't a problem until you are far into it.  Just yesterday, my stepdaughter was scrolling on Facebook.  She freaked out and I asked her what the problem was.  In her newsfeed, showed a very sexually explicit video of a woman with hardly any clothes on.  We were both shocked that this was allowed on to this page.  While she didn't actively reach out, since she did have this person as a friend, it showed up in her feed.  She quickly hid and blocked the content.  This just proves how even unsuspecting people can be caught into the web of pornography.

In our home, my husband and I both know the passwords to each others phones.  On our cable, we ensure that even teen rated shows are blocked.  Our internet is blocked by most everyone, so that most can't access it.  Yes, there are always ways around thing--but we do what we can to protect not only our marriage--but our children.

President Howard W. Hunter said, "Pornography, flirtations and unwholesome fantasies erode one's character and strike at the foundation of a happy marriage. Unity and trust within a marriage are thereby destroyed.  If we want to do anything for our marriage, we need to have a happy marriage.  That can come by following the counsel of prophets and by limiting those sources which can lead us to stray and into grey areas.

As we safeguard our family, we must also recognize that we must be respectful, be positive and appropriate when we speak to our spouse.  Our children learn by examples.  If we are being degrading and disrespectful, this doesn't give them a good example of healthy relationships.  The best thing we can offer our spouse and children is to show them kindness, respect, love and by being appropriate.  I love when I see happily married couples, who show the kind of love that others dream of.  This is how we should be with our spouse.

I like the quote from President Howard W. Hunter from the October 1994 General Conference address  "Tenderness and respect- never selfishness-must be the guiding principles in the intimate relationship between husband and wife. Each partner must be considerate and sensitive to the other's needs, and desires. Any domineering, indecent or uncontrolled behavior in the intimate relationship between husband and wife is condemned by the Lord.  What better advice could we have been given?  Being tender with one another and respectful, sensitive to what our spouse needs."

Week 10: Seeking to Understand

The marital poop detector, as defined by Gottman in our reading is very important and vital to marriages.  What exactly is this?  It is when you are able tell the other spouse that something isn't right.  Just like when you can smell "poop” you can tell when something isn't right.  There was a study that spoke about being unhappy in your marriage and how this can be tied directly to the expectations that we share with our spouses.  While this ended up being proven wrong, Gottman speaks of other studies which share opposite opinions on this subject.  As Gottman stated, "really people with the greatest expectations for their marriage usually wind up with the highest quality marriages," (Gottman, 2015).  I feel this is true.  That isn't to say that their marriage won't have problems or won't end in divorce, but I feel that if you have goals and expectations you have a vision of the future.

 How might one try to incorporate this into their daily married lives?  You must make sure that you don't dwell on negativity.  We must not hold onto grudges and let the negativity stay.  We need to make sure we recognize when it is there, call it out (poop detector) when it does come in.  We need to focus if and when it comes on making sure it leaves, so it doesn't leave any lingering effects or "smells" in our marriage.

 If I had to choose the one thing I learned the most from this book, it would be to treat my spouse with more respect than anyone else.  Treat them as if they are visiting your house, how you treat guests.  You tend to be overly kind and nice and give guests the benefit of the doubt.  However, how often we find ourselves being nit picky with our spouses, and getting irritated for minor infractions.  When if they were a guest, we would probably just let it go off of our back and give them the benefit of the doubt.

 I was just thinking about how my husband and I address each other and it makes me sad.  It isn't that I'm making a conscious effort to be mean or rude, but its almost like you put your guard down and have no filters.  This isn't good.  We need to always have these "filters" on, so that we might be able to give our spouse our best self.  Not the worn down, irritated spouse who nags them about every little thing.  If a guest spilled something, we wouldn't flip out.  We would offer to help clean it up.  That is how we need to be towards our spouse.  Treat them how we want to be treated.  Treat them as if they are the most important and precious thing in the word.  They are, and they should be treated as such.  Why would we treat them in a way we don't want others to treat them or even ourselves?  When we think about things this way, we take a step back and realize that we have room for improvement.  When we focus on kindness and serving others, there is a change that takes over in the relationship.

Week 9: Managing Conflict; Consecrating Ourselves

            In our readings this week, we read a talk from Elder Lynn G. Robbins of the 70.  Elder Robbins was speaking to the world, at the April 1998 General Conference.  Elder Robbins said, “The family is also Satan’s primary target. He is waging war on the family. One of his schemes is the subtle and cunning way he has of sneaking behind enemy lines and entering our very homes and lives. He damages and often destroys families within the walls of their own homes. His strategy is to stir up anger between family members.”  Oh, how I feel that this is even more prevalent—almost 20 years later!  While I can see similarities and differences in my family compared to when I was a kid, I feel sorry for the contention that Satan is causing.  He wants families to fall apart and fail.  Before Satan works on children, he works on causing issues within the marriage.

            Of course, what is the best thing we can do to help our marriages?  Perhaps speaking kindly and not getting upset and angry with them.  Elder Robbins stated, “Becoming angry is a conscious choice, a decision; therefore, we can make the choice not to become angry. We choose! To those who say, “But I can’t help myself,” author William Wilbanks responds: “Nonsense.”

            In the end, we control our own actions.  If we can contain ourselves and not go off on co-workers, employers, students, store workers, etc—then we can work on containing our anger towards our spouse and children.  Unfortunately, you can see the world we live in and how people have no control anymore.  They are fighting, getting angry with others and resorting to violence, instead of resolving issues they have.

            Goddard stated that “the vast majority of relationships can survive and flourish if each of us brings our whole sole as an offering…We enter marriage expecting our needs to be met.  No partner on the face of the earth can meet all our needs."  We need to understand that most people will never have a fairy tail life.  I would love to meet the person who is never met with someone saying an unkind word or opposition and trials in their marriage

            My husband often jokes when he does something wrong, “well, you are perfect, so that wouldn’t have happened”.  In all honesty, we know we aren’t perfect and know just what it takes to push each others buttons.

            How can we get past the not-so-happily ever after? First, we need to realize that marriage is not a fairy tale. Life is not always full of happy endings, nor do most people get swept up from a prince riding a horse. Goddard helps us understand how we can communicate with our spouses: "When we have unmet needs, we humbly invite: 'I could sure use a hand with putting the kids to bed tonight. Is this something you could help me with?' We give gladly and we receive graciously."  Quite simply, we need to be kind with one another.  We need to focus on how we can serve those we are married to and love them, unconditionally.  We need to understand others have faults—as do we—and that’s what makes us human.  We are all part of this game of Life.  We all want to end the game and be happy.  We can, but it takes effort.  We know that there will be bumps and detours along the way.  But, in the end, we can be happy if we follow the Savior and his teachings.

Week 8: Beware of Pride

I really appreciated the lesson this week on Pride.  I feel like this is something that can be discussed over and over again.  There are so many different aspects to pride, that it wouldn’t feel repetitive based on how you went about discussing this topic.

On my mission, I had a really hard time with several companions.  I’m not kidding when I had those companions that people would see at Zone Meetings or Mission Conferences, and missionaries would pray not to get them-- I always got them.  It almost got to be a running joke with some elders I came out with.  I used to think my Mission President hated me.  They would always assure me, President doesn’t hate you.  But after the 4^th or 5^th one, they were like, “okay, maybe president doesn’t like you?”  It was a question, because no one understood why I would end up with them.

I also ended up having an Emergency Transfer (ET) on my mission—twice.  Once was from my trainer who was pretty much apostate.  The other was to help another sister companionship in my zone.  They were struggling big time, so President decided he would ET both of our companionships, and I was sent the problem companion.  Needless to say, my letters and journal entries were less than spiritual or uplifting during these times.  I remember discussion at length doctrine with my Dad.  He always had such great advice.  He constantly would warn me about the pride cycle and how pride can be evident even in our missionary companionships. 

The proud man (or woman) cannot be helped, and until we repent, we are just going to be miserable.  We need to learn to get rid of our pride and come unto the Savior (Either 12:27), and he will show us our weaknesses and help us to overcome them.  Remember that his grace is sufficient for all of us (he is not going to run out of grace) And he CAN fix all of our problems, if we humble ourselves and let him do it.  This is something that I had to do over and over on my mission with my companions.  It is something I must do in my marriage as well.

In President Benson’s 1989 talk “Beware of Pride”, he counsels: “In the scriptures there is no such thing as righteous pride—it is always considered a sin. Therefore, no matter how the world uses the term, we must understand how God uses the term so we can understand the language of holy writ and profit thereby. Most of us think of pride as self-centeredness, conceit, boastfulness, arrogance, or haughtiness. All of these are elements of the sin, but the heart, or core, is still missing.

The central feature of pride is enmity—enmity toward God and enmity toward our fellowmen. Enmity means “hatred toward, hostility to, or a state of opposition.” It is the power by which Satan wishes to reign over us.

When we step back, we must realize that we need to not have enmity.  I will admit that there are times where I am prideful and have to work through them.  I need to rely on the savior and make sure that pride doesn’t come into my relationship with my husband in our relationship with each other.  Being prideful does nothing to bring us closer to the Savior—it pushes us further apart.

Week 7: Staying Emotionally Connected

One of the best ways that a couple can strengthen their marriage, is simply having faith in Jesus Christ.  Christ was the perfect example of the life we should live like.  We should try to emulate his life and to serve and love all those around us.  Christ taught us that even the little things can be big.  That having faith as tiny as a mustard seed, can grow great things.  We can apply this principle into our marriages.  Marriages take work.  Just as you wouldn’t simply plant a mustard seed and leave it, you can’t just start a marriage and not do anything to nourish it.  If you leave it unattended, weeds will creep up, it may end up withering away and dying.  Marriages require work.  The Savior taught us this.

The Savior loved everyone.  He taught us that we need to do the little things in life and sometimes those are all it takes.  A simple act of service, a hug, kind words, etc.  If we focus on these areas in our marriages, it will help our marriage flourish.  That isn’t to say that we don’t need to pray together or read our scriptures.  Christ taught parables and lessons—which we find in the scriptures.  He taught us to pray.  Not just pray, but to truly plead and speak to our Heavenly Father. 

When you think about ways that strengthen a marriage one I think of is faith in Christ. As we look at His life and example we are shown that little things bring great things. When He did little things for the children they would show their love back to Him. This is what can happen in any relationship. When we take the time to do little things for others even if we don’t think it would do or mean anything to them that is what makes the difference. More people need to slow down, and take the time to do little things for others. This is what makes great relationships.

Perhaps the greatest gift we can learn from Christ is the gift Charity.  Charity is a gift from Heavenly Father and it is the pure love of Christ.  “Wherefore my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ…”(Moroni 7:47)

When we take the time to focus on the teachings of the Savior in our marriage (and our lives), we can become focused on sustained when times of trouble come.  That isn’t to say that if you follow Christ you will have no problems.  However, I have seen a difference in the lives of those who try their hardest to follow Christ, compared to those who just go with the flow.  The people who follow Christ, to the best of their ability—despite their short comings—are happier.