Midlife and Marriage

Have you reached your forties and fifties? You feel smug and safe because you are still married? Be careful.  You are beginning to feel your age. You have become conscious of age categories when running a marathon or participating in a bicycle race. You have to watch what you eat. For the first time you discover you have gained weight. It happened to me when we had just returned from a week long backpack trip.

Your children are grown. Your bucket list may have too few things crossed off. You may be looking at new sports cars or a trip to Australia. Maybe you are thinking of going back to college. When you read about a big road project that will be completed in 2045, you calculate if you should get excited about that. You begin to wonder if you have passed the midpoint of your life. Do you have less time to live than the time you have already lived?

                       YOU ARE FREE

 

 

Be mindful. Renew priorities.

 

This is a good time to take a look at what you want for the rest of your life. Three things are important.

 

Number One.  Prioritize your faith in God.What is your purpose? What do you want to accomplish by the end of your life? What are your gifts and talents? What brings you joy?

 

Number Two.  Prioritize your marriage. How connected are you to your mate? What do you enjoy about each other? Have you shared each other's stories? Is there more to discover? Do you share things on your bucket lists? Make time for each other. Renew the kind of love you showed each other when you were courting. You are alone again with each other. Flirt. Play. Enjoy. Support, Discover.

 

Number Three.  Support your family. Stay in touch. Promote family reunions. Get together when you can. Encourage. Love. Embrace.  

If you do these things, you will become soul mates and adore each other after 60 years of marriage.

 

 

I KNOW

Soul Mates Learn to Handle Change

Birth of a baby brings change
 

The Truth of Impermanence
The biggest cause of pain in our lives comes from not accepting the truth of impermanence. Feelings of loss flow out of our reaction to change. We may not choose change. Like it or not, change comes. Change comes in two parts, gain and loss. We have to grieve and let go of the loss before we can see or feel the gain.

Experiencing Loss
Immediately after a loss, feelings cloud our thinking. If we accept our feelings and work through them, the clouds lift and we can begin to feel the gain. Knowing what to expect helps the grieving process do its work of healing. Validation by ourselves and others accelerates the healing. Loss or change makes us aware of ourselves. When we grieve the loss, we grieve for ourselves. "What is going to happen to me?" We become aware of dependency needs. We examine our goals, values, and resources. We recognize the opportunity for introspection, evaluation and exploration of our inner resources and a challenge to risk something new.
 
Big Changes Bring Big Challenges
The birth of a baby, the biggest change in a couple relationship, can strengthen their bond or it can tear them apart. Many changes will challenge them as they go through life together. When their children become adults and leave, another big change occurs. People who go through the grieving process will accept the challenge of moving to an adult to adult relationship with their children and welcome the opportunity to become just a couple again. Single parents must embrace their freedom to explore new interests. Some may be afraid to let go and welcome the second half of their lives.

Mid-life Brings Changes
Mid-life brings changes. Flexible open people understand the challenge and put thier energy into recapturing the joy of long time love. The best is yet to come. Maturity makes relationship sweeter . Those who have lost a love through divorce or death may experience a soul mate relationship in the second half of their lives understanding that with loss comes a gain if you are willing to look for it.

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Ageing and Marriage

Growing Old Together

No age comes without challenges. When we first married my husband had just been discharged from the navy. Three months later he enrolled in college. I taught school. Marriage and family have always been top priority for us. Like most people, we went into marriage with some unrealistic expectations.
Learning to live with someone different from you is a huge challenge. Making it from payday to payday was another challenge. Savings did not exist. We were on our own. Our parents had no money and could not help. We learned how to get along with what we had.

Mid-life Crisis

Middle age is a time of transition and evaluating. Usually finances have improved. You may question sacrifices you believe you are making. You wonder how much time you have left and how much of your bucket list have you crossed off. Some people blow up their marriages by having an affair or letting their family know they are gay. It is hard to begin again, but you learn from experience if you stay open to learning.
When our children all reached school age I decided to go back to college and get a masters degree in Counseling Psychology. Everett was supportive. It paid off in many ways. We both learned more about ourselves and each other. We worked together with our children to help them go to college. We got through the "empty nest" syndrome.

Aging is the Biggest Challenge

The future becomes shorter and shorter while life together grows sweeter. You no longer feel in control of staying together forever while anxiety about the future increases. You live with losses; hearing, vision, agility, keen memory, friends, family, and even decreased sexual activity.
There are also pluses. If you have spent time working on understanding and accepting yourself and the relationship, this is pay-off time. Gone are the conflicts over routine tasks; who does the dishes, makes the bed, cleans the toilets, pays the bills, etc. In evolving soul mate relationships those things have probably been worked out by the time the Kids have gone. You are comfortable with yourself and your mate. In the beginning you liked each other. In time you truly love each other, but after years together you adore each other.
To love and be loved like that is the ultimate achievement in life. Deep, satisfying love as life runs its course can come to anyone at any stage of life if two people want it and are willing to do what it takes. Don't forget. God is love and having God in your life is the biggest blessing of all.

How Do You Handle Change and Loss?

What You Can Control

You cannot control everything that happens, but you are responsible for your reactions to what happens to you. If you become rigid, defensive, and stuck, you will experience deterioration and disorder. If you stay open to grieving losses and use your energy to grow, you can transform a loss into a gain. Avoid becoming victim and trying to get others to rescue you.

Gains Can Include Losses

Sometimes changes that appear to be gains can also include losses that need to be recognized. The summer I got married, I had planned a trip to Europe with a friend. Giving up the trip was difficult. Eight years later my husband had a job transfer to Germany. We lived there for two and a half years and traveled extensively.

I started my career as a teacher. My husband went to college while I taught school. I became active in teachers' groups and eventually became President of the Sanger Elementary Teachers Association. My husband's graduation and the birth of our first child occurred simultaneously. My husband got a job in Sacramento. The move meant a loss of my career, the loss of friends and of having an important place in the community, the loss of our church, the loss of bringing in income. The new baby, although a joy and very much wanted, brought a loss of freedom to go and come as I pleased. It was very difficult and I went through all the stages of grieving.

Learning from Change

I learned. I found strengths I didn't know I had. I did a lot of introspection. I learned the importance of relationships and how to communicate better. I had always wanted to write. This was the perfect time to explore that interest and see if I could write for publication. I took a class on how to sell what you write. I used my family as models. Eventually I wrote a book, "How to Keep the Family That Prays Together From Falling Apart." That led to doing workshops on parenting and then to an interest in going back to school to get my degree in Counseling Psychology. I have been a psychotherapist for more than 30 years. I have come to realize that every loss in life can be a stepping stone to greater learning and maturity.