Before I leave the topic of issues to consider when you’re thinking of leaving your marriage, I wanted to bring up a few situations that make the decision to stay or go vastly more complicated. What happens in a marriage,… Continue Reading
Here’s a statistic from Dr. Paul Amato, sociologist at Penn State University, that I find staggering: Around 55-60 percent of divorces occur in low-conflict marriages, where hollering is at a minimum, and arguments might even be quite rare. Dr. Amato calls these… Continue Reading
Lessons 1-7 are in the the post below, Blended Families–Part III. 8. Avoid areas staked out by the child’s own parent. If your step-son says, “Dad says he’ll teach me to sail,” don’t run out to the nearest shipyard. 9.… Continue Reading
Some spouses came across as aggressive and demanding. But Norah and Tali were different. Let’s look at two controlling women who passively managed to get their spouses to do their bidding. Norah never learned to drive. Norm encouraged her repeatedly… Continue Reading
According to Virginia Woolf, for a woman to succeed in her ambition to write fiction, she “must have money and a room of her own.” Granted your little one may not be attempting to compose the Great American [or in… Continue Reading
As Mario Puzo informed us–and he ought to know–“The strength of a family, like the strength of an army, is in its loyalty to each other.” So far, so good. But loyalty to, precisely, which part of the family and… Continue Reading
So we’ve addressed the importance of picking and winning small battles, as well as of not entering into an argument with your spouse on topics on which there’s really no ‘winning.’ What else can you do to get out from… Continue Reading
So by now you know to pick small battles and win them, to stay away from heated arguments, to plan for change-back moves, and to share your suffering with somebody close to you. What else can you do to crawl… Continue Reading
At one end of the relationship gradation is patriarchal violence [and, as I’ve mentioned before, if you are in a physically abusive relationship in which you are beaten to the point of physical harm, this blog is not for you.… Continue Reading
I’d like to briefly address in this post the fine line between the controlling spouse and the abusive one. The controlling partner can, you feel, cause you to behave in ways you don’t want to avoid his/her anger, but I’d… Continue Reading
So we’ve gone through some crucial control-reassertion moves, talked about how to deal with change-back moves, addressed what your fears might be–and quoted my son not once but twice. Not bad for a day’s work. But there are still a… Continue Reading
As people read about couples where one partner is dominated and controlled by the other, most healthy individuals wonder why, in heaven’s name, the controlled partner doesn’t leave–or at least make it clear that the day of a new regime… Continue Reading
