How to Save a Marriage

Video Transcript

"Hi, this is Laura Turner, and I'm going to talk to you today about how to save a marriage. Really the most important part of a marriage is communication and the knowledge of what's going on in your partner's head. In order to save your failing marriage, I would say the first thing that you ought to do is to sit down with your partner and discover what the problem is by talking with them. And I've also heard, and I have also done this myself when I've had disagreements with my partner, is you can actually, even if you're very angry with them, you should take the other person's hand and actually initiate contact while talking about these difficult things so that you don't stand up and fly and run off screaming. Make sure that you have that physical contact there, that will remind you that this is somebody that you love and somebody that you need to work these problems out with. So while you're talking, touch each other. Next, all along physical contact, if you are having trouble in your marriage because there is no more sexual intimacy, actually sit down with your partner and try to communicate what you need from them, that you want to initiate physical contact again, that you need to, and actually make a concerted effort on both of your parts to be intimate again. Next, if you're having trouble communicating with your partner, if you've really tried and nothing is really working, I would suggest going to a marriage counselor, or getting some sort of a mediator who is a third party who's someone you don't know, that doesn't know you well, that doesn't have anything invested in whether or not your marriage survives or fails so that they can actually help you to communicate with each other because that's really what a mediator does. It's not so much that the mediator or the counselor is going to save your marriage for you, but they are just going to help you to save it yourselves. And finally, in order to save your marriage, you have to make your marriage your number one priority in your life. In my opinion your relationships with the people that you love should always be on your highest priority list because really when it comes down to it, at the end of everything, at the end of work, at the end of everything else that goes on in life, what is most important in life, and that would be the people that you love and who love you, so good luck."