Handling Change

[Liz]

I find change hard to handle. I like variety in life, but I also find security in some things being constant, in putting my roots down somewhere. In our first year of marriage, we managed to move twice including moving back to England from abroad and an additional short stay in a hotel. For a while we lived out of boxes with a lot of our stuff in storage. We bought our first home which needed a lot of maintenance even to make it tolerably comfortable. We both changed job. I changed career direction and started to learn to drive. Add to this adjusting to married life and I think the first year of our marriage was pretty stressful. As I've got older I like change less and less.

Has anyone else had a stressful start to their married life? How do you cope with change?

[Peach]

This is not so much about a tough start to marriage, but our parents are getting on now. Mum has just moved into sheltered accomodation and she really likes us to visit regularly. She needs more and more done for her. I find I get quite stressed out by her frequent phonecalls. The children are just getting more independent and now it's like I've got a new child who needs me. I really do love her, but the change is putting a strain on us. I always seem to be talking about her and I think my husband gets a bit fed up at times.

[Debbie Allen]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Liz:
[B]I find change hard to handle. I like variety in life, but I also find security in some things being constant, in putting my roots down somewhere.

What about change in the relationship of two people becoming one marriage? Change in lifestyles is the difficult part for my new husband as he has been single most of his adult life. He was 37 when we got married and never married. He has been through an Engaged Encounter with someone else before me and it was an amicable split. For our marriage, I went through RCIA and went to the Engaged Encounter. I was married once before and have two children -one who has just graduated yesterday from College and one who will graduate next December. I have learned plenty from my precious marriage or what NOT to do in this one. I learned all about baggage and letting go. I did most of this witht he help of a book by Bruce Fisher et al. I went through the building blocks twice and maybe three times before I could acctually see what was going on and being able to step back and take a look at things in a new perspective. Now here is the difficulty: I know what commitment and what change should occur when two people get married. My husband doesn't-becuase I don't think he really realizes what he needs to change in order to be one with each other. He abused me when we first got marreid andit has now subsided ( I knew he didn't realized what he was doing, becuase it was as if someone was telling him some of the story about living with a woman and a wife, but he wasn't getting the whole story). Now at the request of a counselor we have started to work on some things, mainly *communication* (sexuality is the biggest issue). Even is you break it down, sexuality is mostly communication or lack thereof. Things are changing and I saw that potential in my husband before we got married. He once asked me why I didn't leave him when he was abusing me. I couldn't tell him that I saw the potential in in and I knew he would change given the right information. I just told him that I loved him and left it at that. It is very difficult when life and people give the wrong information or no information on married life to make things work. Well I have said enough.

[Jani]

Hi. I am new to this site, but it seems very interesting and informative. Anyway, as to change, I know it isn't easy. My hubby and I have been married nearly 5 years and together nearly 9 years, prior to that we had been single and living on our own ( we were 37 and 39 when we met) - though I had had my eldest daughter living with me, but she married 3 weeks prior to my meeting my (now) hubby. It has been so difficult, more so for my hubby, at least I had had all the years with my daughter living with me, so understood about sharing your life, but my hubby never really had this before. He had been engaged before, and I had been in a long-term relationship, too - both around the same time and for the same length of time, but even though we met some 2 years after these had ended, we were both still smarting and wary of commiting to a new relationship, but we did decide to get engaged about 12 days after we met, but it was another 6 months before we lived together, and a whole four years (and 2 children) before we eventually married. We are still having problems, I don't know if it is caused by the independence we had for so many years of our lives - even though we both still maintain some independence. We do love each other, but I think we don't communicate half as much as we should - he keeps things from me (I don't know why - I can be trusted!), but I am sometimes reluctant to say too much to him as I have felt he has let me down in the past re confidentiality - and we all know that TRUST plays a major part in relationships and/or marriages. Our youngest is a very difficult child and I don't think that this has helped us, although I am taking steps to try and get the child's behaviour etc sorted out via the NSPCC at the local school. We virtually separated in the last part of last year, but I then chose to stay, but sometimes I am not sure if I made the right decision - I feel so muddled and everything seems such a mess at times, but at other times things are really good and I am happier. I wish I knew what I was looking for - or what my hubby was looking for. We are both too quick to criticise and too slow to praise, this I know - and we seem to be too much on the defence - both taking umbrage at the slightest criticism as if it is the end of the world. The cycle needs to be broken, but I don't know how to do it - this is a change we both need as it would be for the better (I hope). Sorry to have gone on so much, I just needed space to get if off my chest and out into the open. Thanks for "listening".

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Jani

[This message has been edited by Jani (edited 26 May 2000).]

[Debbie Allen]

I hope that you do feel better letting it off your chest. Sometimes that is all that is needed. I am thankful that this forum is here. I don't know everything that can be talked about here, but am just looking and being careful with what I do say. This is second marriage and I was real leary of commitment too. My first marriage was a living nightmare. He didn't physically abuse me, but did it so mentally and emotionally. I have two grown daughters fromt hat marriage. This marriage is something different. I wanted or expected to be one with the other immediately after the wedding---big mistake, but I was persistant. He came from a very loving family and he can't figure out the relationships I have with my two daughters. The youngest (21) is very loving and warm and has a wonderful personality, only she has low-self esteem caused in part from the way her father treated her and most times still does. My oldest (23) is cold and doesn't think before she speaks. Right now the relationship between her and I is real cool. She let me know in a letter that I was trying to change her ever since the divorce and she has been in college. She lived with her father and I had no say over her and I can't for the life of me understand what she is doing or how she even got that idea. My husband wants to say something but feels that he should stay out of it (at least his mother has told me that he should stay out of it.) I am confused at this change and I don't know what to say to her, I only am short with her on the phone and when she tells me goodbye and that she loves me, I just say bye and hang up. I wish that there was some advice on parent's of grown children-like the one that I am going through. I got off topic again, sorry. Anyway my new husband and I have gone to counseling one time- but with that visit he saw that I was not going to leave him just because we couldn't communicate and that I was going to be persistent in "US" getting the help we needed. Sometimes it takes counseling to get to the fire when all you can see is the smoke. He still acts sometimes like he is single. That is the hardest to geth through (I think).With all this going on they are doing some real changes at his workplace. and my business is kind of slow right now.
You said something about trust and getting that in a relationship.... there is something that is harder to get--forgiveness. There will never be trust without forgiveness too. I don't mean forgiveness for what he has done, but also forgiveness for what you have done and said and how you acted. I found the saying " Actions speak louder than words" is a little off. Words DO hurt and the stay in ones minds just as long as the action does. Now that I have run around with this subject I think it is time to let someone else speak.