The Jon and Kate debacle / Taking Back Romance?! / Mentors - 6/24/09

[Smartmarriages]

- THE JON/KATE DEBACLE: DIVORCE IS CONTAGIOUS......
- A VINDICATION OF LOVE
- JON AND KATE NEEDED A MENTOR COUPLE

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- THE JON/KATE DEBACLE: DIVORCE IS CONTAGIOUS......

I can't help it.  It's hard to focus on the conference ....this whole
Jon/Kate debacle is making me crazy.   But the silver lining is that we've
been handed an opening.  USE this Jon/Kate horror to write opinion pieces,
to call radio and tv stations, to blog.....use this to get our message out
there and counter the message.  Please send me anything you do so we can
share it.  

The twitter/blog/broadcast/print world is FULL of comments today from people
asking how we (as a nation) can be focused on the Jon and Kate divorce when
we should be focused on IMPORTANT THINGS like Iran or the budget crisis.
They don't get it - how important intact families are to the health and
wealth and well-being of the nation and the power and negativity of the
message this show is sending to millions of couples and the incredible costs
- financial, emotional, developmental ­ of divorce to men, women, kids, the
village, the budget, the future, the nation.   I'm heartsick.....feels like
this is a slippery slope backwards.  What we fear is social contagion - the
crazy message that they are divorcing for the good of the children. I wish
the president would get tough with Jon and Kate - say you don't get divorced
for the children - that's not right, that you learn to work out your
differences and model that for your kids and you stay together to conserve
emotional and financial resources and strengthen the village and blah blah -
so much he could say.

Maybe we could send Jon and Kate a DVD of the Story of Us, or just the
script of the closing monologue which IRONICALLY IS *KATIE'S CLOSING
MONOLOGUE*, here is a snatch:

> There's a history and histories don't happen overnight. In Mesopotamia or
> Ancient Troy or somewhere back there, there were cities built on top of other
> cities, but I don't want to build another city. I like this city. I know where
> we keep the Bactine, and what kind of mood you're in when you wake up by which
> eyebrow is higher. And you always know that I'm a little quiet in the morning
> and compensate accordingly. That's a dance you perfect over time.
> 
> And it's hard, it's much harder than I thought it would be, but there's more
> good than bad. And you don't just give up. And it's not for the sake of the
> children, but they're great kids aren't they? And we made them - I mean think
> about that - there were no people there and then there were people - EIGHT of
> them. And they grew. And I won't be able to say to some stranger, "Josh has
> your hands" or "Remember how Erin threw up at the Lincoln Memorial?"
http://www.smartmarriages.com/marriage.quotes.html#scripts

Or send them this: 

> I didn't marry you because you were perfect. I didn't even marry you because I
> loved you. I married you because you gave me a promise. That promise made up
> for your faults. And the promise I gave you made up for mine. Two imperfect
> people got married and it was the promise that made the marriage. And when our
> children were growing up, it wasn't a house that protected them; and IT WASN'T
> OUR LOVE THAT PROTECTED THEM ­ IT WAS THAT PROMISE.
> Thornton Wilder, The Skin of Our Teeth

The TV news and newspapers were all focused this morning on the fact that
the Jon/Kate divorce announcement episode was the most watched Reality show
ever and on whether or not we can trust THE REALITY of Reality Shows.
They're sending investigative reporters to examine the divorce records were
Katie says they've lived apart for 2 years and people are outraged that they
renewed their vows in Hawaii just a year ago and the show producers are
complicit in the misrepresentation and that no one will watch the show or
trust the reality of reality shows.  THAT's NOT the PROBLEM.  The problem is
the message the show sent that doesn't square with the reality of the
research of the effects of divorce on kids.  You don't divorce for the kids'
sake unless there is violence in the home.  You show them what marriage is -
mommies and daddies are two distinct people who disagree and you show them
how you live with and love, and keep your vows, and build your family -
around the disagreements.

I'm convinced the show will have increased popularity as they break the news
to the kids and then as they show their dating lives and introduce the new
step father and step mother - as they normalize divorce and show how
wonderfully the family adjusts - that will be the real unreality of this
reality show.  I know there is no way to track it but I predict that this
will go viral. 

> It is sometimes essential for a husband and a wife to quarrel - they get to
> know each other better.
> Goethe

If anyone finds a Jon and Kate website - where we can all comment, send it
to me, please.  - diane

 ------------------------------------------------
 - A VINDICATION OF LOVE

Along these same lines, I've not shared a book review that's been making me
crazy - the lead cover of this Sunday's (June 21) NY Times Book Review
magazine. I didn't want to give the book (or the review) airtime, but  I
should alert you to what the Times sees as significant (worth a cover
feature) ­ and it may have contributed to my sense that we're in some kind
of backwards slide - back to the 70s when the divorce epidemic took off and
everyone became neutral - or worse - negative, about marriage.

You wouldn't know it from the title, ³A Vindication of Love: Reclaiming
Romance for the Twenty-First Century", but it's all about reclaiming romance
from the boring institution of marriage.   ³We have been pragmatic and
pedestrian about our erotic lives for too long,² the author writes, and as
the reviewer puts it, she *goes on to celebrate the wilder, messier
connections - our idea of a contented married ending is too cozy and tame
for her - instead we should focus on the fullness and intensity of emotion.*

I read it as sour grapes by a woman who admits to a life of messy and
dangerous entanglements including being physically harmed and emotionally
trashed (repeatedly) - and one who doesn't know the research: that passion
ends faster in non-marital, uncommitted relationships than in marriage AND
that commitment is what is most often highly erotic, especially for women,
- the lubricant you can't buy in a tube.  Full blown and intense.  (I can
hear Jackie Wilson in the background singing - to be loved, to be loved, to
be really, really loved....that's romance.) ANY woman can stand on a street
corner and have one *exciting* romantic liaison after another....and they
can delude themselves that that is taking back romance?? The research is
clear that for both women AND MEN  the most likely place to develop deep and
exciting knowing -  love, passion, and eroticism - and, over time, your own
couple's sexual style - is in a life-long marriage.

But there was no one this Sunday to point that out - the Times chose a
reviewer who ends her review by identifying herself as one of those brave,
unmarried pregnant woman. Not that there's anything wrong with that......but
ignore the research, ignore the stats (violence to women occurs
overwhelmingly outside marriage in those *exciting* romantic relationships)
.......... we can so easily end up justifying that we're standing alone
holding a big bunch of sour grapes......better to have loved and had the
crap beat out of us than to live in what the author calls *quiet marriage*.

To which I have to repeat Frank Pittman's comment on living with those
exciting passing strangers:
> For most people, a life lived alone, with passing strangers or passing
> lovers, is incoherent and ultimately unbearable. Someone must be
> there to know what we have done for those we love.

> Marriage, ultimately, is the practice of becoming passionate friends.
> Harville Hendrix
> ***************
> I think a man and a woman should choose each other for life, for the simple
> reason that a long life with all its accidents is barely enough time for a man
> and a woman to understand each other and. . . to understand - is to love."
> William Butler Yeats


I wish we could interest these two in attending the Fri morning keynote -
Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity and Barry McCarthy's Develop Your Couples
Sexual Style. I tell at least one caller a week to listen to Barry
McCarthy's workshop recording: Marital Sex as it Ought To Be - and I
encourage all of you married folks to keep it in the car, listen to it at
least once a year.....you don't want to become pedestrian-s.

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- JON AND KATE NEEDED A MENTOR COUPLE

Even in the midst of depressing developments such as the Jon and Kate
split-up, the news isn't all bad.  Every now and then children manage to
beat the odds and have successful marriages despite growing up with the
specter of parental divorce.  One example that comes to mind is Beverly and
Tom Rodgers, both of whom experienced the breakup of their parents' marriage
as kids.  In their book Adult Children of Divorced Parents:  Making Your
Marriage Work, they relate their experiences not only while growing up but
during the early years of their marriage.  Those years were unquestionably
years of struggle; had their level of marital commitment not been extremely
strong, it is doubtful their marriage would have lasted.  By their own
admission they had a lot to learn about what makes a successful marriage.
One thing that struck me, however, in reading their book, is that early on
as a married couple they realized that they could benefit from actively
seeking out an older, more experienced couple willing to give them some
pointers.  In effect, they took an active role in finding themselves   what
is known as a mentor couple.  They did on their own what marriage champion
Michael McManus advocates and a number of churches have begun doing in
recent years -- i.e., pairing up newly married couples with mentor couples
who then share tips for dealing some of the common problems that can come up
in a marriage.  This process can potentially be valuable for any couple
starting out, but especially for those couples in which one or both partners
grew up with divorce.  So often children nowadays grow up never seeing a
successful romantic relationship of any kind, let alone a viable marriage,
and mentor couples can go a long way toward filling the gap.
--Cindy Coan

> 814 - Sat July 11, 4pm
> Children of Divorce: Change Your Odds!
> Beverly Rodgers, PhD, Tom Rodgers, PhD
> According to research, children of divorce are less likely to marry, and if
> and when they do, face higher divorce rates. Learn important steps to change
> the odds.

Diane Sollee, Director
Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education, LLC (CMFCE)
5310 Belt Rd NW,   
Washington, DC 20015
www.smartmarriages.com
202-362-3332  
diane at smartmarriages.com

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