Divorce and Remarriage

Anyone who has experienced divorce and/or remarriage in some way or another knows how challenging the readjustments can be. These readjustments take time to get used to. They won't happen overnight. In fact, it takes about 2 years to adjust and get used to them.

We were given four guidelines for blended families.

1. There is a minimum of 2 years to have a sense of normalcy. It takes time to figure out how you will work as a family.

2. It will never look or feel like a normal, 2-parent family. It's not the same and will never be the same! But that's ok. Every family is unique as it is, so don't stress that it's not a perfect looking family.

3. Biological parent should do all corrections/parenting. If the step-parent does the corrections and parenting, it leads to resentment toward that parent.

4. Step-parent should be like a really good aunt/uncle. This doesn't mean that they're the favorite aunt/uncle that gives out candy and treats. Traits of a really good aunt/uncle include being a role model or good example, supportive, gives advice, spends time with the kids, and supports the biological parent. 

Lastly, the parents of blended families need to have more closed-door councils/conferences. It's really important for the couple to figure out what is and isn't working for them and the kids. Blended families can work happily, it just takes time and effort to get there.

Parenting

Parenting is to protect and prepare children to survive and to thrive in the world in which they will live. 

First and foremost, all parenting should be done with LOVE! Not to show your power and authority over them. Forming a good relationship with your child should start when they're young because by the time they are teens, the only tool you have to influence them is your relationship with them.

When misbehavior does occur, provide discipline. Not punishment. 

Before I provide information on the best way to provide discipline, I want to stress that the more a child's needs are met, the less they misbehave.

So... focus on the child's needs, not their misbehaviors!

Popkins describes that the child's five basic needs include: Contact/Belonging, Power, Protection, Withdrawal, and Challenges. 

Here's a table that describes the needs, the mistaken approach by the child to get that need met, and then the way a parent should respond.

Child’s Goal	Mistaken Approach	Parent Response
Contact/Belonging	Undue Attention Seeking	Offer Contact Freely Provide Opportunities to Contribute
Power	Controls Others Rebellion	Help Them to Develop Responsibility Provide Choices and Consequences
Protection	Revenge	Assertiveness Forgiveness
Withdrawal	Undue Avoidance	Appropriate Avoidance (let them have the alone time they need)

I encourage you to look at the Problem-Handling Model because that's where I'm getting most of my information. 

When a problem comes up, figure out who owns the problem. Who is most affected by this problem?

Once this is established, you can know what steps to take. If the child owns the problem, let them learn from natural consequences (and make sure to be sympathetic and empathetic, but don't try to "save" them from the consequences of their actions). A parent should only interfere if it effects their safety, if it's too far in the future, or if it affects other people. If the parent owns the problem, these should be the steps followed. If the child doesn't change the problem, then go to the next step.

I'm going to use the example of picking up their things they keep leaving lying around the front room.

1. Give a Polite Request. If they follow through, show appreciation! (Would you please pick up your things and put them away? Thank you!)

2. Use an I-Statement. Remember to use this in positive and negative situations! This is the model: "When you                  I feel                 because                 . 
I would like                       ."

3. Give a Firm Request.

4. Give Logical Consequences. This is supposed to mimic natural consequences, and be logically connected to the misbehavior/problem. 

Remember to not engage in power struggles because power struggles mean you are losing and the child is winning. Just "pull up a chair" and talk! Or if a decision has already been made just walk away.




Here's an article that's goes more into depth!
https://www.mcds.org/uploaded/Whats_Up/Community_Ed/ActiveParentingSummary.pdf

Finances

Finances can be a huge stress and burden in marriages and families. So many people have to have both parents working, rather than one staying home with the kids. 

What about the families that are making the transition from both the husband and wife working to just one income? Here are some steps to consider as you do this.

1. Inventory: Track how much money is coming in and how much is spent on what. This helps to see if all expenditures are necessary. How much money is being spent on your needs? How much money is being spent on your wants? What is technically a need or want? It's important to figure out what you should really be spending your money on, and what you don't really need to be spending your money on. 

2. Advice: Sometimes people need an outside look on what they're spending their money on, and what's necessary and what's not. This helps you receive "tough love." An outside perspective can help you decipher between needs and wants, without being biased.

3. Move Quickly: Sometimes you have to go down to one income unexpectedly. No matter what the situation is: Move quickly! You can't wait until you run out of money to put your plans into action. The faster you start implementing your budget, the better off you'll be!

4. Make a Budget: You must take the information you got from your inventory and make a plan where you spend less money than you make. You can't spend more money than you're making. There are some categories where you can't change how much your spending, like bills. Other categories can be reduced or gotten rid of completely, like food or going out to eat or clothes. If there's money leftover from the income, put it into savings! This can help to create an emergency fund. You never know what's going to happen or what will bring extra bills or expenses. 

Make sure to be patient! Budgeting can be hard, and sometimes people have a hard time sticking to a budget or slip up every now and then. It's so important to stick with it! Your attitude will make a huge difference in being able to be persistent and patient. Stay positive! 

Source: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/765556846/Staying-at-home-How-to-downsize-from-dual-to-single-income.html 

Communication

Normally, people use three media to communicate. These include words (14%), tone (35%), and nonverbal (51%). Our nonverbal ways to communicate come from our past experiences. Everyone has different backgrounds and past experiences. This means that everyone has a different way of communicating nonverbally which means that this leaves a lot of room misinterpretation and miscommunication. 

Since so much of communication is done nonverbally, you can never not communicate!

The best way to avoid miscommunications is to check that you're understanding the other person correctly. You can do this by saying, "Did I understand you correctly that.." Especially if it's a negative interaction, you're going to want to make sure that you're not misunderstanding each other. 

Communication is a hard thing to do when we all do it differently. The best way to avoid miscommunication is to realize that we all have different backgrounds that drive us to communicate the way we do and we have to make sure we're understanding each other.

Strong Families and Crises

In Chinese, crisis is written as danger+opportunity. With every struggle we have, there's an opportunity to succumb or overcome it.

There are so many possible stressors that a family can go through. Some occur everyday and others are bigger and more life-changing. We all have our ways of coping with difficult times, but it's what we do daily that helps make our families strong so that when those hard times do happen we can overcome it and come out stronger. 

So what do strong families do daily?

1. Have dinner together and have set daily routines. Spending quality time together helps a family to stay close to one another. Routines especially help children to have a constant thing to rely on. When something big and life changing happens, make sure to stick with the daily routines. This can help children to have a sense of normalcy even though life got turned upside down.
2. Accept each other (personalities, communication styles, etc.). If everyone feels loved and accepted, it makes it easier for people to cope with challenges. The home becomes a safe zone where everyone can be themselves and not have to worry about what others will think of them and accept their own coping strategies.
3. Have family councils. This pretty much means that every member of the family should be included in decisions and just talk to each other. Talking about each other's interests and what's going on each other's lives helps families to stay close and have a habit of talking to each other. This way when a crisis does happen, parents and children may feel more comfortable to talk about it together.
4. Involve everybody. Families should be a TEAM. When you sit down and talk as a family to make a decision, make sure you are sincere. Sometimes parents already have a decision made, and while they may listen to everyone else's opinion, they still don't take those opinions into consideration and just stick with the original decision made. Sincerely consider everyone's opinions and ideas. Sometimes they won't work, but go with them when they do. It will make the times you can't go with their ideas easier because they'll know that you do listen and value their opinions.
5. Support and be supported by family and friends. Having a good support system makes the hard times easier and better because you know you have people that have your back.
6. Affirm your family's worth and each individual's self-worth. Knowing that everyone is valuable and loved can be a great support when challenges occur.
7. Have family activities. Doing fun things together is just as important as spending time together doing day-to-day activities. Vacations or just short family outings can bring the family closer to one another. 

Having a strong family foundation will help ensure that the family will overcome crises, instead of succumbing to them.

Sexual Intimacy

Sex can be a wonderful, sacred experience. 

The best way for that to happen is for sexual intimacy to occur only between a husband and wife who are married. I'm recently married and I'm so grateful that both my husband and I waited until we were married to have sex. It made the experience so much more special and meaningful since it was the first time for the both of us. It gave us the opportunity to learn and grow together and become one.

Since male and female response cycles are so different, it takes time to learn about each other's needs and wants. A common misconception is about women's response cycles. Sex has to be a decision for a woman. They have to feel safe, emotionally connected, and have nonsexual touches outside the bedroom to decide to have sex. Once a woman decides, then the men must include the talk and touch. For a woman to have any desire, she needs to have that emotional connection and touching outside the bedroom. This makes her feel safe and loved and more comfortable to give of herself to her husband. 

There are benefits to being so different though. This gives the spouses an opportunity to think about the other person and their needs more. The more selfless you are, the closer relationship you will have. Once a couple puts in an effort to understand each other and talk to each other, they can be on the same page. When this happens, when a husband and wife can understand each other and know how to help the other, it will make sex that much more satisfying!

Adjustments in the Early Years of Marriage

When a couple first gets married, there's a lot of adjustments and transitions that need to be made. The main question that gets asked in some form or another is, "Where do we set boundaries?" 

I think the biggest boundary that needs to be set is the fact that a couple needs to have transparency. This means that when people ask about intimate things in another couple's marriage, that couple needs to be honest to the person asking that certain things are only between the husband and wife. This also means that if the husband or wife is upset at the other, that they shouldn't go to friends or mom and dad and vent to them. Even if the couple has gotten past what happened, other people might still be stuck on it and won't forget what happened, whether big or small. 

The solution to this: communication is key! A husband and wife just need to talk to each other FIRST. Since I'm newly married, I've seen this firsthand. A lot of our problem was that we weren't being as honest and open as we should've been about our feelings and thoughts and that lead to miscommunications and misperceptions on both of our parts. We would've saved a lot of time if we would've just talked about it as things happened rather than waiting until feelings had been hurt. 

Another major adjustment in a marriage is when kids start to come. Babies can bring so much joy into a family's life, and yet a lot of couples find that their satisfaction in marriage decreases after each child is born. This can be because of many different reasons. Some of these include the fact that the baby needs constant attention and so the mother's attention is often more focused on the baby. This often makes the father feel like he's not involved and he feels left out. A lot of misperceptions end up happening on both ends, which makes each spouse less "satisfied" in the marriage. 

There's lots of ways that this can be avoided though. The main thing would be that the mother should encourage the father to be very involved during the pregnancy and after the child is born, and the father should make sure he's doing his best to be involved. Before the birth, the father can go to all the doctor appointments and the mother can make sure she's scheduling the appointments around the father's school or work schedule. During the birth, the mother should rely on her husband, more than her mother or other women in her life. This can be an incredible bonding experience, so it's important that the husband is being the one involved and not someone else. After all, it's not just her baby. It's their baby! After the birth, each spouse should be attentive to each other's needs and look for opportunities to love and serve the other, especially since babies can make both parents so tired and worn out. The father can help take care of the child and bond with it at the same time. When couples take the time to love each other and include the father in the important, bonding times with the child, marital satisfaction won't go down but can actually increase.

To me, families take a lot of time and communication. It's so important to always be looking for opportunities to serve and love each other. A spouse and their wants and needs  should come before anything else!

Dating and Preparing for Marriage

Nowadays it seems as though it's getting harder and harder for people to have successful marriages. Personally, I think part of it might be that the dating world has changed and the definition of dating has changed. I think this could contribute to people struggling more in marriage. 

Some people genuinely want to find someone to love and marry. Others may just care more about the physical aspects of a relationship. I know in my high school NCMOs (noncommittal make outs) were really popular and people thought it was fun and cool. For a relationship to truly work and be healthy, it needs to start at a certain place and progress in a certain order. The Relationship Attachment Model (RAM) is the perfect example of this. Dr. John Van Epp created this believing that this is how a relationship should progress in order to survive and survive happily.

The first is "know." How does a relationship start without knowing that person? 

The second is "trust." The more you know someone, the more you trust them. 

(Each aspect builds off of the one immediately previous)

The third aspect is "rely." The more you trust someone, the more you can rely on them to 
meet your needs, whether that's in a friendly relationship or romantic. 

Fourth is "commit." 

Let me ask a question. 

Have you ever committed to someone before you really knew them? Dated after just meeting? And how did that work out? This may sound harsh, but it probably didn't. Why? 
Because these aspects of relationships were unbalanced and out of order. 

The fifth is "touch." If this comes first, then there is no base and support for the relationship. I mentioned make-out buddies or one night stands. Why do they exist? Because people start the relationship at touch and try to work backwards. It does not work that way and it shouldn't. Without a solid foundation of knowing them building into trust, trust becoming reliance, reliance leading you to commit, and LASTLY commitment leading to touch, a relationship is not healthy. 

My advice to you? Start at the very beginning. Build a friendship that has the strength to support the other aspects of a building relationship, especially if you want it to lead to marriage.

Gender Roles

Most people would tend to describe female tendencies as:

Emotionally expressive, cooperative, detail-oriented, relationally-oriented (how things are in relation to each other), and typically better at language and writing.

Most people would tend to describe male tendencies as:

Physical/aggressive, competitive/active, gross-oriented (sees things in the "bigger picture"), spatially/task-oriented, and typically better at mathematics and logic. 

That being said, there's ALWAYS people who are an exception to the natural tendencies, and there's also a range of each "category." It's ok if someone is different than the "typical" male or female, that's what makes us all different and unique. We have to be careful not to treat them different because we think they are "different."

So if men and women are so different, why would God assign/demand that they create a family together?

I think President Gordon B. Hinckley put it beautifully when he said, "In His grand design, when God first created man, He created duality of the sexes. The ennobling expression of that duality is found in marriage. One individual is complementary to the other. As Paul stated, 'Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord' (1 Corinthians 11:11). There is no other arrangement that meets the divine purposes of the Almighty. Man and woman are His creations. Their duality is His design. Their complementary relationships and functions are fundamental to His purposes. One is incomplete without the other."

Men and women are pretty much opposites to complement each other. Based of The Family: A Proclamation to the World, women are best fit to be the nurturers of the children and men are to provide for, protect, and preside over the family. That doesn't mean that the husbands and wives don't help each other. Husbands and wives are supposed to be equal partners and work as a team to make their family work. It's amazing because our tasks/abilities go along with how our brains tend to be wired. 

Husbands and wives round each other out and are able to provide both sides of the spectrum. If this wasn't the case, we wouldn't be able to reach our full potentials and help each other learn and grow. For example, a wife may be more detail-oriented and focusing a lot on the here and now. The husband can them come in and help her see the "bigger picture." This also goes for the children as well as the parents. Children need both parents to be able to create the perfect environment for them to learn and grow.

Here's a funny explanation of male and female brains called, The Tale of Two Brains.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XjUFYxSxDk 

Cultures

I've had the opportunity to travel to some amazing places. With that, I've had the opportunity to experience a lot of different, amazing cultures. I've gotten to eat their food, live in a typical home there, and get immersed in their cultures. 

And I loved it!

An interesting question was posed to us. That question is this, "Are all cultures equal in terms of being right and wrong, good and bad?"

Personally, I don't believe that any culture in this life will be perfect. Each culture has some good and some bad to it. In each culture itself, there will be families that are the epitome of the good parts of the culture and other families who maybe aren't. Everyone is raised differently and I think that's a part of what makes each culture the way that it is. We all interpret things differently and have different beliefs that help drive us to do what we do. 

I'd like to give a quick example of a difference between cultures. Last year, I had the opportunity to go on a humanitarian trip to Samoa and this was one of the times that I was really immersed in the culture. We spent a lot of time with the families there and got to know the people fairly quickly. One thing a few of us in the group noticed was that in all of the families the parents hit the kids. That was just how they disciplined and got them to do what they asked them to do. Don't get me wrong the people are so loving to everyone and generations of the family all live together or right next to each other because their culture is so family oriented. They all help take care of each other. It's just part of their culture to hit the kids when they're misbehaving. I don't know if all Samoans are like this, but that was something that we observed in the area that we were in. In America, hitting children is often looked down upon and most people don't believe in that method. A lot of research has been done here on physical punishment and so we have changed our culture to where a good majority of families no longer use physical punishment. 

Each culture is so different and I think that it's so wonderful and valuable to learn about the different cultures! One thing I learned from spending time with the Samoans is that family is so important and we are so blessed to have everything that we do. There's always a reason to be happy! They call their simple homes "paradise" and I think we should all follow their example and make our own homes paradise as well!

Holy Homes

President James E. Faust said, "In addition to temples, surely another holy place on earth ought to be our homes. The feelings of holiness in my home prepared me for feelings of holiness in the temple."

I think this is a good basis for why we talked about family systems this week. Understanding the different family system theories allows us to examine how our own families are and hopefully be able to alter the way we act in certain situations. This, in turn, will allow our homes to be sanctuaries that are "holy" and peaceful, just like the temple. 

Whether or not we realize it, we are always influencing each other. This kind of creates a "mobile" effect. Just like a baby's mobile above their crib, if one piece moves it bumps into another piece which bumps into another piece and etc. It kind of creates a ripple effect, until the whole unit is moving and shifting. This effect isn't necessarily always a linear effect. Sometimes, we can effect multiple people at once and sometimes it comes back and effects us in return. 

To create more positive effects, I think we have to take into account the fact that each of us are shaped by our interactions with each other. Take this mobile for example. Each of these animals live in the same place, but each have their own families, backgrounds, and experiences that have shaped them and essentially taught them how to act. This may not be a good example because some of these animals eats the other ones, but I think in a family perspective we have to consider that not only are we shaping each other but outside influences are influencing each individual member. This means that a brother and sister can learn from their friends, in different experiences, how to act a certain way or a type of slang. The siblings could then say or do something they think means one thing, but to the other sibling it could be something totally different. They had different experiences that taught them different meanings. I think sometimes that can be offending to some people because they're not thinking it could mean something different.

In families, we not only have to be open to different ways of thinking, but we also have to consider the fact that the more we give to each relationship, the more we receive. I've noticed in my own life that when I'm fully giving to others and trying to meet their needs and wants, the more others are willing to reciprocate that and in turn my needs and wants get met. Sometimes, if we feel those needs aren't being met in return, we withdraw from the relationship and stop trying.

Family means working together, forgiving each other, and loving and serving each other. Once all these things are done, family relationships will start to improve.

Fighting for the Family

This week we learned about societal trends and the family. The articles and videos we saw were really interesting and enlightening! Many people have believed that the world will be overrun with people and there wouldn’t be enough room or resources for us all. This all started with the “baby boom.” In the video, “New Economic Reality: Demographic Winter” it said how the baby boom wasn’t really that big of a boom after all. This isn’t an exact quote but the average women only had about 3-4 children at that time. That’s less than what even a generation back was having. Now, it’s the norm for people to have only one or two kids. The video stressed that the fewer kids we have, the more social and economic problems that we will have in the future. While those who were born in the baby boom are getting older and more are starting to retire, the rest of us will have to make up enough money to provide for the Social Security fund. As the fertility and birth rates continue to decline, the less people there will be in the work force to replace those retiring from the work force.

The fear of overpopulating was just one trend that contributed to the decline of birth rates. There are also many other trends that all contribute to one another. These include an increase in those delaying marriage, increase of cohabiting couples, increase of premarital sex, increase of births to unmarried women, increase of mothers working, increase of people living alone, and an increase in divorce rates. All these are contributing to a decline in family, and especially to a decline of the traditional family, which includes a married father and mother caring for their children. While other homes may not be bad or detrimental for other children to live in, there are numerous studies that show that kids who grew up with a married father and mother in the home were far better off than those who were raised in other types of homes.

Another big thing is that people are more afraid to get married than they used to and people are wanting to pursue careers and personal goals before settling down. While it’s important to learn about hard work and autonomy, it’s also important to have a family. I’ve heard so many stories about people who had a life based on their career and so they didn’t get married or if they got married then they didn’t have kids. Each time I heard that kind of story it always ended in them regretting that decision. While they loved their career and success, they also wished they had taken the time to make their own family. Personally, I think family gives us the opportunity to learn about hard work and independence and selflessness. Without these values, we couldn’t have a functioning society.

           

So how can we start to change the decline in families?

How can we fight for the family?

           

I think one of the really interesting things in the textbook was all the myths that people have come to believe about marriage and families. If we can help dispel these, then we can start to have a realistic view about marriage and family. One myth is that if you marry for love that that love will last forever. Once the initial “honeymoon phase” is over and people get into the routine of life, many couples find that they fear they married the wrong person or that their love for their spouse is fading. The problem is that love is a commitment. Marrying for love won’t make the marriage last.

This leads into the next myth that happy couples don’t have conflict.

THIS HAS NEVER BEEN TRUE AND NEVER WILL BE TRUE!

I like to compare this to an individual person. While people don’t love and ask for trials, the average person will admit that their hardest times helped them to grow into a stronger person, the person that they are today. So… when a couple has conflict, this gives them an opportunity to work things out and to grow together. Couples have to be honest and open and actually communicate for the relationship to work.

Last, is the myth that opposites attract. What may be attractive at first, later becomes annoying. If a couple has nothing in common, it’s really hard for them to find common ground and interests, leaving them with not much to do together, unless they’re willing to compromise. My well educated teacher told us that, “The average couple on the way to divorce have approximately 10 areas of significant incompatibility (hobbies, parenting styles, etc.).” If you don’t have similar styles of living or similar goals for the future, then it will be extremely hard to not drift apart.

Dispelling the myths won’t be enough though. We have to start within our own families and make sure our family is strong. If we also want to help in the decline of families and birth rates, then we need to make sure we have kids! Yes, every family is different which means that every family will have a different amount of kids. There is no universal number of kids that has to be met. Personally, I believe that the decision on how many kids to have is between the couple and God. One of our main purposes on earth is to “multiply and replenish the earth.” There is a quote that I really liked that helped put having kids into a whole new perspective. It is by the prophet Brigham Young and he said, “There are multitudes of pure and holy spirits waiting to take tabernacles, now what is our duty?—To prepare tabernacles for them; to take a course that will not tend to drive those spirits into the families of the wicked, where they will be trained in wickedness, debauchery, and every species of crime. It is the duty of every righteous man and woman to prepare tabernacles for all the spirits they can.” Personally, I’ve always wanted a big family with lots of kids, but this just reiterated how important it is to bring children to the earth. I want to give as many children a good home as possible and I want to make sure that my home is a good, righteous home. It would be so sad if a child that was supposed to go to a good, happy home got born into one that was abusive or evil.

To help stop the decline of families, we first have to build up our own homes!

Interesting watches and reads:

·      New Economic Reality: Demographic Winter Part 1 and 2

- http://www.byutv.org/watch/59b6b917-984a-478f-93b1-521a647779c4/new-economic-reality-demographic-winter-part-1

- http://www.byutv.org/watch/b3dfa9f3-6e20-4d64-af96-fbf3fd64670a/new-economic-reality-demographic-winter-part-2

·      New York Times video and article on the author of The Population Bomb

- https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/01/us/the-unrealized-horrors-of-population-explosion.html

- https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/vatican-invites-pro-abortion-population-bomb-author-to-speak-at-biological