-
Is It Important That A Family Eats Together?
This article was originally published on momminghard.com. Life is rushed, messy and frustrating. It is easy to forget to sit back and enjoy the small things. We run around worrying about work, bills and just about everything else that we forget to simply ask each other “how was your day?” Finding the time to sit together as a family doesn’t have to be hard. You really don’t need to pencil family time in between grocery shopping and the online skype call you need to make at 2 pm. By simply eating dinner together around a table, you can fit in some really great family time. There are so many hidden…
-
How to Know if You Have Postpartum Depression
This article was originally published on momminghard.com. After having a baby, your body is riddled with pregnancy and labor-related hormones. It takes a while for your hormone levels to settle back to normal. These hormones can often upset your emotional balance. While most moms experience some form of weepiness and sadness in the week or two following childbirth, up to 15% of moms experience postpartum depression. Baby blues is a very mild form of postpartum depression. It is a general sadness for a few days or weeks after the birth of your child. This usually goes away on its own and you are back to feeling normal again. It…
-
How to Love Yourself So That You Can Love Others
We spend so much time showing our love for others that we forget something really important. If you cannot love yourself, you cannot truly love another. When your feelings toward yourself are negative, you bring that into your relationships with others. You think of yourself as unworthy of love. This can lead you into relationships where you are not loved as you should be. Self-love is not the same as self-centeredness or narcissism. You do not have to develop over-inflated self-esteem. It’s more about accepting yourself and deeming yourself worthy of the love of others. It might sound like an easy task. You can stand in front of the mirror,…
-
Giving and Receiving Forgiveness Is Crucial to a Relationship
Studies have shown that forgiveness is a crucial factor in a healthy relationship. Couples who demonstrate forgiveness have longer, healthier romantic relationships. Everybody has flaws and couples who expect a relationship to be perfect are setting themselves up for disappointment. Forgiveness is tough but not being able to forgive has many negative consequences. What lack of forgiveness can cause In relationships where there is a lack of forgiveness, it is difficult to resolve conflicts. Neither partner is prepared to compromise nor admit to being wrong. They keep harboring a grudge and build up resentment against each other. Those who hold grudges are constantly living in the past. Lack of…
-
8 Tips for Avoiding Misunderstandings in Your Relationship
A simple misunderstanding can be the beginning of the end of a relationship. Before they fully understand what’s going on, it’s turned into a massive argument. Things are said that can’t be taken back. A crack has turned into a chasm, and it can’t be plastered over. Misunderstandings occur quite easily in relationships. All it takes is a partner who listens with half an ear to something the other party says. Or a misinterpretation of your partner’s behavior. Most often a misunderstanding occurs as a result of a failure to communicate effectively. If it’s not addressed there and then in a mature, adult fashion, it can be disastrous. What if…
-
10 Bad Relationship Mistakes Couples Think are Acceptable
When you’ve been in a relationship for a while, a sense of complacency can set it. This can be the beginning of the end of the relationship. Couples might begin to engage in relationship mistakes that are unhealthy and harmful to each other. They stop communicating Couples will start assuming their partner knows what they think and feel. They soon find themselves resenting each other because they no longer communicate as they previously did. Little issues begin to fester into big issues because the couple is not talking about them. The couple embarks on a state of co-existence. They stop listening Very often, an unhappy partner will express…
-
Why Everyone Needs to Lose Their First Love
Four years ago, my life imploded and then fell apart. My first love, who I’d been married to for 21 years, announced that he no longer wanted to be married to me. What followed was the horrible necessity of splitting our assets and working out custody and maintenance for our child. At that time, to be honest, I was in pure survival mode. Once the divorce was finalized, I could mourn the fact that my first love was over. And I’m glad I did. I got to process and deal with my grief over the end of the relationship on my own terms and at my own pace. Losing your…
-
How to Prevent Money Issues Causing Conflict in Your Relationship
Financial issues can place enormous pressure on a relationship. We tend to think that they only play a role when there’s no money to spend. We see relationships go into freefall when one partner loses their job and the financial future is in jeopardy. However, it’s not only a lack of money that can put the strain on a relationship. Your money management styles can cause conflict. The way you react to having additional money can also result in a lengthy argument. Many of our fiscal habits come from our own upbringing. We either choose to emulate our parents’ habits, or we choose to be the complete opposite of what…
-
What to Do When Your Partner Won’t Tell You How They Feel
A partner who cannot express his/her feelings can be a source of great frustration. It feels like they expect you to read their minds and know what they’re feeling. They wear an impenetrable mask, and you never know what’s going on in their minds and hearts. You express your feelings and expect to get something in return, but it’s like talking to a brick wall. Getting your partner to open up and share their emotions is like trying to get the proverbial blood out of a stone. Often, this is a characteristic that stems from childhood. Your partner was taught that expressing emotions is not acceptable. After that, the damage…
-
5 Ways Marriage Is Harder In 2018 (And What You Can Do About It)
Hollywood tends to paint a really skew picture of what marriage is like. I mean, how much of an actual marriage can you honestly fit into a two-hour movie? Any married couple will be able to tell you that it is much harder work to keep a marriage healthy than they could have thought. Living in this day and age doesn’t make it any easier. On the contrary, couples today are faced with more challenges than ever before. The elephant in the room With the invention of the smartphone, came the invention of the digital divide. Most people go to bed with their smartphones. It is that third wheel that…
