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Are you tired of marriage books that sound like they were written thirty years ago? Do you want real, honest advice from a couple who knows the hopes and struggles of today's couples? Do you want to build a marriage that will last a lifetime? Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts is the first comprehensive marriage preparation program specifically designed for today's couples. And it's the first program for couples developed by a couple. And Les Leslie Parrott are no ordinary couple. As marriage counselors and teachers, they're on the cutting edge of marriage research and education. Each year they teach a blockbuster relationships course to hundred of college students They see the struggles and dreams of couples up close. And they reveal the flaws and foibles of their own relationship in order to show how challenging—and rewarding — marriage can be. Most importantly, however, Les and Leslie Parrott share a dream: to equip couples in their twenties and thirties to prepare for lifelong marriage before it even starts. They know from experience that many couples spend more time preparing for their wedding than they do for marriage. Having tasted firsthand the difficulties of 'wedding bell blues,' they show young couples the skills they need to make the transition from 'single' to 'married' smooth and enjoyable. Whether you're contemplating marriage, engaged, or newly married, Les and Leslie will lead you through the thorniest spot in establishing a relationship. You'll learn how to uncover and deal with problems before they emerge. You'll discover how to communicate, not just talk. And you'll learn the importance of becoming 'soul mates' — a couple committed to growing together spiritually. Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts is more than a book — it's practically a premarital counseling session! Questions at the end of every chapter help you explore each topic personally. Companion men's and women's workbooks full of self-tests and exercises will help you apply what you learn. And the Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts video curriculum will help you to learn and grow with other couples who are dealing with the same struggles and questions. So start today, while your love is fresh. Save your marriage — before it starts.
Have You Faced the Myths of Marriage with Honesty?
Tom and Laura came to see us just nine months after their wedding. They had swallowed the happily-ever-after myth whole and were now feeling queasy. "Before we got married we couldn't bear to be apart from one another," Laura confided. "We did almost everything together, and I thought that's how it would be in our marriage, even more so." She paused for a moment. "But now Tom needs more space. It seems like he's not the guy I married."
Tom rolled his eyes as Laura continued: "He used to be so considerate and thoughtful before we were married"
"Oh, and I'm a total slouch now?" Tom interrupted.
"Of course not, you or maybe we are just different now."
Nervously twisting his wedding band, Tom looked at Laura: "Marriage isn't what I expected either. I didn't expect it to be a big honeymoon or anything; I just thought you would try to make life a little easier for me. Instead, when I come home from the office, all you want is to go out or"
"I make dinner every night for you," Laura interrupted.
Surprised by their display of unrestrained emotion in front of us, they stopped silent and looked to us as if to say, "See, our marriage isn't what it's supposed to be."
Tom and Laura entered their marriage believing that happiness would abound. They had heard that marriage was hard work, but they didn't expect it to be a twenty-four-hour, seven-day-a-week job.
The belief in a happily-ever-after marriage is one of the most widely held and destructive marriage myths. But it is only the tip of the marital-myth iceberg. Every difficult marriage is plagued by a vast assortment of misconceptions about what marriage should be. In this chapter, however, we consider only those ideas that are most harmful and most common:
1. "We expect exactly the same things from marriage."
2. "Everything good in our relationship will get better."
3. "Everything bad in my life will disappear."
4. "My spouse will make me whole."
The goal of this chapter is to take the mythology out of marriage. For too long, marriage has been saddled with unrealistic expectations and misguided assumptions. Liberated from these four myths, couples can settle into the real world of marriage with all its joys and sorrows, passion and pain.
Myth One: "We Expect Exactly the Same Things from Marriage"
What we anticipate seldom occurs, what we least expect generally happens, especially in marriage. Saying "I do" brings with it a host of conscious and unconscious expectations that aren't always fulfilled.
Neil and Cathy, a couple in their late twenties and married for four years, each had a clear image of what life together would be like, but they had never discussed their ideas. They, like most newlyweds, simply assumed the other had an identical picture of marriage in mind. Nothing, however, could have been further from the truth.
Cathy: "I expected married life to bring more stability and predictability to our lifestyle. To me it meant working in the garden together."
Neil: "I wanted our marriage to be exciting and spontaneous, not a ho-hum routine. To me it meant riding a motorcycle together."
As far back as early childhood, Neil and Cathy began dreaming of how married life would be. They grew up in homes where parents modeled "married life." They read books describing loving relationships. They watched television shows and movies depicting scenes from marriage. For years they had fantasized about life after crossing the threshold. With little effort, each had formed an idea of what it would and should be like to live as a married couple.
Consciously and unconsciously, Neil and Cathy painted brushstrokes on their mental marital canvases. But it never occurred to either of them that the other might be working from a different palette. They simply assumed their life-long partner would work with complementary colors and in a similar style.
The first year of marriage, however, revealed sharp and unexpected contrasts. What Cathy thought of as security, Neil thought of as boring. They valued many of the same things, but with different levels of intensity. Cathy painted carefully with delicate pastels; Neil painted boldly with primary colors.
Most incongruous expectations fall into two major categories: unspoken rules and unconscious roles. Bringing both of them out into the open can save years of wear and tear on a young marriage.
Unspoken Rules
Everyone lives by a set of rules that is rarely spoken but always known. Needless to say, unspoken rules become more vocal when our spouse "breaks" them. This became painfully obvious to us when we visited our families for the first time as a married couple.
One Christmas, we flew from Los Angeles to Chicago to be with our families for the holidays. The first night was at my (Leslie's) house. As was my family's custom, I woke up early in the morning to squeeze in every possible minute with my family. Les, on the other hand, slept in.
I interpreted Les's sleeping as avoidance and rejection and felt he did not value time with my family. "It's embarrassing to me," I told Les. "Everyone is up and eating in the kitchen. Don't you want to be with us?"
Les, on the other hand, didn't understand my intensity. "What did I do? I'm just catching up from jet lag. I'll come down after my shower," he said. As I found out later, Les expected a slower, easier pace during the holidays, because that's the way it was at his house.
In this incident, Les had broken a rule he didn't know existed, and I discovered a rule I had never put into words. Both of us felt misunderstood and frustrated. We both had our own ideas about what was acceptable, and it never occurred to either of us that our expectations would be so different. Each of us became irritated by the other's unspoken expectations and frustrated that the other did not live by the same rules.
Since that first Christmas we have learned to discuss our secret expectations and make our silent rules known. We have also helped the couples we counsel to become more aware of their own unspoken rules, to keep little problems from becoming big ones.
Contents Acknowledgments 9
Before You Begin 11
Question 1: Have You Faced the Myths of Marriage with Honesty? 15
Question 2: Can You Identify Your Love Style? 31
Question 3: Have You Developed the Habit of Happiness? 53
Question 4: Can You Say What You Mean and Understand What You Hear? 71
Question 5: Have You Bridged the Gender Gap? 91
Question 6: Do You Know How to Fight a Good Fight? 111
Question 7: Are You and Your Partner Soul Mates? 131
Notes 151
Question One:
Have You Faced the Myths of Marriage with Honesty?
Tom and Laura came to see us just nine months after their wedding. They had swallowed the happily-ever-after myth whole and were now feeling queasy. 'Before we got married we couldn't bear to be apart from one another,' Laura confided. 'We did almost everything together, and I thought that's how it would be in our marriage, even more so.' She paused for a moment. 'But now Tom needs more space. It seems like he's not the guy I married.'
Tom rolled his eyes as Laura continued: 'He used to be so considerate and thoughtful before we were married'
'Oh, and I'm a total slouch now?' Tom interrupted.
'Of course not, you or maybe we are just different now.'
Nervously twisting his wedding band, Tom looked at Laura: 'Marriage isn't what I expected either. I didn't expect it to be a big honeymoon or anything; I just thought you would try to make life a little easier for me. Instead, when I come home from the office, all you want is to go out or'
'I make dinner every night for you,' Laura interrupted.
Surprised by their display of unrestrained emotion in front of us, they stopped silent and looked to us as if to say, 'See, our marriage isn't what it's supposed to be.'
Tom and Laura entered their marriage believing that happiness would abound. They had heard that marriage was hard work, but they didn't expect it to be a twenty-four-hour, seven-day-a-week job.
The belief in a happily-ever-after marriage is one of the most widely held and destructive marriage myths. But it is only the tip of the marital-myth iceberg. Every difficult marriage is plagued by a vast assortment of misconceptions about what marriage should be.1 In this chapter, however, we consider only those ideas that are most harmful and most common:
1. 'We expect exactly the same things from marriage.'
2. 'Everything good in our relationship will get better.'
3. 'Everything bad in my life will disappear.'
4. 'My spouse will make me whole.'
The goal of this chapter is to take the mythology out of marriage. For too long, marriage has been saddled with unrealistic expectations and misguided assumptions. Liberated from these four myths, couples can settle into the real world of marriage with all its joys and sorrows, passion and pain.
Myth One: 'We Expect Exactly the Same Things from Marriage'
What we anticipate seldom occurs, what we least expect generally happens, especially in marriage. Saying 'I do' brings with it a host of conscious and unconscious expectations that aren't always fulfilled.
Neil and Cathy, a couple in their late twenties and married for four years, each had a clear image of what life together would be like, but they had never discussed their ideas. They, like most newlyweds, simply assumed the other had an identical picture of marriage in mind. Nothing, however, could have been further from the truth.
Cathy: 'I expected married life to bring more stability and predictability to our lifestyle. To me it meant working in the garden together.'
Neil: 'I wanted our marriage to be exciting and spontaneous, not a ho-hum routine. To me it meant riding a motorcycle together.'
As far back as early childhood, Neil and Cathy began dreaming of how married life would be. They grew up in homes where parents modeled 'married life.' They read books describing loving relationships. They watched television shows and movies depicting scenes from marriage. For years they had fantasized about life after crossing the threshold. With little effort, each had formed an idea of what it would and should be like to live as a married couple.
Consciously and unconsciously, Neil and Cathy painted brushstrokes on their mental marital canvases. But it never occurred to either of them that the other might be working from a different palette. They simply assumed their life-long partner would work with complementary colors and in a similar style.
The first year of marriage, however, revealed sharp and unexpected contrasts. What Cathy thought of as security, Neil thought of as boring. They valued many of the same things, but with different levels of intensity. Cathy painted carefully with delicate pastels; Neil painted boldly with primary colors.
Most incongruous expectations fall into two major categories: unspoken rules and unconscious roles. Bringing both of them out into the open can save years of wear and tear on a young marriage.
Unspoken Rules Everyone lives by a set of rules that is rarely spoken but always known. Needless to say, unspoken rules become more vocal when our spouse 'breaks' them. This became painfully obvious to us when we visited our families for the first time as a married couple.
One Christmas, we flew from Los Angeles to Chicago to be with our families for the holidays. The first night was at my (Leslie's) house. As was my family's custom, I woke up early in the morning to squeeze in every possible minute with my family. Les, on the other hand, slept in.
I interpreted Les's sleeping as avoidance and rejection and felt he did not value time with my family. 'It's embarrassing to me,' I told Les. 'Everyone is up and eating in the kitchen. Don't you want to be with us?'
Les, on the other hand, didn't understand my intensity. 'What did I do? I'm just catching up from jet lag. I'll come down after my shower,' he said. As I found out later, Les expected a slower, easier pace during the holidays, because that's the way it was at his house.
In this incident, Les had broken a rule he didn't know existed, and I discovered a rule I had never put into words. Both of us felt misunderstood and frustrated. We both had our own ideas about what was acceptable, and it never occurred to either of us that our expectations would be so different. Each of us became irritated by the other's unspoken expectations and frustrated that the other did not live by the same rules.
Since that first Christmas we have learned to discuss our secret expectations and make our silent rules known. We have also helped the couples we counsel to become more aware of their own unspoken rules, to keep little problems from becoming big ones.
While this book isn't ground breaking in any sort of way, what it does it does well and that's to get you talking about things before you get married. Me and my wife read this when we were engaged and having been married before there were a lot of things that I related too. It may seem silly to talk about who's going to take out the trash and who's going to do the dishes, however if you aren't both on the same page then conflict will arise due to lack of communication. Of course there is so much more to this book than that. It's a quick read and one you owe yourself and your future spouse. It's best if you both read through it.
2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Jeannine44
Posted September 26, 2009
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I'm getting married October 24th 2009. My fiance and I have been going to pre-marital counseling and reading this book! Honestly, this book is so eye opening, and I feel like it's not only preparing me to keep and open mind in my marriage, but also making me aware of that fact that.... There is no perfect marriage and there is no "Happily Ever After" that a couple has not WORKED their booty's off to attain!! Marriage doesn't come easy, and it only becomes great when both parties have WORKED HARD at it! I love this book!
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted July 21, 2008
Our church selected this book for pre-marriage classes. At first I thought it was simplistic because I thought that my boyfriend and I had talked about everything. Was I wrong! This book really facilitates talking about the really important things to kicking off your marriage. I would really recommend doing the workbook at the same time as the book 'it has points in the book to complete the exercises'. This really forces you to apply what you are reading.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted April 20, 2008
This book was required reading for premarital counseling at our church. Since when does being a Christian require one to dismiss all discourse on gender differences (are they innate or learned?) as having been settled 'once and for all?' (and by science, no less) as this book suggests? The advice in this book reflects that premise: In the book that was 'contextualized for my gender' I was told how to deal with my emotions when my husband forgets the anniversary of our first date while his gender-contextualized book reminds him that 'most men do not realize that women need to be respected, because men and women react very differently to not being respected.' What? It would be silly if this weren't so harmful. People read these books with eyes and ears wide open as they are preparing for marriage, in good faith that it will dole out helpful advice. Instead of talking couples through thought-provoking questions to ask of themselves and each other, couples are told to take gender stereotypes into account when communicating and interacting with their spouse. Marriages need all the help they can get. I want my marriage to be grounded in faith but I don't think I should be asked to swallow outdated and harmful gender stereotypes in order to get permission to marry. The fact that our preist based her marriage counseling on this book made us seriously second-guess our decision to marry in that church.
1 out of 5 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted January 30, 2008
I highly recommend this book. It has been so great for my fiance and I to read during our engagement. Even if you're already married, I think it would still be really helpful. There are so many things in it that seem like they would actually be common sense, but I never would have thought about it in the way they explain it and what to do in certain situations. Buy it if you are even considering marriage!
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted July 23, 2012
:) reserve this book only for stories...
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Posted July 23, 2012
;) Alright
0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted December 6, 2011
This book was an easy read with great common sense points that most people wouldn't have given much thought before going into a marriage
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Posted December 6, 2011
In preparation of our upcoming nuptials my Finance and I read this book. It was not a dull read at all and the workbooks made comparing notes (or rather relationship expectations) fun and exciting (as opposed to creating anxiety). This book is relevant to readers at any stage of a committed relationship. It is a great guide to cooperating and living a fulfilling life as companions.
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Posted September 4, 2002
My fiancee and I just finished this book and had a great time while we were working on it. While we already had great communication, this book helped us think about a few things we hadn't come up with on our own and reconfirmed our thoughts and expectations about how we want to live our lives together. I highly recommend this to anyone getting married!
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Posted November 9, 2001
My fiance and I used this book and the workbooks for our pre-marital counseling. It was a down to earth look at communication, understanding ourselves better, and where do we as a couple meet in the middle. It upholds a model of biblical equality for the male/female relationship and was very refershing in its honesty. I have recommended this to other engaged couples and recommend it to you, as well.
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Posted July 23, 2001
A friend recommended that my fiance and I read this book, and it helped our relationship immensely. The authors opened our eyes to many myths about the marriage relationship, and helped my fiance and I understand one another better. The workbooks were also helpful, because we wrote our answers individually, then discussed our responses. By reading this book together, my fiance and I discovered more about each other than we had previously in our three year dating relationship. He has since read the book by himself, raving about how much it has helped him understand our upcoming roles as a Christian husband and wife. I think every engaged couple should read this book. I now feel better prepared for marriage, thanks to the insightful words of Les and Leslie Parrott.
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Posted December 12, 1999
Most practical advice on marriage I have read yet! Down to earth examination of problems couples face and how to solve them. Also great b/c written by husband and wife team, so both perspectives are well represented.
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Overview
Are you tired of marriage books that sound like they were written thirty years ago? Do you want real, honest advice from a couple who knows the hopes and struggles of today's couples? Do you want to build a marriage that will last a lifetime? Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts is the first comprehensive marriage preparation program specifically designed for today's couples. And it's the first program for couples developed by a couple. And Les Leslie Parrott are no ordinary couple. As marriage counselors and ...