{"id":225771,"date":"2019-01-25T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-01-25T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/get-your-relationship-needs-met-this-valentines-day\/"},"modified":"2019-01-25T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-01-25T08:00:00","slug":"get-your-relationship-needs-met-this-valentines-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/get-your-relationship-needs-met-this-valentines-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Get your relationship needs met this Valentine\u2019s Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Genevieve A. Suzuki<\/p>\n

Marriage is not for the weakhearted.<\/p>\n

I know the last thing you think you\u2019d hear from your local divorce attorney is how to stay married, but I think many of my colleagues and I have seen enough to be able to tell you what can help keep a marriage intact.<\/p>\n

And although you\u2019d think it\u2019s counterintuitive to be selfish in a union of two people, one of the most important things you can do to enjoy your marriage is to advocate for your own needs.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not talking about selfish desires like telling your partner, \u201cHey, I\u2019d really like to sow my wild oats while being married to you\u201d or \u201cI would love for you to completely financially support me while I watch the latest season of whatever housewives is on TV\u201d or even \u201cYou raise the kids while I hang out with my friends as though we\u2019re in college.\u201d<\/p>\n

When I tell you to be your own advocate, I mean you need to tell your partner what you need to feel satisfied in your marriage.<\/p>\n

The other day I was talking to a friend whose marriage was on shaky ground. He and his spouse had grown apart and he was starting to think about calling it quits. \u201cWe just like different things,\u201d he said, talking about how he liked to focus on his career while his wife enjoyed going to movies. In the very next breath, however, he talked about how beautiful she was and showed me the latest photo.<\/p>\n

I stared at him for a beat before chastising him. They had been married for 12 years and he was going to toss it to the side because they were doing different things? Was she disloyal to the marriage when she was going to movies? Was she dating someone else?<\/p>\n

No, he admitted. \u201cNeither of us has betrayed the other.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unacceptable, I told him. \u201cYou are clearly still in love with her. Make it work. Go to counseling.\u201d<\/p>\n

He worried his wife would wonder why he was willing to try now, after a year of squabbling.<\/p>\n

I advised him to look into her eyes and tell her the truth: He had been talking to a divorce attorney when he realized he wasn\u2019t going to give up. \u201cTell her that even the divorce attorney could see the truth; tell her, \u2018I\u2019m still in love with you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

He was struck by that; so simple to say, but still so hard to manage. It\u2019s funny how, when we are first wooing each other in the beginning of a relationship, we are willing to take risks, but during a relationship we become too prideful to admit our vulnerabilities.<\/p>\n

But that one simple admission may go a long way toward healing a rift caused by the refusal to engage in meaningful communication.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile you\u2019re at it,\u201d I said, \u201cplan to go to a movie with her next month. And then ask her to hang out with you on the Sunday you\u2019re not working.\u201d<\/p>\n

My husband, Derek, and I have been married for 18 years. We both acknowledge marriage is work. Yes, you need to compromise with your spouse, but you also need to ask for things you want, otherwise you can easily get lost along the way.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to accuse a person with \u201cYou never did this\u2026\u201d \u2014 it\u2019s harder to answer the question, \u201cBut did you ask?\u201d<\/p>\n

For example, I have sat through, and will continue to sit through, LeBron James\u2019 games, whether James is with the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Miami Heat or the Los Angeles Lakers. Derek in turn has endured my obsession with soap and lotion, sometimes taking us throughout the city on the hunt for a special brand.<\/p>\n

\"Get<\/a>
Genevieve A. Suzuki (Foto cortes\u00eda)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There are times where we each groan through the various games and excursions, but for the most part it\u2019s good for us. Among many things, I love my husband for knowing I\u2019d like to visit the Fresh store while we are in Los Angeles and I\u2019m sure he appreciates the tickets I bought him to see James play his first game as a Laker. It\u2019s almost like Stockholm syndrome, except it comes with health benefits and being jointly tortured by our minor children.<\/p>\n

This Valentine\u2019s Day, take a few minutes to sit down with your loved one, spouse or significant other, and agree to devote time to each other\u2019s needs. That fine balance between being selfish and selfless will prove worth it as your relationship grows and matures.<\/p>\n

\u2014Genevieve A. Suzuki is a local attorney who lives and works in La Mesa.<\/em><\/p>\n

[Photo courtesy of www.canstockphoto.com<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Genevieve A. Suzuki Marriage is not for the weakhearted.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":225772,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11548","_seopress_titles_title":"Get your relationship needs met this Valentine\u2019s Day","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11547,11548],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-la-mesa-courier"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}