Divorce Busting / Marriage & Stress/ Mr Mom/ Online Marriage Education - 8/10/10

[Smartmarriages]

- JUST BACK, HEADING OUT AGAIN
- DIVORCE BUSING SECRETS CLIP - ³IT REALLY CREATED QUITE A STIR²
- MARRIAGE AND STRESS
- When roles reverse: The rise of the stay-at-home husband
- Green Bay organization promotes skills that build healthy

- JUST BACK, HEADING OUT AGAIN
I am just back from a trip to scout sites for the 2011 Conference.  Close
but no cigar...nothing to announce at this point ­ am heading out again to
look at two more possibilities.  I¹m being told the economy is picking up
(that would be good news) so the rates and negotiations are tough.  You will
know as soon as I sign.  After I return I¹ll be gone another week with
family to celebrate my birthday.....(I¹m getting old! Oy.)  I will be back
by 24th.  Get to me with any business this week ­ especially your class
schedules for the Directory ­ I¹m getting lots of inquiries from folks
looking for classes. - diane

- DIVORCE BUSING SECRETS CLIP - ³IT REALLY CREATED QUITE A STIR²
Wow, look at what Michele Weiner-Davis was able to do ­ post a clip from her
keynote at Smart Marriages on You Tube.  I wish I knew how to do that.  If
any of the rest of you Keynoters post clips, please send me the url so I can
share them.  Watch Michele in a 4:55 min clip on Divorce Busting Secrets,
here:  http://bit.ly/dqUuyp    You can order all 24 Smart Marriages keynotes
on DVD or audio CD/iPod here:
http://www.iplaybacksmartmarriages.com/ Or at 800-241-7785

You can join Michele for an intensive 3-day Divorce Busting training in
Boulder Sept 23rd-25th.  This small group, hands-on training is for
therapists, marriage educators, clergy, military, marriage mentors or anyone
working with couples.  Michele will share her step-by-step program for
helping on-the-brink couples prevent divorce and strengthen their marriages
plus effective strategies for working with only one spouse.  For information
about this transformational training, visit:
http://www.divorcebusting.com/events.htm
or 800-664-2435  MENTION SMART MARRIAGES AND GET A FREE COPY OF THE DIVORCE
REMEDY the book I recommend to every couple that calls that is on the brink
of divorce. - diane


- MARRIAGE AND STRESS
Married grad students experience less stress than their single
counterparts......just as John Gray was saying in his incredible keynote at
Smart Marriages on the effects of stress, cortisol, gender, and marriage.
http://tinyurl.com/2eeod6h

- When roles reverse: The rise of the stay-at-home husband
 Is this the new status symbol for alpha women?
- Changing Times:  Trophy Wives traded for Mr Moms....
  marie claire
  By Hilary Stout  
  8/9/2010 
 
 Most women have known‹and probably dated‹a guy like Todd Gottlieb. A
self-described ³hard-core bachelor,² he was never going to get married, and
he was certainly never going to have children. Life in Southern California
was good: golfing, camping, trips to Vegas with the boys‹not to mention
dates with ³fantastic ladies.² His biggest emotional commitment was to the
San Diego Chargers.
 
Today, Todd is a married father of two. Forget Vegas‹the 38-year-old could
recently be found driving through Chicago¹s O¹Hare airport with a pair of
shrieking toddlers in the backseat, attempting the near-impossible feat of
picking up an arriving visitor (his mother) at the exact moment she stepped
out of the terminal. Back home, there was a gas leak to deal with and then
dinner to cook. Since his carefree single days, Todd had fallen hard for a
woman on their first date and eventually married her, then quit his
corporate PR job to open a ceramics studio with her. And then came the real
stunner: When she had their first baby, they sold the ceramics business, and
he gave up work entirely. Today the Gottlieb family‹which includes Hogan,
age 4, and Ivria, age 2‹lives in a tony Illinois suburb where a stay-at-home
dad is so unusual that ³people look at us like we have three heads,² says
Todd¹s wife, Ariella, who now runs her own promotions company.

For the hard-driving careerist mother, a husband who¹s willing to take up
the lion¹s share at home is a godsend. But across the country, their
situation is becoming more common: In the recent recession, three men lost
their jobs for every one woman that did, and as a result, this year, for the
first time ever, women make up the majority of the workforce. Four in 10
mothers are now their households¹ primary breadwinners, and an estimated
143,000 unemployed fathers of children under 15 are caring for the kids full
time while their wives work. Athomedad.org lists 148 support groups around
the country; MTV¹s atom.com lineup includes ³Stay at Home Dad,² a
side-splitting Web show about an acerbic househusband; and confessional
blogs abound, with names like Rebel Dad and Dudes on Diapers. Speaking of,
Pampers‹which in a recent survey found that 69 percent of fathers say they
change diapers as much as their wives‹has started targeting male consumers,
hiring New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees as a spokesman.

And just as having a stay-at-home wife carries cachet in certain male
corporate circles, having a househusband may, in a way, be the ultimate
status symbol for the successful professional woman. When her husband, PJ,
was working as a mortgage broker, Michelle Mullen, a clinical pharmacist in
Charlotte, North Carolina, usually lunched on Lean Cuisines from the
break-room freezer. But ever since PJ became a full-time father to their
2-year-old, he sends Michelle off to work every day with homemade curried
beef stew, turkey molé soup, or tarragon chicken salad with raisins and
walnuts. ³I¹m spoiled,² she says, adding with a laugh, ³A man who changes
diapers is just sexy.²

Diane Sollee, director of the Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples
Education and smartmarriages.com, a website that acts as a clearinghouse for
information on strengthening relationships, says that as women work more,
the qualities we value in a partner can shift greatly. ³In a way, it¹s
almost like bragging for a woman to say she has a stay-at-home husband,² she
observes. ³Not only is she the breadwinner with a great job, but she¹s also
got this highly evolved male person‹a feminist, father, and husband who
doesn¹t care what the gender roles are. It¹s really an elevated life-form.²
For the hard-driving careerist mother, a husband who¹s willing to take up
the lion¹s share at home is a godsend.

Still, the transition from breadwinner to househusband can be rough on a
guy¹s ego. Despite all the enlightened views about hands-on dads, all the
reflexive ³That¹s great!² comments from hip and politically correct peers,
the professional dad lives a life filled with big existential questions
(What is my true worth as a person if I don¹t get a paycheck?) and tiny
daily indignities, like having to buy presents for his wife with her money,
or shrugging off incredulous looks at dinner parties after revealing he¹s a
stay-at-home dad. ³At times it¹s been emasculating,² admits PJ, who has been
home full time since his son, CJ, was born two years ago. When people see
him pushing a stroller at 11 a.m. on a Tuesday, they jump to conclusions:
Guys assume he¹s been laid off, and little old ladies figure he¹s dabbling
in childcare. ³Are you babysitting today? Giving Mommy a break?² they coo.
³Babysitting?! I¹m his father,² seethes PJ.

He recalls one recent evening after the baby had been a pill the whole
day‹nothing seemed to make him happy. By the time PJ¹s wife, Michelle, came
home from work, he was exhausted and miserable. ³I need to leave,² he told
her and walked out the door. He didn¹t go far, just sat on the deck and
listened to his iPod. After about an hour, he went back inside. ³I don¹t
know if I¹m man enough to be a woman,² he said to his wife.

For the full article: http://tinyurl.com/2uwj5s6

-----------------------------
- Green Bay organization promotes skills that build healthy marriages
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Aug. 7, 2010
( Nice to read about how much the couples like this very affordable,
accessible format. Reminds me of the Frank Fincham keynote on his Smart
Marriages Impact-Award-Winning e-PREP program targeted at young adults. -
diane)  

Lindsay Atwater was in the fifth grade when her parents divorced.
 
"I remember it vividly. I was in a new school and it was religious-based,"
she said. "I was one of the only children whose parents were divorced. It
was almost embarrassing. Being that young, you don't have a choice but to
take it hard."

Now 32 and a little over a month away from her own marriage, both Atwater
and her fiancé, Tom Dix, 27, also the product of divorce, want to make sure
they get it right.
 
"Both of us come from broken families. We have seen what our families have
gone through," said Atwater, who recently completed a premarital prep
session along with Dix.
 
But instead of walking into a marriage counselor's office, the Appleton
couple simply signed on to their computer from the comfort of their home and
participated in a webinar, the latest in an array of nuptial tools being
offered by thinkmarriage.org.
 
"Our goal is to prevent bad marriages before they begin," said Susan Dutton
Freund, the organization's executive director.

For the full article: http://tinyurl.com/2czw3rs


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