Marriage

This question is from a Group Therapy post in our TrèsSugar Community. Add your advice in the comments!

My husband and I have been together for 15 years. We have more than our share of ups and downs. More downs than I can remember. I have been by his side through everything. I still question his faithfulness in the past, but these last few months he has been sexting this woman that he went to school with.

Now granted she lives over 1,000 miles away but he has told her he loves her. He tells me it means nothing and makes a joke out of the whole thing. He tries to play like I am all the sex he needs and it is only harmless flirting. I confronted her on FB and told her to back off, she messaged me back and said they are just friends and blocked me. That right there tells me that something is wrong with the picture.

I tried to rekindle the flame we once had and it was amazing. Then I found out that he was still texting her. I have asked him to tell her to get lost and tell her that he is happily married. He has not done it yet. I am not sure at this point what to do . I know that if the thought is there, sooner or later the action will be there. I should also add that we have a 4-year-old daughter together.

Have a dilemma of your own? Post it anonymously on Group Therapy for advice, and check out what else is happening in the TrèsSugar Community.

This question is from a Group Therapy post in our TrèsSugar Community. Add your advice in the comments!

My husband and I are having some major major issues and I want to show him that we're worth it and fight for him. He is my very best friend and I just want to spice it up and light the spark back up. Has anyone been through this and how do I fix it?

Have a dilemma of your own? Post it anonymously on Group Therapy for advice, and check out what else is happening in the TrèsSugar Community.

Iconic author and editor Helen Gurley Brown died today at age 90. Helen is known as the woman who brought sex to the masses, with her best-seller Sex and the Single Girl in 1962, and then by leading Cosmopolitan as editor in chief from 1965 until 1997.

After 50 years of marriage, Helen Gurley Brown's husband, David Brown, died in 2010. Despite the make-yourself populism Helen promoted to women each month in Cosmo, she credited much to her husband in 2008, saying, "I owe him everything. I wouldn't be who I am or achieved what I did." Of course, what made them each successful was not the other but their partnership. David convinced Helen to write Sex and the Single Girl; he published Cosmo for the first few years while she edited it. It was a marriage of collaboration and mutual respect, so let's look at some of Helen's secrets for making it work.

• Choose wisely: "Marry a decent, good, kind person who will cherish you."
• Always say yes to sex: "If only one of you is in the mood, do it. Even if sex isn’t great every time, it's a unique form of communication and togetherness that can help you stay together with a good degree of contentment."
• Depend on each other: "Marriage is insurance for the worst years of your life. During your best years you don't need a husband."
• Communicate, maniacally: "If you listen to your mate maniacally well, you can’t go wrong."
• Except when it comes to orgasms: "There's enough trouble having a man in your life without saying, 'Look, I didn't have an orgasm last night.'"

File this under unions no one saw coming: Agyness Deyn eloped with actor Giovanni Ribisi last Friday. According to Crown City News, the couple was spotted "passionately kissing" in line at the eastern branch of the Los Angeles County Registrar's office. When asked if they were there to get married, they shyly said yes. Ribisi also added that he and Deyn had been dating for "a while."

A spokesperson for Ribisi confirmed the happy news on Thursday afternoon, saying, "Agyness Deyn and Giovanni Ribisi quietly married in Los Angeles over the weekend." Deyn previously dated Josh Hubbard of The Paddingtons for four years but ended the relationship in 2008. She told The Daily Mail in March that she hadn't dated anyone for several months, partially due to her hectic acting schedule.

"The fact is I'm choosy, but mainly about a man's character," she said. "He has to be interesting, funny, and clever. I don't even mind if he's not very good-looking."

Each year, almost 80,000 foreign spouses are awarded US green cards. The American government has determined that these couples are in bona fide relationships with the help of the "Stokes interview." Stokes refers to a federal court decision that ordered New York's immigration services to be more fair in deciding marriage green card cases. When officials have any suspicion that they're dealing with a sham marriage, they will interview the spouses separately, asking them questions about their personal life and relationship. The answers to these questions can't be memorized ahead of time, and officials will compare each spouse's answers afterward for discrepancies.

The New York Daily News recently looked into the city's "Stokes unit" and reported on some example questions. They include:

• What restaurant do you and your husband usually order takeout from? Where do you keep the menus?
• How did you celebrate New Year's Eve last year?
• How much is your rent? Who writes the check?

One man, the paper reports, reported sleeping in the same bed with his wife every night, but didn't know that she had an oxygen tank next to the bed. Whoops. If an immigrant can avoid something like that and beat the system, after 10 years of citizenship, you're off free, thanks to the statute of limitations. Would you ever consider getting married for a green card?

This week's confession comes from our anonymous Confession Booth group in the TrèsSugar Community. Weigh in with your advice below.

I'm a 23-year-old girl from a Sikh family where all girls in the house are traditionally married off through arranged marriage. I have been told to go and see a boy tomorrow, as my father's friend has insisted we go. I begged and pleaded to my mom that I do not want to go, as I don't believe in arranged marriages and I don't want my life as my sisters', but she didn't want to hear me and refused me to tell the boy no, as the family's "image" will get spoiled. I'm scared. I don't want to get married to some unknown man. I agreed we are just going to see the boy, but I don't want them to say yes. I'm still studying. I don't want this, and my sisters are too far to even help me. I'm so scared and I have no one to listen to me. I have no hope . . . I don't want this . . . please help.

There's lots of important stuff going on in our community. Join it, check it out, share your posts or advice in the great groups, and maybe we'll feature it here.

We're happy to present this story from one of our favorite sites, The Good Men Project. Today, Mark Tyrrell offers eight relationship tools to make your marriage work.

"All marriages are happy. It's the living together afterward that causes all the trouble." — Raymond Hull

So how do you make your marriage work? Or do you just blindly hope it'll take care of itself?

Think of a hot, successful date with someone you’re attracted to. You have fun, great conversation and more sexual chemistry than a warehouse full of pheromones. You don’t have to “work at” the date because it’s self sustaining. It runs as smoothly as the gliding hand of a classical guitar maestro and you can’t wait for another rendition.

Teenage Dating in a Twilight-Hunger Games World

But marriage, or any long term relationship; well that’s a whole other caboodle.

If we’re not careful, marriage can deteriorate into little more than a torturous assault course; littered with routine boredoms, frustrations and resentments. Couple all that with external pressures and sometimes marriage feels not worth the effort. But there are major benefits to being hitched or committed, other than just a beneficial tax regime.

Healthy marriage; healthy people.

Being happily married bestows heaps of health benefits. You might be forgiven for thinking that if you’re married you don’t live longer it just seems like it but, no, a good marriage really can help you clock up more years (1) and married people are happier (2) even though they don’t always look it from the outside.

But when marriage doesn’t work it can feel being manacled to a maniac, marooned with a misogynist or nailed to a nag. And I don’t care what the studies say, that’s not healthy. You may hear couples say stuff like: “We are making our marriage work!” but how do we do this?

Making it work.

We pay lip service to “working on the marriage” but what is the work we need to do? Marriage vows such as “to love and to cherish” and “forsaking all others, for better or for worse” don’t really tell us how to make it work, although they give us a clue.

Fortunately a ton of research has been done on what to do and not do to make your marriage, or any intimate relationship work. Follow the guidelines here to become “good at marriage."

Tip one: Be romantic but keep it real.

We are all (force?) fed romance in movies and novels. The handsome man gets the beautiful woman. But what I wonder is what happens after our romantic couple ride off into the sunset together? What do they do exactly? Bicker? Moan at one another? Start to ignore each other?

After all that romance, our beautiful couple is bound to have massive expectations of their life together. But when rose tinted expectations clash with day to reality, watch out!

Romance is vital in any relationship. Always seeing the best in your partner helps to keep things intimate and love should be expressed. But if you have been raised on Mills and Boon Romance novels or feel-good movies, then your own romantic expectations can work against the sustainability of your long term relationship.

When day to day life fails to live up to the giddy, heady lust-filled days of the pre-settled down romance people can become angry, even blame one another: “This wasn’t what I signed up for." They find it hard to take the rough with the smooth because they never really figured there would be any rough.

Expectations not diluted with at least a dash of realism can be a royal road to relationship ruin. Your partner may be an angel, but they have feet of clay. You must learn to love those feet or at least accept them a bit!

Get the rest after the jump!

Once you know — in a formal sense — how to change your name after marriage, it can be difficult to keep up with all the extra steps: who to tell, which documents to change, which groups you need to notify. To make things easier, we've come up with a short, simple list that you can reference postwedding. Not sure where to start? Here's what you need to consider:

When to Change Your Name

• Your name can be changed only once you've received a certified marriage license with a raised, authentic seal.
• For travel purposes, it's best to wait until after your honeymoon, because the name on your passport needs to match the name on your ticket and extra travel documents.

Who to Notify
In addition to changing your passport, drivers license, Social Security card, and other official documents, you also need to address the following:

• Bank and credit card companies
• Home utilities companies
• Post office
• Human resources department
• Business cards
• Leases, mortgages, or rental information
• Insurance policies
• Medical groups: Doctor, dentist, etc.
• Professional associations and licenses
• School records
• Gym membership
• Airlines and frequent flyer programs
• Email address
• Social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
• Personal or professional website
• Magazine subscriptions

Don't forget to share the news with friends and family, too! Whether you're into a subtle announcement or something a bit more formal, here are seven ways to tell people that you changed your name.

Have you changed yours? Share any tips or suggestions in the comments below!