It's time for Wifey Wednesday, where we talk marriage! I introduce a topic, and you all comment on it, or else write your own blog post and then link up to this one afterwards!
Yesterday I was browsing through my Twitter feed and one Tweet caught my eye. A woman tweeted that she was beginning the Love Dare. And I followed her link to a brand new blog, My Personal Dare. She says that she's been married for 10 years, and she never expected to be at such a low place in her marriage. But she's not content with that.
The movie Fireproof gave her a kick in the pants. In that movie, the main character, who is facing a marriage that looks irretrievable, uses a book to teach him to love his wife unconditionally. And as he changes, she slowly changes, too.
The initial changes are hard, because he gets no positive feedback. That's what this blogger found, too, when she launched into it:
In Fireproof, Caleb Holt used a book called The Love Dare to learn more about love and how to show his love to his wife. My husband and I bought that book. It's been sitting on a bookshelf, collecting dust. After we bought it, I tried to follow it. Caring for three children and other responsibilities got in the way. Because I had read part of it, I knew a little bit about what this Love Dare is all about. I know that two of the "dares" are to not say anything negative toward your spouse and to do something nice for him or her. So that is what I did yesterday. I didn't expect my "something nice" to be received so coolly. If he hadn't noticed, that would have been OK. But when he said that he didn't want me to hold it over his head that I had done something for him…. Well, to say that hurt would be an understatement. It was nearly enough to make me give up on this whole thing.
But she isn't giving up! And if you want to follow along with her through the forty days, I encourage you to, because I think it will encourage your marriage, too.
So today, here's the question I want to ask: have you ever been at a low point in your marriage? How did you turn it around?
For me, the first several years of our marriage were hard, because I really could not figure out the sex thing. I didn't think it was that great and my libido was basically zero. He, on the other hand, really wanted it all the time (at least that's what it felt like to me). So I thought he only wanted one thing from me, and he didn't really love me. And he felt like I didn't really love him, either.
One day it occurred to me that God didn't ask me to get married so I could get all my needs met. And God said, whether or not I was getting my needs met, I was to love my husband. So I embarked on a journey of trying to figure out how sex could be good. Keith came to about the same realization about the same time I did, and together, as we stopped blaming each other, things got a lot better. And when I stopped worrying so much about how to turn him off (so that we wouldn't get into a fight at night), I calmed down and realized that perhaps I wanted to be turned on.
The thing that really clinched it, then, was a change in my own attitude. So often we're waiting for someone else to change, when we do hold the power in our hands.
If that's where you are, I encourage you to watch Fireproof and get the Love Dare.
And now, can you share your thoughts? Just leave a comment, or better still, write your own blog post and then come back here and enter it in the Linky!
Labels: intimacy, marriage, wifey wednesdays |
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Wow. I was not expecting to see my words on this blog! When I decided to write about my Love Dare experiences, I didn't think that anyone else would want to read it. I just thought the blog would help to keep me on track. Once again, God must have had other things in mind!
The sex issue is one that my husband and I are constantly facing. I mentioned that a little in my first post on My Personal Dare. It is somewhat comforting to know that others ahve gone through the same thing and VERY comforting to know that other marriages have survived it.
Lynn