Tag / conflict
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Into the Marriage Votex
I love doing marriage work. It is deeply rewarding to be trusted with a couple’s most valuable resource at a time of fear and hurt. For 15 years I have studied the patterns, the stages relationships go through. I see how they get built, how they break down and how they heal. I ask people to give me months. I have to walk them slowly out of a mess that…
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You Might Not be Fighting Enough
When a new couple comes into my office one of my first questions is “Are you fighting too much or too little?” By the time couples get to my office, the answer is usually they aren’t fighting enough. I have to say that if my practice was in some less Nordic state, I might get a different response. But this is Minnesota, the land of MN nice and passive aggressive…
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The Bullshit Detector….Just another reason family is so damned hard.
If you’ve been following me for awhile, you get that I think it all comes down to attachment. When you love someone, sleep with them, touch them, break bread with them, they become family. And no one makes you crazy like family does. Kids make you crazy. Partners make you crazy. And no matter how grown you think you are, your siblings and your parents can still jerk your chain.…
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Sorry- Love is Messy
At the core of my professional and my personal life is the belief that all relationships are fueled by a powerful, biologically programed desire for connection. The reason I never run out of work is that the path to connection looks easy and then makes us come unglued. Everyone walks down the aisle fairly confident that love will prevail. No one is prepared for how brutal it feels when the…
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The Powerful Habit of Reconnecting
Couples fight. Parents yell. Siblings bicker. Kids have meltdowns. Parenting and marriage and life are messy. I got into it this morning with Joey, the 13 year old over socks. He was running late for school, I forgot he had student council, he had a rough night with sleep. It was just a bump but it was a rough bump right as he was walking out the door. I heard…
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Post Thanksgiving Rundown
My guess is that by now you’ve eaten (and perhaps drank) way too much. You’re not actually likely to be reading this on Thursday evening as you fell asleep doped up on tryptophane and my newsletter got lost in endless Black Friday ads. Just wanted to pop in and wish you the best. As we step into a the next holiday season take a moment to process any unresolved feelings…
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Thanks for putting up with me- it’s been 7 years!
On August 21, 2008 I had the crazy/brave idea to start Notes from a Marriage Geek. (September 2009 I started the FB page.) Most Thursdays I waiver between inspired and freaked out about getting this out to you all. 7 years of writing have given me both a voice and an audience. I love how much I have been challenged and grown since that first post. Here it is- an…
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Do You Have Ugly Money Fights?
Couple’s fight about money. Solving that problem would solve all my money problems but fighting about money will likely follow us to our future very expensive nursing homes. Couples fight about money because money is about justice and care and having a voice and feeling secure. We fight because we’re hurt and scared and we fight because our parents fought about money. Here are a few classic money fights. Financial…
