Is There a Cure for Divorce?

While this article doesn't refer to illness, I thought it might be interesting to you for it's take on how to thwart divorce. Divorce and serious illness are not strangers to each other. In one study, when the man became ill, only 3 percent experienced the end of a marriage; but among women, about 21 percent ended up separated or divorced.

Excerpts from:
IS THERE A CURE FOR DIVORCE?
by David Wygant
Huffington Post
8/22/11

.....A relationship does not just end over night. It takes time. But there is that point in the relationship where the marriage "jumps the shark," as they say. It's often that one thing that happens over and over again, without the ability to change or compromise, and both partners emotionally close down on each other.

So when that one thing comes up, instead of shutting down, putting up your dukes, or setting down your battleground lines--basically letting your ego take over--what if that moment, when everything started going haywire, you actually do the exact opposite of what you normally do? What if, instead, you thought to yourself, "What does my partner need right now, what does my partner need today that makes them feel loved, and how can I provide that for them?"

So many times we really do know how to love the other partner, we know what they need and how to provide it. But we refuse to do those things because they're not doing things for us, they're not giving us what we want. That's probably how the majority of relationships end. The If-you-don't-do-it-for-me-I'm-not-going-to-do-it-for-you syndrome, and then a couple years later you're divorced, angry, pissed off, and ready to start over with the hope of a fresh new relationship. One that will probably repeat itself if you did not learn the lesson the first time around.

We refuse to love our partner the way they need, so the battlegrounds are drawn. Once the battlegrounds are drawn, you can kiss that relationship goodbye because there is no way in the world you're going to give in at that point. And neither is your partner. It often becomes a very dangerous tit-for-tat game that has no chance in hell of ever surviving or finding the love in the relationship again.

Relationships are a beautiful thing, and we could cut down on the divorce rate dramatically if we just spent a little bit of time every single day loving our partners instead of responding by how they treat or have treated us.....

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Your thoughts?

Daring to Hope?

I recently started a new medication, which may be having a positive effect on my pain condition. This is the first major, desirable shift in over ten years.

For the first few months on this medication, I couldn't even allow myself to think that my pain could be controlled with only one, relatively benign drug. And I certainly couldn't express hope out loud. I did not want to offer any bait to evil spirits lingering in my vicinity, eager to pounce on optimism and turn it into yet another disappointment.

Over the years I have consulted most genres of specialists - from neurologists to gynecologists to uro-gynecologists to orthopedists to rheumatologists. I even saw a tropical medicine specialist. In my desperation, I also wandered over onto the fringe side of the healing spectrum and got some comfort from crystals and potions - although no decrease in my pain.

I have been primed to expect defeat. Richard, an optimist and scientist, has always believed in probability. And probability tells him that if I try enough options, some of them will work. His mantra has been: "There's always something more to try."

More often than not, I found this phrase to be exhausting. It left me feeling like a parched wanderer in an endless desert forcing myself to rise up to scale one more sand dune in the hopes of reaching an ever-vanishing oasis.

Recently, Richard began to give voice to hopes of recovery. I told him, "Shush. Be quiet." I'm not ready yet to broadcast.

For now, reaching toward hope is harder than anticipating more pain.

Grand Rounds is Up

at Dr Deb's site. It's a collection of posts from the health care world. Have a look.

Dislocated Shoulder -- Relationship Realignment

While hiking a steep mountain trail on vacation in Acadia National Park in Maine, my foot found the only rock with slime on it. I went down with a bang and dislocated my shoulder.

Richard and I had to hike back up to the road and hail a ride to the local hospital. Now, I've known pain, years of it. But this pain was a new taste treat and had me groaning and cursing and counting down the seconds until the nurse dripped some morphine into my vein, and then some more.

They were able to relocate my shoulder fairly easily and with that, the pain subsided.

Richard was by my side throughout -- helping me hike to the road, holding my stuff, sitting by my bed in the hospital. He was present and hugely helpful. And as the days passed and I had to learn to meet the world left-handed, he continued to be responsive to my requests for assistance and to problem solve.

He was wonderful, but I felt alone and wanted more -- and illegitimate for feeling greedy when he was trying so hard.

What was missing for me was overt empathy. At the same time I worked to be independent and do it all myself, I was a wounded bird who just wanted to be sheltered and babied. I did my best to tie my shoelaces one-handed while trying to ignore my yearnings to have my needs anticipated without speaking them aloud and to be cuddled and coddled and told that it would all be OK.

After a few days, I could no longer sustain this inner tension. I was growing weary of the strain and resentful of Richard's helpfulness without emotional empathy. We finally had a talk.

I tried to tell him what I was missing without blaming him for not providing it. I cheered his efforts at practical support and told him, as explicitly as I could, that I both accepted him and loved him, and still felt the sadness of not getting the kind of loving my injury had awakened.

He listened. And he tried to give me more emotional support. When he saw me struggle to wrap my sling around my shoulder he said to me, "I am so sorry you're having to go through this. I wish I could make it all better." His saying that made it far better for me than any attempts to help me adjust my sling.

The more I thought about the specifics of my current situation, the more I realized that the condition of being in a close relationship periodically involves the existence of a gap between what you get and what you feel you want. The gap of life.

The tricky part is not to deny the reality and legitimacy of your wants; while at the same time not punishing your partner for not fulfilling them and (and this is the trickiest bit) accepting him, with love and gratitude, for who he is and for staying in the conversation with you.

To hold both the love and the sadness, and sit side-by-side in the gap of life, together.

Do you know what I mean?