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Find time to nurture your marriage

When time and energy are in short supply, couples may neglect one of the most crucial ingredients for a strong marriage: giving your spouse your undivided time and attention.

Judith Schaffer, MA, LMFT, a marriage and family therapist at Aurora's Bayshore Counseling Center, sees many couples whose lives are so busy that the only time they really talk to each other is in counseling sessions. 

"Our culture glorifies personal fulfillment and the value of the individual to such an extent that the relationship may become secondary," she said. "One current mode of couples therapy gets spouses to look at how their behavior either nurtures or harms their marriage. Often this requires them to examine how competitiveness, resentment, and other negative emotions could be sabotaging the relationship."

An article in the current Atlantic Monthly discusses several new books that address the exhaustion of contemporary working parents and the single-minded focus on children that characterize many modern marriages. The author notes that "For many couples childrearing has become not merely one aspect of marriage but its entire purpose and function," citing the complex schedule of soccer games and after-school activities that have replaced the carefree, unstructured childhood of the past.

Couples who don't find ways to meet one another's intimate emotional needs are at far greater risk of divorce or a marriage that falls short of the mutually gratifying partnership that it's meant to be. "Devoting time to one another does not mean neglecting your kids," says Schaffer. "On the contrary, maintaining a strong, loving marriage is the greatest gift you can give to your children . . . and yourselves." Find time to nurture your marriage