Lily Tomlin asks “if love is the answer, could you please rephrase the question? “ We all have struggled with family relationships and love. As a marriage counselor I am a relationship expert whose longest stable relationship is with a bearded collie, a Scottish Sheepdog. My significant other has fleas. I certainly don’t live a perfect life with all the answers but I have spent over 25 years living intimately with 100's of families. I see how difficult it is to connect and,yet,how vital it is to our happiness.
The choice of a life partner is the most important decision we make. As Socrates points out “by all means marry, if you get a good wife you'll be happy. If you get a bad one you'll become a philosopher.” Your chances are only as good as your choices. In fact, that’s one of the reasons that Beardies and I have lasted for over 30 years, I went to dog shows, researched different breeds, and temperaments. Yet, when I chose my ex husband I went for big arms, hopefully because I was 17 at the time.
I’ve learned over the years what works and what doesn’t. Ironically, most of the happy marriages I see are in my bereavement group where one of the partners is dead. Oh course, that is somewhat disingenuous because only people who are having relationship problems come to counseling but as you know you often learn more from what doesn’t work. For example, we know the 4 horsemen of divorce are criticism, defensiveness, contempt and withdrawal.
We’re now studying happy marriages too and know that there are 5 times more positive interactions for every negative one in good relationships. There is also much to be learned from our pets. The unconditional acceptance (since living with Mulligan all my annoying habits have disappeared) allows us to be ourselves which is a prerequisite for connection - this acceptance allow us access to our own tenderness and we feel better about
ourselves.
