The Marriage CourseSample

The Impact of Family

Family background has a big influence on a marriage

• for some people, the support they receive from their family is good and helpful in building a strong marriage
• for others, their wider family dynamics are more complicated and can even be damaging 

Leaving and letting go

When we get married, a profound change should take place in our relationship with our parent or parents (or whoever were our main caregivers as we grew up)

• the change from being a child and completely dependent upon them to a healthy independence as an adult
• the significance of leaving is not so much the physical move as the psychological and emotional one
• we create a new ‘centre of gravity’ -- our highest loyalty must be to each other

Support each other. 

If necessary, put boundaries in place, not to cut yourselves off from your parents but to connect with them as a couple in a new way.

Listen to parental advice, but make your own decisions together as a couple.

Building healthy family relationships

1. Resolve any conflict

Use the same process as in Day 4 to unblock the drain:

• identify and talk about the main issue causing tension
• apologise when you have been wrong
• choose to forgive and move on

2. Consider their needs

It can be helpful to take the initiative with parents about things like:

• visiting them
• enabling them to see their grandchildren
• working out what holidays you might spend together
• phoning them

Looking at our past

We bring a mixture of experiences into our marriage from our family background:

• what was good (be grateful for that)
• what was different to our partner’s experience (be aware that this can cause conflict)
• what was negative (and may be painful)

Healing childhood pain

1. Grieve your own and your partner’s unmet needs

You may encounter strong feelings as you do this, but recognizing and admitting to yourself the hurt you’ve experienced can be a huge step forward. Allow your partner to talk about what they suffered or missed out on and give them the gift of your emotional support.

2. Forgive

Give up continuing expectations and longings of what you have wanted your parents or others to be for you. Remember, forgiveness is an ongoing act of the will and is essential for healing.

Forgiving someone is not condoning their actions or giving them the right to repeat what they’ve done. Forgiveness is about being set free from the ways they’ve hurt you.