8.01.2011

Marriage Mondays: Marriage Supermodels, Leader of the Strong

Today's Marriage Monday is a series of interviews I did with some lovely friends of mine. I asked a bunch of girlfriends, all of whom are in very different stages in their dating/relationship lives, some questions about marriage role models. I am really excited to share their responses with you. I "participated" in the interview also, and will be posting my own answers last. I'm excited to share with you these smart, interesting women's take on marital role models and how they weigh in on our own marriages. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed putting it together! And please, feel free to answer the interview questions yourself in the comments! I'd love to hear more views on this topic! : )

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Leader of the Strong is my friend's superhero name. It's from a dream she had when we were in college, which is where we met. We haven't lived in the same city, but have kept in touch all these years. She gave a great toast at our wedding and had everyone laughing when she revealed that I used to sneak vegetables into A.P.'s food! She's getting married soon and I'm super psyched to go to her wedding in NYC. I think that her answers are especially interesting because she is looking marriage in the eye. Enjoy!

1. Marty Created Alias? Leader of the Strong, though technically she created this...in her brain!

2. What is your marital status? (If you are married, please tell me how long you've been married.)
Engaged! T minus 11 DAYS until I'm a MARRIED lady!

3. Growing up, what was your view of marriage?
That when you were married you were old...I still feel weird about the idea of being a "Mrs." (but I'm not taking my fiance's name. I might hyphenate, but I don't think I have to be "Mrs." unless I take his name right?).

4. Do you feel like you have strong role models for marriage in your life?
I think so. I feel like my parents have been through a lot - living apart for years at a time for work purposes, addiction, sickness, and they've stayed together through it all and made it work. And so many times my parents have said to me that one of the most important things in a partner is that he makes you laugh and is kind. That always made a lot of sense to me. Especially since I'm HILARIOUS and couldn't end up with someone boring. :)

4a. If yes, how do you feel like they affect your marriage?
Maybe on a subconscious level, it has reinforced that whole, better or for worse, sickness and health thing. But also, my opinion about marriage has always been that divorce is not really an option. I do have a serious view on marriage, I couldn't imagine being one of those people that gets married 4 times. Just date then!!

4b. If no, is/was this a concern for you? Do you wish you had better marriage role models?

5. Do you think having positive marriage role models is important to a successful marriage? Why or why not?
Yes, but even if you don't, I feel like that could be more reason for you to not go down the same path as the less than ideal role models you had. Maybe you see that, and you make a commitment to yourself that that's not how you want to be. I don't think I can speak from personal experience there though, just speculating. But, having good role models could also mean you have a good support system when it comes to marriage and relationships, that you don't just call it quits because things start to get hard or for petty reasons, because those good role models are there to put things into perspective and get you to work it out. I don't know. I think this question was hard to answer I hope that made sense... Also I feel like I'm interpreting "good role models' as not divorced, and bad ones as divorced and I don't think that's necessarily true all the time. There could be a married couple who has the worst relationship ever, and staying together might actually be serving as a bad role model to a kid. Like if there's violence or severe meanness involved or something.

Thank you so much for agreeing to share with us!

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(Photo by Theresa Scarbrough)

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