-
Welcome
To Women’s Online Magazine™
As a member, you can post your comments, join in a discussion, upload article/ video content and try out our advertisers' sample products!
The Speed of Trust
By Dr. Beth Erickson
Bestselling author, Stephen M.R. Covey, wrote a wonderful book called The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything. An M.B.A. and business consultant of worldwide renown, Covey, unapologetically talks about the importance of trust in a business context. He takes on the myths that trust is a soft topic and is too risky and potentially costly for businesses.
But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. He wrote at length about the multiple costs of low trust in businesses. Speed decreases, taking productivity in the same direction. Thereby, costs increase, as does corporate sabotage. Teamwork to produce high quality products is diminished and is replaced by cooperation to create a negative culture.
The Rising Tide of Family Disintegration: Making A Difference
As a marriage and family therapist for over 35 years, I am bullish on marriage, and I always have been. I try daily to save and strengthen marriages, the cornerstone of healthy families, productive and successful kids, and our democracy.
My most recent book called Marriage Isn’t for Sissies: 7 Simple Keys to Unlocking the Best Part of Your Life helps people improve and strengthen their most precious asset: their marriage. There is a growing body of evidence that affirms the need for social supports to be physically and emotionally well. And what better source for this than a relationship with a spouse who is a best friend.
(more…)
The Long Goodbye: Caring For Alzheimer’s Patients
Caring for an Alzheimer’s patient is perhaps second only in difficulty to tending to a chronically and persistently mentally ill loved one. In both cases, you never know if they are going to return to a state of sentience. And if they don’t, they are there but not there. Yet, they are not gone so caregivers can get on with life. In these instances, it is difficult for loved ones’ lives to normalize. The longer it goes on, the more family members wonder if they ever will.
What Is Normal Grief For Caregivers Of Alzheimer’s Patients?
Family caregivers experience an ambiguous loss of their loved one, where the patient is physically present but psychologically absent. These losses are very different from a clear cut loss that can be grieved so the caregiver can move on. It certainly feels like a loss, but it is not an actual one, in that there is no body to cremate or bury.
(more…)
Are You Emotionally Divorced?
It is a common misconception that people are divorced the moment the judge signs the legal documents. Not so. While they may be legally divorced, now comes the hard part. Being legally divorced is only relevant from a logistical standpoint. Yes, there is important paperwork that needs to be done.
The Social Security Administration and credit card companies need to be notified. One or both spouses need to move out. Time sharing guidelines for any children of the marriage need to be negotiated. Extended family members need to be told. There are myriad ways that each of you needs to begin to create a life apart from the other. But all of this doesn’t necessarily mean you will be divorced in the most important way: emotionally. Being emotionally divorced is a process that occurs over time.
(more…)
What You Can Learn about Relationships from Watching the Obamas
When Americans elected President Barak Obama, we did so for numerous reasons. His grace under the fire of the presidential debates. His charisma and ability to inspire hope in a grim time. His articulateness. His accomplishments. And his obvious intelligence.
Now that we Americans have elected him, we are the beneficiaries of an unexpected perquisite. President and Mrs. Obama provide a role model of a good marriage.
What does it take to make a good marriage? Current divorce statistics tell us that over 50% of Americans apparently don’t know. Those whose parents did not model an intimate, cooperative, and mutually supportive and satisfying marriage are disadvantaged. It’s hard to know what such a marriage looks like.
(more…)
Insulating Your Marriage from the Economic Downturn
The current economic situation will try not just your patience and your faith. But it also likely will put your marriage to the test. Is it possible to insulate your marriage from the effects of Wall Street greed and the havoc it has created? How can you keep your marriage from becoming a casualty of the current economic turmoil?
In broad brushstrokes, there are three basic types of responses couples have to the current economic turmoil – or any trying situation, for that matter. See if you recognize yourself.
You wall yourselves off from each other emotionally. You take their fears, and insecurities and go down inside with them, where your spouse is protected from or not able to be privy to them. Then your marriage is at risk of extramarital affairs, and you, or your spouse are subject to depression, substance abuse, and domestic violence in an attempt to manage your fears and frustrations. These “solutions,” of course, compound the problem.
You blame each other for your current situation, rather than taking responsibility for your part in the problem or in what might solve it. “If only’s” and “You should have’s” only lay down the gauntlet for fights. And they do nothing constructive to solve the problem(s) created by the current financial mess. Then your interactions usually result in conflict and accomplish nothing except greater desperation and isolation.
(more…)
