Guest Posts

Want A Growing Marriage?

I am reviewing the book called “The Beautiful Wife” and I was sent 4 guest posts from the author and I after reading them I thought it would be a great thing for my readers.  I am going to be posting one every Sunday for the next 4 weeks.  Also be looking for my review on the book on 3/7/2012.


source

My husband and I were reading a financial book about how to make your money grow when one of the principles jumped off the page at me:

What you focus on grows. 

Because it’s such a simple principle, I couldn’t get it out of my mind and began applying it to all areas of life, especially relationships.

Most women have the desire to grow a more intimate relationship with their husband

yet  few  focus  their  desire  long  enough  to  do  anything  about  it.
Thus, nothing changes.

  • Ignorance, 
  • Distractions, and/or
  • hopelessness are often to blame.

I should know. Just 19 when I said, “I do”, I was ignorant about how to grow my marriage.  Our pre-marriage counseling consisted of one two-hour meeting with my pastor and that wasn’t enough to prepare me for the emotional, spiritual, and verbal abuse my husband doled out on a regular basis.   The abuse produced pain and grief.
I could think of little else than surviving.

Hope for our future crumbled.

Over time, I began sharing my pain with a few trusted, godly women.  Venting my pain and hearing their honest feed-back helped me see that the abuse I was suffering wasn’t my fault.

I  began seeing a Christian counselor who gave me tools that helped restore me to a place of strength and dignity.

The best choice I made was to dig into God’s word and find out what He wanted to say to me about my marriage.  In the Bible I found the following verses which applied to my situation:

  •  “…Your godly lives will speak to them [husbands] better than any words.  They will be won over by watching your pure godly behavior.” (I Peter 3:1,2)  In place of preaching to my husband, I began entrusting my difficult situation to God through prayer—listening for His instruction.
  •  “Instead, we will hold to the truth in love…” (Ephesians 4:15) I began to exchange preaching for speaking the truth in love—in as few words as possible.
  • “See that no one pays back evil for evil, but always try to do good…” (I Thessalonians 5:15) On my new path, I chose to respond in kindness and enforce healthy boundaries in place of angry retaliation.

When I dug into the word, I learned that my husband wasn’t the only one sinning.  My responses to Tom were often sinful and my response was the only thing I was responsible for.
(What I wanted was to change my husband but I couldn’t find a biblical reference to support my desire and neither will you)!    

Focused on God and His Word, I was able to reverse negative behavioral patterns in my life which had long plagued me.

When I did what I could do—keeping my focus on God, HE DID WHAT I COULD NOT!

He healed me and ultimately my marriage—to the praise of His glorious grace!

What you focus on grows. 

Are you focused on growing your marriage? 

Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2012 Margaret Margaret

Coping with Adoption

I was contacted by Sara and she wanted to write a guest post.  She wrote about tips to cope with placing your child for adoption.  Let me know what you think!


The decision to give your child up for adoption is a hard one, but coping with the aftermath of actually placing him or her in adoption is equally as hard if not harder. Once you do relinquish your baby you’re faced with an onslaught of emotions that are unparalleled to anything you’ve ever experienced and can be overwhelming to deal with on your own, even when you know that you’re ultimately doing the right thing. You’ve lost a part of you, and that’s hard no matter what the circumstances were that led you to the decision to place them in adoption in the first place. When faced with these feelings try to use these coping mechanisms:
1. Don’t close yourself off
As much as you may want to ignore the feelings and go on with your life as though nothing happened, it’s important to allow yourself time to grieve over the loss. Dealing with these feelings up front will help you heal quicker than if you try to bottle them up.

2. Recognize each stage of emotion
You likely will go through several stages of emotions: depression, guilt, anger, denial, and ultimately acceptance. Allow yourself time to fully experience each feeling and then let each one go. These feelings are normal and a necessary part of the healing process.

3. Find someone who can relate
Locate a support group or a mentor who can help you work through everything you’re feeling. Having someone to talk that has also been through all the same feelings you’re going through will provide you a crutch to lean on and to help you recover.

4. Write out your emotions
Start a journal or a blog that will allow you to chronicle your feelings. Writing in a journal can be very therapeutic for dealing with emotions and can allow you a way to voice all of your frustration and pain without worry of feeling judged by anyone. Also, blogging can open up a new community of support to you by connecting with other mothers who have also given up their child for adoption.

5. Find the good
If you made the decision to place your child up for adoption then it’s because you knew that you couldn’t give them what they needed and had enough foresight to see that someone else would be better suited to do so. As painful as this decision is, you should also rejoice in the fact that you chose to place them in a good and loving home.
Dealing with the grief over losing a child, even when it’s by choice, is a rocky road to travel. But there is light at the end of the tunnel so don’t give up hope. You may not ever be whole again, but you will recover.

Author Bio
Sara is an active nanny as well as an active freelance writer. She is a frequent contributor of nanny service. Learn more about her at: http://www.nannypro.com/blog/sara-dawkins/.

Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2012 Margaret Margaret

Adoption Awareness Month

Adoption Awareness Month

Unless you have adopted, or are planning to do so, you may know little about children who need homes. Given that it is adoption awareness month, it seems only appropriate to give some general information about the world of adoption.

According to the U.S. Department of Human Services, there are 1.8 million adopted children in the United States; these children account for 2 percent of all children in the United States. Of those:

• 75 percent were adopted domestically.

• 37 percent through the foster care system.

• 38 percent through private services.

• 25 percent were adopted internationally.

About 75 percent of children are adopted by non-family members while 25 percent are adopted by relatives; seventeen percent of those adopted by relatives are adopted through the foster care system and 37 are adopted through private mediums.

There are several ways to adopt in the United States. One way is through the foster care system. In 2010, there were 107,000 children in the foster care system waiting to be adopted and 53,000 were adopted. The general process is that a state-licensed agency (either for-profit or non-profit) matches prospective parents to children in need of a home. Though substantially cheaper than all other types of adoption, many choose other means of adoption. This is because many people want newborns of a particular race, and foster care adoption houses children of all ages and races. Unfortunately, these children need a home just as much as all other children up for adoption.

A second way to adopt is through a private agency. Private agencies act as intermediaries between children and prospective parents in the matching process. Many choose this medium because the agency guides parents through the entire adoption process.

A third way to adopt is independently, i.e. privately. It is legal in most states, though Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, and Massachusetts do not allow it; the laws surrounding independent adoption vary from state-to-state. This process involves prospective parents independently seeking out biological parents who have put their child up for adoption; lawyers are used as intermediaries. Many choose this means of adoption because agencies have policies regarding parent-criteria and prospective parent-biological parent contact both during and after the adoption. Independent adoption allows both prospective parents and biological parents to set their own criteria. Prospective parents control the search process and have direct contact with the biological parents; both parties also decide if the child will have contact with the biological parents after the adoption process is finalized.

A fourth way to adopt is internationally. China, Russia, Guatemala, Korea, and Ethiopia are common countries from which children are adopted; however, about 80 other countries around the world adopt out children to parents from different countries. In 2010, over 11,000 children were adopted from other countries. Generally, parents use adoption services similar to domestic adoption services. Many choose to adopt internationally to help children in desperate situations; many times, children are undernourished, under-educated, or have disabilities. Others choose this process because, depending on country, it can be less costly.

Amber Paley is a guest post and article writer bringing to us information and statistics on child adoptions.  Amber also writes about abuse in nursing homes.
Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Margaret Margaret

The Japanese Tsunami: When The Past Dances With the Present

I am super excited to have a guest post today!!!!!  I met him on Twitter and asked him if he would guest post for me.  I have never had a male guest post for me before and I was excited to finally have one!  After reading his post here go and check out his blog!

As of this writing, 3/16/11, the Japanese death toll is over 4,000, with countless thousands missing, and an estimated $200 billion in damages has already occurred. This ongoing tragedy is really a tale of three horrific events, an earthquake, a tsunami, and the looming threat of a nuclear catastrophe. Because Japan is located in the Ring of Fire region, it has a long history of earthquakes and tsunamis. The shifting of geographic tectonic plates beneath the Pacific ocean causes the earthquakes. This in turn causes the tsunami in the Pacific’s vast waters. Wikipedia lists major earthquakes in Japan going back to November 684 A.D. This current earthquake, measured 8.9 on the Richter scale, is the strongest earthquake of those listed.
Like Karen Zacharias’ well written and moving play, Legacy of Light, these events model a dance between past and present. In Legacy of Light, the philosophy and physics of 17th century Voltaire and his former mistress Emilie du Chatelet are juxtaposed and intertwined with related individuals and events in our present time. On a much more horrific scale, the earthquakes and tsunamis of Japan’s tumultuous geographic past are becoming intertwined with the most powerful force unleashed by mankind in history, atomic power.
Japan has 55 nuclear power plants, with several more planned. The US has 104. The most significant nuclear meltdowns to date have occurred in the US, 3 Mile Island, and in Russia, Chernobyl. The Japanese power plant in its’ Fukushima plant is now confirmed to be in a meltdown situation. The damage was initially caused by the earthquake and tsunami, but has now taken on a life of its own. In the past, this third stage of the disaster would not have occurred. But now, it could ultimately be the most devastating part. Somehow in our modern, sheltered world of computer, smart phones, and SUVs, we forget where we come from. We forget the power of nature and we can barely conceive of the consequences when the past dances with the present.
By Steve Mallis
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Our Attitude Matters

“Happiness is an attitude. We either make ourselves miserable, or happy and strong. The amount of work is the same.” 
Francesca Reigler      

About three weeks ago, I signed up for the SITSGIRLS Tribe Building/Blogging Support event.  We started last week, were assigned to groups with animal names (Hare & Lamby for me), got to connect with a new set of bloggers with somewhat similar niches, and were off and running to complete daily tasks/assignments. It has been a whirlwind of activity ever since and one of the assignments was to pair up with a fellow team member and guest blog for each other today.
As serendipity would have it, Margaret and I connected and agreed to give it a shot. Margaret and I consulted with each other and the result is what you are staring at here …Adapted from another post.

Regardless of what we believe, one thing is certain: our attitude accompanies us on every path we travel and serves as judge and jury to our actions; we must choose wisely.

A Case in Point:
When I was in graduate school, I had the good fortune of studying with a beloved and highly regarded Professor of Clinical Psychology; we’ll call him Prof Zee here. Prof Zee’s classes were always packed with eager students because he had a reputation for being a brilliant, compassionate and attentive teacher. He was skilled at distilling complex theories and equations into clear and understandable language and even students from other departments lined up to register for and take his fundamentals course.

To our dismay, Prof Zee announced at the beginning of one academic year that he planned to retire and move away from New York.  Everyone scrambled to register for his final semester class and those of us who were fortunate enough to attend that final course were forever blessed by the wisdom and skill of a master teacher.

On the first day of class, Prof Zee advised us to “stop worrying about failure or success and focus on being present and engaged.” We were. Throughout the course, he engaged and challenged us with individual and group assignments.  For our final exams, he gave us both a take home and in-class exam. We came to our last class both exhilarated and saddened.  Somehow, we suspected that Prof Zee had something up his sleeve. He gave back the exams and instructed us to spend a few minutes reflecting on our efforts throughout the semester. Then he said, “I want you to write the final cumulative grade you know you deserve on your exam sheet and give it back to me.” We did and quickly handed our papers back.

Once all the grade sheets were returned to Prof Zee, he led us in a riveting discussion on how our beliefs, attitudes, and training shape our choices, decisions, and ultimately, our outcomes. What were other internal/external predictors? He called on several students to ask why they gave themselves a low/high grade. The answers were revelatory and ran the gamut; I earned it, I didn’t deserve it, I shoulda-coulda-woulda, I know my stuff and on and on. There was a heated discussion on the impact expectations and a positive attitude has on our sense of self worth and value.
In the end, we agreed that a healthy self-image, a positive mental attitude gives us more “A+” Days. We have free will to make our own choices and it is up to us to stay stuck in a rut or go with the flow. To make us remember this, Prof Zee gave us the final grade we wrote down … we deserved it!  What are you choosing to do?

Until Next Time…
Ask. Believe. Receive. ©
Elizabeth Obih-Frank
Elizabeth Obih-Frank believes in positive kismet/fate and writes two bi-weekly blogs; Mirth and Motivation  and Positive Kismet  where she shares motivational, goodwill pieces and more. She is a mom to twins, a master trainer/educator, former real estate program director, writer, healer, motivational speaker and social media fan. She loves a good laugh, good food and an occasional jaunt to somewhere around the world.

Invisible Illness Week

This week is invisible illness week.  I have a chronic but invisible illness.  People that don’t know me tend to think I am just lazy or a bitch.  I wish that people would take the time to get to know me before they judge me.  If you don’t have an invisible illness you don’t know what it feels like for people to not understand that there is a reason I am like I am.  Here are some stats that will shock you.  I know they did me!

  • Nearly 1 in 2 Americans (133 million) has a chronic condition
  • 96% of them live with an illness that is invisible. These people do no use a cane or any assistive device and may look perfectly healthy.
  • That number is projected to increase by more than one percent per year by 2030, resulting in an estimated chronically ill population of 171 million. Chronic Care in America 
  • Sixty percent of the chronically ill are between the ages of 18 and 64. 
  • The divorce rate among the chronically ill is over 75 percent 

I got these stats from:http://invisibleillnessweek.com/2009/05/06/statistics_chronic_illness/.

There are so many different types of invisible illness.  This week I am having some great guest posters post about their invisible illnesses.  I will post my story on Tuesday and then the other days I will have some amazing women post about their struggles with their invisible but chronic illnesses.  I hope everyone can learn from these lady’s and be a little more excepting of others!