Lost Boy

This is not easy. You have a spouse doing something that you don't want them to. Doing something that they shouldn't be doing. And he gets angry. And you are 6-7 years into marriage... My guess is some of the love magic is gone in the marriage. Most marriages experience it and different people react differently to it. It is much like a flower garden. At first it is new and exciting... starting to grow. 6-7 years down the line the garden is established and the gardeners stop tending to the garden as much as they used to. Complacency sets in and weeds start popping up in the garden and the gardeners do do anything about them. The weeds will continue to flourish if nothing is done. And eventually the weeds will take over to the point that it is hard to save your flower garden. At your stage, either one of you can manage the weeds for a while. And that is what you may have to do. Love is not a 50/50 proposition. It is a 100% proposition. Not a 100/100. Just a 100. You give your 100%. That is what you need to be worried about. If you worry about your partner's 100%, chances are you won't give your 100%. You look at your husband and you think, he isn't giving his 100%... So your inclination is to not give your 100%. He may think he is giving his 100%, but sees you slacking.. So now he slacks a little more... And you experience the love death spiral. The only way to break out is to stop basing your actions on your spouse's actions. Yes, it hurts that he isn't where you would hope he would be. Here is the real hard question.. Are you where he would like you to be? Are you providing the same love and support you did when you first got married? Is much of your focus on the kids and not on him? I am not trying to say you are responsible for his actions. He is. I am saying that you may have to take a large step back and really look at your relationship. Take the emotion out of the analysis. Emotion will just cloud your analysis and you will do dumb things. Really look at it. You can't change him. You can only change you. Remember that the reason you are married is because you loved your husband. It is not because you love your kids. As long as mom and dad's relationship is good, the kids will be just fine. But parents can neglect their partner for the kids thinking that they are doing well. This is not a good thing to do. Keep your partnership strong and the kids will be fine. So now that you are looking at this from a neutral perspective... What would the savior have you do? He treated those he loved (he loved everyone) with kindness. He healed the ungrateful lepers. And never complained to them. He fed 5000 people and a week later they had forgotten about it. He loved without expectation of love in return. This is hard to do. This is heavenly thing to do. My guess is that your husband needs help. Nagging him and riding him are only going to drive him to hide it. You definitely don't want that. You need him to trust you. And trust is only going to come through love... but he is drinking.. why should you love him? Why should the savior love you? The savior loves your husband. He is not going to give up on him. Love him. Help him in positive ways. If he is going to change, it is going to be because he loves you. And wants to make himself better. If he doesn't feel your love, things are going to spiral out of control. Why should you have to do all the work? It absolutely sucks. Been there done that. But we really aren't alone, are we. Know that the Lord is with you. Let him guide you. He guides through love.

That would be my guess as well. It would be hard to believe that there would be someone dimwitted enough at youtube to shut it down. At least not someone who wanted to keep their job.

Christ stands at the door knocking, but you are the one that has to open that door. A man does not run the church. The church is run by God and his Son Jesus Christ. This takes faith to believe this. This is a church based on faith.. Not blind faith, but faith. There are various things that the church teaches that are out of step with the philosophies of men. We can certainly know the truthfulness of these things through the testifying of the spirit. However, we can forget these things as well. You don't physically see a God sitting at the head of the church because he requires us to have faith. True faith is trusting in the Lord. Trusting that he is leading the church and its teachings. As for the sleep deprivation... Why is that happening?

I haven't felt like a take over at all. I was an elder's quorum instructor before the change and still am. My personal teaching style is to say very little. I'll read through the conference talk and listen to it several times. Pick out a few things to read, but mostly write down questions. And not just any old questions. I like to ask questions that require thought and get people unwittingly bearing their testimony and providing personal experience in answering the question. This does two things. It engages people, because people are just naturally snoopy to know about other people's lives, but far more important is that it invites the spirit. Lately I have hardly said anything at all when I teach... Get the discussion started and then just shut up and let them teach themselves. The interesting thing is that when I do this, I get a bunch of brothers coming up to me after the lesson complimenting me on it being a great lesson. I always assure them that I did very little and that it was them, not me.

I am afraid there is probably nothing that you can do. Perhaps the bishop could mention something in a relief society meeting about not asking members if or why they aren't wearing garments. That some times there are personal and legitimate reasons not to and it can be aggravating to the person you are asking. I am guessing this is basically a female issue. I would find it quite weird for a male to comment to a female whether she is wearing garments or not. I would find it strange for a guy to ask another guy why he isn't wearing any, but I suppose it would happen. Anyway, I figure it is none of my business. I suspect the reason they ask is because they don't want to see you go inactive or something like that. In a sense it is their way of showing concern for you. I don't think most would be judging you as a bad person, but just wondering why. And that is why you might talk with the bishop to see if he can't have a generic discussion talking about these things with the ladies.

I have not been in that exact same situation. I did end up on a 6 month assignment with a female coworker in a foreign country. However, we did not share a car nor were we in the same hotel. We each had our own apartments and rode bicycles to work. In that 6 month time, I think I might have had a one on one meal with her one time. I made it a point to keep it professional and that is all. She wanted to go do things on the weekend together as she was pretty lonely. I decided that could be too easy to get close to her so I never did anything with her on the weekends. It just isn't worth it getting friendly with her. Way too much to jeopardize.

I knew a couple of missionaries on my mission that did not confess their sins with their girl friends before coming on the mission. Their decision not to confess weighed heavily on them, one was a companion of mine and he had a hard time dealing with it. I don't know if he eventually went home or not. The right thing to do is often not the easy thing to do. But it remains the right thing to do and in the long run will serve you better for doing it. Good luck and trust in your heavenly father.

Yeah, been there done that. 1) frequent calls to my wife and kids. Now I would probably do video chat 2) went to many bars. Never had an alcoholic drink. Just let my coworkers know that I didn't drink. Now for a harder question. Have you ever been asked to go on a business trip with a coworker of the opposite sex, especially a good looking one and you only had one car to share so eating out with this coworker would be a given. Would you voluntarily tell your spouse without you having to ask? Would you go? What if it was for a week or more? What if the person was a bit flirty with you?

She has a boy friend. Time to move on and not worry about her.

What you shared is what I refer to as proofing. Changing water to wine follows some Devine law, but it is not a natural thing to occur on earth. It happened through devine intervention... Poofing. As for Moses, he saw a lot, but that did not give him understanding of all he saw. Lost boy is arrogant, but not because he believes Moses had a primative understanding. We have a primative understanding of things compared to those in the future.

Yes, what you are explaining is to me proofing stuff into existence. I have no issue with God being able to rearrange matter. But it does not make any sense at all that he did. Why would he create dinosaur fossils? To me that would be like lying to his children. Then take light from other stars. If the stars are 100 million light years away, how did the light get here in several thousand years time. But not just here, it would have had to been done the same way for the other countless worlds God created. It makes far more sense that the Bible was written according to knowledge understandable by primative man. And why did it take 6 days for him to do this? Why not just snap his fingers and have it done in an instance? God to me is a God of order. Billions of years in the making explains an orderly progression.

Absolutely evolution takes place. Just look at dogs. Humans have changed them significantly over the years. Imagine what mother nature has done over hundreds of millions of years. Or over the course of a thousand years if that is what floats your boat. Millions of years seems so much more plausible to me than God just poofing everything here.

That is almost every day of my life. The only thing that I am really trying to change is that if the lady requests something that I get 'er done right away. She seems to like that a lot. And good things come from a happy wife.

Glad I am not the only one that has had wifey issues... 😉 Ok, I wish I were the only one that had that challenge. Love has certainly had its challenges. When I found out of my wife's emotional affair, I was devastated. The hardest thing I had to go through. There was a huge part of me that wanted to cut and run. But after prayer, the answer was to love her and forgive her. I don't expect her to return to church any time soon. She isn't anti mormon, but just doesn't think it has what she needs. That leaves me with what about our eternal marriage.. I have this strong feeling that all will work out if I do my part. And my part is loving my wife. Looking for the good in her everyday. Serving her everyday. I suspect you have felt many of the same things I have and probably to a much harder degree. Keep loving her. Kindness and a gentle heart. I have found the more effort I put into loving her, the less pain I have. I think that is part of the forgiveness process. You will probably never forget the events, but the pain gets erased. And happiness can return. And your mind dwells on good things not the negative. And I think that is what is meant by you remember them no more.

Why do so many people want to label themselves as liberal or conservative? Republican or Democrat? Both groups are highly intolerant of the other. Both groups have good and bad points. And neither are really doing the things required to keep America great. I would label myself liberal in the sense that I am looking for better ways of doing things. Open minded to new ideas. I value hard work and education. Family and health. I want the nation as a whole to succeed. I recognize that we cannot succeed as a whole without improving the lives of our less fortunate. But I am not for handouts for the able bodied either. I believe that providing health care for all citizens will result in more productivity, happier people and less crime. I believe in getting rid of the law granting citizenship to everyone born here, but I believe in providing far more visas than currently offered. I believe in taxing these people with a flat tax so that they are not getting the benefits of being here for free. I believe that we need to find a way to make college more affordable. I believe in reducing military spending by 50%and spending that money on infrastructure and renewable energy. Shedding our reliance on dirty fuel sources. I believe that strong families are crucial for the health of the nation. I don't believe in a minimum needs to be $15 an hour. I believe that if you want more money, go out and do the jobs that pay more.

Here is the real answer. Misinformation and no willingness to really study it. They have heard from multiple sources how bad it is and have made up their minds without truly studying the facts. 1) Single payer is not socialized medicine. It would be a federally run insurance corporation of sorts. That part would essentially be socialized. That is where the socialized part ends. Hospitals, clinics, doctor offices, labs etc would still be private or non-profit. Hospitals would still compete for your business as would doctors. 2) There would be a new tax on your pay stub, but most likely the medicare would be eliminated. And your health insurance premium that you and your employer pay would be eliminated. Also, co-pays would either be eliminated or reduced. The net effect on one salary would be most likely a net increase in take home pay. 3) Countries with a socialized payment system typically have much lower drug costs. 4) Your assets won't be wiped out due to major illness. 5) Most people don't use market driven insurance anyway. Most people get the health insurance their company offers. And generally you get one or two options. It is rare to get three or more options. This is not a capitalistic system. People claim that if you don't like what the company offers, you can go buy insurance out of your pocket on your own. Well, in a single payer system, you could do that as well. You could purchase premium coverage. 6) You would have more access to doctors and hospitals. Essentially all would be in the system. 7) Cost of child birth would be next to zero. Could that potentially reduce the number of abortions? Other misinformation. 1) Waiting for an operation could take over a year. This really depends on the country, the system, how things are set up, etc. Read this. http://www.drsforamerica.org/blog/the-waiting-times-myth 2) Innovation would decrease. This also is not factual. It is a guess at best. Hospitals would still be allowed to develop new treatments and procedures. And it really depends on how the single payer is set up to determine how much money is allotted to developing new procedures, etc. Some people are opposed to this because they don't like providing a free lunch to slackers. Guess what, we already do. A good healthcare system is going to create a healthier, more productive population. More productive equates to less crime. Less crime means less cost for law enforcement and incarceration. It would most likely result in a reduction in gun sales as well. And for the final comment. I am not a democrat. I very much dislike the democratic party. I was born a republican but am no longer a republican due to the republican stance on things such as health care reform and immigration. That said, I truly believe that a single payer system is going to happen. If it happens under democratic rule, then the democrats will get to set it up how they want. If it happens under republican rule, republicans will get to set it up how they want. I truly believe that the republicans have a huge chance here to make history and crush democrats for a very long time if they pulled their heads out and passed this legislation. If the democrats set it up, they will ensure that abortion is covered, that illegals are covered, etc. Now would you like to discuss immigration policies???

I have known a few people in your situation. Serving a mission is an act of faith. But lets lay this out for you. Your parents love you. I can hardly believe that serving a mission would change that love for you. You love your parents. You serving a mission is going to hurt their feelings a bit, but they will get over it. You will show them love and write them often and let them know that they have been wonderful parents. They may get upset if you go. If they do, don't get upset back. Have understanding and compassion. It isn't going to be easy at first. But I have seen many a relationship blessed from missionary service.

Me? I don't really care. Most of the world doesn't have the same hang up on seeing a boob and they are fine. But I understand some are a bit more prudish and to make it easy for all a little blanket goes a long way.

Wait? There are people that still have issues with women breastfeeding? Really? My wife breastfeed all of our kids in the U.S., in the chapel during sacrament meeting. I don't recall any stares, no one made any comments to us. Honestly I don't even know if anyone knew. My wife was pretty good at it. And if someone happens to see boob during sacrament meeting, is it going to be the end of their salvation? But I can certainly understand the predicament of the bishop. You have a member that is unhappy with something taking place at church mostly because we are so wrapped up in being modest. So now the bishop can run the risk of incensing the person that has the concern or the mother that was breastfeeding. Either way feeling are most likely going to get hurt. What do you do? If the mother was doing no wrong, then you have to side with her and explain to the member that she was not doing anything wrong. In some countries it is not uncommon to see a 4 or 5 year old getting some boob action from mom. Pop it right out for all to see and give their kid a quick snack. Avoiding porn and being prudish are two very different things. a woman feeding her baby is not porn. Nothing like feeling guilty over doing nothing wrong...

I think I had situation that I can relate to and maybe give you one guys experience. When we first got married we had a lot of sex. Now I didn't just get married so I can have sex. There was so many things that drew me to her, fun, adventurous, hard working, frugal in many ways, but willing to spend on important stuff, etc. But then she got pregnant. Sex life was gone. Sucked not being able to have sex with her. but I figured after the baby things would return. The good sex life did return to some degree. And then came more kids. After the 4th the sex life didn't return. As a guy that was frustrating as can be. I still loved her, but that part of the relationship was gone. I felt like she was neglecting me. I turned to video games. I need some release to my stress and I wasn't getting it through sex. I certainly wasn't smart enough to find another way. Things certainly weren't happy. I would express my desire to have sex and she would feed me some line. I got tired of it. There was no point in asking any more so I just gave up. I loved her and never wanted to be mean or hurt her, but I felt neglected. I would come home from work and the first thing I would get is not a kiss or a hug, but a wife that either wanted to tell me how bad her day was or nag me about something I did wrong or didn't do or forgot or something else. I didn't want to deal with that. I did just as much work as she did, maybe even more. So I would just shut down and go play video games and she would go to the bedroom. I tried following a few times hoping for loving, but the loving never happened. We were in a love death spiral. she would love me a little less, I would love her a little less. not good at all. Looking back on that time in my life, I could have handled things so much better. She could have handled things so much better. What I have since learned is that love is not just a feeling. Being in love can be far different than loving. Love is a choice and it is an action. You did not marry the perfect guy. He did not marry the perfect woman. My guess is that you are not the fun you that he married and he is not the guy that you married. Video games are a form of release. It is a way to get away from your problems. And it is certainly an addiction as well. I dare bet that when he started he was feeling a lot of stress either from you or from new responsibility or work or some place. And playing video games helps you escaped that stress. This doesn't mean it is good to play video games, it just is explaining a major reason why. So what got us out of our love death spiral? It was mostly me. I am not trying to pat myself on the shoulder. It was me that helped get us into it. I am telling you because the healing has to start from someone. And let me tell you. it sucks. I decided I would change myself into the person I thought my wife would want to be married to. Here are the things I did. 1) I made a chart of 8 things I would do to improve myself. They included things to improve me physically, spiritually and capability to love. And I would daily check those things off as I did them. And here they are 2) Pray 3) read the scriptures 4) stay on my new diet and reduce my weight 5) walk the dog in the morning. 6) walk the dog at night 7) Do at least a half hour of house work more than I usually did. 😎 Find a sincere compliment to pay her every day. 9) Find something kind to do for her every day. 10) -- this isn't part of my list, but I gave up video games... Or at least the addiction to them. I play from time to time like once every couple of weeks and only for a couple of hours. Before it was every night for 2-4 hours a night. refocusing on what is important get me off of them. I didn't tell her I was doing this. I figured the only way to fix this situation was to win her heart back. I knew it was going to be hard. I knew she would not respond at first. I made up my mind to give it a year. And after a year, if things weren't better, I could say that I put in a very sincere effort. The first month wasn't too hard, but by month 4, I had put in a lot of effort without much in return. I told myself not to expect anything in return and to just keep with the program and do so with the most loving attitude I could. It was very much not easy. however, in month 4 things started to change. I am an engineer and like to know that if I put A into a box, that I will get B out. not C or D, but B. If I want C or D, I would put something different in there. But relationships aren't like that. you aren't guaranteed that if you put A into the box you will get B out. it could be M or P. I had to commit to patience. I had to commit to controlling my anger. When something went wrong and I got angry, I had to squish that emotion and approach the situation from perspective as devoid of emotion as possible. No more yelling, no more negative actions. When she would get mad at me for doing something, I would stay calm and say, I am sorry and I am trying my best. And that really calmed things down. Where are we today? I look forward to seeing her every day. She hugs me and kisses me every morning and night and when I am lucky a few times in between. Is there still tension? Not often and it gets dealt with quickly. Are things perfect? No. I am still working on me and improving me. I still daily look for ways to love my wife. She treats me so much better. We talk a lot more, go on dates, have romance, etc. Learn to communicate in a loving way. Don't be accusatory towards him.... You always. blah blah blah. Yes, he probably is that. but you pointing that out is not going to help you one bit. It is part of a love death spiral. You are putting yourself in a position of superiority over him. You certainly would not like him to do that to you. Loving communication is not hard to do, but not natural either. You being mad at him and letting him know that you are mad isn't going to help you either. I know, I was there. My wife would get quite upset with me, but I didn't care. I had nothing to lose if she got mad at me. She could not use the you aren't getting any sex tool. She had worn that out long ago and I didn't care. So her getting mad had no effect. So what do you do? I had a good idea of what was missing in my wife's life. And so I have tried my best to do that for her. Turn me into the person she would want to spend time with. I understood that our problems were not just me, but were her as well, but I can only fix me. You can only fix you. You can't fix you with the thought that he has to fix himself if you fix you. You have to take his actions out of the equation. You fix you regardless of what his response is. Treat him with kindness. You think that you should get kindness in return for being kind to him. Think otherwise. Don't do this with expectations from him. You do it out of love and because that is what Christ would do. I have as my theme song "I'm trying to be like Jesus" I don't know how many times I have listened to that song. I cried a lot but it helped. You are going to have to figure out how he likes to be loved and then love him. You can take an online test about the 5 love languages to help you out. It isn't the end all be all, but it certainly helps. If sex is a difficulty for you, you may need to learn some other ways to help him out. Be forgiving and patient. This is going to take time and it won't be easy. Love is not 50/50. Jesus loves you regardless, he would show you kindness and forgiveness. He would be patient and gentle. These are things that heal relationships. There are not guarantees. arm yourself with love and you have a fighting chance. Good luck.

I once had a very vivid and realist dream. And I always wanted to turn it into a book. As dreams go, most dreams don't really have a plot nor an ending and neither did this one, but it had a pretty cool setup. In the dream a young man inherits an old mansion from an old and secretive uncle who also left a cryptic note with the mansion that only this young man was to read. Now I can't remember if the young man was me or someone else, but that doesn't really matter. I remember the house to be a old large Victorian style house that wouldn't be out of place in a horror movie, but not quite so dark. I only remember a bit of the inside and the one room in particular, most likely the library, had thousands of old books many of which were laying out on the table. And there was a suit of armor that looked like it had seen action, but was very well taken care of. Through the note, the young man stumbles on a secret passage in the library to a secret room. In the room he finds a strange sword that is covered in an alien language. There is a book on the table in that secret room that has more of this alien language written on it plus some notes in English and a persons name. And there was a distinct feeling not to reveal this stuff to anyone. And that is basically where the dream ended. Never got to finish the story, but I was riveted.

You could go darker.. He accidentally killed his cousin.. playing on the docks... accidentally knocked his cousin off. Neither could swim so the cousin drowned and the young prince pretended to know nothing about it. And he has been carrying this guilt the whole time.

What if he wasn't adopted, but stolen... Or switched at birth. Or maybe he found out that his dad was not the rightful king... Or he is not the son of the king, but the son of someone else who his mom had a little romantic thing with and the king never knew...

Twin brother or sister stolen while as a baby....

Love is not just a feeling. It is a choice and it is an action. Choose to love her every day. Choose action to show this love. Love is like a plant. The more you take care of it, the more it will grow and develop. If you don't take care of it for a while, the plant will survive and you might lie to yourself that the plant is ok, but it isn't. Make it a point to truly show love to your wife every day. And when things get tough between you and her, step up the love. And never act out of anger. Acting out of anger always leads to bad things. If you are angry, take control of your emotion. Take a step back and reanalyze what you are angry about. And remember to love her everyday.