Don’t be the other woman

The brain has an amazing ability to protect itself. Wounds from our childhood can cause us to hemorrhage unless our brain stops the bleeding. It does this by blocking out all traumatic memories. My brain has taken the opposite approach, however. It can recall in the greatest detail good and bad events from my childhood. Even though I was not quite talking, I can recall my favorite dress, the shabby playhouse in our backyard and even the toys I loved. Those were all pleasant memories. But I also remember the not-so-pleasant ones: those are the details my brain will not let me forget.

Around the age of nine, I spent an enjoyable day at the fair with my parents. As we were leaving, a young, beautiful brunette ran up to my dad and threw her arms around him. My dad graciously accepted the hug. He was good-looking, with a bright smile and charming ways; these qualities made him very attractive to women. The woman was flirtatious and wasn’t as excited to meet my mother or my dad’s three children. This seemingly minor event caused a major argument. My parents fought for the full forty-five-minute drive home and well into the night. This was not the first time a woman had been overly friendly with my dad, and not the last time my mom would be jealous.

I know my dad was not innocent in this situation. He loved to add to my mom’s insecurities. She accused him of cheating, though he denied it. This was the same argument, just a new woman. But this one event shaped who I am today. As a young girl, I decided I would never want to be the cause of such intense jealousy, or damage someone else’s marriage. The unknown woman probably never realized the uproar she had caused. I came to understand that when you’re married there is no such thing as “innocent flirting.”

As a wife, I have an even deeper appreciation for women who don’t flirt with my husband, but I also understand that not every woman will be so considerate. Some women crave attention from men, even when they know they’re married. They never give a passing thought to the wife, who has invested her life in this one individual, or the insecurities it may bring to the surface. Some husbands will encourage this behavior which only adds to the cycle of jealousy. Security in a marriage is priceless! I understand the struggles, which is why I respect other wives, and I have made a vow that I will never be the other woman.

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket

This is one expression both my parents could agree on. I heard it over and over as a child. It is very easy to put all of your energy into one thing. It may be a job, a relationship, money, your mate, your friends. Your identity is based on that one thing. If it fails, you’re a failure; if it succeeds, you’re a success.

My husband was a good example of this. He worked at a winery, where most of his time and energy was spent. He loved it! It gave him value and worth. He had other priorities, but this was his biggest. But this all changed the day we had our daughter. Now the winery didn’t seem as important. He knew he had to make a change. So he did the unthinkable, and quit. When he quit, he lost all his eggs. He lost his identity, his value, his worth.

This was a valuable lesson that he willingly learned. Some people are not given the option. Many don’t realize they have put so much emphasis on one thing until it’s gone. Maybe they have neglected friends and family in order to put all their energy into their marriage. Perhaps they have neglected all of their friends and family to concentrate on their career. The disaster is just waiting to happen. The day the basket breaks. The day the mate leaves, or the job is lost.

Just like the stock market, the safest course is diversification. To have many assets spread evenly across the board. To keep all things balanced and in proper perspective. Develop friendships with a variety of people. Enjoy your mate, but don’t neglect your family. Appreciate your career, but know it’s just one of your assets. Remember that all things in life are transient. A job can be gone tomorrow, a family member lost indefinitely, a friendship severed. Choose the best eggs carefully, treat them delicately and make sure you don’t put them all in one basket.

Do the opposite

If you are successful in all areas of life, do not apply this lesson! But for the rest of us, here is a little trick I’ve learned. Some people can make money in their sleep but can’t make a marriage last past the honeymoon. Others are sensitive and capable in relationships, but encounter one disaster after another in financial matters. Then there are those that fail at everything. They have no money, no family, no friends. Something went terribly wrong.

So what do you do? How can you help someone in this predicament? Three little words may open the universe: DO THE OPPOSITE! If every choice you have made up until now has resulted in failure, maybe the problem is not you, it’s the choices you’re making.

We all are creatures of habit: we will make a pattern for ourselves and use it over and over again. If we have an accurate pattern, we can end up with a nicely fitting garment. If the pattern is distorted or flawed, we may not realize it until we try on our new outfit and see the lopsided results.

It’s the same with our choices. We may not realize we have been using distorted or flawed reasoning until we experience the bad ending. This trick does not take much effort. This is how it works: You’re upset, or someone has treated you rudely. What is your reaction? Lash out, ignore them, get even. What is the last thing you would do? Buy them flowers, give them a hug, smile. Then that’s the right choice!

You may not see instantaneous results. But be patient, stick with it. Try it for one week. If you want to spend money, don’t. If you want to nag your mate, compliment them instead. If you want to yell at your children, give them a hug. It may be the easiest way to change your life. No counseling, no hypnosis, no reliving your childhood—all it takes is the simple step of doing the opposite.

Don’t let them meet the extended

It was not intentional, but boy did it work in my favor. It just so happened that my soon-to-be husband was never able to meet the extended family, before he vowed to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, till death do us part. Looking back, this may be one of my husband’s biggest regrets, but was one of my wisest moves.

If you have a perfect, functioning family, you should skip this part. For the rest of us, if you ever plan on getting married, you might want to learn this valuable lesson. Don’t let them meet the extended family until after the deal is done, and make sure the ink has dried. You may even want to wait until after you have your first child …

It all comes down to the gene pool. You have met someone so special that you want to spend the rest of your life with them, you want to reproduce, have little versions of yourselves running around, live happily ever after. Then the day comes to meet the distant relatives. You want their approval and their acceptance, but instead your world is shattered. Somehow it is all quite different from what you had imagined.

They are loud and rude, as opposed to reserved and dignified. They are intoxicated and obnoxious, as opposed to sober and agreeable. You may wonder if this is the wrong family: how could your perfect someone come from such imperfection? This can raise a series of troubling questions. Do I really want to be related to these people? What will our children be like? Doubt after doubt will fill their mind, until they run off, never to be seen again. It will all be traced back to the day they met the extended family.

Most men who have married into our family have done so without fully understanding what they were getting into. I look at it not as deceit, but as the decent thing to do. You will have plenty to fight about once you’re married. Enjoy your courtship, your wedding day, your first year as newlyweds. When they’re intoxicated on your love and cannot remember life before you, then the time is right. But until that day, don’t let them meet the extended.

Divorce damages

I recently tried to explain, to my youngest daughter, what getting a divorce meant. I said, “It’s when a mom and dad can’t get along and they decide not to be married anymore, so they don’t live together.” I thought it was a simple explanation for a five-year-old, so I was caught off guard when her eyes suddenly filled with tears and she started sobbing. She then said, “Are you and dad going to get divorced?” I tried to reassure her that we hoped never to get divorced, and she soon calmed down.

This brief, innocent conversation made me realize something I had kept buried for many years: divorce damages! I remember the day my mom told us she was getting divorced from my father. She did all the right things: she sat us down and talked to us about it, telling us she loved us and that it was not our fault. Lastly, she said, “It’s going to be really hard for the next few years.”

I appreciate her telling us this, but for some reason it did not prepare me for the future. “It’s going to be really hard” was actually an understatement. I was twelve at the time, in sixth grade. I looked forward to school as an escape. My little sister, on the other hand, was five, and just starting kindergarten. She would cry every morning when my mom dropped her off at school. The tears lasted all day long, for most of the school year. Some days I would have to go to her classroom to try and comfort her, but to no avail. She was damaged. Seeing my own five-year-old sobbing brought back the sadness I had seen in my little sister’s eyes. A sadness that we will both carry for the rest of our lives.

I once read a quote that struck me: “As a child I grew up without any visible scars. But inside I battled monsters of rage, depression and insecurity with out knowing why … my parents’ divorce took away from me every child’s birthright—the feeling of being secure and protected.” It was if I had written that statement. A few days later, I was talking to my husband, who is also from a broken family. When I mentioned this quote, he said, “That is exactly how I feel.” We have both been robbed of our birthright; we are both children of divorce. Our scars are invisible, and our wounds are internal. They will never heal, and we will carry them for the rest of our lives, because divorce damages.

Are you a child of divorce? How has it impacted your life?

Appreciation is a protection

Saying my son hates the dentist is an understatement. After eight cavities, he knows what going to the dentist involves. We usually tell him the morning of his appointment. This will be followed by crying and moaning, until the dreaded event arrives. When it’s all over and the dentist gives him a wink with the words, “No cavities,” he will sigh and say, “That wasn’t so bad.” Yet I know that in another six months we will repeat the same routine.

His fear of the dentist does motivate him to do one thing: he will spend an exorbitant amount of time brushing his teeth each evening. He will floss, use a special mouthwash, and take as many preventative measures as he can to avoid the agony of another cavity.

In any relationship, appreciation is the preventative care. In order to have a good marriage, you must have two appreciators; two people who are indebted to each other, who overflow with gratitude, who never forget to acknowledge the other person’s efforts. Appreciation can be self-centered. It’s the realization that your life would not be the same without this amazing person. But at the same time it requires you to take the focus off yourself and put it on someone else. It’s not assuming that this person knows how you feel, it’s expressing it. Appreciation is treating a person with dignity: bestowing honor, giving worth, adding to their self-respect.

Why is this one preventative measure so hard for people to perform? One reason is that appreciation requires time and effort. It’s like cooking a good pot of chili: the more you let it simmer, the better it taste. If we slow down and reflect on our lives, the better the appreciation will be. It‘s easy to be rushed, overwhelmed and annoyed. This leads to complaining, fault-finding and minimizing. A second reason is that some people have never been appreciated. They have never heard the words, “I am proud of you,” “Thank you for being a part of my life,” “You are an amazing person.” So to them, showing appreciation feels like getting their teeth pulled. You have to tug and wrench on them before they will show an ounce of gratitude.

I have witnessed a lack of appreciation, and it can be as painful to watch as seeing my son get a cavity filled. I have seen someone’s hard work go unnoticed. I’ve observed efforts go unrewarded. Failure to appreciate is like the sweet, syrupy foods that get stuck in your teeth, slowly starting the decay, forming holes in a relationship. Appreciation is the toothbrush and toothpaste. It is the preventative measure that you perform every day, to keep your loved ones healthy and happy. In any relationship, appreciation is a clinically proven cavity protector.

Two wrongs never make a right

If my coffee is too sweet, I never add more sugar to fix the problem. It’s the same with our lives. Sometimes we get into difficult situations. We may have made a wrong turn and have lost our direction. Survival books will tell you that the best thing to do in these situations is to stay calm, stop and regain your composure. Usually we do the opposite: we panic and keep moving, ending up far off course.

This happened to my mom when she was in an unhappy marriage. Because she never stopped to regain her composure, she ended up far off her original path. Instead of leaving my dad and finding herself, she made her life much more complicated by finding another man. She says this was her escape route. This new man was the complete opposite of my father. He was young and immature and brought much heartache into our lives.

My mom still lives with this regret and apologizes for the pain this relationship caused her children. Looking back, she knows it was the wrong choice. From her experience, I have realized many valuable lessons. One of the most profound is that two wrongs never make a right. If you have made a bad choice, you can find your way out. The trick is to STOP. Don’t make anymore decisions, evaluate your situation and stay calm. Find a trusted, all-knowing friend, and brainstorm. Throw every possible solution into the air. Write them down. There is no right answer at this stage—just options. Think about them all, weighing the pros and cons. Who will get hurt? What will cause the least damage? Can it be fixed? Come up with plans A, B and C. Then make a decision. Hopefully it will be the right one.

You may know instantly that plan A was the incorrect choice, but don’t give up hope. Move onto plan B, and then all the way through Plan X if needed. If you have made a wrong decision, there is a 50% chance the next one will be right. And always remember, no matter how you add, subtract or multiply, two wrongs will never make a right.


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Love, the unconditional kind

The day I got married, I took a vow that went something like this : “I, Aubrey, take you, Jonathan, to be my lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part.” These vows are spoken every day; they are also broken every day. But unspoken vows can be more important than uttered promises.

The love I have for my husband is not the same adoration I have for my family. Marital love is based on conditions. If your spouse cheats on you, abuses you, steals from you, lies to you, or ends up in prison, it usually affects how you feel about him or her. This can lead to divorce court or embarrassing yourself on Judge Judy.

That’s not the love most family members have for each other. I feel differently about my children than I do about my mate. If my children cheated, stole, lied, or ended up in prison, my love would not change. I might be embarrassed by their choices, but I would still love them as much as I did yesterday. This is the absolute love that you share with your flesh and blood. It’s not one many people talk about, but it is one I have seen displayed over and over again.

My parents demonstrated this hopeful love with all three of their children. They believed in us, they wanted the best for us, and they recognized hidden greatness, even if it might not have existed. I am pretty sure my parents did not make this vow the day I was born: “I take thee, little baby Aubrey, to be my family, in absolute love, unconditionally. For dumber or smarter, in bad choices or good. Through jail time, addictions, evictions, even when you’re misunderstood. I will hope for the best, with no expectations, and will hold your hand through all your afflictions.” They may never have uttered those words, but I have seen them in action, and it gives me confidence that, no matter what poor or wise decisions I make, whether or not they express it in words, my family will always be there with open arms to show me love—the unconditional kind.