Things to Remember

It's discouraging to think that after spending so much time and effort in various classes that when all is said and done there is no feasible way that we can remember all of the things that we have spent time and effort to study this semester. However, I have compiled a list of a few things that I'd like to take away from this semester.

1.       Research misconceptions – Often when we are presented with information from a “study” we take it to be truth but in reality the information could be misleading in the way that it is presented and we need to take that into consideration. I feel that by applying the information that was discussed in class and in the PowerPoint I will be able to make more educated decisions not just about the world that I live in but for my family as well.

2.       Don’t hang all your social problems on one nail – Although this comment was made sort of in passing as we were discussing a few different issues I found it to be quite profound and applicable for the world that we live in. In my own family I have an Uncle who is now a Grandfather who blames his own Father for all of the failures that he’s had in life based off of the way that my Grandparents chose to raise their children. This has caused a lot of friction not just in their relationship but throughout the family as well. A few years after my Uncle approached my Grandparents with this accusation my father died and I remember that all of my dad’s family was gathered together and I remember that one of the things that my Grandpa said was that their kids, grandkids, and great grand kids were their “treasures.” Seeing my gruff old Grandpa express his emotions as freely as he did will be something that I never forget. I can only imagine the pain that they felt and probably still feel from the hostility that was presented by my dad’s brother. Although I do think that it’s important to “give credit where credit is due” I think that we also need to remember to take responsibility for our own actions and not be too judgmental or harsh on others.

3.       A family without order is like a basketball without rules – When I was younger I used to always wish that my family would be more like the “cool” families in the neighborhood or in the ward and that my parents would be the kind of parents that would let us do whatever we wanted. As I’ve gained some life experience and studied more about the family systems theory I realized how naïve that thought was. Families need order to be able to function.

4.       Masculine VS. Feminine VS. Christ – The exercise that we did on the board really helped me to see others in a little bit of a different light. Sometimes I feel that maybe we shy away from people that aren’t “normal” or maybe that are exhibiting characteristics from the “wrong” gender but in reality these characteristics are often the same characteristics that Christ has, would we shy away from Christ?

5.       A crisis is created not just by a situation but our interpretation of the situation and our ability to adjust – More than anything I think that this concept has helped me to better understand my older sister. She’s definitely one that needs to plan out every detail of her life and sometimes that creates a lot of friction and loss of productivity when things don’t go “as planned.” Understanding that everyone deals with things differently makes a big difference in the amount of patience that I have with others.

6.       Functions of nonverbal behavior – Nonverbal behavior is something that I feel that apparently I really need to be aware of. After I started dating my husband he gently informed me that one of the reasons why it took him so long to ask me out (let alone talk to me) was because I looked so grumpy and mean all the time. I found this to be quite a shock but the more that I’m aware of the nonverbal cues that I’m sending the more that I’ve come to realize that most of the time I’m communicating to others that I’m a cranky old lady who just wants to be left alone. I think that when raising children nonverbal cues will be especially important and that I need to be aware when the messages that my nonverbal cues are sending compared to my verbal cues.

7.       Emotions are the glue to relationships – I’m not the kind of person that tends to make friends easily. Partly, I’m assuming for the reasons listed above. But I also think that one of the reasons why I struggle so much is that I don’t tend to share my feelings very openly with others. Remembering that the emotions are what bonds a relationship I think will help me with the relationships with my husband, family, and other people that I come into contact with.

8.       Fathers – Reading about the importance of fathers in the text only helped to cement the thoughts that I’ve already had about the importance of my children growing up with a father that is actively involved in their lives. As my husband and I have talked, we felt that it was important that my husband provide for the family and I stay home to be with the children. Knowing that this is a huge responsibility for my husband, I’ve anticipated late nights and early mornings without dad being around much. As we read the chapter I began to think a little differently. Regardless of my skills, talents, and natural abilities there is no way that I can effectively raise children on my own. They need the presence of their father within the home.

9.       It’s not about the “kids” in a marriage it’s about you and your spouse and there needs to be aspects of life that don’t involve the children – We have some friends who have a son who is now almost three years old. When we first met we offered to watch their son so that they could go on a date sometime. Time after time they declined our offer. At first I thought that the reason was because we were essentially still strangers to them and they wouldn’t want to leave their child with someone that they didn’t trust. Come to find out a year or so later it wasn’t necessarily that they didn’t trust us with their son it was more that they “felt bad” having to leave their son for someone else to take care of. They felt that it was their responsibility to watch and care for their son and not anyone else’s. As we’ve been friends with them we’ve come to realize just how much this decision really impacts their relationship. My husband and I have talked about it some but as we studied more about intimacy in marriage the more that I feel that it is absolutely crucial to make the time to take the kids out of the picture for a little bit so that mom and dad can work on their relationship.

10.   Marital Fidelity – I think that now more than ever it is becoming easier and easier to stumble upon ways to be unfaithful to our spouses. I used to be under the impression that the only way to be unfaithful to a spouse would be through a sexual affair. But after reading the article but Scott Gardner and Christian Greiner my eyes were opened to the reality of how easy it is to hurt the ones we love the most. There are many ways to be unfaithful and we must always be vigilant with every thought and action no matter how harmless they may seem in the beginning.

Six Stations of Divorce

This week we've been discussing the topics of separation, divorce, and remarriage. All interesting topics and stages in life that will affect everyone in one way or another. Most specifically, I wanted to share some information that we covered about divorce. Divorce is becoming more and more prevalent in our society and I think that it's important that we take the opportunity to learn about divorce because in one way or another we will all have interaction with divorce. In 1970, Paul Bohannan presented divorce in a new light. He proposed that there are six different experiences or "stations" that most people will typically undergo during the divorce process.

1. Emotional Divorce - loss of trust, respect and affection for each other

2. Legal Divorce - court brings the marriage to an end

3. Economic Divorce - settlement of property

4. Co-Parental Divorce - custody of children

5. Community Divorce (social divorce) - division of friends that the couple shared during their married relationship

6. Psychic Divorce - identity changes from "married" to "single"

These stages are normal and although not all couples will go through each stage in their entirety they will in some respects experience each of the stages. Paul Bohannan also points out that while marriage makes us feel good because we've been "selected" divorce makes us feel "so awful" because in effect we've been "deselected."

Parenting

This week we focused on parenting our children. There was a lot of good discussion and a lot of participation from different class members. It's nice to know that even though we may all belong to the same church that our opinions can vary so much. It's also nice to know that for the most part we can keep pretty civil during most of our discussions. Overall, I was interested to study this topic more in depth over the course of the week. I'm also taking a parenting class this semester in addition to a parent education class so more exposure to parenting topics is definitely of high interest to me right now. Here are a few things that I have learned this week that I thought that I'd share. (Sorry if it's a bit jumbled - but that's just how my brain works these days - yay for being pregnant!)

Differences between parenting styles and parenting practices:
  - parenting styles: constellation of behavior over time (group of behaviors)
  - parenting practices: specific behaviors to achieve specific goals

Marital Satisfaction with Children:
  - It's not about the "kids" in a marriage, it's about you and your spouse and there needs to be aspects of life that don't involve the children. Such as date nights without the children and conversations without  the children which aren't about the children.

Types of Discipline:
  - Reinforcement - goal: get more of the same behavior
         * positive: (adding something) privileges, rewards, etc.
         * negative: (taking something away) privileges or removing chores
  - Punishment - goal: stop the behavior
         * positive
         * negative

Influencing Your Children:
**If you want to increase influence with your children you need to increase the quality of relationship with the child **

 20 Minute Solution
- Spend 20 minutes with the child every day of the week
- Parents cannot ask questions
- Parents can only give positive narration of the child's activities
- No questions are allowed to be asked by parents
- Parents cannot have "teaching moments" with their child

Misbehavior often occurs out of a manifestation of a need that isn't being met. By addressing the behavior, the need continues to not be met and the same amount or more misbehavior will occur.

Fathers

This week we've been discussing different family roles. In particular we've been emphasizing on a father's role to provide, preside, and protect the family and the great responsibility that truly is. We were assigned to write a paper on the topic - I'd thought I'd share mine with you.

Summarizing a Father’s Role

In my exposure to the literature about a father’s involvement in the home, some of the most important aspects that stood out to me weren’t necessarily the parenting methods that were used, the amount of time that is spent individually with each child or the way in which conflict is resolved but it was more the state of the father’s heart and mind as he fulfills his role of a father. You can have two fathers that carry out their days in exactly the same way but one might do so begrudgingly and the other with a more positive attitude. The way that the family interacts with the father will vary based off of the father’s attitudes, beliefs and behaviors. Merely “doing” and going through the motions is not enough.

Overall, I believe that a father should provide for his household for monetary, spiritual, educational, and other necessities such as shelter or emotional support. Along with providing, fathers should preside within their homes and be an authority figure that works alongside his wife to create a home with warmth, love, and direction for their children. Father’s should also be actively involved in protecting the home and the members of his family. Physical protection is a part of this but protection also includes being involved enough to know who a child’s friends are and the influence that they have over the child, the amount of screen time that a child is exposed to and the content of the media that is being viewed. Protection also comes in the form of spiritual protection and ensuring that the family isn’t exposed to influences or experiences that could harm their spiritual well being or limit or decrease their spiritual well being.

Fathers have a huge impact on their families. Children look up to their fathers and often pattern their futures based off of the homes that they grew up in. Young boys typically grow up to have many of the same characteristics and habits of family relations as their fathers do. This incorporates the good as well as the bad. A young boy that grows up in a home where mothers are respected and love is expressed will expect the same for their future families. Children that grow up in abusive or hostile homes will often carry these practices into their own families. Young girls also take notice of the things that their father’s do. Many young girls often marry a man that has many of the same characteristics as her father did. Taking into account that each individual and family is different, it may not be possible or practical for the father to assume all of these responsibilities and there may be some sharing or switching of responsibility between the mother and the father for the family to find the right balance that would work best for them.

Remembering My Father

Although my own father passed away the summer before my senior year of High School, I feel that we had a unique opportunity to grow closer together in the years before his passing. Unlike some instances of the early death of a parent, my father wasn’t sick and we had no preparation before his death but I feel as if in some ways we were prepared. The few years before this time, my father was really making some changes in his life that impacted our family quite a bit. He was making an effort to be more involved at church and becoming less involved in other areas. This change was a big step for our family. We began to spend more quality time together and to look forward to those opportunities. We don’t know what brought about this change. Maybe my parents started to realize that my older sister and I would soon be leaving home or maybe my father was going through some kind of midlife crisis – either way we’ve all been grateful for that change.

I think that some of the most impactful moments of the time that were moments that we had to spend just one on one together. My dad became a very important person in my life instead of “just a parent.” My father became a confidant and a source of encouragement to me. We could talk for hours about the things that were troubling me and he would listen and provide feedback when I wanted it. I don’t remember very many of the things that he said but I do remember that I felt safe when I talked to my dad and that it meant a great deal to me that he would take the time out of his busy schedule to just listen to all of the things that were important to me at the time but probably didn’t matter much to him. He just always seemed to be very supportive of me and the decisions that I was making in my life.

Overall, I feel that I was most impacted by my father when I could or couldn’t recognize his love for me. I seem to remember the high points when I could feel and identify moments when I knew that my father loved me. However, I also feel that I seem to remember the low points when I couldn’t feel my father’s love for me and when our relationship struggled. I’ve always been one who seeks after the approval and recognition of loved ones and I think that this is a major contributing factor into the relationship that I had with my father.

Future Family

                Taking into account that I have highlighted only a few interactions between myself and my father from the seventeen years that I had to spend with him, I have used these experiences and many others as well as literature and research that I have been exposed to in order to set some expectations for my own husband in how he interacts with our children. I feel that the more involved and equal the relationship between husband and wife the more open and constructive the family relationship can be. My husband and I have talked about this and we have set the goal of having a weekly date, even when we have children. We realize that this might not always be possible or easy to accomplish but it is something that we are striving for because we feel that when mom and dad are united the family is more united and the household runs more smoothly.

                Additional fathering expectations that we have set for our future family is the incorporation of daddy daughter or daddy son outings and keep regular interviews with our children beginning when they are young. We recognize that this could create a lot of scheduling conflict for my husband but we want our children to be able to have time to spend with our children individually and be in the situation where he can help them through their struggles or experience their triumphs just as much as a mother who witnesses the smiles or tears when children come home from school or play groups. We’ve also discussed the important aspect of family support for each child’s interest. We will strive to attend, as a family, sporting events or performances of all of our children and be available to encourage them and support them in their talents and activities.

                Although the expectations that I have presented are very important to my husband and I, we also have the expectation that a father, as well as a mother, will live their personal lives in such a way that they will be living in accordance of the gospel teachings so that they can have the influence and guidance of the Holy Ghost. We feel this to be a very important part of parenting. We may not always have the right answers or even know where to begin with trying to find the right answers but by living close to the Spirit and by following the promptings received we believe that we will be able to make the decisions that will be best for our children and our family.

                As a mother, helping my husband to achieve these goals and meet these expectations as a father as well as finding balance between work and home life I will have to make sure that I am supporting my husband and encouraging him to take an active role in the lives of our children. I can do this by ensuring that our family schedule isn’t overrun with appointments and activities so that dad has time to spend with the kids and that he won’t be rushing from one thing to the next all of the time. Another thing that I can do to help my husband is to realize that he’s not going to be a perfect father, and I’m not going to be a perfect mother. We’re going to make mistakes and it is going to get messy sometimes but if we take those experiences as learning experiences and help each other along the way then we will be able to continually improve and grow as parents.

Communication

As a young married couple, my husband and I have often been on the receiving end of advice about good communication in a marriage relationship. Communication takes work and effort from both parties in order to be effective. We spent time talking about communication this week and the reasons why communication works and why we struggle sometimes.

Types of Communication
Overall, there are two types of communication; verbal and nonverbal. Verbal is fairly self explanatory, essentially anything that we vocalize is considered to be verbal communication. Although humans have a highly developed system for verbal communication, other animals have ways of verbally communicating as well. We all know that the lions, tigers, and bears (oh my!) that we see at the zoo have ways of communicating with one another which we may not be able to understand but they seem to be able to get their messages across to one another. Nonverbal communication on the other hand comes in many different forms and serve many different functions. Some of the different forms include the clothes you wear, facial expressions, touching, and cues we give during verbal communication such as raising eyebrows, hands on hips, etc.

Functions of Nonverbal Behavior
There are eight different functions of nonverbal behavior, no wonder people have a hard time communicating these days!
1. Complement our words
2. Contradict our words
3. Repeat the message
4. Regulate communication
5. Substitute for words
6. Accent the verbal message
7. Trigger attributions
8. Influence both the attitudes and the behavior of others

With so many ways that a message can be communicated, it becomes apparent that it's not that hard for our messages to be misunderstood when we send them, but also when others receive them. Listening is a major part in communication and there are many ways to be an effective or ineffective listener. Some of the styles of poor listening that we studied and discussed in class are listed below.


The Faker: "Fakers only pretend to be listening. They may smile while you talk to them. They may nod their heads. They may appear to be intent, but they are either thinking about something else or are so intent on appearing to be listening that they do not hear what you are saying."

The Dependent Listener: "Some people primarily want to please the speaker. They are so concerned about whether the speaker has a good impression of them that they are unable to listen and respond appropriately. Dependent listeners may agree excessively with what the speaker says, not because they really agree but because they want to maintain the goodwill of the speaker."

The Interrupter: "Interrupters never allow the other to finish. They may be afraid that they will forget something important they want to say. Or they may feel that it is necessary to respond to a point as soon as it is made. Or they may simply be more concerned with their own thoughts and feelings than with those of others. In any case, they barrage the other with words rather than offering the other an understanding ear."

The Self-Conscious Listener: "Some people are concerned primarily with their own status in the eyes of the other rather than with the ideas and feelings of the other. Trying to impress the other person, they don't listen with understanding."

The Intellectual Listener: "Intellectual listeners attend only to the words of the other. They make a rational appraisal of what the other has said verbally, but they ignore the nonverbal cues (including the feelings that are communicated nonverbally)"

Family Crises

Crisis within family life is not anything new or unheard of. Every family will go through some kind of crisis at some point. Family scholar Reuben Hill spent a portion of his career studying stresses within the family system and created a model to identify the different ways in which we cope with stress. This model is the ABCX family crisis model. A is stressor event and the subsequent hardships that are created because of the stressor event. B is how the stress is managed, typically through a variety of coping resources that are available to the family. C is very much dependent upon the people that are involved in the situation, it is how the event is defined by the individuals. Together, A, B, and C come together to create X or the crisis.

When discussing crises, it's important to understand that a crisis is created not just by an individual situation but by our interpretation of the situation and our ability to adjust to that situation. It really all goes back to our perception of an event and the way that we choose to handle things in our lives. There are numerous ways that individuals and families can cope with stress. The following is a list that we created in class of some ways that people cope with stress.

* Listening or performing music
* Watching fish in a fish tank
* Listening to moving water (fountains, waterfalls, rivers, fish tanks, etc.)
* Receiving support from a "church family"
* Receiving support or seeking guidance from extended family members
* Talking or communicating with others
* Exercising
* Journaling
* Friends or community support
* Food
* Seeking refuge
* Family flexibility
* Religious or other rituals and traditions
* Humor
* Family trips and activities
* Cohesion
* Working together
* Planning ahead

Although there is much that we cannot control when we are experiencing a crisis in our lives, we can control the way that we react and therefore have some power over the outcome of the experience.

Marital Fidelity

This week we've been focusing on marital fidelity. I've found it to be a sobering subject, but interesting to learn more about. In one of the articles that we read by Scott Gardner and Christian Greiner entitled, "Infidelity: Protecting Our Marriages" my eyes were opened to a much broader spectrum of what an affair really is and how the concept of fidelity has changed through the years.One such example, as illustrated in the graph below, is the change of perception that people are having about marital infidelity. I was expecting the results to portray opposite results but it's nice to know that when so much pressure and destruction is placed on the family at least people are starting to come around to the idea of fidelity.







The article also discussed the many different ways in which people are unfaithful to their spouses. The four types of affairs that the authors talked about were categorized by the type of involvement (either emotional or physical) and the level of attachment to the other individual (attached or detached). To maintain the clarity of the authors on this level, I have included direct quotes from the article.

Fantasy Affair
"A Fantasy Affair (emotional/detached) is characterized by having an emotional affair with someone who has no knowledge about what is taking place, or with someone who is anonymous and would likely never be met. Examples can include flirting online or otherwise fantasizing romantically about someone other than a spouse ... A Fantasy Affair (emotional/detached) is characterized by having an emotional affair with someone who has no knowledge about what is taking place, or with someone who is anonymous and would likely never be met. Examples can include flirting online or otherwise fantasizing romantically about someone other than a spouse"

Visual Affair/Pornography
"When we let our thoughts unfaithfully imagine what life would be like with another person, infidelity has been committed. More and more this type of infidelity is being committed online through e-mails, chat rooms, or social networking sites. One survey showed that on-line sexual activities were the cause of separation and divorce in over 22% of those surveyed (Schneider & Wise, 2001, cited in Subotnik, R., 2007, p. 188.) Even though the two people may never meet face-to-face, the unfaithful spouse becomes more and more emotionally disconnected from his or her family. Many will justify their thoughts claiming their love is dead, however President Kimball (1962) taught that when love wanes or dies “it is often infidelity of thought or act which gave the lethal potion.”

Romantic Affair
"A Romantic Affair (emotional/attached) occurs when an individual becoming emotionally involved with a specific person other than his or her spouse. A romantic affair is characterized by a “second life” and is a result of trying to escape the monotony of everyday life (VanderVoort & Duck, 2004).
The media is constantly telling us that ordinary marriage is “hopelessly boring and middle-class ” (cited in Hafen & Hafen, 1994). In the book “The Belonging Heart” Elder Bruce and Marie Hafen (1994) write that Satan would like us to believe that we should abandon our dull routines and seek out dramatic gestures of romance, even if that means looking outside our home. He wants us to believe that life’s petty responsibilities are impeding desire and love. He wants us to believe that every marriage should be like a Shakespearean love story, never asking us to imagine Romeo and Juliet dealing with household clutter, unpaid bills, and crying children. Research by VanderVoort and Duck (2004) confirms that there is often a “utopian edge” to an affair (p. 12). They believe that one reason this type of affair is so tempting is that it offers an escape from everyday life. It transfers a person from a life of laundry, ringing telephones and children into a life of hotels, resorts, and back rooms."

Sexual Affair
"In contrast to the Romantic Affair, a Sexual Affair (physical/attached) occurs when a person engages in sexual acts outside the bonds of marriage with or without emotional attachment. In some instances visual affairs will lead a person into committing the more serious sin of a physical affair. President Kimball (1962) warned, “The adversary is subtle; he is cunning, he knows that he cannot induce good men and women immediately to do major evils so he moves slyly, whispering half truths until he has his intended victims following him, and finally he clamps his chains upon them and fetters them tight, and then he laughs at their discomfiture and their misery.” Satan will try to convince us that we can find happiness, joy and pleasure in infidelity. Just the opposite is true. Even though it may seem for a time that everything is wonderful, President Benson (1988) warned, “Quickly the relationship will sour. Guilt and shame set in. We become fearful that our sins will be discovered. We must sneak and hide, lie and cheat. Love begins to die. Bitterness, jealousy, anger, and even hate begin to grow.”

After reading through this article and spending some time thinking through the messages that were presented, I took time to take stock of my marriage relationship and to make sure that all of my relations inside and outside of marriage are in order. I plan to do so frequently and I think it would be wise if all married or committed individuals did the same.