GPS to a Joyful Marriage

Looking back at two different times of struggling with major depression in my life, I realize they were both caused by an external substance.  We moved to Australia in the summer of 2000 (their winter.)  I was ecstatic to be there.  My depression prior to that usually stemmed from living away from my family, and Australia was the farthest we’d ever been.  Even so, I recall feeling pity for a couple preparing to leave this wonderful place; I was actually grateful to live there and dealing very well with the distance from home.  A year later though, I was deep in depression. I couldn’t figure out what caused my depression, and eventually, I started doing some research online.  I discovered that high blood pressure medicines sometimes triggered depression.  I had been prescribed one the year before, and sure enough, the one I took identified depression as a side effect.  I went to my doctor (who was unaware of this side effect) and she changed my medicine.  My depression quickly disa

During our Grace Group meeting last night (these are people from our church who gather at our home once a month), we got into an interesting conversation about faith (among other things.)  I was amazed at how my suspicions about women and men played out right before my eyes.  It confirmed my desire to talk in depth about women, in particular, and depression.  I may not have a degree by my name for qualifications, but I have years of experience (and the Internet at my fingertips) to back me up.  (Not to mention an amazing God who will always guide my writing.) One woman began discussing her occasional struggle with feeling down and her inability to “snap out of it”.  The other ladies (and I) chimed in with “I know what you mean!” and “Sometimes there are no reasons for these feelings!”  We began discussing how we all fall into moments, hours and sometimes days where we can’t get “out of the funk”.  We pray, we read our Bible, we cry out to God – but we can’t always escape the pull-

I’m always reminded about the biggest problem I see in churches when we are signing up couples for one of our marriage seminars – people are fearful of revealing their faults and struggles when they step through the church doors.  Inevitably, I will hear at least one person say to me, “We don’t really need this seminar,” as they are writing their name on our sign-up sheet.  There are some acceptable problems we feel comfortable sharing in the church environment, but most of those are caused by an external matter such as the loss of money or a job, illness, your spouse has left you, etc.  Rarely though, will people share their self-rooted issues, such as a troubled marriage, for fear of being judged as a not-so-righteous Christian.   I believe some church goers tend to be judgmental with each other because it makes their own deep, dark secrets seem not as bad.  Not all church goers are judgmental, but it only takes a few to bring discord.   Often times, I hear Christian’s voice

I believe the word commitment, in marriage, has been “watered down” to suit each individual’s idea and need.  Most couples struggle to get through the day-to-day grime that marriage can be, much less grasp the terms of a lifetime commitment.  And with the high divorce rate in our country,  how can you understand those terms if you come from a broken home?   Ironically, I have seen couples determine to make their marriage work because of the poor role model they had from parents who divorced.  I, myself, chose not to stay on the same path my father walked so my children wouldn’t be the victims of divorce as I was.  I also feared dying young as he did, which, to me, appeared to be a result of the guilt he carried and wrong choices he made.  Unfortunately, many adult children of divorce lack the insight to recognize the effects of a broken home and make the same mistakes their parents did. Even more persuasive than our parental role models is the influence of Hollywood in our li

Commitment:  The state of being bound emotionally or intellectually to a course of action or to another person or persons: a deep commitment to liberal policies; a profound commitment to the family. Commitment seems to be a dying value.  I don’t know about you, but inevitably, when I have to take care of the business of living, one roadblock after another causes me great frustration due to the lack of commitment in someone supposedly doing their job. For example:  We own a condo in Orlando and the rental management company recently stopped their work in Orlando.  It took me a month just to talk to a person (after no one answered emails and voicemails) to find out how we would make the transfer and to confirm that we would be getting all the money owed us.  (We didn’t see that for another month.)  It took a few more weeks after that (again, with multiple emails and voicemails) just to get the name of the renter and another week to get his phone number.  There was a day where