I’m sure you have heard the quip – ‘If love is blind, marriage is the eye-opener’. I’d recommend that we have our eyes even partially opened before the marriage takes place. It will be wide open enough after that!

Let the sleeping CHB rest no man…

imagine at the counselling session she is afraid to tell her mate what are some of the things she doesn’t like and what she expects out of the marriage.

Just as you said… To her it would have been harsh and even unpleasant so she is going to wait until they are married. Well i did my best to get her to talk even after the man (one of my colleague) impressed upon her the importance of verbalizing her feelings.

And believe it or not i made reference to your last post about the “virtuous man” and your 10 essential qualities. Stating to her she needs to be upfront about what she would “stand for or not.”
And all this happened before i came home and found this recent response. Thanks…

On a different note i would love to see what others think what CHB is HAHAHAH!!

So that’s our little secret, hmmmm…

To answer you:-
There is something ‘deceptive’ about courtship the way it has been romanticized. Persons put on a ‘false’ self to keep the other interested. (S)he does everything to appear to be what the other desires.

What is false will one day be uncovered. Usually it emerges after marriage. Rarely all at once…just little by little. You wake up each day seeing a new side to the stranger/monster you married.

Sometimes too, circumstances that they never anticipated or even discussed the remote possibility of, could cause problems later on.

I find that many of the persons I counsel for marital difficulties have one thing in common – a superficial dating experience. Couples just don’t bother to talk about the harsh and unpleasant subjects when they are dating. They mistakenly believe they should address them after marriage.

Mistake!!!!! Way too late…

I say talk about the unpleasant stuff up front, see what you will have to contend with and decide whether or not you are prepared to take it on.

Too many people blindly “sign-on” to people’s baggage without having any idea what they are really ‘picking up’.

Hope that answers your question

what about the Mate who displays all of the qualities in the initial part of the relationship and then after marriage changes? 1. was that person that was all the time and was hiding the real “them” or 2. the present situation has forced then to change? hmmm…

You can see from my answer to Duane that I do not believe that the list of 10 essentials are in anyway above-average. They are normal for me. Moreover, I do not use the romantic notion of ‘perfect-mate’. Practicality makes that nonsense.

However, I know myself well enough and know what I have to offer in a relationship. I am not prepared to ’settle’ for less than I deserve. I don’t think that any woman or man should. Not to please society that says you are supposed to be married by a certain age.
Not to satisfy some biological clock that ticks, but cannot change a diaper
Not to satisfy the church that has not been able to quell the increasing divorce rates
Not to obey Paul who says its better to marry than to burn…I say burn baby burn!!

First thing a woman or man needs to recognize is that you are better off single than be married and miserable for having made the wrong choice. That is my principle plain and simple.

I have listed what are the critically important factors I am not prepared to compromise on – for a peaceful life. Not some fairytale – ‘happily ever after’ nor chasing a pipe dream of a ‘perfect mate’.

Hats off to those who choose to do otherwise…