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.