Together for Life Online Team

By Bob Schuchts Just as there are vital signs for revealing the health of our physical bodies, there are key indicators marking the health of our marriage. These eight practices are ways of maintaining unity and intimacy for a thriving marriage. I encourage you to examine these vital signs in your own marriage. No matter what you find, it is a good way to start building a healthy marriage. How is your Spiritual Unity? This is the glue that holds your marriage together. God is love, so a marriage without God at the center is devoid of genuine love. Conversely, a marriage rooted and grounded in Christ can withstand almost any challenge. Does your relationship with God hold central place in your marriage? Is this evident in your daily life? Do you worship and pray together regularly? What is the quality of your Emotional Intimacy? Have you noticed when you…

It’s the beginning of a new year and many of us, moved by good intentions, make new year’s resolutions. This is an opportunity to introduce positive changes in our lives. Many of our resolutions are about changing one of our habits. Our life seems to be defined by them. Aristotle, the Greek philosopher, wrote, “We are what we repeatedly do.” Unfortunately, as we know from experience, our good intentions do not often produce the results we want because our habits are stronger than our good intentions. George Santayana, a philosopher and novelist wrote, “A habit is stronger than reason.”  Our habits are shortcuts that our brains create to make life easier. Our habits give us routines that we follow without much thought. Because of this, changing our habits is difficult.  Our brain resists such change. If we are serious about changing a habit, we need to outsmart our brain. We…

7. Did We Mention Prayer? Finally, have we mentioned the importance of praying both individually and as a couple before, during, and after an argument? We have? Good. Let’s mention it one more time then. We’re being a little facetious here to make the point that marriage truly is hard work, and there will be times that the only way you find the strength to go back in there one more time and try to work things out is because God won’t stop bugging you to do it. You can ignore God and your spouse and your problems, but you do so at your peril. Please, for your sake, take time to pray before you sit down to discuss a serious issue. Say something such as, “God, please help us to be open to hearing each other’s concerns and even more open to your will. Hail Mary . . .”…

Q: My husband I were married in the Catholic Church. He attends a Christian church and takes the Bible as the literal word of God. I attend Mass faithfully; he attends his church occasionally. Someone wisely said before we got married that this division could cause a rift in our marriage. And as any bride excited about getting married would do, I unwisely ignored this sage advice and said, “that will never happen to us.” We have many more problems amongst us, many of them are deemed to be problems my husband has identified about me—some fair and some not fair. In a spirit of trying to repair our not-yet-one-year-old marriage, I compromised and decided to attend my husband’s church instead of mine. I told him I still want to keep my weekly adoration hours (in the middle of the night which doesn’t impact him) and I will still pray…

5. Take Breaks, Early and Often As we mentioned above, everyone knows the importance of taking breaks, but almost everyone takes them too late, resulting in scenes where, at about an 8, one spouse proclaims, “I’m not talking about this anymore. I’m done!” and the other responds, “Like hell you are!”and then they follow each other around from room to room trying to, loudly, not have the conversation. In order to work, a break must be taken much earlier, say at around a 7. At this stage, breaks are brief moments when one spouse or another steps away from the discussion to collect themselves so that they can shortly return to and continue with the conversation. For instance, let’s say that you’re feeling as if you or your spouse is at the 7 on the emotional temperature scale. To take a break you might say, “I’m sorry, my throat is…

Marriages succeed only if spouses are willing to regularly accommodate each other. Accommodating each other’s likes and dislikes was for Teri and me the most challenging adjustment in the first years of our marriage. Differences are often what attract us, but once we start the marital journey together these differences can became bones of contention. When Teri and I got married we brought together cultures as diverse as anyone could imagine. I am an Italian, born in a small town of northern Italy and Teri is a French/Irish American whose family roots are from Louisiana. I am the son of a farmer who became a factory worker to make a living. Teri is the daughter of a well-respected corporate leader. I came to this country alone with $1,000 in my pocket. Teri, on the other hand, was used to the comfort of a large and well-established family. In the early…

3. You Don’t Have to Agree on What “Really” Happened The couples we talk to on our radio program and in our counseling practice often get hung up on the question,“How can we solve our problems if we can’t even agree on what happened?” These couples get stuck arguing so much about the details of who did what to whom and when and how that they never get around to solving the problem. Let us let you in on a little secret. It is a very rare instance, indeed, when any married couple—especially the best ones—actually agree on what “really” happened. Agreement about who was wrong and who was right and who started it and how happens once in a while, but it’s certainly not the norm. Take it as a gift if it happens, but don’t count on it. The good news is that to solve a problem, you…

Q: My husband and I had both lost our spouses when we married 10 years ago. I keep wondering if he loves me the same or, hopefully, more than his deceased wife. This has become an obsession for me.—RT Greg Popcak: The feelings you describe are relatively common, but you’re focusing on the wrong question. You have framed your problem in a way that is impossible to answer. That’s why you are becoming obsessed.  We can never really get enough of what we don’t really want. For whatever reason, you feel insecure in your relationship with your husband, but rather than asking yourself what you need to do to improve your connection with him, you put yourself in the position of competing with a dead woman. How can you possibly win? First, you need to check your assumptions about how love works. Love is not a natural resource that is…