DO KIDS NEED PARENTS WHO LOVE EACH OTHER?

Many of us have an ailing marriage because we haven’t put in the effort to make it better.  We take our husbands for granted, we let his irritating habits loom larger than our love, our lives pass each other like ships passing in the night, with hardly a friendly toot in the passing.  Have we gotten out of the habit of nurturing our marriages?  Those little eyes and ears are picking up everything.  Do you like what you and your husband are teaching?

“Children are like emotional Geiger counters,” says E. Mark Cummings, psychologist at Notre Dame University.  Kids pay close attention to their parents’ emotions for information about how safe they are in the family.  How much more secure a child will feel when his parents love and treasure each other, encourage and pray for each other, than in a home filled with yelling, demeaning words, complaints and antipathy.

Remember when your spouse was your top priority?  You rearranged your schedules to be together, you had little surprises, you went out of your way to perform thoughtful gestures on his behalf.  I called my husband my Big Brown Bear and we traced “I love you” in each other’s hands with our fingers.  We loved to dance together, study together, take walks together, hold each other, and just be together.  It was like an extended commercial for Hallmark cards with everything in soft focus.  We knew love and trust could surmount any challenge.

Then we had kids.  My children are as lovely and magical as yours, but their incessant demands made focusing on my husband feel like a luxury.  “It’s the reality of many parents, especially moms, that the care of children leaves no energy, time, or even desire to invest in their marriage,” says Sheryl Kayne, who runs parenting workshops in Connecticut.  With dual careers and commitments, an endless list of extracurricular activities, and an infinite number of distractions (include Pinterest, Facebook, Dancing with the Stars), couple time often gets shelved.

So what?  The Center for Law and Social Policy found: “…studies support the notion that, on average, children do best when raised by their two married biological parents…  Research indicates that, on average, children who grow up in families with both their biological parents in a low-conflict marriage are better off in a number of ways than children who grow up in single-, step or cohabiting-parent households.”

Sociologist Paul Amato explains, “Specifically, compared with children who grow up in stable, two-parent families, children born outside marriage reach adulthood with less education, earn less income, have lower occupational status, are more likely to be idle (not employed and not in school), are more likely to have a non-marital birth (among daughters), have more troubled marriages, experience higher rates of divorce, and report more symptoms of depression…  Research clearly demonstrates that children growing up with two continuously married parents are less likely than other children to experience a wide range of cognitive, emotional, and social problems, not only during childhood, but also in adulthood.”

I know many of you are single mothers for one reason or another.  I applaud you while I hurt for you.  I know that sometimes divorce is a necessary answer to marital problems.  I have some suggestions for you at the end of this article. 

However, the research is clear: If we are concerned about elevating the well-being and life opportunities for children, we must be concerned about the health and strength of our marriage.

Pope Francis taught: “Dear parents, your children need to discover by watching you that it is beautiful to love another.”  Children watch their parents carefully, he said.  “They watch a lot and when they see that dad and mum love each other, the children grow in that climate of love, happiness and security.”  Children, he said, need to see their parents kiss each other, compliment each other, and resolve arguments peacefully.

Remaining a couple over the long term takes effort on both sides.  It requires commitment and compromise, communication and cooperation, especially as life tends to throw curveballs when we least expect them.  So what can we, as wives and mothers, do to cultivate a healthy marriage?

A. The most important starting point is for Mom and Dad to love and respect each other.  Why?  Because so much of the identity of our children is wrapped up in Mom and Dad.  So much of their security is knowing that Mom and Dad really love each other.

I heard about a lady who started keeping a list on her phone of all the things that her husband did that irritated her.  She planned to confront him with this huge list in order to make him want to change.  However, one day she realized that listing his faults was just chasing her love away.  It took a long time for her to click on “select all.”  It took another long time before she could make herself hit “delete”.  

But as soon as the list was gone, she felt a new love for her husband.  What she could have done next was start a list of all the things she appreciated about her husband.

It goes without saying that your kids need and deserve your love.  But, your husband needs to come first.  This is tough for some mothers to hear, but just about every relationship expert agrees.  Of course, there are times when a child’s immediate needs might come first momentarily, but ultimately the marriage bond has to be paramount.  When it’s the other way around, bad things happen.  When kids are the center of your universe, they grow up thinking they are the center of the universe.  They are likely to grow arrogant and self-centered.  This can cause real problems when they’re older and enter the “real” world.


Kids are so sensitive and observant, they pick up everything.  

And they model what we do.  If a boy sees his father treating his mother poorly, he is likely to believe that’s an acceptable way to treat women.  And if a girl sees her mother disrespecting her father, she’s more likely to disrespect all men.  Compare this to kids who see their parents expressing true love toward one another and what they will grow up believing.

Knowing that their parents are a united pair provides security.  As long as things are good with Mom and Dad, kids feel like they can face anything.

B. We need to realize that men are different than women.  We think differently, we have different priorities, we act differently, the same words mean different things to each of us.  And that’s a good thing.  But we will be in trouble if we expect our husbands to be the same as our girlfriends.  It works a whole lot better if we see their strengths and abilities in their differentness instead of bemoaning that they aren’t like us.  Men like to be appreciated and admired.  They are usually not good with expressing feelings.

C. We need to find out what makes them feel loved and then do it.  When my husband and I first married, I tried to show my love by fixing him elaborate meals.  One day I spent all afternoon making a peeled grape and pomegranate salad, because I loved him.  Did that make him feel loved?  He thoroughly enjoyed the meals I made, but it did not convey to him the love I felt.  What he wanted was to be touched.  He showed his love to me by giving me back rubs and foot rubs.  

Did that make me feel loved?  They felt great and I appreciated them, but that wasn’t what made me feel loved.  For me, it was acts of caring…when he helped me with the dishes, or offered to put the children to bed.  Once we discovered what made each other feel loved, we were better able to express our love in a way that felt like love.  Your husband’s love language may be words of love, or gifts, or something off the wall.  Learn what makes him feel loved.

D. Good old date night.  We need to spend time together.  “It requires effort to remain friends, lovers, and connected partners,” insists Kayne.  “The relationship you build with your partner creates the foundation for your family, so you want it to be a strong one.  You may think that your children will resent this time away from them, but when kids grow up knowing their parents love and make time for each other, it provides a sense of security that nothing else can.”

My son and his wife have six children.  They work to have time together.  Their weekly date night might just be a walk together, or a trip to the library or McDonalds.  Their children each have learned to make at least one dish and they get to plan and cook dinner for date night.  They feel a part in strengthening their parent’s marriage.  My son and his wife also have an annual “mini-moon.”  They have sit down dinners together.  When the children are in bed, they play games together. 

Sometimes my children would set up a fancy table complete with menu for my husband and I for special occasions and act as waiters and waitresses for us.

You can even be outrageous with each other.  Once I arranged a surprise over-night trip to Catalina.  We couldn’t afford a hotel, so we camped.  I made a picnic lunch to eat on the boat over.  We still remember that weekend.  Another time, I took belly dancing classes and made a costume so I could perform (in private) for him.  I probably shouldn't have told you that, but it was fun.

E.  Be affectionate with each other.  Hold his hand, hug, kiss, laugh and be silly, baby him when he’s sick, say “I love you”.  This non-sexual affection is a nice reminder that Mom and Dad really love each other.  But keep it PG.  Save the sexy stuff for when you two are alone.

“When a child grows up in a home that is loving in many ways—through physical touch, kind words and deeds, thoughtful acts of service for one another—they will naturally be drawn to a life partner who holds these qualities,” says Day.  “It will become the child’s barometer for what a spouse should be because it is what he knows.”

F.  Argue in a healthy manner.  Not healthy is name calling, insults, threats of abandonment, threats of violence, hitting, pushing, avoidance, walking out, sulking, withdrawing, anger and hateful feelings.  Everyone can see those are destructive to a relationship.

I was blessed to have a marriage where my husband never raised his voice to me, never demeaned me.  We never fought. He was nice.  I was nice.  Maybe too nice.  We didn’t want to hurt each other’s feelings so we didn’t talk about what was bothering us.  And nothing got better.

“Showing our children how to handle conflict effectively is one of the greatest gifts we can give them,” insists Dr. Lieberman.  “I have worked with numerous patients who grew up in homes where their parents never openly communicated differences.  These kids ‘learned’ that you must always agree with your loved ones.  So when they have disagreements later on in their own lives, they assume the relationship is ruined or that there’s something wrong with them.”

Mastering the art of empathic listening works to smooth ruffled feathers and also shows respect.  Mild conflict that involves support and compromise and positive emotions reassures kids that parents can work things through.  When you do this right, you reinforce the concept of unconditional love by showing that you can argue and still be OK.

If you are a single mother, is your child doomed?  Of course not.  There are countless successful happy people who were raised by a determined and dedicated single mother.  It is harder, but you can do it.  There is one thing that you can do that will help.

Pope Francis said that even if couples are unable to live together, they must find a way to work together harmoniously.  “Please, do not use your children as hostages!” he said.  “Never, ever speak ill of the other to your children!  Never!  They are the first victims of this battle between you.”  This means that even if you’re divorced, don’t make the mistake of tearing down your child by tearing down your ex.  Build up your child by portraying your ex in the best possible light, even when it is difficult.

You should also honor those other men in your child’s life: teachers, coaches, grandfathers, uncles, neighbors, friends.

This September, my husband and I will have been married for fifty-five years.  Our love is so much deeper, so much richer, more precious now than when we naively fell in love years ago.  There were times when we didn’t “feel” love, but love is more than a feeling.  It is a verb.  It is doing loving things.  The knowledge and remembrance of our love took us past those times to where we could feel it again and rejoice in being together.