Marriage

This week we started discussing marriage and marital intimacy. I didn't know much about this prior to this week but now I feel like I have a better understanding of what a healthy, successful marriage should be like. I obviously don't know for sure, but I have a better understanding anyway. We learned that the main thing that lowers marital satisfaction is the birth of the first and successive children. The couple becomes less satisfied with marriage when they start having children. This is a natural thing due to many factors. The couple has to deal with new challenges that involve more than just themselves. A couple is most dissatisfied with their marriage when their children are in their teens. After the first child leaves the nest, things get a little better. Their marital satisfaction increases successively as each child leaves the nest until they are all gone and the marriage is back to where it was before they had children. This is a generalized situation of course but a trend none the less. I think it is interesting how stresses make a marriage less satisfying but stress is good for us as humans. I also think it is interesting that the purpose of marriage is technically to have children and to raise them, but that is when it is the least satisfying to be married. Brother Williams made a list of the stresses that come with marriage and having the first child. He said that stress is natural and people naturally feel like pulling away from each other when stress arises. In fact, people are more likely to divorce in the 2nd to 5th years of marriage, usually after one or two children are born. Also, when children start leaving home. He went on to say that we don't want to do what is natural, we want to do what is divine. I know that God would not want us to pull away from each other when times get tough, but rather we should come closer together and learn together. If we can avoid those natural inclinations to pull away from one another in those stressful times then we have a better chance at a happy and successful marriage. I am obviously not an expert on this but what I learned this week makes sense to me and I would be willing to give it a shot when I get married.

Dating

This week I learned new things about relationships that I have not though about before. The most interesting thing that stuck out to me was the Relationship Attachment Model. It is basically the way people should go about doing things in their relationships to stay safe and to effectively learn about each other. The order of "operation" is to first know the person, trust them, rely on them, be committed to them, and then touching is allowed. You should know someone more than you trust them and you should trust them more than you rely on them and so on and so forth. Touching should be the least of them all. This is important in good relationships because I think the mental part is more important than physical satisfaction. You should be able to talk with them even before you start kissing and all that other stuff. Something I thought was cute that was said was, "there is no such thing as falling in love. Falling usually leads to injuries." We don't just fall for people. We get to know them and love them for the people that they are. At least that is how it should be. I also learned that dating has three p's. Dating should be planned, paid, and paired off. Otherwise it is just hanging out. There are also four steps to relationships. Dating, Courtship, Engagement, and Marriage. I think this is critcal to good relationships because people now days don't go through that process in the right order and things can get messed up that way. This class has really shown me not only that the world is losing it's morals but how and what ways that they are losing them.

Gender Roles

This week has  been very interesting. We have been discussing gender roles and the differences between men and women. I was shocked to find out that there are people out there who think that boys should be raised more like girls. Boys are usually raised to be tough and they don't show their emotions as much as girls. Some things that people were saying was that girls are given more love and care as children or that they get the more gentle side of the parents. This could be true but I think there is a natural reason for this. I don't think parents consciously think about raising their boys tougher than their girls. I think it comes naturally to them because that is how it is supposed to be. I think men are supposed to be different than women. The Lord made us that way for a reason. The trend now is to make men the same as women. I think by doing that we make it more socially acceptable to be homosexual. If there is no difference between men and women in society then there is no difference between them when it comes to getting married and raising children. Something that we talked about today in class was that people are saying that people are born gay or lesbian. That it is just a gene that some people get. I highly disagree with this. Children do not go around with the mind set that they like the same gender. They don't even know what the word gender means. For boys, there is usually a disconnect between them and their father which makes them feel like there is something wrong with them. They then begin to seek for affection from a male and end up being sexualized either by molestation or by pornography or otherwise. When their body responds to this they think that there has always been something wrong with them and that they must have always been gay. When it comes to homosexual females, they usually start out in a heterosexual relationship and find that it is too hard. They experiment with the other gender and find that it is much easier to be lesbian because females understand each other. I don't think God intended us to be homosexual. If He had then He would have given both genders the parts to procreate by themselves. In the Family: A Proclamation to the World it says that our gender is essential to our physical and spiritual identity. That man and woman have a divine purpose to love and care for each other as well as their children. That document is inspired of the Lord. I know that it is true. Anything or anyone that says otherwise does not know how much God loves us. Men have the responsibility to preside, protect and provide for a family while women have the responsibility to nurture and be the emotional support of a family. Children are to be raised under these divine principles.
Another thing I thought was interesting was an analogy that Brother Williams used to describe some families. He used a river to describe different kinds of personalities that make up a family. When a river is flowing, it carries things with it especially when the water is moving rapidly. When logs or sticks are in the river they usually flow with the water, pointy side forward because it creates less resistance. Then there are other times when the log is firmly stuck between both sides and things start to collect at that point. This log (or whatever it is, concrete, etc.) sometimes is strong enough to withstand everything that collects there and is pushing on it. This, in turn, purifies the water that comes after the block. This is like a family where there is a person who acts as a filter in their family. He said that sometimes they were put there by God to help the family out. He said that those kind of people would be considered a "savior". Not like the Savior of the World but a savior. They are willing to suffer for the good of others. It is amazing how different personalities help a family function (or not sometimes). There was so much that I learned this week that I can't remember all of it. I am not very good at summarizing either so I hope I get my points across.

Week 3

This week has been interesting. Alot of what I have been learning in my Family Relations class is matching up with what I have learned in my other classes that aren't even related. For example, earlier today I was reading in The Book of Mormon and I came across a scripture that I wasn't too sure what it meant. Later, I went to my Family Relations class and the scripture was clarified right before class ended. It was amazing to have that happen so quickly. The scripture I was confused about was 2 Nephi 1:6 where it is talking about the promised land and who will live there. It says that no one will come to this land (the promised land, probably the USA) unless they are brought here by the will and help of the Lord. In my family relations class, we did some role playing with the scenario of a Mexican family trying to come to the United States and the effects that has on a family. Some interesting stories came up about different experiences of this. I learned how every single family member can be effected by everything that happens to any of the family members. Anyway, the closing thought that our professor shared with us was that no one knows what people's circumstances really are. If someone is coming from a different country, you have no idea what they went through to get here or why they came. They could have been inspired of the Lord to come to a new country. Any harsh judgements you might have about them, you have no idea what it took for them to get to where they are. The family can get really messed up in stressful situations but with the Lord's help, relationships can mend and life can continue. At the beginning of this week we watched some video clips that really surprised me. They were all related to social status and the different levels that we place people on subconsciously. There was one woman in a video that lived in a trailer that was run down. She was a single mother of about four sons and she worked at Burger King. By her appearance she looked run down but she was willing to work for her family. She had to walk ten miles to get to work every day and people would yell at her from their cars and call her some naughty names. This woman was fairly satisfied with her way of life. She didn't really motivate her children to do better than her. One of her sons was different than the others. He wore nicer clothes and was ashamed of the way his family lived. He wanted a better life while his family was complacent. I couldn't help but feel bad for both the mother and her son. I was touched by this video and I wish I could help people in those situations. There were other videos that were interesting as well. One was of a woman being taught how to attract wealthy men. She looked about middle class and was having no success in finding a good man. When she learned how to dress and act like a wealthy woman she attracted wealthy men. It is interesting how our society puts labels on everyone without even realizing it. People from different social classes would get along just fine together if they didn't belong to a social class. I can't help but think of all the people we are missing out on meeting because of the barriers of social class. This week was full of things that got me thinking about how I can change my life to better include people of all kinds. The saying don't judge a book by its' cover has never before meant so much to me.