Tonight I will bring up the need to attend a relationship workshop of some sort. I'm thinking about the Family Dynamics seminar, but it will take a real financial outlay and a major chunk of time that H has never shown the slightest interest in investing like that. <P>He quit reading HNHN the same day he started. The book is still on his desk, so not totally abandoned. I will have to read out loud in bed I guess. Anyway, I could some prayer support in order to even bring up the idea of going to a group for help. I'm scared. At least I have his guilt over the pregnancy to use for leverage! Hope it works.<P><P>------------------<BR>A true friend is one who not only is willing to love us the way we are, but is able to leave us better than he found us.

Dear Lord, I pray that you will be with Karenna tonight as she approaches her husband about attending the workshop. I pray that if it is your will for them, please soften her H's heart to the idea, and work out the details for them. I pray that you will work on her husband's heart, leading him to finish the HNHN book, helping him to understand the concepts. Lord, please show her H how to love her the way you want a man to love his wife, as Christ loves the church. I pray that you will go before Karenna in everything she says and does. Help her Father to stay focused upon you. We praise You father, and thank You. IJN, AMEN

Haven't heard how this endeavor went or if you delayed it for a time. How are you doing Karenna? <P>Maybe doing the EN questionaires together would be more helpful at first before you read the book to him. Might get more conversation going?<P>Father, we thank you that you care about all areas of our life, that you place marriage high in your hierarchy and hate divorce. You made us differently as men and women for a purpose, designed us to be one in spirit and flesh, of one mind, united in Christ for Your glory. <P>Father give Karenna wisdom as she approaches her husband in this area of her marriage. Open the doors of communication and guide each word that comes from Karenna's mouth. Use this gift of a child as a means for them to grow close to one another and to You rather than as a weapon. Bind their hearts in You Father, IJN, Amen.

Kareena: I'm with you on this. I wanted to attend a Marriage Workshop offered by our church but was afraid to mention it. In the past our church did a His Needs/Her Needs class and boy I wish we would have done it. But again, I never pushed it. This time, I felt the need to suggest it. Before I got a chance, he sent me an email and suggested we attend. I sent in the check right away, found a sitter, etc. before he could change his mind. So we are scheduled to go at the end of this month. I will be praying that things work out for you, too. I read somewhere about the needs questionnaire being online somewhere. Can someone tell me how to get to it? Thanks! J

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We pass like ships in the night. Haven't even hardly seen each other, let alone have time to talk. I'll print out a bunch of stuff and see to it that we address some serious issues this weekend. We need to get this on the calendar as early as possible or it will be impossible.<P>Again it was clear how alienated I am. Yesterday morning a van crashed into my car and it never occured to me to tell H. I called insurance, arranged for the estimate and repairs. Talked to others about it throughout the day and forgot all about by the time H came home. He found the damage on his own and asked if I was ok. <P>It is clear from the location that I was not at fault and he was patient enough to take notice and he didn't light into me this time. Before he would have raged at me for both the damage and for not telling him first. <P>Whenever anything exciting happens to me H is the last person I think to tell. I would much rather call a friend and have a sharing time, comfort and listening than to face the unpredictable monster. I had to literally force myself to tell him I was pregnant before telling others. <P>I don't yearn for conversation with this man. I do yearn for conversation with many other people, male and female. This is just one more thing I can't fix on my own.<P>------------------<BR>A true friend is one who not only is willing to love us the way we are, but is able to leave us better than he found us.

Kareena: I was once in your shoes. My H traveled so... much, we would only talk on the phone & the conversation was always the same. He would ask what's new & how everyone was and I would say fine...etc. etc. Day after day. Surface talk. I blamed it on him not being there, but I guess that's not true. Like you, I would call my sister (very far away) in Florida or a friend whenever something new happened or just for someone to talk to about everyday events. We grew further & further apart without ever talking about it. We never fought but we never talked either. Now that we are together in recovery, I am finding communication to be one of the hardest aspects. At first when we were attempting to make time each day for each other, I didn't even know what to say or talk about. I am getting much better. I still have trouble talking about things that bother me. But I sometimes email him or write him a note or letter. I have no problems expressing myself on paper. So that is a small step towards face to face confrontation. We are learning and hope to learn more at our marriage seminar. Perhaps you two will start communicating again soon. Like love, it's a choice, we sometimes have to put forth the effort. I am still trying! Blessings, J

A friend who is a betrayed, gave me this prayer. I guess it does come from a book, but it is a great prayer. Pray it everyday! See what a difference it can make!<P>Lord, help me to be a good wife/husband. I fully realize that I don't have what it takes to be one without your help. Take my selfishness, impatience, and irritability and turn them into kindness, long-suffering, and the willingness to bear all things. Take my old emotional habits and mindsets,automatic reactions, rude assumptions and self-protective stance, and make me patient, kind, good, faithful, gently and self-controlled. Take the hardness of my heart and break down the walls with Your battering ram of revelation. Give me a new heart and work in me Your love, peace and joy(gal. 22,23). I am not able to rise above who I am at this moment. Only You can transform me.<P>Show me where there is sin in my heart, especially with regard to my husband/wife. I confess the times I have been unloving, critical, angry, resentful, disrespectful, or unforgiving towards him/her. Help me to put aside any hurt, anger or disappointment I feel and forgive him the way You do--totally and completely, no looking back. make me a tool of reconciliation, peace and healing i this marriage. Enable us to communicate well and rescue us from the threshold of seperation where the realities of divorce begin.<P>Make me my husbands/wife's helpmate, companion, champion, friend and support. Help me to create a peaceful, resful, safe place for him to come home to. Teach me how to take care of myself and stay attracive to him. Grow me into a creative and confident woman/man who is rich in mind, soul and spirit. Make me the kind of woman/man he can be proud to say is his/her wife/husband.<P>I lay my expectations at Your cross. I release my husband/wife from the burden of fulfilling me in area's where I should be looking to You. Help me to accept him/her the way he/she is and not try to change him. I realize that in some ways he may never change, but at the same time, i release him to change in ways I never thought he could. I leave any changing that needs to be done in Your hands, fully accepting that neither of us is perfect and never will be. Only You, Lord, are perfect and I look to you to perfect us.<P>Teach me how to pray for my husband and make my prayers a true language of love. Where love had died, create new love between us. Show me what unconditionallove really is and how to communicate it in a way he/she can clearly perceive. Bring unity between us so that we can be in agreement about everything(Amos 3:3). May the God of patience and confort grant us to be like minded toward one another, according to Christ Jesus(Romans 15;5). make us a team, not pursueing separate, competitive. or independent lives but working together, overlooking each other's faults and weaknesses for the greater good of the marriage. Help us to pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify another(Romans 14:19) May be be "perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgement"(I Corinthians 1:10)<P>I pray that our commitment to You and to one another will grow stronger and more passionate everyday. Enable him/her to be the head of the home as You made him to be and show me how to support and respect him as he rises to that place of leadership. Help me understand his dreams and see things from his perspective. Reveal tome what he/she wants and needs and show me potential problems before they rise. Breathe Your life into this marriage.<P>Make me a new person, Lord. Give me a freash perspective, a postivive outlook, and a renewed relationship with the man/woman You've given me. Help me see him with new eyes, new appreciation, new love, new compassion and new acceptance. Give my husband a new wife/husband and let it be me. Amen.<P>

Mercy,<BR>The first part of your prayer is from the intro. in Power of a Praying Wife, the book we are using as a guide for our study on this forum. The rest appears to be compilations of prayers in subsequent chapters. If you don't already have the book, do see about getting it. It is an awesome, life-changing book. Chapter 1 of POPW has always been the most relevant chapter for me. I pray that first pray a lot, especially the three letter prayer, "Change ME Lord". <P>Prayer has been so powerful for the participants on this forum. We would love to have you study with us. We plan to start over after the last chapter of POPW with the POPW study guide. It goes into more detail about the book. <P>God bless you, Mercy. So glad to have you post with us!<P>AW