Weekly Marriage Tips

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“Honest failure is a badge of experience. All of you will fail at some time in your career, or in love or in life. No one ever sets out to fail. But being afraid to fail means you’ll be afraid to try.”
         - Steve Blank

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Don’t Be Afraid to Fail

Sustaining a good relationship (vs. initiating one) has much to do with trying new things and, sometimes, failing at them. To keep your sex life interesting, you might add new positions or toys (and, hopefully, laugh if they don’t turn out as expected!) You might try new ways to keep your household organized, or go to a world premier play to spruce up your date night only to be horrified by the content.

If one of you has ADHD, you will undoubtedly be experimenting with how to organize yourself better, how to stay on task, and how to remind yourself to be involved rather than distracted.

This experimenting is critically important work – never be afraid to try…and also measure your success so you can answer the question “is this a keeper…or do I move on?”

The partner to experimentation is creating an environment in which trying new things is valued. That means encouragement, rather than “that’s a stupid idea”…and responding with laughter rather than tears or frustration when something doesn’t work out as planned.

___________________________________________________________________________________

NEXT COUPLES COURSE STARTS SEPTEMBER 12.  FIND OUT MORE AT THIS LINK.  The course is given by phone - what do you have to lose?

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“This is a moment to consider what ‘doing better’ really means.”
          -Anna Quindlen

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Anna Quindlen said this at the Grinnell College graduation ceremony this year. She was referring to how we think about personal success, but I think the quote is just as relevant to relationship success.

I urge you all to think about what ‘doing better’ really means within the context of your relationship. After years of thinking of this, I’ve decided that for me, ‘doing better’ means:

• Focusing on people and loving relationships, not stuff and projects

• Actively creating happy moments with those you love

• Encouraging everyone in my family to pursue something for which they have a passion, no matter how foreign that passion might be to me

• Learning how to say ‘no’ to obligations for which I have little time

• Finding something every day for which I can say “thank you”

What does “doing better” mean to you? And, so this isn’t too theoretical an exercise, are there things you can do to help you ‘do better?’

________________________________________________________________________________________

NEXT MARRIAGE SEMINAR STARTS SEPTEMBER 12.  FOR COMPLETE INFORMATION OR TO REGISTER, GO TO THIS LINK.
 

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“Don’t worry….be happy”

• Bobby McFerrin

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Don’t Worry, Be Happy

A little bit of worry can be a good thing – it can push us to get things done faster, encourage us to be prepared for trouble…and sometimes it’s just a total waste of time. I was reminded of this earlier this week when I spent a mostly sleepless night worrying about things that each of my children was supposed to be doing. I was concerned one might forget an appointment and the other wasn’t aware of the urgency of his task.

Turned out I lost all that sleep over nothing. One didn’t forget, the other was well aware of the urgency and had already taken care of it.

In this case, I should have written the concerns down on a pad next to my bed as soon as I thought about them so I could LET THEM GO and get my much needed sleep. And, perhaps, realize that my kids are older now and don’t need all that mothering. In fact, these days when I “don’t worry” they will “be happy.” And if they had forgotten? Then, just like when they are out on their own, they would have needed to “clean up the mess” themselves. Another reason to “be happy” – at least for me!

ADHD Effect on Couples – Next Seminar Starts Sept 12

The next session of my phone seminar for struggling couples in which one or both partners has ADHD starts Monday, Sept. 12. Many couples have found this course helps them jumpstart their marital recovery. For more information about the course, go to this link.

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

Underneath this smile
My world is slowly caving in
What I’m standing on is sinking in
And I don’t have a clue how to get off…
All the while I’m hanging on
Because that is all I know

-Hilary Duff

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Something I Really Need to Say

If you feel as if your world is caving in, the best immediate response is not to hide behind a smile, but to open up and connect with another person around your pain.

I work with many couples in which one spouse says something like this: “I didn’t feel I could tell my spouse how I was feeling because he/she would have try to tell my why my feelings were wrong or unjustified.” The net result of this dynamic is that serious problems in the relationship sit below the surface and fester, making things worse.

You can interrupt this destructive pattern. Tell your partner that there are things that are bothering you that you both need to talk about and propose some learning conversations (see my book for details about this). If he/she is not willing or able to converse “safely” in this format, ask that you start professional counseling.

You’ll both be better off, and it’s better than hiding behind a smile.

MY NEXT MARRIAGE SEMINAR STARTS SEPT. 12.  MORE DETAILS CAN BE FOUND AT THIS LINK.

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“Nothing drives a woman more crazy than a man who is doing NOTHING!”

-Mark Gungor

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Drives a Woman Crazy!

Enough has been written about the differences between men and women that few question the idea that men and women are wired differently. Scientific research supports this idea, as well. Did you know that it takes men significantly longer than women to “recover” from the physiological effects of conflict?

Just for fun, though, here is Mark Gungor's look at what makes men and women’s brains so different…I think it will make you laugh! See the video Here

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

"The most potent medication we have is also our most dangerous and abused drug. It is called food."

-Ned Hallowell

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

What You Put in Your Body

As you think about your health, do you think of food as medication? If not, you might try it for a while. I find that thinking of food as medicine helps me think carefully about the choices I make about what to put into my body.

Simplified, a chemically healthy diet for your brain includes a little lean protein at every meal; lots of vegetables and beans; few processed foods and few/no sugared drinks. It also includes 2500 - 5000 mg of fish oil a day either from oily fish (examples: sardines/salmon) or fish oil supplements.* These combine together to provide sustained energy with fewer swings in mood plus improved focus.

There’s more, of course. But just following these basic guidelines will help you start harnessing the power of one of the most powerful drugs we have.  If you have ADHD, this type of diet can help you better manage your symptoms.

*If you are taking medications, please check with your doctor about taking higher doses of fish oil.

MY NEXT ADHD IN-DEPTH COUPLES PHONE SEMINAR IS SCHEDULED TO BEGIN SEPTEMBER 12.  FIND OUT MORE OR SIGN UP NOW AT THIS LINK!

If you or your spouse has ADHD, please join our forum at www.adhdmarriage.com to ask your questions and learn from others who share your issues.  In addition, you'll find in-depth essays to help you learn how to thrive in a marriage affected by ADHD.
 
Hope to hear from you there!
 
Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“We can train in rejoicing in even the smallest blessings our life holds. It is easy to miss our own good fortune; often happiness comes in ways we don’t even notice. It’s like a cartoon I saw of an astonished-looking man saying, ‘What was that?’ The caption below read, ‘Bob experiences a moment of well-being.’ The ordinariness of our good fortune is hard to catch.”

• Pema Chodron as quoted by Brian Johnson

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Rejoice in Small Blessings

Sometimes when I describe my life with my husband to other people I think to myself ‘wow, that sounds really boring!’ We cherish our routine of getting into bed together at night, take pleasure in being in the same room even if we aren’t talking to each other, laugh and say ‘we’ve been married too long!’ when we blurt out the same words at the same time.

These are silly little things – yet they aren’t. Getting into bed together at night is a “blessing” to us both since there were years when we were too angry at each other to create that pleasure. We feel fortunate for the stability of companionable silence after so many years of the opposite.

When we first decided to turn our relationship around we weren’t in a very good place at all – pain and anger still abounded. But we made a pact to actively seek out the good – and actively create good – in our relationship. We found, as Chodron suggests, that rejoicing in small blessings (wherever they may be found) was an excellent way to gain perspective and open our hearts to the healing we both needed.

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“The fear habit, the anger habit, the self-pity habit – all are strengthened and empowered when we continue to buy into them. The most compassionate things we can do is to interrupt these habits.”

• Pema Chodron

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

Interrupting Habits of Thought

American Buddhist nun Chodron argues that “habitual momentum” keeps us stuck responding in thought-less ways to our feelings and the world around us. She proposes a process by which you acknowledge “churned up” feelings then overtly interrupt them to move away from them, as it is in our best interests to do so.

How about you? Do you have specific “patterns” of negative responses in your relationship – responses you repeat over and over again? If so, then Chodron suggests doing “anything that doesn’t reinforce the crippling habits.” That might even be singing, dancing, or running around the block. (I would take it one step further – don’t just interrupt the response patterns, replace them with something more productive – she has a version of this she calls “inclining our minds to joy”.) There is little doubt that if you interrupt those habits over and over again, pretty soon you may find they are no longer habits – and you are the winner since you are no longer a “slave” to negativity.

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

“According to the latest research, 25 percent of Americans have no intimate social connection at all, and countless others spend the bulk of them time by themselves.  One recent study found that half of all American adults lack even a single close friend they can rely on.”

-Experience Life Magazine, May, 2011

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

While I would like to see how the research about not having even a single close friend was done before I completely believe it, the direction of this statement is nonetheless sobering.  In an age of electronic connection, many of us are losing our deepest personal bonds.  Since good mental health is closely tied to how connected you are, this is bad news, indeed.

We all wish to be part of something “larger” than us – a community of like minded people, a group of cherished childhood friends, a cause, perhaps a religious organization, even a really good workout class.  But connecting take TIME and I wonder if part of the issue in our lack of connection comes from our inability to “schedule” time to connect in person.  We are too busy – with work, with following our kids around, with taking care of our “stuff.”

For the next few weeks, why not overtly set aside some specific time to connect somehow with other people who are important to you?  If you have to put some “stuff” aside, so be it.  The people connections are what really matter.

© 2011 Melissa Orlov

Heart to Heart

Tips for Thriving in your Marriage

(picture of a family lost in jungle.  Man says to wife…) “O.K., I admit it, we’re lost, but the important thing is to remain focused on whose fault it is.”

ADHD Marriage blog and forum

Dr. Hallowell's website

Sign up for these weekly marriage tips and other announcements related to ADHD & Marriage

We can laugh at this cartoon in part because it’s so true.  How often have you spent time and energy arguing with your partner about who is right, rather than simply working together (regardless of who is right) to solve the problem at hand?!

I plan to add this to my “front of the fridge” collection, right next to another of my favorites in which a “man” bird is leaning over to put the last piece of grass on his beautifully constructed nest while his “wife” looks on and says crossly “I can’t believe you’re going to put it there!”

I hang these things up where all can see for a reason – to remind myself (and my family) to “take it easy”, remain a team, and look for the lighter side in life.

© 2011 Melissa Orlov