Invest in your marriage, Invest in your kids

This week, I’d like to introduce you to Aliza Said. She’s a marriage coach that I met not too long ago who is passionate about empowering women and helping them to show up as their strongest selves. As I share a similar passion, it’s not surprising that I am very excited to have her guest post today! As marriage is one of areas of expertise, Aliza was gracious enough to share with us about how making your marriage a priority is actually really beneficial for your children. This hit very close to home for me, as I know for sure that my parents’ marriage had an effect on not only my childhood, but on how I perceived and participated in relationships. I’ll let her take it from here:

Invest in your marriage, Invest in your kids

A new baby brings a whole jumble of emotions. So many moms feel like they enter this whirlwind of pure love, a newly learned overwhelm and endless things that need to be taken care of.

Usually, the first thing that gets pushed to the bottom of your priorities list is your marriage and relationship as parents.

There are so many reasons that parents neglect their relationship and the romance dissolves:

Sometimes they’re just too exhausted to invest in their marriage.

Sometimes they think their kids have to be first, all the time.

Sometimes they feel like they’re in constant survival mode.

Sometimes they fall in to believe the myth that marriage is doomed after having kids.

Sometimes they get into the flow of just being co-operators of the home and not lovers.

Whatever the reason, it happens all the time. Parents drift apart after having kids and so many think they just have to wait it out until the kids grow up.

But here’s the thing, your marriage is not just about you.

Your marriage has a huge impact on your kids.

You might not realize how much your relationship shapes and creates your kids’ world and inner self.

Here, we’re going to touch on just a few of those things so that you can push up your marriage on the priority list and start living in love again.

A Living Model –

There’s a thumb rule in parenting, kids learn from what you do, not what you say.

You can tell your kids not to yell, be kind and gracious with people but if you and your husband parade around with anger and hostility, the actions will speak stronger than words.

Being a living model to your kids is a huge responsibility and honor. You get to show them the ropes of life and the world. You can be a living model of affection, deep and loving communication and humility in relationships. You could also unconsciously be modeling resentment and negativity.

This doesn’t mean your relationship has to be perfect, it means you can also model to your kids how to repair conflict, how to communicate when things are tough and how to forgive and go on with love.

Generational patterns are real, our automatic habits will go back to what we were shown as kids. To some extent, you can choose which patterns you hand down to your kids.

Key to Happiness

In the longest study on happiness, researchers found that strong relationships most accurately predicted people’s happiness throughout their lives. They are “intrinsic to everything we do and everything we are,” the authors write.

When you equip your kids with relationship abilities, you’re essentially giving them the key to happiness for the rest of their lives.

Kids’ Development

John and Julie Gottman researched relationships after the birth of a baby. They found that a strained relationship might also strain the healthy development of a child. Babies and kids are amazingly attuned to the energy between you. When parents are unhappily married, they might be distressed and lonely and withdraw from emotional and physical responses to their baby. Parents may force the baby into more preferable behavior like just being quiet, instead of providing their emotional and physical needs.

Babies raised by unhappy parents suffered developmentally, they trudged behind babies of happily married parents both emotionally and intellectually.

Kids or Marriage First?

Society tells us that your kids need to be first, when really, we’re creating a society of people who are really good at thinking about themselves, thinking that their ego is the most important. We’re putting ourselves in a crisis of raising a narcissistic generation.

Instead, put your marriage first. A healthy and happy marriage is the greatest gift you can give your kids.

When your kids watch you nurture your relationship, they learn the importance of thinking about others, creating an environment of giving and consideration, sensitivity and joy with others.

Epic Self Development

When your marriage stretches your heart in ways you never imagined possible, your heart is now stretched and wider to love your kids as well. When you try to find the good in your husband, you’ll be able to find the good in your kids. When your patience has been tested in your marriage, you’ll know to step up with patience in parenting as well.

Marriage can challenge your mind, body and soul. It can rip open the most tender wounds and force you to examine your inner compass. Once you do that deep work, you’ll then show up as a wholehearted mom, capable of parenting with whole new depths.

Security and Stability

Kids need an emotional anchor in life. Life can seem overwhelming to them, learning how to ride the waves of life. When your marriage is secure and safe, they too feel like they have a safe place to land on. When a kid is riding the waves of frustration at school or figuring out their friends, coming back to choppy waters at home, just makes him feel even more helpless and emotionally drowning.

If you build strong roots for your children, it’ll allow them to grow their branches and reach up high and blossom their own fruits.

A happy marriage can add so much love, passion and connection to your life. But when you invest in your marriage, you’re not only thinking about your own happiness, you’re also investing in your kids.