</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">May I ask, why 3 months for women? Is it because we are more emotional and longer takes a physical and phycological toll on us, or is it because men will be more involved with OW, or figure we are weak for putting up with it this long, or am I way off base on this one?
How were you able to do marriage coaching with MB principles? I think I worded that badly, doing too many things at one time. How did you get qualified?
FBOW - not trying to hijack your thread, I'm curious about Cerri. Unfortunately today my brain is fried, so I don't have much to offer unless it is simple stuff.
Thanks
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S-
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Yes, three months for women because the stress is so draining. Men can (for the most part) more easily compartmentalize their lives. So, although I do not in any way want to diminish their suffereing, they seem to do Plan A better for a longer term.
Even at that the reccomended time (Willard Harley... not just me) for men is not more than 6 months.
Here in the fantasy world of the forum there is a really skewed idea of what Plan A is all about. Plan A is a strategy to separate the spouse from the lover. It is a negotiation effort to let the WS spouse know that the BS is aware of his/her contribution to the breakdown of the marriage and that he/she is willing and able to do what it takes to address those things.
But it is still only a strategy to separate the WS from the lover. If your spouse is not actively involved in an affair.. Plan A has NO APPLICATION in your marriage.
(If you have other issues in your marriage the MB steps for addressing those are honesty, attempts to negotiate using POJA, and in extreme cases separation)
A mc that I know once said to me that men take the emotional temperature of a relationship about once a day... maybe even once a week. Women OTOH do so about every 10 minutes. For a woman, knowing that her husband is intimately involved with OW is just too painful. Some women can do Plan A for only a day. And that's ok. Plan A can be done in a letter.
Plan A is not about being perfect, or about being a doormat..... and certainly not about being a perfect doormat! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />
Now, if we look at the purpose of Plan A as WH intended it to be... a strategy to separate the spouse from the lover.... then we can see that by definition it can't go on forever. At some early point (and if you ever had the chance to listen to his radio show while it was still available on the net you would have heard this over and over again...) it will become obvious that the WS is simply having his cake and eating it too.
One thing that Harley also nsays over and over to BS's who call the show is that if the WS is trying to decided between the BS and the lover, it's time for Plan B. If you have stated and demonstrated that you are willing to address the issues in the M and the affair still continues, it's time for Plan B.
This idea that if you feel like your Plan A is enabling the affair then you're doing it right... is NOT what Willard Harley says.... regardless of what you read here at the forum.
To a certain extent you will send that message for a short time, but along with eliminating LBers (demands, disrespect, anger, dishonesty, annoying habits and independent behavior) and doing your best to meet needs, you MUST be honest. And that means telling the WS that the A is the most cruel and painful thing he/she could do to you. And you need to do that every time the WS has contact with the lover.
The idea that anything that upsets your spouse is a LBer is bunk. Honesty, even when delivered with care and courtesy can be upsetting, but it is essential in marriage. Dishonesty OTOH IS a LBer.
So, you eliminate LBers, you meet needs as best you can, you are honest, and when those things don't produce the desired result (ending the affair!!!) within a reasonable amount of time 3-6 months... you go to Plan B.
Plan A/Plan B info link No one wants to go to Plan B. And the thing you have to realize about WH brilliant methods is that much of what he has shown to work, goes against what our emotions tell us to do. Instinctively as humans we use demands, disrespect and anger to get what we want. But as he states so well, in the end those things (that our emotions tell us to do) don't work.
The same is true with Plan B. Nobody goes there willingly. If there is the least little feeling of love for the WS or the least little hope that the A might end, we all want to stick it out and stay in the battle. But a love bank can be drained in a heartbeat, more than that, it can go deep in the red. And when that happens and the feelings of love for the WS are gone, the BS has no desire to fix the marriage any longer.
I see it over and over again. People who should go to Plan B and who won't. They think they can save the marriage by continuing to hang on meeting needs and being pleasant... all the while the WS is running around with someone else... disregarding the pain he is causing to his family. And then bingo... one day the BS wakes up and says 'that's it, it's over, I don't know what I ever saw in this person, he's an idiot and jerk and I want nothing to do with him.'
And then, the marriage
is over. When the affair ends... which they almost all do...sooner with Plan B and telling... the BS has no desire to reconcile or to even talk about restoring the marriage. The love is gone, and the BS has been too hurt. Plan B is to protect the BS and to prevent that from happening. It needs to be done while there are still feelings of love.
So then... how does one get certified to be an MB coach? There was a class offered last summer in Washington DC as part of the Smart Marriages Conference. The class followed the same format as the MB weekend with the added emphasis of gearing it towards professionals who would be using this material to work with couples.
Following that class we were to then complete the 24 session assignments which couples receive after the weekend. It's gruelling. Besides the reading and the listening and the writing and the discussing... there is the mandatory 15 hours per week undivided attention time with your spouse.(that part's not gruelling, it's fun!) Harley wants coaches not only to understand his material, but to know what the couples from the weekends will be struggling with. And he wants to coaches to live his stuff. The third and final part of the training is being assigned to coach couples from the weekend through the assignments. Some couples do just fine, but many struggle with the concepts and just being able to stay motivated. That's the phase of the training I am doing now.
Now for me... prior to that weekend in DC, and the 24 session follow up, which is done... I have about six and a half years of intensive study and work with Harleys stuff.
I heard him on the radio in 96 when Give and Take was published. I bought the book the next day and started reading. Unfortunately my own marriage was falling apart and I was involved in an EA, so although I completely bought into the principles it just made me mad. I often wonder how things might have been different if it had been SAA instead of G&T... but that's a story for a parallel universe.
When I left my marriage and met my current H, I came to the R with G&T in hand (literally) and said 'if we're going to be together this is how I want to do it.'
Well, that being a second R for me and a 3rd for him, along with the fact that I now know it was an A (we were both still married but separated, I wouldn't have called it an A then, now .... duh!!! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" /> ) things went from good to bad to horrible in short order.
In 98 we counselled with Jennifer who at that time was in real person practice near our home. She dumped us since I was still married (something I would do today as a coach but I didn't get it then) so we were on our own. We bought HN/HN and LBers, adding to our Harley library.
Sometime in there I found the MB site and read every word with the exception of the infidelity stuff. I would look at that and think... well at least we don't have THAT problem... little did I know...Anyway, that was pre-forum, so I read and read and read.
In 99 we found the radio show which at that time was daily. So we listened daily for at least a year. We also did some email counselling with WH.
In 2000 we got married and in early 2001 (late 2000?) we went to the MB weekend here in Mpls. Still struggling to make it work, and still pigheadedly determined to beat the odds, even though I was in w/d and miserable. All the while doing our best to use the WH concepts.
By this time we owned pretty much the complete set of Harley books. And now with the weekend stuff we had duplicates and the tape sets.
I became active here about 2 years ago. I have an older membership than that but it's been lost long ago. Anyway, when I began reading and posting I was shocked at how much the info and advice here differs from Harley's work. Especially regarding Plan A and its application in marriage.
In fall of 2001 we counselled with SH. We have done those questionairres more times than I want to think about!!! That ended in the spring of 2002.
The coaching class in DC was July of 2002.
In the August of 2002 I finally did what WH had told me many times I needed to do... go to Plan B. (And that finally turned the tide for us.)
So besides the book learning (I have multiple copies of just about everything Harley and have read and reread them ... they sit here next to my desk and they get used often) and the weekend, and the radio show, and the coaching training, and 2 years of showing up here daily and quoting WH, I've been the WS, the BS, done Plan A, done Plan B, and can say this stuff works. Without following the Harley concepts and rules H and I would not still be married.
If you are at all interested in pursuing coaching I would suggest reading every article and q/a here, at least twice. Buying the books and reading then until you can quote them forwards and backwards... in your sleep <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> . Use the forum as a place to explain and champion WH's concepts, quote what he says. And first and foremost, live it.
The WH plan for creating love in marriage is simple:
1. Negotiate to meet needs
2. Eliminate LBers
3. Using honesty and POJA create a lifestyle that makes you both happy at the same time.
Contrary to popular opinion, the basis of MB is not Plan A... it's honesty and POJA.
Enough lecture for the day?? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> Good!
Let me know if this leaves you with even more questions... I'm happy to answer what I can. Oh, and don't worry about the fried brain... you should hear what I sound like at the end of the day!! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />
C
