Relationship Improvement

mozzarella

New Member
How come there are so many threads about problems in marriages and inlaws but none about improving relationships?

It's always a mystery to man and women what the other sex really wants and has on the mind and wat do they mean when they respond a certain way. Since we have lots of old boys and young girls here why not learn from each other and find better ways to communicate and build a rs with our partners.
 


Actually I find learning other ppl's problems and trying to avoid them in your r/s is a form of improvement
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I agree with hippo2002!

Think being truthful and loving each other family is important as well. Probably learning how to re-love will bring the passion back. I am trying to teach my fiance how to re-love and hope he understand the meaning of re-love through my effort.

My method of re-loving is to reminicising how we met, how we fell in love, our first date, first kiss, first bouquet of flowers, first gift and lotsa fun stuffs we had been through. Also, we talked about why we quarrel and how we came into agreement and move on.

Anyone have better method to re-love? My fiance is my number x bf and all my previous relationships don't last more than 10 months. We are having our 2 year anniversary soon and i realise that once every few months i will feel like falling in love with him over again.
 
cow cow,

That's very sweet what you are doing now.
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But do be aware that there are only so many times you can repeat what you are doing. If you over-do it, you run the risk of living in the past rather than accepting the reality of the present.

In other words, your definition of "re-loving" only works if it is used sparingly, like icing on the cake. When a couple go through the dating process, it is often the honeymoon period. Everything seems to go very well where you try consciously or subconsciously to show only your good side. Nothing seems too big to handle. That's the danger.

In any relationship, even for a married couple of 10,20,30 or more years, they will tell you the initial stages of meeting and knowing each other is probably the best part. So if you keep replaying this stage of your relationship, of course everything will seem so nice.

But the real test is after the marriage. Unfortunately for some, they realize after the dust has settled that they are not compatible. Or that the marriage is not what they make it out to be. That's when the Big D comes in. In this case, "re-loving" will not help at all.

My advice is that you should be truthful to each other about how you feel. If there are any differences or problems you foresee, bring it up and try to solve it together. Be prepared that it may not end with a solution and that you have to leave the person. But at least, you know you have tried and it's better to leave early based on the the mutual differences that exist during courtship, rather than wait too late after marriage to break up.
 
Hi David,

Thanks for your advice! Actually my fiance and I are quite unique couples. I mean.. we don't start the relationship like any other normal couples. Not sure if this is good or bad.. Actually thinking back stuffs and cracking our heads to recall is already part and puzzle of our life... It will kinda like bring the "wow" back into our life and sometimes we will be surprised with the things we had done and say things like "did we do that?" Hahaha!

Think it is also how one mature with the relaitonship. I once read from a magazine that sometimes people will adopt the hobby of their partners and personally i think its quite true. I gotta say, my fiance and i are 2 very different people. Over time, we slowly grew to like each other's hobby and are very happy over it. One of the example is he had influenced me to watch Hollywood serial (which turns out i am crazier than he is over certain serials) while i influenced him to watch HK serials.

The way we solve our problems really work for us but I am not sure if this will work for all couples. My fiance have a cooler head than me and when things get heated, he will bring out why we quarrel, my point of view and his point of view. Then we will start explaining our views in calm and cool tone, trying our best not to allow emotions overcome us. This is really very hard for me since my emotions will run and tears will flood my face. Still, we talk things out in the civilized way. For this way of settling our disagreement, we don't bring any hatred or anger over night.

Understand that there will be differences since we are both individual human beings with our inbuilt characteristics since birth. I believe it is how we work our way out. My grandmother and grandfather are very different in terms of age, character and nationality but their marriage last till death do them part and they still love each other alot. I remember seeing my grandmother waking up in the midle of the night after my grandfather passed away and told me that she dreamt of him with tears swelling in her eyes. It was one thing which i did not understand since i was young then. Also, I don't see my grandparents talking much to each other. Any way, since i am the one posting in the forum, it does seems like i put in effort to maintain the relationship but in actual fact my fiance did his part as well. To sum up, think a relationship is how 2 parties maintain it and make it work.
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Hi cow cow,

I really envy you. I really don't hv the kind of luck to hv such a husband. He doesn't communicate, and will never think why I am angry with him. He thinks my hobby is ridiculous, even the things I do and never ask why I do things in a certain way. He has never showed any interest in what I do, instead I'll try to understand what he is doing but I hv given up cos he does not care how I feel. He feel that buying dinner for me is showing concern to me but I don't translate that as concern.

Really couples like you and yr husband are very rare, really good to know that there are couples who can share mutual trust and hobbies as well. I am just one of those with problems and I belong to the common ones. My sis, my mum don't hv a great marriage like yrs but they just accept it. I really regretted marrying, I shld hv opened my eyes bigger and observe more abt my husband. Now with 2 kids, it's really hard to leave the marriage. Honestly, I lost faith in marriage after being married for 4 yrs.

My mum is not happy in her marriage, sometimes she feels ok, other times she really felt really unhappy. Seeing my parents like that, I really hope my marriage will be better, I thought communication is the best way to make marriage work but I married someone who do not need to talk. I tried emailing, sms and talking face to face but to no avail. I wrote how I feel, but he just seems unaffected and think that everything is ok. I really don't know what to with this person. I feel cheated, cos during courtship he was not like that or I must be blinded by love at that time. Communication needs 2 way, I give up now cos the marriage is wearing me out emotionally, mentally and physically. Really like to see more of these positive threads.

Sorry for being a dampener here, with all my problems.
 
Hi Ping Ping,

I am actually not married yet. In fact i am engaged to my fiance by just a sentence. Not even a proper proposal (he said will make up to me). One afternoon he was telling me that all the good hotels are fully booked for this special date because his friend wanted that date and he said he actually wanted to get married on the same date. Boom! And from that moment, we were engaged.

Hmm.. I am not quite sure what can i say to make you feel better because at the start of my relationship with my fiance, we had already agreed that we will have to sort out whatsoever problem or unhappiness we have with each other. Being truthful really helps. He wasn't one who will express himself either but I explained to him the importance of communication. He slowly understood it and now we are very open to each other. Maybe you wanna start by telling your hubby why you get angry with him? I don't use to express my anger also but men are usually very stupid and they will never understand why women get angry. Think men will prefer us to convey our anger through words and they learn from there. But don't start with insult or sarcasm; it will hurt more. I am always very sacarstic when i get angry and my fiance hated it. He told me about my problem and that is how we learn to control our emotions when things get heated.

Actually, it is really good that your hubby buy you food. He probably think it is his responsibility and it is a kind of way to show his concern and love. For me, its the other way round. Every weekend, i will get my fiance food or at least we try to eat together on Sunday late morning.

Do you and your hubby read? One of the common hobby I share with my fiance is to read but we don't really read a common genre. I like thrillers or gore while he can read anything. Some times we will introduce each other the book we are reading. Recently, he had introduced me to golf while i introduced him to diving.

There are actually good and bad when we have common interest and we understand each other too well. Even though our relationship doesn't seem to be so long, we are aleady behaving like old couples. I know his every action and stuff which means there are no more surprises in my life as i can see through his every move. And that goes vice versa.

There must be something that had attracted you to your Hubby during courtship. It will always be there and how the both of you grow from that attraction. For my case, its my planning and my fiance cool headedness. Take for example our wedding stuffs. He knew that I only need a small ceremony with no banquet involved but due to his family tradition, we cannot avoid the banquet at all. Even though it is my part to give way, he handed me the full authority to do all researches and decisions where he will only step in when it comes to payment or when I cannot decide due to the million choices i have on hand. Hehehehe.. he knew of my fickle mindedness and my last minute back out stuff.

Actually SG is a very small place and it can really get very boring during weekends. Since both of you already had 2 kids, you can try bringing them out for activities together? At the same time, treat it as a 4 people pat tor session? I don't have kids yet but this is what i learnt from my sisters. They try to go out and spend quality family time together or even travel overseas together.

Hopefully this helps and try to stay optimistic.
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Hi.. thanks for starting this thread. I do agree that sometimes after some time in the relationship, things turn stagnant. For myself, my boyfriend is a nice guy... but he lacks the initative to do things... such as giving surprises, sending flowers etc.. Sometimes, I do feel very disappointed especially I'm from the hotel sector, whereby you always surprise your guests through different means. Also, sometimes I feel what he tells me is not consistent. For example, he mentioned before to pay for gym membership to lose weight but didn't do it... I asked him if he'll get a car if kids come along next time.. he said he won't rule out the possibility but at times he will brush me off and said it's too expensive and he hates to drive (even though he has a license)..Career wise, I am alot more focused than he and I know what I want since the day I graduated. However, he is still feeling waters even though he is older than me. I long for a family oriented man who will take good care of me... hence, am not sure if I'm making the right choice. I am not being materialistic... but I need someone who can run the family...

Ping Ping: I'm sure your kids do bring you lots of happiness. I feel that kids can sometimes help strengthen a marriage = )
 
cow,
he laughed because he is digging out old threads waiting for pple like you to unknowingly start replying without realizing the TS is probably not reading it anymore.
 
there is a real estate saying, you profit when you buy, not when you sell. similarly, the success of a relationship depends more on picking the right person to be with than accommodating yourself to the wrong partner.

just throwing in a different perspective that's all. pick carefully and you don't have to work so hard at making the relationship work.
 
that's astute... most pple dun actually explore that... they choose to explore post-choice, but seldom their choice... maybe it's gotta do with not being able to admit that we made a wrong choice...
 
sometimes its when the individual did PICK carefully but yet her/his expectation changes and expect the other party to conform to her needs. well i guess rs there is a risk is not just choosing but also able to put one expectation on check.

e.g, gal expect her ex bf to be obama/some rich guy. that ridiculous rite. then when the rs failed, she tend say the guy can't make it.
 
mark, i think sometimes it isnt the expectation that changes, it could also bethat the 'expectation' that is picked carefully isnt compatible with the 'picked' partner.
 
Aiyo... I thought this thread died off le...

Milo.. I also realised the initial date of the post after i posted my reply... T_T
 
corleone, very good point. you want your partner to be mature, or set in his ways. with such a person, good or bad, you know what you are getting into. but if he is still growing into the person he will be, there is no guarantee what he'd become. in other words, your choice has no real basis.
 
Well often the selection is OKAY but the individual requirements upgrade. I have heard from many female friends saying, how come he cannot provide me all the financial needs. how come he never upgrade and improve.

U choose an apple and want it to grow into durian?
 
Maybe apple has thought that it were a durian and has portrayed itself as the king of fruits.....

As much as it is as important that we pick the right fruit (honestly, how many of us got it right the first time??), it is no less important that we stop hogging the fruit later when we realise that it is not the desired fruit.
 
when there is a problem then its is solved then that means we are improving lor.

every problem we have means improving.

no problem no gain.

hehehe.....

so there is no need to mention how to improve the relationship.
 

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