According to the recently published book The 7 Stages of Marriage, there are seven stages present in every marriage. I’ve always believed that there is an evolution and a development that occurs in the marital union – just as there are ages and stages in life, so there are in a marriage. Written by Dr. Rita DeMaria and Sari Harrar, this book focuses on how to happy couples can move through these different stages in a marriage to maintain the happiness and healthiness of their loving relationship.
How to Maintain
The difference between the 7 Stages of Marriage and many other marriage help books is that the target audience of this book is not the couple wondering if they are in a troubled relationship nor the couple that are struggling to heal old wounds. Instead, the audience is the happily married couple that wants to maintain their relationship, invigorate it or keep the connections between them open and fresh.
That may sound like a lot for one book to do, but just from a quick scan, it’s got a lot of potential. According to the book, the seven stages of a marriage are:
- Passion – When you and your spouse are in the initial heat of the marriage and everything is fresh and new
- Realization – The early passion of the marriage fades as the reality of day to day life sets in
- Rebellion – Individual interests begin to reassert themselves as you and your spouse begin to find other ways to entertain yourself to escape the ho-hum of the daily grind – this is a time period when infidelity most often happens
- Cooperation – Your partnership outpaces the romance of your relationship as you deal with your shared responsibilities from children to home to finances and more
- Reunion – This is the period of the marriage where the couple begins to recommit, they have matured, their love has matured and their issues with regard to material gain and paternal caring are dwindling
- Explosion – This is the time of intense changes in the married couples life as they deal with the death of parents, the changing of careers and the children leaving the nest and health problems may arise
- Completion – A final and full realization of their love
I’m quite excited about reading this book and I’m interested in a new way of looking at the nuances in a relationship as well as helping us to discover more about each other, our marriages and continuing to keep it happy and successful. Have you had a chance to check out this book? I’ll be happy to bring you more when I’m done reading it.
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