Posted By: avflox on

Thursday, July 10th, 2008, 9:25 pm

The fairy tale is over: Shania Twain is splitting from her husband, Robert "Mutt" Lange. Wait, don’t slam your browser down on me, I'm going somewhere with this (I'm only a scandal monger when I have the details).

Canadian country singer Twain and record-producer Lange have been married for fourteen years. The couple met at Fan Fair in 1993, after Lange heard her debut album and hit up her record label for Twain's number. They married six months later and many criticized the move as an attempt by Twain to further her career.

In response, Twain wrote what would become her first Billboard 100 top ten hit, the Grammy Award-winning song, "You're Still The One."

It almost feels like the end of an era. OK, fine, a decade. I was fifteen when the song came out ten years ago. I had been involved with a few boys, but I was just starting my first significant emotional relationship. I remember seeing the music video and thinking, "one day, I will have that. One day, I will meet a man and fall in love and we will live happily ever after." You know, the stuff Disney told us with every movie during our formative years.

"And they lived happily ever after," is a convenient end for a writer.

In the preview for the Sex And The City movie, New York's favorite single gal, Carrie, is seen reading a bedtime story to her friend Charlotte’s daughter.

"'Cinderella and the prince lived happily ever after,'" she reads, then pauses. "You know, things don't really happen like this in real life, I just think you should know now."

The movie promises a twist to the traditional happy ending, hinting--not at all subtly--at perhaps a more realistic conclusion. I don't buy it. Sex And The City hasn't had its stilettos on the ground since the book (if then--bear with me).

Sequel or no sequel, the writers will make it work in the end like a proper Disney story.

Because reality, for all the "reality" TV on our televisions, doesn't sell very well. How many of us didn't detest Téa Leoni’s character in Spanglish? She’s too real, too messy, and hits too close to home. We gravitated toward Paz Vega's Flor, whose mentalité is nothing like that of most of us, no matter how much like our mothers we have become.

I think we need less stories about what happens between the first kiss and the altar and more about what happens after that, before the reconciliation or divorce court.

I came into marriage completely unprepared. I had no idea what I was getting into. I really thought nothing would change, that the title of wife was just that: a title. I thought my relationship would remain exactly the same as it was, with just that and a few other minor differences.

I didn't know better. I mean, I had nothing to go by. Carrie ends up with Mr. Big. And they live happily ever after, obviously. Right?

I had a pretty good example of a stable marriage. My mother and father are still together. Divorce, for the most part, is uncommon in my family. But there are a lot of fairy tales there. Deep valleys of hardship are suffered alone and left undiscussed. Trouble in a marriage, you see, is a dirty, shameful thing.

It's not like a divorce where you can point fingers, go insane, even make a video and put it on YouTube about how horrible your ex is (which, while tacky, it isn't shameful, especially not when you are the lover scorned). But when you're still together, expressing your concerns on issues could tarnish your partner and, by grace of union, you. So we say nothing.

Essentially, we are fighting the biggest battles, climbing the tallest towers and slaying the meanest dragons in silence. I think we need an attitude adjustment.

Maybe if we talk more openly about what's really going on in our heads and in our marriages, we'll find a more successful way to truthfully communicate to our partners as we make our way through the uncharted territory that is the Gen Y marriage.

And maybe then Gen Z will be able to stand on the shoulders of giants, see further, plan better, know better and, who knows, maybe actually live happily ever after.

Tags: love, relationships, divorce, marriage

Posted By: avflox on

Thursday, July 10th, 2008, 9:07 pm

"Sex and the twin cities!" screams a special on the Rock 106. "It's the hottest new ladies' night in town! From 5:00 PM 'til 9:00 PM in the bar and out on the patio, ladies get all premium martinis for just $3.99! Don’t worry guys! You get to be Mr. Big!"

Listening as we drive through Louisiana feels like going back in time, both because of the unfamiliar setting and because of the allusion to Sex and the City.

Sex and the City changed a generation. Not because it opened the eyes of women and helped them embrace their sexuality but because, in ending with all four protagonists coupled up, the show confirmed what all the so-called Single and Fabulous! women of the late 90s and early 00s had feared all along: that the exclamation point after Single and Fabulous is a cruel question mark.

It caused an incredible backlash: from sitcoms like Desperate Housewives and Army Wives, where the emphasis is on married women and mothers, to reality fests like Bridezillas and The Real Housewives of Orange County, we can’t seem to get enough of the kind of women we spent over half a decade mocking (cue Miranda: "I’m telling you, married people are the enemy").

But the cultural shift is not just happening inside out TVs--it's outside the window, too. Lizzy Ratner writes in The New York Observer: "recent years have seen a breed of ambitious, twentysomething nesters settling in the city, embracing the comforts of hearth and home with all the fervor of characters in Middlemarch. This prudish pack--call them the New Victorians--appears to have little interest in the prolonged puberty of earlier generations. While their forbears flitted away their 20's in a haze of booze, Bolivian marching powder, and bed-hopping, New Vics throw dinner parties, tend to pedigreed pets, practice earnest monogamy, and affect an air of complacent careerism. Indeed, at the tender age of 28, 26, even 24, the New Vics have developed such fierce commitments, be they romantic or professional, that angst-ridden cultural productions like the 1994 movie Reality Bites, or Benjamin Kunkel's 2005 novel Indecision, simply wouldn't make sense to them."

Arts eschewed by recent generations such as cooking, gardening, home decoration and bathroom renovation have made a full-force comeback. Martha Stewart made a grave error, but the most important thing is that she makes great gravy.

"Such concerns tend to occupy a good plot of space in the New Victorian mind," writes Ratner, "crowding out more troublesome notions like 'Why are we in Iraq?' or even 'Why I am attracted to my best friend’s husband?' (The adultery-filled pages of John Updike’s best novels now seem like dispatches from a foreign land. One need only mention the word 'affair' in the chatroom pages of Urbanbaby.com to get quickly excoriated as a 'home wrecker'; the New Victorian morality is not one that permits nuance or discretion.) Single people are to be pitied--that is, if their existence is even acknowledged."

This return is part of something bigger, a sort of massive hangover after a decade of Sex and the City antics. The martinis, shoes and game of musical beds of Single and Fabulous! was a momentary fix to the powerful Reality Bites-induced existential crisis of the early 90s. It gave us a sense of purpose.

The names of the boys and bars and even fave drinks and designers change. But the storyline is the same. Suddenly, Single and Fabulous! starts to fall apart. You see the wrinkles under the flawless makeup and the sagging, less flexible skin. "Single and Fabulous!" you scream at the mirror, spilling a little vodka on the cheap dresser you bought off eBay a few years ago after you got tired of putting your make-up on top of cardboard boxes. It's so hard being a working woman in a not-so-fabulous job and having a closet full of fabulous shoes and going out every night! Single and Fabulous!

Single and fabulous?

"I don't think anyone drifts for the sake of drifting anymore," says Anya Kamenetz, 26, the Yale-educated author of Generation Debt. "There's much more of a purposeful zigzagging. It's very much like, 'I'm going to check off this list of things.' And it might be the same things that my older brother and sister did when they were out of college, but they did it with this aimlessness and relaxation, while we do it with a sense of the life course and 'what are you going to accomplish?'"

What, indeed, I couldn't help but wonder.

"They say nothing lasts forever," comes Carrie’s answer from the trailer for Sex and the City: The Movie. "Dreams change, trends come and go…" and with all the shots of her in Mr. Big's arms and one half of the cast tending to toddlers, it looks like Single and Famous! is out like last season's Louboutins.

Tags: love, relationships, marriage

Posted By: bethlivi on

Tuesday, July 1st, 2008, 2:33 pm

I am attempting to recruit participants for my dissertation research. I am posting an invitation to participate in my dissertation research. I am studying how partners negotiate the things that need to get done in their home and work lives. A description can be found at the link below:

http://www.bethlivingston.net/Second_Shift_Study_1.pdf

A link to the first of the three surveys is here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=4N890EOXCDULBhbGEnKAbA_3d_3d 

If you are married or living with your girlfriend/boyfriend, and you'd like to help me out, I'd be eternally grateful. In general, you're being asked to fill out three surveys, two weeks apart, each of which will take you around 30-45 minutes. Your partner should do the same if at all possible (but if he cannot, please feel free to still participate). The first link above explains everything in detail.

I think you'll find the questions and process interesting, and I'll be happy to share my findings with you upon the conclusion of the study. 

I'll also give each couple a summarized analysis of their responses, with consent.

Please feel free to forward the introduction link above to anyone you know who may be interested in participating in this study, regardless of their ages or occupation.

Thanks!

Tags: research, work, marriage

Posted By: illinimomof2 on

Wednesday, June 11th, 2008, 2:38 pm

You would never believe that I am living this life.  We are both successfull college educated individuals and yet my husband can not kick the cocaine habit, even though he is in jeopardy of loosing his family.  I thought things were getting better and yet he used again and got himself kicked out of rehab and now thinks he can do it on his own. 

 I have a new born, and I am physically and emotionally worn out.  All I ever hear is that this is the last time, I love you and I don't want to loose you.  For me this is it.  Living on my own has got to be better than living like this.  Is there hope??  Does anyone out there have any suggestions on how to move on, to forgive and most importantly learn to trust?  Does trust ever really come back?

Tags: wife, marriage, mother, hope, cocaine

Posted By: spbynikkih on

Monday, April 28th, 2008, 1:26 pm

Last night I attended a "women" only sex talk that our pastors wife was doing.  I attended because, while my own sex life is great, I was curious to see what she had to say.  I have been doing "romance parties" (Slumber Parties) for over 2 yrs.  While many church goers know what I do (heck I make several deliveries at church each week) there are always the "You're going to heck quot; people too.  I've also come across many women here in the Bible Belt that feel sex is only for the man.  She is not to enjoy any of it.  

The pastor's wife went into several scriptures talking about how everything in the marriage bed is sacred (minus homosexuality, adultry, etc).  Some of the women were shocked as she continued to tell them to enjoy their husbands...anything goes! 

She went on to say that God created sex.  He isnt up there covering his ears like a little school boy.  One of his first conversations with Adam was a sex talk..."Be fruitful and multiply".  He gave us a clitoris for one reason....PLEASURE!!!!  That is the only purpose of the clitoris.  God made it..enjoy the pleasure it brings you!

She made the point that churches should be telling their congregation to enjoy sex,not act like it is a "dirty little secret" that married couples do.  We all know if you arent giving it to him, there is someone else out there that will.  You should want to crave him, ravish him...that is what God intended. 

If couples took the time to fully enjoy the gift of sex with their partner, then just think of how relationships would grow.  Trust, the feeling of being wanted and loved.  There would not be the need to go outside of the marriage.

I've had 7 women tell me that coming to my presentations have opened their eyes when they see the preachers wife or little Miss Suzy that teaches Sunday school buying creams and lotions for the bedroom!  Seven women on the verge of divorcing their husbands because they did not want to meet their husbands sexual needs in fear it would offend the Lord.  They should never hold back sex from him or vise versa.  Because we all know that if you aren't giving him the attention, some one else will.

God created sex!  Tonight DEVOUR your husband and ENJOY him!  God wants you to!!!!!!  See how your relationship changes with your husband.  Watch your relationship flourish with trust and a new kindled love!

Women have to know that it is ok!  Enjoy it!

There's lots of fun ways to incorporate sex into your lifestyle! 

http://www.slumberpartiesbynikkih.com/

Tags: bible, relationship, marriage, sex, intimacy