Real life is not like the movies!

I watch a lot of Hallmark and romantic movies. Very rarely are there any surprises, in fact a good love story starts with falling in love, almost breaking up, but deciding that you can’t live without each other and must be together, the end. Very few movies go beyond the “we must be together”, in fact most movies resolve the conflict and end with the happily ever after in the last five minutes of the movie. Just getting to the alter is not the hard part, staying happily married with someone so completely different from you is the hard part!

I love the following quote “A bride sighed blissfully on her wedding day, ‘Mom, I’m at the end of all my troubles!’ ‘Yes,’ replied her mother, ‘but at which end?’” (Conference report 1996, 34; or Ensign, Nov 1996, 26.) Now there is a wise mother who knows what marriage is all about. There is no such thing as happily ever after.

My husband and I got married six months after we met. Even in that short of time, the road to the alter was rocky. Looking back I felt as this bride felt that we were at the end of our troubles. We were committed to each other and the love that we had for each other would get us through. Now there is some truth to that, you have to love each other, you have to think about the things that made you fall in love and want to share your life with this person, and you have to be committed. You can’t always run from your problems, sometimes you have to grab each other’s hands and run towards them so that you can work them out together. But you also have to pay attention to each other.

I have teenage daughters and I had no idea how much of my time they would demand. My time is a precious commodity around this house. I thought that teenagers would want to spend time with their friends and the last person they would want to do things with is their mom. I couldn’t have been more wrong. They need to connect with me. I don’t know why I had this idea that we grow out of needing attention from those we love. Just like our daughters need time with me, my spouse needs my time and attention too and sometimes my limited time, causes arguments. I can only be stretched so far.

John Gottman explains this need in his book, The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work like this, “In marriage, couples are always making what I call “bids” for each other’s attention, affection, humor, or support. Bids can be as minor as asking for a backrub or as significant as seeking help in carrying the burden when an aging parent is ill. The partner responds to each bid either by turning toward the spouse or turning away. A tendency to turn toward your partner is the basis of trust, emotional connection, passion, and a satisfying sex life."

This feeling of wanting attention, affection, humor, or support isn’t just limited to my husbands and kids. I can easily think of times I wanted those things from my husband and either got them or didn’t get them. A lot of times, these “bids” aren’t really difficult things to do, they might be as easy as asking someone how their day went, or putting down a book to look at the fall colors as you are driving down the road.

Just being aware of bids is a huge step towards a happy marriage. Think about those bids the next time your spouse come home in a rotten mood and says something like, “I had the worst day, you have no idea the kind of pressure I’m under.” Instead of responding with something defensive, realize that he may just want your support and want to talk to you about his day.

Why are these bids so important? Gottman says that “the couples who remain married had turned toward their partner’s bids an average of 86 percent of the time in the Love Lab, while those who ended up divorced had averaged only 33 percent.” I hope no one goes into a marriage expecting that you’ll have a good run but in ten or fifteen years they’ll probably end up divorced and move on to the next relationship. Showing your partner that you care about what they care about is pretty important, simply realizing that is the first step towards a happier relationship.