Blisstree » divorce-rate

Save a Marriage – Stop Sharing

Tracee Sioux — Wed, 14 May 2008 12:00:00 +0000

Sister, let me give you some marital advice:

Sharing is overrated. It’s a source of conflict, disaster really.

There is no reason on planet earth you need to share – unless you want to fight.

We stopped sharing sheets a long time ago. No needs to share each other’s night sweats. No need to wake up irritated when the sheets end up on the floor. People don’t have the same body temperatures. They just don’t. No reason to fight and ruin a marriage over body temperature.

Computers. It’s worth $500 to save a marriage. Buy another computer. I don’t care if it’s social or work, there will be conflict over who is “more important” if you try to share a computer.

Workspace. No. Someone always thinks they’re “more entitled” to spend time there, to move other people’s notes or materials.

Television. We never fight about who gets to watch what anymore. We stopped sharing a TV. There’s no magic on earth that will make a husband and wife want to watch the same stuff on TV.

For heaven’s sake no one should share a car. It will leave one person trapped. Marriages don’t survive traps.

I’m angling for my own bedroom. We’re both entitled to a good night’s sleep and there’s a problem with the snoring. He can’t help it and I can’t sleep through it and our couch sucks. Next house, “guest bedroom” is going to be a priority.

That’s not what they tell me in all those marriage seminars at church.

They are lying. That’s what we do to people. We lie to them and tell them that marriage is about togetherness. Really, there’s only so much togetherness any couple can handle. It’s false advertising.

That’s the cause of the one-in-two divorce rate. That’s my explanation for the 7 year itch. After 7 years you realize you bought something, without knowing what was in the package. The ones who stay married find a way to cope with what’s really in the package – like abandoning the idea of sharing – the ones who don’t, get divorced.

I’m telling you right now to avoid the whole trap. If you want marital peace – don’t share.

Image Source: So Sioux Me, My husband and I sharing time at a Vow Mariage Retreat this spring.

Post from: Blisstree

Save a Marriage – Stop Sharing

Saving Self/Tanking Market

Tracee Sioux — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:41:32 +0000

I took a major action step to Save Myself. It wasn’t easy, there were a few fights and one angry letter to Suze Orman over my using $50, of our already very tight budget, to Save My Self by opening a TD Ameritrade Account.

Rewind: Suze Orman had a Save Yourself Plan in her book Women & Money. Women who signed up for a TD Ameritrade Investment Account before March 2008 and automatically save $50 a month for one year will be given a free $100.

So far I’ve saved $100. But, I don’t know what to do with it. The market is tanking and it’s giving me ambivalent feelings about my ability to make a decision. I’m afraid of making “the wrong one.”

Our investment decision are always surface and ambivalent to begin with.

Did you see Suze rip that couple a new one on Oprah? Do you know how this investment did over the last 10 years? Do you know how much you’re spending on servicing this mutual fund? And a whole bunch of other questions I didn’t really follow. Then don’t tell me you have a good mutual fund because you don’t even know what kind of mutual fund you have! she scolded.

The pressure is causing paralysis of indecision. Have you ever looked at a prospectus?

Prior to my husband working at a chicken company I would have thought chicken was as sound an investment as you could get – everybody eats chicken. (except those with an inexplicable love affair with the soy bean). But even that stock is tanking because of . . . wait for it . . . oil.

The seemingly innocuous development of ethanol – with 1/3 of the United States corn crop – is driving up the price of chicken feed and it’s causing unprecedented worldwide food inflation.

Do you have a crystal ball that explains the safe investment which will quickly grow? Can I borrow it?

(P.S. Stockpile chicken.)

Post from: Blisstree

Saving Self/Tanking Market

J&K+8 = Marriage Reality

Tracee Sioux — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 11:00:11 +0000

Maybe those who criticize the marriage of Jon & Kate plus 8 haven’t figured this out:

Happily Ever After was a damn lie. No one rides off into the sunset. The days are not all rosy and loving and no one is spending hours every day lying in bed telling each other how wonderful the other is. It’s just not the reality of marriage.

The reality is this:

Half (50%) of Americans get divorced.

Statistically, it’s probably accurate to assume that ALL married people find marriage challenging and MOST married people are sometimes unhappy in their marriage and EVERY married person sometimes does something imperfect.

In fact, the state of marriage is in such trouble that the federal government is now trying to help people stay married by providing marriage education courses free of charge regardless of income. You know if anti-welfare George W. Bush is providing free social services to try to help people avoid divorce - marriage is having some serious problems.

All the romantic movies and fairy tales and expectations were simply a load of crap.

Marriage is this: very hard work.

If you consider staying miserably married a failure in itself, and I do, then way more than the majority of us are failing at it.

Jon & Kate’s marriage is a resounding success (statistically they’ve beaten the average divorce rate of multiples parents, which is two or three times higher than for parents of single children) and it’s a shame that anyone’s marriage would be so highly criticized. Holding on to our absurd fairy-tale ideals about what marriage should be like isn’t going to help anyone’s marriage.

Pretending that marriage is as easy as happily ever after never helps anyone’s children grow up to be good at the difficult job of being a spouse. It is better that their 8 children are exposed to the reality of the hard work, conflict and conflict-resolution that goes into a marriage, so they will have a clearer understanding of marriage before they do it expecting happily ever after.

What criticism of their marriage does is dismiss all the hard work and trial and error that a successful marriage, like Jon & Kate’s, involves.

You know what I think? I think if you’re critical of other people’s marriage – well, you’re probably critical of your own spouse. And criticism is a sure marriage killer.

Post from: Blisstree

J&K+8 = Marriage Reality