Marital Connection
Tracy Lamperti
Re-establishing An Emotionally Intimate Connection
Goal
To connect/re-connect in a meaningful and fun non-sexual way. Why non-sexual? Because some couples have become so separate and disconnected. They desire to reconnect but feel too vulnerable and overwhelmed to connect sexually.
Most activities listed here are meant to take no longer than 45 minutes, except the ones with a (*). If you both have time AND it naturally takes longer, you may extend it beyond the 45 minutes if you both agree.
Keep your own journal or notes about these experiences so that you can make the most of them and really begin to understand your experience.
Steps
- Decide how many times per week you want to engage in this process (minimum 3, maximum 7). You must agree and it must be a commitment.
- Decide how many weeks you are making this commitment for, i.e. 1 week followed by reassessment and re-commitment, 2 weeks followed by reassessment… Please do not go more than 3 weeks without reassessing and recommitting. You may want to continue with the same agreement. You may want to change it. You may want to move on to the next level.
- Take turns choosing one activity from the list. Do not remind each other that it is their turn. Do not debate which activity to choose or give the person who it’s not their turn, the choice. The one whose turn it is chooses. If you don’t like anything on the list or if you would like to alter the activity on the list, you may do so, but the change cannot include a sexual activity. That is the next level.
- Embellishments like lighting and music are up to the person who is choosing for that day/night.
- The camera part of the phone is ok, but no phone for any other purpose.
Here goes!
- Hand Massage – Take turns giving each other a hand massage per the video instructions or similar. Here’s one instructional video on hand massage. The first 10 minutes are narrated and the second 10 minutes are the same massage without narration so you can follow along if you want. Lots of talking and massage don’t usually go well together but some talk is ok. Provide some feedback about how you are enjoying the experience, and for sure, speak up lovingly if you are experiencing any discomfort.
- Board Game or Cards
- Side-by-side Handholding Walk – Leave the dog and the children home (with someone responsible depending on age). Don’t worry about conversation, just let it flow naturally, but no hot-topics and no family business, and no talking all about the children or your aging parents.
- Faux Power Outage – The one who chose this, decide what kind of fun you would like to have? Candles, what kind of snacks, a board game or cards, music (pretend your phone is a battery operated radio).
- Silent Blindfolded Trust Walk – Even better in the dark! Take turns being blindfolded and led on a walk. The leader must take you by the hand and there is to be no talking. The leader raises your hand up if there is a step up, down if down, to the right if to the right and so on. The leader must take responsibility for looking ahead so they know where to lead you and looking behind to ensure you are safe and navigating everything well. Try some more challenging areas like hills or stairs, twists and turns around trees, etc. If the weather or other conditions make it that going outside is not reasonable, try to do it in your home. Go slow and careful. We don’t want any injuries.
For all 20 activities, download the full PDF!
Do you get it that every time we seem to turn on the tv, news or in the movies these days the boys and men are getting terrible representation? Whether they are kowtowing to a bossy woman, making obscene gestures or noises, getting drunk or on drugs, committing some stupid crime, espousing the effeminate or acting like a pompus a__, or the countless other ways that they are being portrayed. What was wrong with Davy Crockett, or Huck Finn, Andy Griffith, Superman? Why have Sponge Bob and Homer Simpson and the many other “men” of today been selling by being so stupid? I am not up on any of today’s shows, but I get the point from the stories I hear, that it is not good. Even when an olympic star comes into the spotlight, all too often the story is tainted by some remark or behavior he made, not realizing everyone was watching. Where are the boys supposed to get their education? And what about the girls? Where are they supposed to learn who would make a good husband and father? What brought this on was my prepping for morning meeting tomorrow at the Lamperti Homeschool. I was looking for something good in The Children’s Book of Virtues , Edited by William J. Bennett, Illustrated by Michael Hague. I just happened to open to page 38, Boy Wanted , by Frank Crane. I won’t put the whole story here, but here is a sample.
Photo by Michelle Kaye
What are those? Are those beans? What are they for? Can I touch them? One can learn a lot about a child by watching them play. Play gives us a glimpse into the thought process, emotions, relationships and the way they organise and put things together. With beans, even a teenager or adult can “sort things out” with beans, sand and other materials. Beans make a good medium for tea parties, hide and seek, play ground play, imaginative water, etc. In fact, beans can bring comfort to all ages. Children who don’t feel like they have a voice or have trouble sharing their thoughts and feelings often find themselves running their hands through the field of beans. The same goes for teenagers. Little ones, of course want to play with the beans, which provides a great opportunity to evaluate self-control, adherance to limits and their depth of imagination or level of organization. Beans are awesome! The video shown here represents a variety of bean benefits! An older adolescent, actually, a young adult, worked out many complicated issues in her sessions week after week while sorting beans. This person successfully sorted out ALL of the kidney beans, sorting on many levels! It is so curious to children to come to their therapy session and notice that something has happened involving the beans. It gives children and teens a real sense of commonality with others as well as insight. They come to learn that some people think like they do and some think differently, and it’s all ok. They learn that, while I may share something about the “beans,” I won’t “spill the beans.” They can trust that I will keep their confidence, just like I keep the confidence of the last “bean worker.” As you see in the video, a young person is re-mixing the kidney beans. This young person, being someone who really struggles with self-control and had been held back for weeks from mixing the beans that had been sorted out. We shared such a delightful moment when she was finally permitted to “mix!” Timing is so important, but relationship is more! So the cycle will continue when many young people come in this week and discover the new state of the beans! Tracy Lamperti, Psychotherapist, Educator, Consultant
