Browse published articles attributed to Joe Beam, with full-archive search.
You probably never meant for it to happen. It’s not as if you went looking for a lover. However, once you fell in love with another person than your spouse, things got rather intense. You’re already in what some refer to as an emotional affair. Perhaps you’ve gone further and the relationship has turned physical. HOW DID IT HAPPEN?
You are not quite sure how you got yourself into the affair, and even less sure about how to get out of it. You are in love with your paramour but hate the sneaking and cheating. You vacillate between ending the forbidden relationship and giving yourself totally to it. You feel intense emotions for your lover, but even as you tell yourself - or your lover - that everything is going to be wonderful, deep within a small voice says that it will not be. When together with your lover, you feel an amazing blending of ecstasy and peace.
“You actually want to stay married to this guy?” She didn’t hesitate a moment. Yes, she wanted to save her marriage. She and her husband were 40ish, married about twenty years, with a couple of children. One evening he told her he was in love with his assistant, that he already had a lawyer, and suggested she procure one for herself.
Question: Should I reveal to my husband events from my past, even though I believe he could never find out about them? There is a threefold test I share with people who ask if they should tell their spouses either about their distant past, or about things that they’ve done since their marriages began. Most often the question comes from people who’ve had an affair, but the same test works well for deciding whether to share any secret you’re keeping from your mate.
She could not look people in the eye as they greeted her. Head down, shoulders slumped; she headed to the nearest open seat and quietly slid into it. Her husband was a study in contrast. Confident, gregarious, he firmly shook hands and made polite small talk before striding over to sit beside his wife.
Live long enough and you learn this lesson: Anyone might do anything in certain circumstances. Just as bad people do bad things, sometimes good people do bad things; not just “minor” things, such as the proverbial white lie, but major things. Including adultery. Presidents, governors, athletes, religious leaders, and a mass of others have been caught breaking their marriage vows. Research indicates men still outpace women in unfaithfulness, but if trends continue, that won’t be for long. Nearly as many wives stray as do husbands. Surprised? Why?
You suspected it long before you knew it for sure.
Yesterday I talked with another wife emotionally involved with an old boyfriend she bumped into online on Facebook. No surprise there. Every month couples enroll in our workshop for marriages in crisis because one of them – usually the wife – had an affair with someone found on one of the social networking sites.
It isn’t unusual to overhear conversations like this. One lady told another that she should NOT stay in her marriage for the sake of her children. She offered the usual: make yourself happy; why should you be punished to stay with that guy just because he fathered your children; over time the kids will be better off. She added more but these generally covered the subject. In those conversations, certain facts seem never to appear. Consider the indications of scientific research. Divorce can affect children for many years, well into adulthood.
Divorce breaks the hearts of those involved — couples, children, parents, friends, church, and the heart of God. One of the greatest underlying events destroying marriages today is adultery. The following is a frank and spiritual message on how to save a marriage after an affair. My fervent passion is in saving marriages and making them healthy and holy again. I encourage you to at least make a commitment not to remain at a disinterested distance when couples you love have their lives coming apart. So let's get started.
Type the question into Google and in less than a quarter of a second it returns over two million links. Some lead to articles, others to "sure fire" products that promise to solve all marriage problems, and others to blogs that say one can and blogs that say one cannot.
The extent of the research and the methodology employed far surpassed any study before it. Published by the University of Chicago in 1994, the “public” version of the report was provocatively titled Sex in America. The scientific version carried the duller title of The Social Organization of Sexuality. Though all sex studies are controversial, this one did its homework in its attempt to avoid research flaws and to get as true a representation of America as possible.
We did an online poll for my visit with on-air personalities Woody & Jim today on 107.5 The River in Nashville. The question was, “Which is most important to you?” The choices were: 1) your mate takes care of his/her body and keeps looking good, 2) your mate fulfills your sexual desires but lets his/her body go, or 3) your mate trips and falls under a bus. (The last one was there because Woody and Jim are hilarious…) Votes? 60% choose number one — the attractive mate 33% chose number two — sexual desires fulfilled
“Our problem,” he said, “is that everyone in my life listens to what I say and does what I tell them. Then I come home and it doesn’t work that way with my wife. I don’t like that.” She didn’t either.
“She’s pregnant by her lover. But she says she has come to her senses, loves me, and wants to save our marriage. My family practically hates her and wants me to divorce her and have nothing else to do with her ever. I don’t know what to do.” Call him Jim. Call her May. Every year situations such as theirs are repeated more times that one might imagine. One person does wrong, consequences arise, penitence hits, and the straying spouse begs for forgiveness and reconciliation.
I love officiating formal church weddings. I especially look forward to that precise moment when the bride first steps into view, relishing the exquisite sensations of those extraordinary seconds. I watch her raise her eyes from her bouquet to his face, and without turning to see his response, know precisely when their eyes meet. I hear his sharp intake of breath and feel the bridesmaids’ stirring and murmuring around me. Everything changes, becomes more vivid, as if by her coming she has brought a different dimension of life to us all.
She interrupted my talk to tell me that I should say the word differently to make its meaning clear. Instead of intimacy, I should say it into-me-see. She had a great point. The Dictionary defines intimacy as “a close, familiar, and usually affectionate or loving personal relationship with another person or group.” In the social sciences we think of it as closeness, openness, vulnerability, and transparency. Pronouncing it into-me-see does a great job of giving the meaning in the way the word sounds. It is letting another person look deep inside you.
The only time I believe in giving up on a marriage is when one of them dies, or if after their divorce one of them marries someone else, or if one of them continues involvement in an activity that makes the marriage impossible. Otherwise, I believe there is a chance to reconcile.
“She’s pregnant by her lover. But she says she has come to her senses, loves me, and wants to save our marriage. My family practically hates her and wants me to divorce her and have nothing else to do with her ever. I don’t know what to do.” Call him Jim. Call her May. Every year situations such as theirs are repeated more times that one might imagine. One person does wrong, consequences arise, penitence hits, and the straying spouse begs for forgiveness and reconciliation.