Week 12 was interesting for me. It was about divorce and remarriage  The reason I think of this subject as interesting is because I have never experienced this type of event in my life, or even in my extended family. Through this week I began to see how hard remarriage really is. People around me always said the second marriage is easier because people know what to do now. In fact it is not. It is way hard, especially when these two different families have kids. There are so many different traditions that someone has from their original family, or even from their first marriage. They have to take all those traditions  and blend them with their new partner. On top of that, the kids suddenly have new siblings to deal with. Plus it is hard to know what to do with your partners kids. You had decided to step into the role of a father, but the partner may not want you disciplined their kid.
It was really interesting learning about all these problems. I think what I learned the most is that these situations are difficult  But they are not impossible. If we trust is the lord, and in our partner, we will be able to have a happy and eternal family.

Week 11 was really interesting for me. It was about parenting. When our kids do something wrong, there are 2 things that can happen. The first is the natural consequence. This is when someone does something and the natural reaction is a consequence. An example of this is when a kid drives his car all night, then brings it home on a sunday night with no gas. The next day, he needs to get to school, but he has no gas in his car to get to school. The consequence is he is late. This type of thing happens to us often, and we are taught that this is the preferred way of teaching our kids. There are only a few conditions in which we don't allow them to experience the natural consequence, one of which is it is too dangerous. Then there is  when parents give a consequence to their child, to teach them something without them having to go through the experience.
I other thing I really liked from this week was when we walked about how to correct our kids. The first was is a kind request. This is when we make ourselves at the same level as our kids, and ask them to do something. When that doesn't work there is a firm request. This is still not bossing our kids around, but there is some authority behind the request. Lastly there is the I statement. That is When YOU do this I don't like it BECAUSE of this. CAN YOU now do this. I think all of this is great.

Week ten was about fatherhood and home makers. I think what stood out to me the most for that week was the article "Does a Full-time home maker switch her mind for a mop?" The article basically explained how stay a home moms actually are, a lot of times, more up to date then a lot of other people. They stay home all day, and a lot of times they listen to the radio, read magazines  new papers, and just gather information that people who have jobs would otherwise not have time to do. It is because of this that often times they know more, and just have more knowledge then others. I have seen this with my own mom. She was a home maker for twenty some years, during that time she was always on tip of the current events. During elections, she was extreamly knowledgeable on the people running for the office. Then she got a job, and I slowly but surely she became less and less aware of the current events. It wasn't because she no longer cared, it was simply because she had no time to listen to the radio, or read an article. Home makers do not trade their mind for a mop, rather they have a greater mind.

Week 9 was about problem solving, and communication. What I thought was really interesting is how much of our communication is non verbal. A very small amount of communication is actually what we say. A larger portion is our tone. That makes a lot of sense. Someone could say something really nice, but have a tone of voice that tells you they are being sarcastic. The same can be true the other way. In regards to this, we learned how hurtful sarcasm can be in a marriage. The problem with this way of communicating  is that the other person may not always know when you are being sarcastic, so they will be very hurt. There is dangers in using sarcasm, in marriage or even with friends, so in all honesty, it is best to just stay away from it.
Back to communication, the biggest portion to communicating is actually with our body language. The way we stand, the way our face looks. It is the biggest factor in which we communicate. If we had a experiment where people tired to guess what the emotion someone was feeling by just looking at their face, I wonder if the results would be somewhat accurate.

I thought week 8 was really interesting. What was really interesting to me was the subject of family crisis. I, like I think a lot of people, thought family crisis of a very bad thing to be avoided at all cost. In truth, it isn't something a family should look for, however it isn't all bad. When a family goes through a crisis, it gives them an opportunity to grow closer as a family. When a crisis appears, the family gathers together and works together to get through that crisis. If they can get through it, they will be closer. During the crisis things can look bad, as if there are no light at the end of the tunnel. When they finally get out, it is more beautiful on the outside as ever. The biggest danger is sometimes during these times, most of the family grows, but a family member is left behind, and almost excluded  Left inside the tunnel almost. It is important to keep the family together during crisis, and make sure no one feels excluded and bad. We don't want to leave anyone behind while going through these beneficial but hard times.

Week seven was the sexuality week. I think what I thought was most interesting was when we introduce our children to sex. I always thought that we should do this by the age of twelve or something like that, but we learned that we should be introducing in small amounts to children 8 years and younger. If you really think about it it makes sense. I heard about sexual things by the time I was in third grade. My mom and dad had told me nothing of that subject, so alot of what I learned were from my friends. Simple introductions to affection when the children are younger will help them have true knowledge of sexual things. Also, another thing I thought was really valuable, is that when people have "the talk" with their kids, they shouldn't act nervous or afraid  Kids can tell when parents feel that way. If they feel as if their parents do not want to talk about this subject, then they will not go to them when they have a question. They will go to other sources which will lead to very dangerous path. Parents need to be comfortable with their kids with this subject to that they can help them

Week 6 was about early marriage and baby blues. I think the thing I liked most about this week was what we learned about the baby blues. I think it is pretty commonly thought that after a baby is born, couples will be more happy. In fact, studies show that when children are born, their martial satisfaction  goes down when children are born. This actually makes sense, when a child in born less time can be spent with each other. The plus side to this is when the children leave. When kids leave the martial satisfaction increase dramatically. It quickly becomes higher then where it was at first. That isn't to say that we should have kids just to increase out satisfaction, however it is pretty awesome. Unfortunately most people divorce when they start having kids, when the satisfaction is going down, or right when all the kids move out. If people would only hold on longer, their relationship would most likely get better then they have ever experienced.

Week 5 was basically about dating which I found really interesting. I think what I liked the most was the value of dating verses just "hanging out". I think it is differently common to just hang out with girls. I know I did when I was back at home. If there was a girl I liked, we would just hang out and do random things. It was hardly ever planned, in fact there were times where we would meet up, and then ask each other what we wanted to do. I can personally say that this is a quick and easy way to be friend zoned. When you just hang out with girls, you quickly become their "girlfriend" instead of a potential partner. I thought there was a lot of value with what Brother Williams said about dating. Dating prepares us for eventually becoming fathers and husbands. A husband provides, presides, and protects. When you date someone it is developing these skills.  You provide because a man will pay for the date. This helps show the woman that when she married this individual, he will work hard and try to provide for their needs. Presiding is developed when you plan for the date, and carry it out. The man is in charge, he is the one who usually plans the date and make sure everything goes alright. On a date a man takes care the woman and makes sure she has a great time. This develops protecting.

During the 4th week we talked about gender roles and same  sex attraction. We learned that there are actual differences between men and woman which I think is critical to realize. Men and woman are equal, but they are different. We talked about a few difference that appear while kids are younger, which reminded me of a story my mom told me a few years ago. There was someone in her old ward who wanted their kids to be raised the same. They let their little boy just play with the same toys as the girl, and he only watched movies that the sister wanted to watched. One day while the parents were in the room they saw their young son take a barbie, bent it over, pointed it at his sister and yelled, BANG BANG. The fact is there are just differences between men and woman.
Something else we talked about was how Gay people often say they were "born gay". This in fact, is rarely true. Often times when, people who consider themselves Gay, if you look at their background, they ether didn't have a father, or just lacked a fatherly influence. As they get older, they naturally want that influence in their life. So they attach onto men who have that authority and influence. The young man is often confused, seeing that he attaches to this man so easy. The conclusion that he could come to is that he is Gay. The fact is, that isn't true, he is just naturally looking for that fatherly influence. I think the last important thing I learned is not to treat to exclude these people who have gender differences  I think it is really easy for us, especially as Mormons, to think, that they aren't good people. These guys are great people, who are basically juts confused and in need of interaction.

I have forgotten to post things for the last like 10 weeks, so I will be catching up in the following posts. This one is for my third week where we talked about social class and culture diversity. I think there was a lot to learn from this week, but I think the lesson that stood out to me most was what we learned from our discussion bored, it asked, are all cultures equal? Naturally I thought they there were all equal, after all everyone is created by God. This in fact is not true. There are plenty of cultures where their traditions go against marriage, family, and God. We learned that we should set aside our cultural differences, and take upon us the culture of God.I that sense, we can all have the same cultures, and the correct values.

So we have learned a lot of really cool things this week in marriage and family. The one experience that stinks out the most to me was in class on Friday. Brother Williams  asked for three volunteers, a dad, a mom, and a daughter. He had a mock therapy session with them which was really cool. I am not going to go too deep into what he did, but what I found really cool was as he was talking to them, he was bonding their friendship and love together. It would be easy to point out the faults of the couple, but instead asked them questions that brought them closer.

It was really cool to see, and I thought, if a therapist and do it, why not us? I’m not married yet, but this activity made me realize when we are dealing with anyone really, we should use positive words, it brings people together and makes all feel good.

Marriage and family class has really been interesting this week. In one of my readings I learned about myths about family life. One of these myths that really stood out to me was people marry because they feel love for each other. What? That's what I first thought, after all since we were little kids we are shown time and time again that "true love" is what we should strive for. However, the book argues that love is hard to define, and that this emotion could very well be something different, or at least intermixed within other emotions.
Obviously, love needs to be present in any marriage, however it can't be the only reason a couple is together. In marriage there will be trying times, and the truth is, love doesn't always conquer all.

My first post!