Hi, all,

After a false recovery, H and I are focusing on rolling up our sleeves and doing the hard work necessary to see if we can attain the marriage we (I) want.

He has agreed to read a book or two with me and the first book I want us to read is "Fall in Love, Stay in Love" because it covers emotional needs (my top 2 aren't being met right now), love busters (we're both guilty of these and need to provide one another with a safe environment), and POJA. I think it will give us a good foundation from which to explore our issues. Also the questionnaires will give me something concrete to refer to, and I like the "solid" feeling of that right now.

So, my question is: Have any of you read books as a couple, and what did you find most effective? Do you agree to have a chapter read by a certain day and then sit down and discuss it? Do you get two copies of the book or do you share the one? Do you take turns reading aloud to one another? What has worked, and what hasn't?

Thanks!

My H and I are reading a book together. What we decided was that I would read the book aloud (he didn't want to read aloud, and I wanted to make sure that we both were reading it). We are reading "Relationship Rescue by Dr. Phil". Since this book has alot of fill in the blank questions, I got on the computer and typed them, made 2 copies and we sit and do them in the same room (but agreed not to read each others). We try to do one section/chapter a night, according to how tired we are, while laying in the bed. We figured that if we do it just before bed there will be no phone calls or interuptions. This also helped us because we talk better at night.

Good Luck

We read "Torn Asunder" and "Surviving an Affair" together. Sometimes one of us would read aloud, sometimes we would read together silently. We did ALL the questionaires, but I printed them from this web site rather than copied them from the book, because that was easier. We did about one chapter at a sitting, maybe twice a week. We discussed what we read. It was very helpful for me. I would actually suggest "Survivng an Affair" over FIL/SIL. It will cover the same things as FIL?SIL, but in a more condensed format. There is additional affair stuff in SAA that I would not have wanted to miss.

Thanks, you guys, for your responses.

I especially appreciate that you both mentioned doing all the questionnaires. I suspect that my H will want to skip those, but that's where you really have to sit and quietly decide how you feel about things, and the results give you kind of a map forward. Important stuff.

You guys wouldn't believe how excited I am that he actually agreed to read a book with me!! I'll scope out Surviving an Affair, too, and maybe opt for that one instead.

I think I'll POJA with my H on this (d'oh! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" /> ) and a couple of possibilities would be read aloud to one another, read silently together.

Thanks again.

JazzeyGirl,

If I were in your shoes, I think that instead of asking my H to read one of *my* books with me, I'd see if he'd be open to letting me read one of "his" books with him. It seems you'd have more success getting him to share something he's already feeling positive about.

Not that you ever suggested you'd try to get him to read one of your books, you may have been planning on asking to read one of his with him all along. I just thought I'd chime in and say I think that would be the more successful route.

Let us know how it goes!

<small>[ January 09, 2004, 07:38 AM: Message edited by: turtlehead ]</small>