Click here to buy "Don't Get Married!"..from barnesandnoble.com OR click the picture above to buy from amazon.com OR buy the eBook! What's in the book?  Read about Man-Boys and Angry Wives, Past vs. Present in Marriage, Infidelity, Sex & Marriage, What's a Marriage for Anyway?, and Emotional Credibility in Marriage. Journey beyond "soulmates" and "in love", into a NEW world of trust, with NEW CONCEPTS like Emotional Credibility, Micro & Macro Trust, and the Emotional Laboratory of Marriage for INDIVIDUAL growth. If this book gets you to stop putting your energies into finding a "soulmate" or a permanent state of feeling "in love" and, instead, gets you to live your life with working concepts like Emotional Credibility, Micro & Macro Trust, and the Emotional Laboratory of Marriage, it will have done its job. Enjoy this paraphrased example of what you'll find in, Don't Get Married! (Unless You Understand A Few Things First), then go buy the book and start living your life!* Don't Get Married! (Unless You Understand A Few Things First) by Anthony Ferraioli, M.D. Marriage isn’t something we automatically know how to do. Yet, people do it all the time, not fully realizing the true, adult meaning of marriage and what we can expect from it and from one another. This leads to disappointments, resentments, misery, and, often, divorce. I hope that, by asking you to spend just a few minutes reading, I might help you avoid this end....

When people get married, a strange thing happens. Sooner or later, they begin to change from peers to parent/child. Peers treat each other with unconditional positive regard, ie. the benefit of the doubt. Children want unconditional love from their parents. They continue to want this from their spouses. Unconditional positive regard means we still have responsibility for our behaviors and what we do with strong emotions such as anger and disappointment. Unconditional love means we have no responsibility for our behaviors or modulating strong emotion. It means we get to show the "parent" our "poopie diaper" and expect them to clean it up for us without our help. This, unfortunately, is what most people think they should get out of their marriage. When we change from peers to parent/child, resentments grow. Often, couples experience first emotional disconnect, then, eventually, physical disconnect (ie. lack of sexual intimacy.) When people get married, another strange thing happens. They go from initially idealizing each other to eventually devaluing each other. When they meet, they "Fall In Love." Then, when they spend more time together and become more like family, they "Fall Out Of Love." Now they are no longer happy together. First idealization, then devaluation. They only know each other in terms of what they wished the other person was (idealized view), or, later, what a disappointment the person is to them (devalued.) They never know the real person they are with, complete with good and bad parts. The gray is lost to the black and white, the idealization and devaluation. True adulthood is lost to the wish for the other person to fix their lives and make them happy. And they never ask themselves what their role is in making the good or bad parts come forward in the other person; in triggering the other person’s buttons. Try this exercise: Imagine that your significant other has just triggered a strong reaction in you. This can be anger, fear, anxiety, envy, distrust, shame, guilt, or anything else. Now, imagine your response. What did you imagine? Did you react in direct line with your strong emotion; ie. angrily, fearfully, anxiously, guiltily, etc.? Or, did you hold back a moment, use restraint, and communicate to your spouse what you are feeling? Most of the time, it is exquisitely difficult to do the latter, so that the great majority of couples do the former; ie. react to one another in childlike ways.

They then lose Emotional Credibility with each other and resentments and distrust grow as the walls come up between them. We humans actively recreate the emotional positions of our childhoods (ie. helplessness, rejection, victimhood, powerlessness, fearfulness, guilt, feeling over-whelmed, chaotic, etc.) with our spouses the closer we get to them and the more they become like family to us. We do this by immediately acting out our emotional reactions to them when they trigger us. This is a childlike behavior and it re-creates childhood misery and preserves our unhappiness. When we feel a strong emotion and react to it, we instantly add our fifty-percent to the misery about to be created between ourselves and our spouses. We then blame the other person, or the circumstances, for our misery.

Eight thoughts for you regarding marriage: ♦ #1 Get married only if you understand that marriage is NOT a cure for loneliness. ♦ #2 Get married only if you understand that you need to take risks and behave differently than you normally would if you are to grow within your marriage and grow your marriage. ♦ #3 Get married only if you are willing to abandon the childhood idea of "Unconditional Love" for the adult idea of "Unconditional Positive Regard." ♦ #4 Get married only if you accept that you contribute fifty-percent to the misery of your current reality. ♦ #5 Get married only if you are prepared to not treat your spouse as a reference point for perfect adult emotional health so that you’ll become resentful if they are not. ♦ #6 Get married only if you know that, by getting married, you will be making the other person "family", which will eventually make you the victim-child and them the incompetent parent in your eyes. This will trigger resentment in you. ♦ #7 Get married only if you accept that marriage is an active, dynamic relationship with a true goal of each individual’s emotional healing and, thus, the maturation and joy of the marital relationship. And finally... ♦ #8 Get married only if you are willing and able to forgive: forgiveness of yourself and forgiveness of your spouse. Anger can be an addictive emotion, since its seeds often go way back to true, childhood injustices. Because of this, we forget to forgive. We forget to let it go. Else, please don’t do it. So, get married only if you feel capable of healing enough to not forget to forgive.

And, some final take home thoughts for you: Take Home Thought #1 A nice, simple technique I like to teach is the "Say Something Positive To Your Spouse Technique." It goes like this: Each time you are with your spouse, force yourself to say one positive thing. It can be about anything you want. It can be the meal, the weather, work, the kids, the lawn, whatever. The important point is that you get into the habit of letting your spouse experience you as a positive force in their life, not a negative, miserable one from their childhood. This technique will, over time, rebuild the trust, or what I call the Emotional Credibility in the marriage. You will begin to build "points" with your spouse and they will, deep inside of their hearts, begin to feel like they are with someone they want to be around. You will be different from their overwhelmed, anxious, constantly upset and worried parents. You will not be continuing their childhood for them, or for yourself. You will begin to heal with this. Take Home Thought #2 You must actually behave yourself with your spouse. You can’t just "let it fly" and say or do anything you want. You can’t just fool around any time you want like you would with a friend or sibling. You must actually follow through on things in a responsible, thoughtful manner. You must actually think about them even when you’re not with them and even when you don’t immediately need something from them. Take Home Thought #3 You have to watch your tone with your spouse. A fast way to lose Emotional Credibility and to trigger your spouses defenses is with an angry, sarcastic, blaming, or dismissive tone. Your tone will set the tone between you. Take Home Thought #4 If you want a happy life, bring it yourself. There is no such thing as the perfect husband or wife. There is only a partner whom you have subconsciously chosen because you fit each other’s "emotional pathology." Now it’s time to work on yourself; your tone, your restraint, your LVACTM (Listen,Validate,Ask,Comment), etc. Don’t think that it’s all your spouse’s fault until you work on your fifty percent of the dynamic. Take Home Thought #5 If you act in ways that scare your spouse or your children, you must stop doing this. When we induce fear in others, we give them a choice to make. They can either become a victim or they can become aggressive. Ultimately this breeds contempt. If you have a problem with anger, you must work on restraint and other key adult skills. Just because you can yell or act out physically, does not mean that you should. Restrain yourself.  Excerpts taken from the new, soon-to-be-released book Don't Get Married! (Unless You Understand A Few Things First), by Anthony Ferraioli, M.D. Copyright©2009Anthony Ferraioli, M.D.  (Note:  No part of the above may be reproduced in any way without the written consent of Anthony Ferraioli, M.D.)- *Any and all information in this or any of Dr. Ferraioli's other books, websites, or other materials, are for educational purposes only and do not constitute medical advice or treatment of any kind; nor does access to and use of any of these materials represent a treatment relationship with Dr. Ferraioli.  Also, please note that, despite any claims made or implied on this website, results may vary with each individual's situation.