In an age of skyrocketing divorce rates, is it really possible to make love last? Welcome to the falling in love forever show with Dr. Barbara and Michael Grossman, the well known relationship experts and best selling authors, the management book. Each week, they share the latest information to help you enjoy your romantic partnerships. So you can fall in love forever. Here are your hosts, doctors Barbara and Michael Grossman.
Hi, I'm Dr. Michael Grossman.
I'm Dr. Barbara Grossman,
where the authors authors of our new book, ageless love prescriptions for a mind body and spirit in the sexy science of, of falling in love, falling in love forever. So it's an interesting book, because we talk about both the science of falling in love forever. And the emotional benefits of falling in love forever. And there's a lot to do with science. The science of feeling love forever, has a lot of components to it. One of them is the physical, the hormonal. As we get older, we change hormones, we lose hormones. And that's a big part of not being able to maintain romantic love and passion, you've got to be able to have the right balance of hormones as you get older. And that's what I do as an anti aging physician. Then the other part, which Dr. Barbara works at every day with her patients, as a marriage counselor, how to maintain the emotions necessary to maintain that quality of finding love forever. Want to add some thoughts about how you do that, in terms of looking at the big picture of the of the changes in, in, in in stages of life, and how that affects of falling in love or falling out of love.
You assume that we're talking about a couple that's fallen in love when they were young, they're starting life together at a stage where you're they're creating their lives, they have to be practical, they have to figure out the careers and, and family life, there's a lot of functional focus in life at the time, a couple gets together and creates a life together. And there's just a lot to do. And eventually, over time, other dimensions of life show up as important. So the same couple needs to then begin to talk about more feelings and new interests that develop and and just how life is looking when parents get older and fade and pass away. And what kind of personal development is inspiring each individual, it's important to grow over a lifetime not stay in the same place. And as new needs and desires arise, it's it's important for the couple to learn how to talk to each other in a way that is open and intimate, and not complaining. But sharing these new developments that are occurring inside and the new directions that may be interesting. So they can invite so you can invite your partner to join you or at least understand where you're going.
So we can say that, if a romantic partnership works things out in the beginning of their relationship, and they find a way to be in love. And it's wonderful. And they are married for some five to 10 years feeling in love, then over time, things can change and things will change. It doesn't stay the same. So whatever you have worked out, when you're married, the first five years or so is not going to be the same after 10 or 15 years of marriage, it's going to change. So you have kids, it's very different when the kids a little. And when the kids start becoming teenagers. It's very different when you're 25 years old, then when you're 35 or 40 in terms of how you feel about everything. And unless you have the skills to talk with each other, to share with each other, how you're feeling differently about life and your situation and your marriage and your family and your work. Unless you can talk with your partner about it. It's a big problem. One of the big problems can become that you can't talk to your spouse about you're upset because they don't want to hear about it. For whatever reason, then find someone else to talk to you about. And then you get emotionally attached to them all not so much, oh really cares about how I feel. And then you get emotionally attached to them. And you begin to separate out from your spouse, and you get more attached to these other people, because they're really listening to you, but your spouse is too busy, or too, whatever. And that's a big problem.
That's no small project to learn how to talk to your partner, because your partner and you are very intertwined with each other, and you have a family together. And whether you're conscious of it or not, your old wounds from childhood are being reactivated. And you may even be interacting in a way that represses the old injuries of your childhood. And so your partner may not seem like they're on your side for a period of time. And so those, those wounds from childhood need to be resolved in favor of healing. And you need to grow your partnership by working together. And learning how to share the old hurts instead of reacting to your partner's similarities to your to a parent, or, or, or being bogged down by old feelings and, and not being your best self, you need to learn how to talk about those feelings in such a way that your partner feels engaged, and on your side and happy to work together to heal yourself and to heal themselves. So that you're accomplishing big things together, that that just enhances your relationship and puts you on the other side of your, of your childhood and your growing up years. And then you can begin to develop beyond that together. But it's so important to learn how to talk about that, those deep feelings without sounding like you're blaming, accusing, or just reacting irrationally.
And there's a quality of sharing deeply with your partner in which you checked lately, but you don't necessarily agree with each other. So one of the peculiar things that I find with Barbara and I is that I love her more now than at any time in the past 50 years. We don't agree on a lot of things. We have different ways of thinking about things, different ways of interacting with things, different ideas of how we should create this, organize that whatever, we have very different ideas. So we don't agree about it. Then we have to decide how to how to deal with that. But what happens is that I am in love with someone who is a real human being different than me,
and yet,
accepts and appreciates me as being different than she is. And you can really love someone who's different than you and not agree on everything. And that's really important. When you see your partner being dynamic, and being effective, and being fantastically creative in their own arena of expertise. And yet they don't agree with everything you say, it creates this mystery. How can this person be so different than me and yet look at them, they're really have a lot of talents and skills and ability and wisdom and thoughtfulness but they're so different than me, then you can really be in love with someone who's different than you. And that brings is great romantic passion, just like when you first met each other. But you really didn't know each other. But you knew they were different than you and you love them. And this passionate kind of love is very different than love of a brother or sister, mother or child. It's different. But you can still love each other intensely. And it takes that intense sharing. But you also have to accept that they're very different than you. And it's okay.
I think our differences make when I when I think about our differences, it makes you exciting, makes you very interesting. And you're like a man I I know you really well I feel like you're my best friend but you're also just very exciting because you have qualities I don't have a qualities I'll probably never have. And it's it's it's a you know, adventure to be with you because I get to experience vicariously those qualities. But the key is that we share our differences. It's really it's reflective, it's it's inward, it's calm, it's thoughtful, it's not aggravated and angry and and blaming and I'm not expecting Michael to agree with me or did on me and and you know pretty well. I'm not going to do that as well. But it isn't. contrary it isn't a it's a real conversation.
So, we wanted to present this big picture on what it takes to be falling in love forever, not just the first five years of marriage, but the whole 50 plus years of marriage is to feel more passionate after 50 years than you did after five years. And after two years, you can do that. And we encourage you to read our books. We've written a book called The marriage map, road to transform your marriage from ideal to adventure. We tell lots of fun stories in there and give you the big picture. And our new book coming out angels love talks about how to stay in love forever, the value of it and how to how to make it real in your own lives. So we look forward to talk to you again. And we hope you enjoyed our little discussion tonight.
Yes, wishing you love.
Thanks so much. Have a good night.
Thank you for watching the falling in the forever show with doctors Barbara and Michael Grossman. Join us next week for another informative discussion to help you keep your love alive. Be sure to visit us at the marriage map.com or find out about our relationship classes that falling in love forever.com