Diet and a Happy Marriage

One of the items that my wife and I have talked about a lot is our diet and fitness.  These are items we talk about because early in our marriage, about a half year into it, my wife expressed about how drastically I had changed.  All of that change was from a poor diet.  Some people will say this is our vanity, I would say it is taking care of yourself.  When I was in the Navy, one of my fellow sailors had a saying that unfortunately is hard to disprove.  "Being healthy is dying at the slowest rate possible."  After I got out of the Navy and didn't have to exercise by force, I kind of took this saying to heart.  When my wife got over here, she had trouble identifying me because of how much weight I put on.

While we both work at the fitness, the bigger part of how we feel is our diet.  My wife spends a lot of time planning and cooking the meals.  We are pretty sure that it saves money, but the bigger benefit is that we limit how much of the junk we eat.  This is beneficial because it really helps out with not having to go to the gym as much.  While my disposition is such that I could easily see myself in a very round pear shape, I am only a mild pear shape despite not going to the gym as often as I would like.  Also she likes that the meals that she is giving me is helping out with our overall health.

A side note is that I tend to agree with my wife that if I don't care about myself and how I look, and vice versa, then what is that saying a lot about how I feel for her.  We both work hard to be good partners for each other, and that includes every day decisions. 

In the long run we both agree that a healthy diet is best for the both of us and for the two of us to have a long happy relationship.  Hard times will come and hard times will go, but we look out for each other and plan to for a long time.

Help-Marriage!

PS, wish we had that nice of oven in the second picture.

Is Age a Major Issue?

A couple weeks ago I was looking at the forums and I found a post where a young lady was asking a simple question.   "I married a husband who was significantly older than me, and now I am finding myself fantasizing about other guys, what should I do?"  I thought about this for a while because I was thinking about it in the husband's point of view of what do you do if your wife presents you with this issue.  Which most likely she would not.  I say issue because I have a relative who did marry in this scenario, and last I talked to them, they were still happily married.  The major difference is the culture.  One is a traditional Asian culture, while the other is a more western culture.

Obviously the culture is a big part of it, but as I thought about it and moved away from the perspective of his point of view, I would probably be in the category of what did I do wrong, and never correct it for the better, I began to wonder if it was the seduction she was fantasizing about or was it actually lust.  I know that many seem to think of it as the same, but I tend to think that for the women it tends to be the seduction that they fantasize about.  The intimate attention from others, usually of the opposite sex.  While for men it tends to be the lust, the conquest per se.  

Overwhelmingly the advice on the forum was that people tend to grow at a certain pace, and that is why you should marry close to your age.  If you marry a person significantly older, then they have already experienced "life," and there is a portion of life that you will be missing because of that.  I believe that there is confusing mixture in the middle of experience and also of care for each other that results in a happy marriage.  This confusing mixture works when both members of the relationship have decided to give the relationship their everything and are willing to do what is necessary for their significant other.

At times both parties will be greedy and want what they want, but overall, if the two parties have decided to give it their all, then they will work things out.  Going back to the question above.  The major issue I see is the inability of one spouse being able to bring up their lack of fulfillment in the relationship, while the other, who has been through it all is satisfied with their relationship and doesn't think about what their spouse may want.  This is similar to the saying that was given during my wife and I's marriage counseling prior to our wedding, and that is the hardest goal for a couple is to keep the dating life as long as possible.  It takes both members of the relationship to keep that going.  After the dating life, then most couples just settle into a life of the status quo.  Raising the kids, going to and from work, and other menial tasks.  This is why many of the articles about relationships go back to expressing your love for one another, because the status quo is the easiest trap to fall into, and also the hardest trap to get out of.  Additionally it is only one or two misspoken words till the relationship is falling apart.

As always feel free to interject.  help-marriage.

Traditional Roles vs What's important.

As I was growing up, one of the phrases I had heard was a man marries with the hope of nothing changing, while a woman will marry with what she could change him to.  Another way to say this is that a woman marries with the idea of her spouses potential, while a man marries with the hope to not have anything change.  Obviously this is not always the case in today's society because of the expanded roles of women in society, but I think it still happens often.  Even in the older societies this was not always the case and sometimes resulted in disappointment.  There is an article about this here, and it is a long read, but the marrying for potential is actually the number 1 item to avoid.  I am glad that I did find a woman that is good with who I am, but at the same time she does gently push me to extend my limits.

This goes along with a recent study about the marriage trends in society.  Traditional marriage trend is that the woman will marry across and up, while the man will usually marry across and down.  Researchers have noted that as more women get to the top, they are also doing like the men and marrying across and down.  Along with that is the increase in the number of men that are looking for women that already have an established income.

I'm from a more traditional family, and one of the items we were taught from my dad was that it was the man's job to support the family.  This is why there was a heavy emphases on getting a good job with benefits and working the way up in the job ladder.  In current times, I concede that this is a discussion for spouses, because it is possible now that the wife may be making more than the husband and may have better benefits.  Either way it is something for consideration, especially if there are plans for having a child in the relationship.

I emphasize the child because one of the worst things I think could be done is to let the child be raised by the day cares and the schools.  If the husband and wife do this then they are putting some of the child's most formative years of education into the hands of total strangers.  After a while the parent's may be wondering where did they get these ideas, but they gave up their upbringing of the child by handing them off to others.  I do think there is value to a housewife, or husband, because of the ability to actually raise and educate the children.

These are my thoughts feel free to comment.

Help-Marriage.

Is Support Set Up to Help the Married Couple

I saw a news report recently that was about a married couple who have a daughter that has a rare disease, Wolf-Hirschhorn Syndrom, and they have to care for her full time.  The highlight of this article was that the couple was considering divorce so that they could get more financial aid to pay for their daughter.  For the location the father was making a reasonable salary, however after the medical bill, it left them in a very fragile situation.

Then there is a couple that I knew from several years back, and that couple had split up.  After the split up, saw a post on Facebook from the ex-wife about how she got her degree, and it was something that her ex-husband wouldn't let her do.  All the while she was still taking care of two kids.  I commend her on getting the degree, but I do wonder if there was financial aid that she was now allowed to get that before she couldn't.  I don't think I'll ever find out that answer, but I strongly suspect that there was because of what my brother has been going through to try and get a degree.

One of the most dangerous things that our government has set up is the social safety nets.  This is dangerous because all people love free stuff, and it is even better when the free stuff provides you a minimal level for your quality of life.  After California passed a law raising the minimum wage, there were reports of people asking for reduced hours so that they would not lose certain tax credits.  My family members who did work in tax preparation had first hand experience of people asking where their dependents were so that they could get their tax credit (they had no children by the way).

Many of the social safety nets are set up to go away after a certain income.  Also they do not always correct for married or not married, or the correction is so small that it is unreasonable.  That is why like in the case of the first story, the couple is considering divorcing.  This is very damaging to our culture because it makes it more valuable to not be married than it is to be married, and results in the children seeing it as marriage does not have the value that it once did.  I do have co-workers who basically live a married life, but they choose not to get married.  Most the time the reason is financial.

Hopefully in the future we will push to have the actual value of marriage recognized and the safety nets adjusted accordingly, but till then, this is what we have.

An Unfortanate Situation for a Cat

I went up to my parents house the start of September, and while I was there I got a chance to get acquainted with the cats that were there.  I didn't get too acquainted with them because I had my dog with me, and as expected they were not too eager to meet Musashi, my dog.  While I was there I ran into a rather unfortunate cat who was called Polio.  I later found out that he was called Polio because when he showed up he looked like he had been a victim of polio.  If not for the injuries he would have been a really good looking cat, much like the one below.

Polio was a rather sweet cat that was three paws into his death bed.  By the time I saw him, he was already looking for a place to die in comfort.  Everyone who lived there, knew that they should take him in and put him down, but no one had the money or heart to do it.  They all knew this because he was past the point of being able to groom him self, he had a club foot, possibly from being hit by a car, and his teeth were literally rotting out.  Most people knew when he showed up because that was when the flies became more abundant.

While I was there, he did try to move inside once.  I got a few scratches from taking him back outside.  Aside from that, he mainly was looking for attention.  Most of the time he was pushed away because everyone was repulsed at his condition.  However they were not repulsed enough to let him starve.

I asked my mom about his background, and to her knowledge, he acted like he had a home, but was left outside and got injured and was then just abandoned.  He would show up, go away, and then show up some time later.  Eventually he just kind of kept on staying.  Most likely because they were too kind to let him starve.

A couple days after I left, Polio disappeared for a couple days.  The next time they saw him was in the backyard in front of the shed, already stiff.  He now does have a resting place, and I hope a better situation than he had before.  Unfortunately reminding me once again about the saying, "pets are here to remind us of our own mortality," I would also add to remind us to love them while we can.  This was my one time to see him, and I am glad that I did, even if he was in a miserable condition.

A Pleasant Encounter

Some time ago my wife and I went out to a Mexican restaurant and had a wonderful talk with the bartender.  It was a very pleasant because of how well he was committed to his family and also that him and his wife had been together for over thirty years.

One of the parts that was surprising was that he had actually met his wife long before they got married.  He would help her grandmother with doing some shopping and had first met her when he was still under ten.  They got married relatively young by most standards, right around 18, and had a child right away.

All the while he was taking care of his family while working most the time as a bartender.  I'm not even sure if you could pull that off starting today.  The two of them did have some misfortune along the way.  There were complications with the second child and the child did not make it.  After this they decided not to try for anymore children.  Along the way he decided not stop drinking.  This was because of all the times that he saw people doing stupid things while working.  Also he encouraged his family to do the same.  They went through their share of other problems like money.  In the end he did say that the hardest was losing the child for them.

By far the best part I liked is despite problems and challenges, the two of them stayed together throughout the entire time.  I have already seen so many of the people I know who have called it quits and gone their separate ways through divorce.  I wish them a many more years together.

A Trip to Remember

Not to long ago my wife and I went on trips.  She took her mom back to Japan while I went up to visit my parents in Washington State.  My trip went much smother than her's but there was much drama because of her trip.

As I said in a previous post, I am spending a lot of time trying to get my mother in law back up to good walking condition.  We use a chair to assist her in moving around for longer distances, but that is only good in places where there is a long distance to navigate, and they let you take the chair.  This led to the first and most time consuming part of her stressful trip.  While on the plane, my mother in law fell down and broke a couple bones.  Fortunately there was an ex Emergency Medical Technician on board and was able to help her.  Also this got her a free upgrade to business class from some generous passengers, free as in at the expense of her arm.

Along the trip, the super typhoon Jebi was present almost the entire way.  So this resulted in very little calm flight and much rain.  She had to work with the lawyer about meeting times because her mom was in the hospital.  While she was there in Tokyo, the next part of the trip was put in jeopardy because of the largest recorded earthquake in Hokkaido.  A day and a half before her flight to Sapporo, New Chitose airport was reopened.  Up till then the two of us had been talking about how to go about rescheduling and if the airline would recognize a natural disaster as a reason to need a reschedule, especially if it is on a flight not attached to the first ticket.  Fortunately we did not have to find out.

All this while my in laws were in Sapporo without utilities or water for three days.  Fortunately they had a supply of bottled water.  On a previous trip I had gotten frustrated at the lack of a working flashlight.  This light was the only working light they had for the three days without power and water.  Also found out about a cool lantern trick after the fact.  Place a water bottle on top of a flashlight to get it to act like a lantern.  My wife made it to Sapporo, and my mother in law also made it.  Luckily there in Sapporo not much stuff got knocked down so there wasn't any cleaning up for them.

Monday my wife made the trip back and I picked her up in Portland.  Something I had not been paying attention to, but it was still happening in the background was that the Shasta area of northern California was burning.  We missed that by half a day.  The I-5 was reopened the morning before we went through the area, and the only restriction was no trucks with flammable loads were allowed.  While passing through we got several great pictures of the burned out forest.  All the while our dog patiently waited out the trip sleeping in thee back seat.