Does marriage need more than love to survive?

[jgomez65]

Two new studies just came out. They list several factors that might determine whether a marriage survives or not.

Among the things they mentioned are:
* The age of the man
* Whether it is their second/third marriage
* Whether the couple cohabitated before getting married.
* Whether they came from broken homes.

The full list is here


It seems like all odds are against a successful marriage and that love it is just one of many other factors that determines if a marriage succeeds or not.

[Father_0f_7]

Of course you need more than love to make a marriage survive.

Love means nothing in a marriage if there is no trust.
Love means nothing in a marriage if there is no times spent together.

[IADad]

Originally Posted by jgomez65

Two new studies just came out. They list several factors that might determine whether a marriage survives or not.

Among the things they mentioned are:
* The age of the man
* Whether it is their second/third marriage
* Whether the couple cohabitated before getting married.
* Whether they came from broken homes.

The full list is here


It seems like all odds are against a successful marriage and that love it is just one of many other factors that determines if a marriage succeeds or not.

"What's love got to do, got to do with it..."

I think some of the material is good but the study itself is pretty weak and really doesn't get to the heart (no pun intended) of the matter.

First of all I take issue with wanting to find the majic formula...as if we can somehow come up with a majic checklist that once you have satisfied all the criteria will guarantee your marriage (or double your spouse back)

Second, I find it laughable that a study on the long-term viablility of marriage covers 6 years. 6 years!

Here's my spin, JMHO, so take it or leave it, (feel free to break into small groups and discuss amongst yourselves....) -

Yes Marriage takes more than love to survive. It is a parnternship, and like any successful partnership the likelhood for long term success goes up with both parties are contributors, there is good communication and certain expectations are set up front (and the converse is true for failing partnerships.

- contributors - Some people say marriage needs to be a 50/50 deal. I disagree, I think marriage needs to be a 100/100 deal, both parties giving everything they have. When you start going down the road of "One weeks toilet cleaning is worth two weeks garbage removal, and you've missed a week of garbage removal, that kid of score keeping then you're in trouble. If both partners are really giving of their full efforst everything will get done and when one is down the other can pick up their slack, like a good functioning team.

- good communication - it's so easy to grow accustomed. Don't assume you know anything about what your spouse will think about a given topi or situation, just talk about it and hopefully you aren't afraid to bring up any suubject, if you are, that's not a good sign and you probably need to talk about not talking about things.

- expectations. I'm amazed at people who've never talked about how to handle conflict, the rules for fighting, how to handle family money etc. before entering a marriage. Personally, DW and I had a very specific discussion prior to getting married, about what happens if thing get tough, and we made a commitment to work on it, we agreed that divorce is too easy of an answer for too many people and that guiding principal has lead us through some pretty damned difficul patches. All we have to do is say, "well, that's something I guess we need to work on..." and we do.

I'm not saying our marriage is perfect, but we've been married 21 years this fall (and we did live together alomst 1 1/2 years) and we're even going through some rough stuff right now, but we are appraoching it together, how can WE fix this, how can WE make it better and having that perspective really does help.

[Dadu2004]

Wow IADad, impressive. Nicely stated and great information for me as I've been married about 2 1/2 months now!

[mom2many]

I gotta agree IADad..great post. I am not going to read the article cause I also don't think there is a magical formula to a long lasting marriage.

Me and my man just celebrated our 19th anniversary 2 days ago, some may or may not know (it's not a secret) that my 2 non-bio children are the product of his affair, and it was because I loved him, and I believe vice versa that we were able to work it all out. So for me love was the key, but so was everything else IADad mentioned. But I also believe that what works for one couple won't work for another, that it is up to each couple to find thier strwngths and weakness's, recognize them and then work togather, or off each other to find that middle ground that makes them both comfortable.

Now I hope that made sense and my spelling wasn't to bad...I am very tired.

[jgomez65]

After 11 years of marriage I can say that commitment and also given 100% on each side has been the secret to a sucessful marriage.

Also I helped a lot that my wife and I were best friends for almost 7 years before we started dating, so there were not surprises there. We knew each other very well, and that helps a lot.

[IADad]

Originally Posted by Dadu2004

Wow IADad, impressive. Nicely stated and great information for me as I've been married about 2 1/2 months now!

thanks, we've weathered more than one storm that could have easily ended a marriage. Sharing not only hopeuflly helps someone else, but it helps remind me as well.

One funny annecdote - our church held a marriage preparation weekend thing for couples about to be married (back in the day, before the invention of language, but after fire) , and one of the sessions was about finances. And they talked about cominglingg finances vs keeping them separate, and we went around the room and told our plans. They got to one couple and the bride to be cheerfully said, "It'll all be "our" money, all together." and her betrothed said, "Nope, I'm keeping my own money, I'll pitch in for the household expenses, but what's mine is mine and whats hers is hers..." The thing that was even more amaziing than their disconnect is the fact that here this couple was about 2 weeks away from being married and they hadn't even thought to discuss this yet...yeah, loves' not going to get them through that one...sadly, I don't know what ever became of them.

[IADad]

Originally Posted by mom2many

I gotta agree IADad..great post. I am not going to read the article cause I also don't think there is a magical formula to a long lasting marriage.

Me and my man just celebrated our 19th anniversary 2 days ago, some may or may not know (it's not a secret) that my 2 non-bio children are the product of his affair, and it was because I loved him, and I believe vice versa that we were able to work it all out. So for me love was the key, but so was everything else IADad mentioned. But I also believe that what works for one couple won't work for another, that it is up to each couple to find thier strwngths and weakness's, recognize them and then work togather, or off each other to find that middle ground that makes them both comfortable.

Now I hope that made sense and my spelling wasn't to bad...I am very tired.

thanks and thanks for sharing...there's a lot more to love than starry eye'd admiration....I think a lot of people just don't even think about the potential of trying harder, wroking together, it's just become too easy to give up (and I'm not condemning divorce or anybody who's been divorced, there certainly are plenty of situations where that's really the best outcome, just saying a lot of people both enter and exit marriage too easily today.

[Rosa]

Yes, if all you have is love, well you don't have a lot.
You need to trust each other.
Accept each other for who you are, why marry someone if all you want to do is change them?
Spend as much time together as you can, be that as a family or alone
Don't be petty, yes my husband has some habits that get on my nerves (seeing how many days worth of socks he can put on the bedroom door handle), but I do things he can't stand as well, you just have to learn to put up with it.
Honesty is important, if I'm annoyed, upset or angry about something I tell my husband and he does the same.
There just a tiny number of things you need to be in a good marriage.

[IADad]

Originally Posted by Rosa

Don't be petty, yes my husband has some habits that get on my nerves (seeing how many days worth of socks he can put on the bedroom door handle), but I do things he can't stand as well, you just have to learn to put up with it.

Oh, very good point, I had forgotten about that. I hate the fact that DW will put things ON TOP of the trash can lid in the garage rather than opeing it up and throwing them in...but I know there are things I do that frustrate her...so I gladly cleanup that little thing. The trick is if you're going to accept something, then you really have to accept it, you can't let it bother you anymore...it's sort of like truly forgiving someone for a transgression, if you still hold it against them or still feel hurt by it then you haven't truly forgiven. If you let the pity stuff go,you'll be happier, "you" yourself and "you" your couple relationship.