Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 14, 1994 TAG: 9402150002
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Joe Kennedy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
``Work,'' he said.
Then, elaborating: ``I'm sure my wife and I will have dinner.'' Valentine's Day is ``more for our kids than us.''
He said the children, in school now, get excited about the candy and other Valentine trappings. In the past, he and his wife did, too. They would go out and have a big meal. But they've changed. Now they're happy with ``a good, quiet time together.''
Their relationship is ``more in-depth than it was before.''
Things haven't always been smooth. For the first six or seven years of their marriage, they had trouble communicating with each other. Realizing it, they went for counseling and read books about relationships.
``In the last few years I've learned a little bit about the person I'm living with,'' he said. ``We're friends.''
I asked if I could speak to his wife about this evolution they'd made, and he said yes. On the phone, she said their stronger marriage stemmed in part from her deciding to ask for what she wants.
``Most women assume that men know what they need or want. What I've learned from being married to him is he has no clue. I say, `I need a hug. I had a bad day at work, and I need your support.'''
She has faults, too. ``I'm a very self-centered person,'' she said.
Things really began to get better when they both gave up drinking. It wasn't that they drank all the time. It was that when they drank, they drank too much. She started attending support group meetings and began to figure out why.
``The acceptance I found in those meetings was something I'd been searching for all my life,'' she said.
Still, it hasn't been easy. ``There was a lot of changing I had to do. ... Until a few years ago, I was a person who said everything was everybody else's fault.''
Now when something goes wrong, she looks first to herself.
As things changed at their house, the children had to adapt. ``They were used to doing as they pleased,'' she said. ``As I became responsible and started setting rules, they've adjusted and turned into really well-developed children.''
She has been candid with them about the program, knowing that alcohol is something they, like all of us, eventually will have to decide about.
Her husband hadn't mentioned alcohol, and he wasn't thrilled to hear, later, that it had come up. He wasn't trying to hide it, but he didn't want this story to make them seem heroic, or indicate that their success in life is assured.
Recovery, the day-by-day, step-by-step process that they've adopted, is ``the toughest thing I've ever done,'' he said. But it's also the best thing. It has shown him how he used alcohol to avoid responsibility. It is giving him an ongoing lesson in maturity.
Now, when something negative befalls him, he monitors his responses. The first ones still aren't very good. If he can get past them, into his second and third thoughts, he does better.
Everybody talks about growing older, but that's the easy part of life. It happens naturally. Growing up is tougher, and growing up together might be the most difficult task of all. Certainly it's more than a once-a-year thing.
A large part of it is simply facing the truth. Those of us who came up in the '50s and '60s can easily remember families that worked more strenuously at hiding their problems than solving them. They thought they were evading pain, but they were just passing it on.
Maybe one benefit of our wide-open age is a greater willingness to look at things honestly.
That's the spirit of this piece: That much good can come from making difficult, but smart, choices. It doesn't mean we have to give up our fun. This couple, for example, was going to a dance last Saturday night, and expecting to have a good time. The dance would be alcohol-free.
Theirs is a Valentine's story for the '90s. It has little to do with flowers, cards or candy, and a lot to do with heart.
by CNB