Becoming Parents/Second Half/ Sign of times: Postnup Depression & Stepmother terminology - 9/5/06

[Smartmarriages]

- BECOMING PARENTS INSTRUCTOR TRAINING/NOV 6-10, SEATTLE
- SECOND HALF OF MARRIAGE PROGRAM VIDEO/VHS DEAL
- SIGNS OF THE TIMES
- FATHER/DAUGHTER REUNIONS
- POSTNUPTIAL DEPRESSION: FROM WHITE TO BLUE
- STEPMOTHERS: WICKED?  NO, ONLY REDUNDANT

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- BECOMING PARENTS INSTRUCTOR TRAINING/NOV 6-10, SEATTLE

This program developed by Pam Jordan is for use with married or unmarried
couples any age, race, or class. Curriculum adaptations available for
low-income/low literacy couples in both English and Spanish. For details and
to register, visit: www.becomingparents.com

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- SECOND HALF OF MARRIAGE PROGRAM VIDEO/VHS DEAL

> Diane, 
> Because the Second Half of Marriage is now on DVD, we are offering the
> remaining Second Half teach-right-out-of-the-box video/VHS kits for $20. To
> order, call 888-690-6667.
> David and Claudia Arp, http://www.marriagealive.com/

Wow, given the growing concern about aging boomer marriages, this is a
program you can all use.  They have a limited number of the VHS kits
available, and they will go fast. Or, order the DVD/video version for $40 on
their website.  Content is the same on DVD or VHS. - diane

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- FATHER/DAUGHTER REUNIONS
Another reason to try to prevent divorce or out-of-wedlock births in the
first place.  An ounce of prevention is worth a life-time and lots of money
in trying to patch things back together.  - diane

> Esther Productions, Inc., a Washington, D.C. based nonprofit
> organization, once again presents The National Daughter-Daddy Reunion
> Tour Oct 6 & 7 in Washington DC.
> 
> The Tour provides an opportunity for practitioners, professionals,
> females ages 13 and older, and fathers to explore the effects of
> father absence on daughters. . . .
> The Tour is two days of intense training, followed by in-school
> lectures, facilitated monthly support groups, and the creation of
> faith-based reconciliation centers.
> 
> For information 202.232.0780 or www.estherproductions.com

> The National Daughter-Daddy Reunion Tour . . . is sponsored by CIGNA
> Healthcare, MedStar Health, The Summit Fund of Washington, the D.C. Healthy
> Relationships and Marriage Coalition in association with the Together is
> Better Campaign, and The National Center for Fathering.
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- SIGNS OF THE TIMES

Weddings are getting to be such an ordeal that we go into post-traumatic
depression/stress disorder from the let down.

And, divorce changes the original meaning of the term stepMOTHER. It was
coined when mothers died and the new wife stepped in to raise them.  With
divorce, kids have a mother.....

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- POSTNUPTIAL DEPRESSION: FROM WHITE TO BLUE
The Independent (UK)
August 29, 2006

It was the best day of your life. But if you're still waiting for the 'happy
ever after' bit, you may have postnuptial depression.

For Hayley Brown, the post-wedding blues hit soon after the honeymoon with
her husband Wesley. "It was really weird," she says. "We had spent 18 months
saving and planning and making sure everything was perfect, and then, in a
single day, it's all over. I kind of thought - what now? There didn't seem
to be anything to talk about or look forward to, and then I just felt
really, really down - it was horrible."

She is not alone. According to relationship experts, one new spouse in 10
will experience postnuptial depression to a greater or lesser degree.

Of course, if you're Britney Spears (now on her second marriage), the
post-wedding hangover has barely taken hold before you realise your dreadful
mistake and start annulment proceedings. And the actor Renée Zellweger
lasted just four months with country and western star Kenny Chesney before
having the marriage annulled on the somewhat bewildering grounds of "
fraud".

But sometimes it is not just the sense of anticlimax once the party is over,
or the realisation that a whirlwind romance is destined for an even quicker
divorce once you actually get to know your husband or wife. The average
wedding now costs more than £20,000, and 20 per cent of couples are starting
married life in serious debt because of the amount they spent on their big
day. Nuptials are now beginning to rival Indian ceremonies for their length
and opulence.

Postnuptial blues do not just have mental manifestations; their symptoms may
be physical too. Once the adrenalin that has kept brides and grooms going
through the stressful last week before the wedding day has worn off,
exhaustion, colds and other viruses may take its place.

Brown, now a mother of two from Ashford, Kent, says other stresses hit the
just-married as well. "Like a lot of brides, I went on a diet about nine
months before I got married and lost a lot of weight because I wanted to
look good on the day," she says. "But then afterwards you just wonder what
it was all for, and it can be tempting to start comfort-eating, then you get
depressed because you have put on weight. Everything just gets to you."

Also, research published last week found that a woman's libido drops steeply
after marriage. Experts believe that levels of phenylethylamine, the
so-called "love chemical", fall in women but not in men once they are in a
secure relationship. This may add to the problems of couples in their first
year of married life.

Postnuptial depression may also set in because many couples have not thought
about their lives beyond saying "I do". According to Dr Jane Greer, a
marriage and family therapist in New York, there is no such thing as a
"honeymoon period" in a marriage and a couple's relationship will need work
straight away.

Writing on the newlyweds' website The Nest, she says: "It is imperative to
plan time for just the two of you, to continue to invest in your marriage.
Whether it's a scheduled Wednesday dinner date or Sunday in bed with the
crossword puzzle, agree to set aside a few hours to be a 'we'." She also
advises couples to have time apart and to continue with their old hobbies
rather than becoming too tied to each other.

For the full article including suggestions for what to do, see:
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health_medical/article1222455.ece

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- STEPMOTHERS: WICKED?  NO, ONLY REDUNDANT

The Times (LONDON) 
August 28, 2006

Wicked? No only redundant
By Carol Sarler

IF WE MUST be treated to more detail of the parting of the McCartneys ‹ and
I very much fear that we must ‹ I should like to plead for no further
mention of Sir Paul¹s adult offspring wherein Heather is described as their
stepmother. She is not ³their² anything, save perhaps their
inheritance-depleting nemesis, and the use of the possessive pronoun simply
proves how anachronistic the title of step-parent has become.

Once, it had purpose. When a young mother died and her widower remarried,
the stepmother really did inherit the mothering of his children; she became
a substitute for the mother and, for good or for bad, she would retain that
role at least until Prince Charming happened by with a good fit in glass
slippers.

Today, very rarely does any of that apply. Certainly not following a
remarriage in late middle age when the children are too grown to need
mothering, or when, courtesy of an epidemic of divorce, a remarriage means
that the children of the groom have a perfectly good mother at home, thank
you very much, and don¹t need another one.

Indeed, the use of a title implies an entitlement that might itself prove
inflammatory. When Jennifer¹s father recently remarried, he turned up at a
school parents¹ evening with his new wife, sat beside Jennifer¹s mother and
then introduced Mk II to the teacher as ³Jennifer¹s stepmother².

³I don¹t mind her showing an interest,² says Jennifer¹s mother, still
spitting tacks, ³but she¹s getting no actual say in anything; Jennifer
already has two parents to do that. So what¹s the point in giving her a
fancy label that suggests otherwise?² Quite so. Furthermore, far from the
permanence of the step-parent of the divorce-free past, the current newcomer
can promise no such thing. Her presence is entirely contingent upon the
survival of a marriage whose collapse would almost certainly herald her
complete disappearance.

Nobody understands this better than the children. Any fondness is adjunctive
to another relationship of which they own no part. It is wholly improper,
therefore, to ask them to pretend possession by saying ³my² stepmother. It
would be fairer to everyone, at least at first, to scrap the term altogether
in favour of ³my father¹s wife². Until, if all involved are very fortunate,
that mutates, in time, to ³my friend².

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