Relationship Advice

Give gifts that your partner has indicated that s/he wants or needs instead of what you believe s/he wants or needs. You can give other gifts, too, but first paying attention to your partner avoids disappointment.

Some partners like to give each other hints about gifts they would like to receive. Others are very clear and forthright about asking for what they want. If you have not been paying attention to your partner’s communication, now is a good time start.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it:

Have a conversation about how each of you lets the other know what is special and meaningful for you. Is your partner’s method workable for you? If it isn’t, talk about what would work, and decide what to do differently.

This is an excerpt from Being Happy Together: How to Have a Fabulous Relationship With Your Life Partner in Less Than an Hour a Week, by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D. You can get more information HERE.

Technorati Tags: CoDependency, Relationship Advice, Communication, Separateness Special Occasions, Relationships

Talk about money. Discuss where it comes from and where it goes, and why.

Money can be a very difficult topic to discuss rationally instead of emotionally. Sometimes the very idea of talking about it makes one or both of you uncomfortable. If this is true for you, talking about money is an especially important thing to do.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it:

Keep track of all of the money you each spend this week. At the end of the week look at your notes together and decide whether you’re satisfied with how you are using your resources.

This is an excerpt from Being Happy Together: How to Have a Fabulous Relationship With Your Life Partner in Less Than an Hour a Week, by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D. You can get more information HERE.

Technorati Tags: Relationships, Money, Communication, Relationship Advice

Him: She could have told me she was going to leave. After all we’ve been together for seven years, and she’d knows I don’t mean it when yell at her. I’m just letting off steam and then I calm down. I didn’t think she really meant for me to stop. I miss her so much and I miss the kids. What can I do to get her to change her mind?

Her: I want to come back, but he just doesn’t get it. The yelling scares me and the kids and all he cares about is having me in bed. He just loves the kids, but I did tell him that if he didn’t change I would leave. I told him at least 10 times that that just shows how much he listens to me.

No, I don’t have another man in my life. At this point it’s tough, just to live. This cramped apartment is all I can afford, and it’s tough be a single mom. But I don’t think he can really change.

Him: I know I can change — you’ve got to give me a chance. Just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it. Just tell me!

Her: I want you to think about what I say. I just told you again, what I want — but do you listen? No! Just quit yelling at me and talk to me like a person.

Him: I just yell for a minute, when I get upset. The kids get over it. And it shouldn’t bother you so much.

Me: But it does upset her. I do imagine what it’s like from her point of view. Have you ever been yelled at?

Him: She yells all the time. I can’t do anything right. There’s no way to please her. She yells, just like my mom did when I was a kid.

Me: What does she yell about?

Her: I just asked him to pick up the stuff he leaves around. Sometimes it’s tough with his dishes in the sink and to come help me with the kids baths. I need to be louder he can’t hear me over the TV, but he doesn’t listen anyway.

Him: I help — you’re just never satisfied.

Me: Slow down! I want you to try something different. Do you really want this marriage to work?

Is this you? “I don’t need therapy, but I could use some advice about…”

Technorati Tags: Relationships, Communication, Difficult Communication, Relationship Advice

Name the movie you would like to see or the restaurant you like best, before you ask your partner’s preference. That way you avoid being angry because your partner did not read your mind.

If you want to eat at an Italian restaurant, say so. If you ask your partner first, s/he might suggest a steak house or a Chinese restaurant, without ever knowing your preference. If you speak first, and your partner does not like your suggestion, then s/he can suggest an alternative and you can negotiate.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it:

Practice stating what you want before you ask for your partner’s preferences. For example, instead of asking your partner “Are you ready to go to bed?” say “I’m ready to go to bed now, are you?”
This is an excerpt from Being Happy Together: How to Have a Fabulous Relationship With Your Life Partner in Less Than an Hour a Week, by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D. You can get more information HERE.

Technorati Tags: Relationships, Separateness, Communication, Relationship Advice

By Belinda Rachman, Esq.

A family law attorney tells couples what to watch out for when choosing an attorney to handle their divorce.

The choice of which attorney to hire for your divorce is overwhelming. The sheer number of divorce lawyers in the phone book makes your head spin. You have heard the horror stories from your friends about how horrid and expensive their divorce was and you want to avoid that pain but which way should you turn? This is a very natural response to what you have heard and seen. You have enough sense to know divorce lawyers are not your friends so you need to chose carefully. Your future and that of your children depend on how you proceed.

Having been a divorce lawyer since 1996 I will tell you the dirty inside secrets and warn you what to look out for. In California and maybe in your own state, divorce lawyers are the ONLY kind of lawyers whose fees are protected, by law, by the equity in their client’s home. It is important to know how divorce lawyers in your state are paid and find that out before you begin. Do they have the right to run up huge bills and then slap a lien on your home and force a sale at the end of the case? Over the years I have seen many, many lawyers do everything in their power to keep the case going so they could run up a bill because they knew they were going to get paid. People who advertise themselves as being “aggressive” are playing to your worst instincts. Doesn’t everyone want the MOST they can get in their settlement? If so, keep away from aggressive lawyers because by the time they are done, there will be little to divide.

Child custody and visitation issues bring out the fighting tiger in a lot of people because they are so angry at their ex it is hard for them to see how much their children need BOTH parents in their lives. It is the rare case where it would be in the child’s best interest to have limits on parental contact. Your focus during your divorce as well as your life, needs to be on what is best for the kids. Divorce lawyers who manipulate emotionally vulnerable clients by encouraging them to fight over the children are not doing them any favors. Depending on the age of the children you may have a very long co-parenting relationship ahead of you. Do you really need to start World War III with the father or mother of your child? A more child focused attorney will understand the need to create a peaceful relationship with your ex and not engage in a scorched earth policy.

The battle over property division can be the one that makes the least sense. How often do people spend more money on the fight than what the stuff is worth? People will get more if they cooperate with each other. This may seem counter intuitive to you but it is true. Think of it as dividing a pie. Which way will you get more, if you cut it in half between the two spouses or if you cut it in 4ths so that each spouse and their lawyer gets a share. It seems obvious that the fewer hands in the pie there more there is to divide.

So what is the solution? How can you find the right lawyer who has the intention to serve you rather than themselves? I am going to start by making some statements and then I am going to ask you an important question. It is a fact that our legal system is adversarial. That means there is a fight with winners and losers. The divorce process is so complicated most people just don’t want to deal with it on their own. So here is the most important question, does it make sense to avoid the adversarial system for your divorce? If keeping out of court and saving money on legal fees while protecting your assets and co-parenting relationship sounds good to you, then you really ought to explore mediation.
So let’s assume you want to proceed with mediation. You want to make sure the mediator you use has a great track record. The most important thing you want to know is how many couples have they worked with and what percentage settled. Once you find that out you can compare price, length of time it takes and other factors like personality and sex of the mediator before you make up your mind. The important thing is to have all the information you need to make an informed decision. Remember you only get one chance to have a “good divorce” so don’t go down the wrong road because you won’t like the destination.

Rachman has been a family law attorney since 1996 and is convinced our adversarial legal system destroys families. She left a successful adversarial law practice and now only does divorce mediation. To listen to an audio program that goes into more detail on how mediation differs from litigation, go to http://www.divorce-inaday.com

Is this you? “I don’t need therapy, but I could use some advice about…”

Technorati Tags: Communication, Difficult Communication, Boundaries, Relationship Advice

Inform your partner as soon as possible if you will not be doing a task that s/he expects you to do. This avoids unpleasant surprises and lets you solve the problem of what to do about the undone task together.

Whether it’s grocery shopping, making travel arrangements or even changing light bulbs, inform your partner about any potential problem before s/he learns about it accidentally.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it:

Discuss whether or not this is a problem for either of you. If it is, set up a regular time to inform each other about upcoming changes. Do this daily or weekly depending upon what you need.
This is an excerpt from Being Happy Together: How to Have a Fabulous Relationship With Your Life Partner in Less Than an Hour a Week, by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D. You can get more information HERE.

Technorati Tags: Relationships, Communication, Care of Your Partner, Relationship Advice

To forgive this to quit hoping you can change the past. To forgive is to risk being hurt again. To forgive is a challenge that must be met. So how do you really do it? Read the rest of this entry »

Laugh together. Share the jokes or cartoons that make you grin, rent a funny video or remember the stories about funny (especially in retrospect) things you have experienced together.

Laughter is healing and brings you closer together. It’s a great way of relieving tension, especially about the unavoidable challenges of living in such a complex world.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it:

Whenever something makes you smile or laugh this week, take a moment and share it with your partner.
This is an excerpt from Being Happy Together: How to Have a Fabulous Relationship With Your Life Partner in Less Than an Hour a Week, by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D. You can get more information HERE.

Technorati Tags: Togetherness, Relationships, Play, Relationship Advice

After being together for nearly 50 years — and married for over 47 of them, it’s hard to find a good birthday present. So this year I just gave Jon the experience of floating in a 120 mile per hour wind tunnel. And I decided to try it too. I’m sharing it here just for fun.

Be sure to watch both videos. The first shows me, dressed in pink, and my husband, dressed in yellow, indoor sky diving for the first minute. The second is the end of my third minute.

http://tinyurl.com/62qzft

http://tinyurl.com/5tparx

I’ve written more about it HERE

Technorati Tags: Relationships, Play, Self Care

Make clear agreements about how to play with other people when you and your partner enjoy very different activities. If your partner hates the music or movies you love most, which other people is it OK for you to enjoy them with? How frequently? With how much advance notice?

Even when you agree that you do not need to do everything together, you may find yourself uncomfortable Read the rest of this entry »