Three Words That Make Relationships Better
June 12, 2010 | 
Author A little inspiration this Saturday afternoon from PravsWorld.
Original link: http://www.pravsworld.com/content/inspiration/125/three-words-that-make-relationships-better
Three-Word Phrases, can be tools to help develop every relationship.
There are many things that you can do to strengthen your relationships. Often the most effective thing you can do involves saying just three words. When spoken sincerely, these statements often have the power to develop new friendships, deepen old ones and even bring healing to relationships that have soured.
The following three-word phrases can be tools to help develop every relationship.
~ Let me help:
Good friends see a need and then try to fill it. When they see a hurt they do what they can to heal it. Without being asked, they jump in and help out.
~ I understand you:
People become closer and enjoy each other more when the other person accepts and understands them. Letting your spouse know – in so many little ways – that you understand them, is one of the most powerful tools for healing your relationship. And this can apply to any relationship.
~ I respect you:
Respect is another way of showing love. Respect demonstrates that another person is a true equal. If you talk to your children as if they were adults you will strengthen the bonds and become closer friends. This applies to all interpersonal relationships.
~ I miss you:
Perhaps more marriages could be saved and strengthened if couples simply and sincerely said to each other “I miss you.” This powerful affirmation tells partners they are wanted, needed, desired and loved. Consider how important you would feel, if you received an unexpected phone call from your spouse in the middle of your workday, just to say “I miss you.”
~ Maybe you’re right:
This phrase is very effective in diffusing an argument. The implication when you say “maybe you’re right” is the humility of admitting, “maybe I’m wrong”. Let’s face it. When you have an argument with someone, all you normally do is solidify the other person’s point of view. They, or you, will not likely change their position and you run the risk of seriously damaging the relationship between you. Saying “maybe you’re right” can open the door to explore the subject more. You may then have the opportunity to express your view in a way that is understandable to the other person.
~ Please forgive me:
Many broken relationships could be restored and healed if people would admit their mistakes and ask for forgiveness. All of us are vulnerable to faults, foibles and failures. A man should never be ashamed to own up that he has been in the wrong, which is saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.
~ I thank you:
Gratitude is an exquisite form of courtesy. People who enjoy the companionship of good, close friends are those who don’t take daily courtesies for granted. They are quick to thank their friends for their many expressions of kindness. On the other hand, people whose circle of friends is severely constricted often do not have the attitude of gratitude.
~ Count on me:
A friend is one who walks in when others walk out. Loyalty is an essential ingredient for true friendship. It is the emotional glue that bonds people. Those that are rich in their relationships tend to be steady and true friends. When troubles come, a good friend is there indicating “you can count on me.”
~ I’ll be there:
If you have ever had to call a friend in the middle of the night, to take a sick child to hospital, or when your car has broken down some miles from home, you will know how good it feels to hear the phrase “I’ll be there.” Being there for another person is the greatest gift we can give. When we are truly present for other people, important things happen to them and us.
We are renewed in love and friendship. We are restored emotionally and spiritually. Being there is at the very core of civility.
~ Go for it:
We are all unique individuals. Don’t try to get your friends to conform to your ideals. Support them in pursuing their interests, no matter how far out they seem to you. God has given everyone dreams, dreams that are unique to that person only.
Support and encourage your friends to follow their dreams. Tell them to “go for it.”
~ I love you:
Perhaps the most important three words that you can say. Telling someone that you truly love them satisfies a person’s deepest emotional needs. The need to belong, to feel appreciated and to be wanted. Your spouse, your children, your friends and you, all need to hear those three little words: “I love you.” Love is a choice. You can love even when the feeling is gone.
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What A Novel Idea
So, I wrote last week about cleaning our kitchen and surprisingly it has stayed clean all week! YAY!
May sound trivial, but is a huge feat for us. Hopefully this will continue. It’s so nice to have the kitchen clean and I’ve really been keeping up with it…cleaning as I do things, putting things away. I really hope it never gets to how it was before. I’m really going to try to make sure we don’t go to that dark place again. No reason for it at all!
This weekend I am cleaning my office, which I’ve been calling the hoarder room all week. It is a mess. Plain and simple. No other description necessary. I should post before and after photos but I am so embarrassed at the state of it.
But starting tomorrow, I will begin to clean it. I really don’t have much else to do this weekend, thank God. Just gonna clean this room and veg with the hubbs and the zoo.
If the weather holds out, we plan on giving the Puppa a bath as well. Should be fun! LOL He also has some mats on his undercarriage that need to be taken care of. So does the Miss. Maybe we’ll get to those too.
But back to the kitchen. what a difference. I can cook, I don’t have to balance and move things around to make room on the counter to prepare and make dinner/lunch/whatever. Tomorrow morning, I can wake up and have some cereal and use a clean spoon from the drawer and a clean bowl and not have to wash them!
Now, we just have to keep it up!
Dedicated to the APS Patients Across the WORLD
Today is WORLD APS DAY!
As you know, my husband had APS. He’s been diagnosed since 2004. It’s been a rocky road and pretty scary at times, but we can’t look back and can only live in the now and hope for the future.
2004 was the year that changed our lives forever. 2005 is the year when we started using that change for good.
In 2005, myself, my husband and our new friend (and fellow APS patient), Tina turned a support forum and informational website into a brand new non-profit dedicated to bringing awareness to APS and education and support to APS patients.
My first priority was to make sure our website and online support forum was informative and honest. I didn’t want another APS patient to be as lost as we were when my husband was diagnosed. I was lucky to find that first forum on Delphi and Tina to point me in the right direction.
I thank God everyday for bringing her into our lives. I wish more people would try to get to know her, because you’d see the wonderful person she is. She’d literally give you the shirt off her back.
I really hope that the APSFA has helped people learn more about APS – the real APS, not the “take coumadin and you’re cured” APS. To me, that’s the most important thing because APS is not a bed of roses. It IS life threatening. Many people die from it, and sometimes they don’t even know they have it before it’s too late.
I have met some of the most amazingly strong people during the past 5 years. I don’t know how people live with being so sick each and everyday. I guess you just get up and do what you can. I don’t know if I could do it. Especially those who don’t have great care and who are basically dismissed by their doctors or even by their friends and families.
Unfortunately, we’ve also lost some people as well – nature of the disease, I guess. It’s hard though because I have so many friends who have this disease and it hit close to home when someone passes. Way too close to home.
I wish patients got better care. I wish they got taken seriously.
Thank you to everyone who has supported the APSFA over the past 5 years. Everything we have done we do for each and every one of you. You are all in my thoughts and prayers on a daily basis. Keep fighting and keep spreading the awareness! Together, we can get the word out!
Eminem – Not Afraid`
In my last “10 Things I’m Loving” post I listed this song as one of the things I was loving. At the time, the video wasn’t out yet…but it is now. And it’s below!
*WARNING* there is swearing, so it’s not kid or work friendly.
I can’t get enough…his new album comes out later this month! I can’t WAIT!
Design Complete & Other stuffs
So the design ended up being more than one of Irene Alexeeva’s kits. What can I say? I like her style and omg I love those little pigs!! I still have to make the side graphics and for some reason my countdown to Eclipse isn’t working anymore so I’ll just put some yummy Twilight pictures there. I really like how it turned out!
The dishes are almost done…well minus the ones in here that I find while cleaning tomorrow and the ones that are throughout the rest of the house if there are any. There’s some soaking in the sink to put in the dishwasher this next time I turn it on, it wasn’t full.
I don’t even want to discuss the state the kitchen was in. It could have been on an episode of Hoarders, i swear. This room (office) too. I’m not at all proud of it, but omg…definitely time to change. No reason to be living that way! It’s nothing but laziness, really.
Well, once again, I vow that I am done…changin my ways! LOL we’ll see how long it lasts. I always say that! But really, we shouldn’t have to take an ENTIRE weekend to clean the house up! Absolutely NO reason for it!
I totally plan on changing it. I am surrounded by junk in here. I am gonna go through the room and just throw shit out that we don’t need.
I had a shelf made over the dog’s cage so I could use it to put stuff on. Well it’s piled with junk taller than me! omg, I couldn’t even tell you what’s under there! And then there’s junk all over the floor…mail, papers, blankets, just junk.
Tomorrow it will be clean. I assure you.
New Blog Design Coming!
I found the cutest kit today in my Google Reader! It’s called “Very Own World” and is a hand-painted kit by Irene Alexeeva. I love her kits! I have a few of them.
I got it at After Five Designs. I’ll have to add their button to my sidebar, I’ve shopped there a few times this month…a couple of my favorite artists have moved there.
I also went to Gorjuss and found a little cutie to add to my blog header! I just ♥ her work! I want to get prints and hang them in my house….one day!
Anyway, I will be hopefully working on this today in between doing the dishes (UGH!) and cleaning the computer room…which I actually may save until tomorrow since the kitchen will take for.ever! I’m actually excited to get started! I need to find a little pear too that I can add. I think I have another Irene Alexeeva kit with a pear in it. Oh, and I have one with little pigs too…hmm…
Ok, gotta feed the dogs and get the iPod going to I can Jam out while I clean. P!nk, Paramore and Eminem are my kitchen cleaning jams of choice lol
Me, the Husband, & OCD
I’m blogging for Mental Health Week today. I, of course, totally forgot so this is last minute (should have done it ahead of time as I had originally planned! grr) But nevertheless, I am blogging now for Mental Health Week.
My husband has OCD – along with depression and anxiety disorder…but I’m going to talk about the OCD.
His main thing with the OCD is hand washing. But he also has issues with his clothes being clean and a whole bunch of bathroom issues that I will spare you from. (you can thank me later)
Actually, I don’t even think hand washing is the main thing. I guess cleanliness, but only to a certain degree…like our house can be a complete pit, yet he doesn’t care or doesn’t do anything about it. Which I find kind of strange, but I guess I’m not supposed to understand it, it makes sense to him, right?
I can admit that I don’t understand my husband’s OCD at all.
But I love him and have to live with him and it’s a part OF him, so I deal as best as I can. I try to be supportive and patient and understand but some of it is just odd and frustrating and wears me out.
I see him running through some of his rituals and I want to shake him and just yell…snap out of it!!
You see, he wasn’t ALWAYS like this…or at least not as bad as he is – and mind you, he’s not that bad. I’ve seen the show Obsessed, yeah…he’s not that bad.
His OCD developed over time.
The past few years have been hard. He was diagnosed with APS and Lupus and a mess of other auto-immune lovelies, and then depression set in because he went from working and going out with friends, having fun…etc to sick sick sick and losing job after job till finally getting on disability. And with the depression came out the OCD.
So while I can understand that he’s gone through a lot of changes, I don’t always understand…which is hard at times.
The easiest way for me to deal with it, is for me to just deal with it…ya know? I know he has OCD, I know a lot of his issues and I try to make things easier for him if I can…I buy him hand sanitizer (they have wipes now, did you know that?) and make sure we have hand soap and let him pick out the scent he likes, and I try to make sure we always have rubber gloves in the house for him to use when necessary (he uses them for a lot of things!!!) and I try not to bring attention to it in public or when we’re with our families or friends.
And then sometimes, I think it’s all totally ridiculous and wish he’d get help for it, or work through it or something! – this doesn’t happen as often as it used to.
I guess it’s with anything, ya know? You deal with it.
My husband has OCD. He’s a hand washing, clothes washing, rubber glove wearing fool, but I love him and I even love his OCD. It’s part of him but not WHO he is. I hope he knows that. And sometimes it’s those little quirky things that he does that makes me love him more. At least his clothes are always clean, he bathes regularly and his hands are always clean…those are positives, right? lol
Plus…I have my little issues as well, and he overlooks them…so I do my best to overlook or deal with his.
10 Things I’m Loving Saturday
After three pretty depressing posts, let’s change the pace and do a ‘”10 Things I’m Loving” post. I always like doing these and I like reading them when other bloggers write them.
1. Pioneer Woman
I am totally loving Pioneer Woman’s site and blogs right now. I recently discovered her site and I’m hooked. It’s in the Google Reader and it’s one that I read first every day! She’s a city girl who married a real live cowboy and is now living on a working ranch with him and their children. She homeschools and takes fabulous photos and I’m totally fascinated by her life and family! lol Below is one of her photos which links to her Flickr account. Check them out, they are awesome!! She’s self taught too…I wanna take photos like her when I grow up!
2. Gummy Bears
I love gummy anything, but I want to gobble these cute little bears up! I even have gummy vitamins! LOL
3. Cara Cara Oranges
The flesh of these oranges is usually pink or red or a darker orange than navel oranges. They are sweet and delicious and I’ve eaten about 40 of them in the past couple months. YUM!
4. Eclipse Breeze Gum
Best.Gum.Ever! As long as they make this gum I will never buy another gum! It’s minty and has a extra almost fruity hint of something. It’s fresh and lovely.
5. Adobe Photoshop
I love Photoshop! It’s a HUGE monster of a program that can do SO MUCH stuff. I haven’t even scratched the surface, but I am learning every day I use it!
6. Scentsy Tarts and Warmers
I bought a Scentsy tart warmer at a craft show at work. I, of course, got a purple (plum) one, and some foodie scents (Pumpkin Roll, Cutiepie Cupcake, Toasted Caramel Sugar, Warm Apple Pie)…well I plugged it in and OMG it is delicious!! The warmers work with a light bulb instead of a candle and the wax doesn’t evaporate. Very cool! And YUMS!
7. Eminem
I know he’s ridiculous and offensive, but I love me some Eminem! His new song, Not Afraid…omg LOVE IT! With lyrics like, “And I just can’t keep living this way, So starting today, I’m breaking out of this cage. I’m standing up, Imma face my demons. I’m manning up, Imma hold my ground. I’ve had enough, now I’m so fed up. Time to put my life back together right now.” ♥ The song below isn’t Not Afraid, but it’s another favorite…Beautiful.
8. New Mountain Dew Flavors
Well, I like MOST of them…there are 3 – White Out, Typhoon, and Distortion. White Out is kind of like Squirt, but without the kick of Squirt…it tastes like carbonated nothing. But I drink it, cuz it’s non. Typhoon is like a punch, it’s pretty good. And Distortion? YUCK! It’s supposed to be lime, but it’s horrible. I’ve drank maybe ONE and not again! Bluck. But new Dews are exciting and I am STILL addicted. I need a 12 step program. Srsly.
9. Wilderness Lodge @ Walt Disney World
We’re going to Disney World in October and will be staying at the Wildreness Lodge! I am SOOO stinking excited and READY for a vacation! I need a break from life and to just be able to RELAX and have fun. And I cannot wait to take my new camera there for a spin!
10. Lilacs
When I was younger, my sisters and I used to have a “Lilac Festival” whenever the neighbor’s lilacs would be in bloom. We, with the 2 neighbor boys, would pick all or most of the lilacs and parade around the yard with them. We were young and it was fun! lol Lilacs always remind me of that.
The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow
Today was better. I didn’t cry. I wan kind of numb actually.
I will be ok though – eventually.
So to the few ppl who I know read my blog, know I’ll be alright. I need to deal and let it sink in a little.
And hang on to hope – at least until July. Then, we’ll see what happens.
Back to our regularly scheduled blog…thanks for reading. Stick around, plz. It will get better.
Can’t Sleep
Laying here in bed, tired as hell but it hurts to close my swollen eyes. I don’t know if my eyes are stinging from being so tired or if they just hurt from crying earlier.
The fresh tears aren’t helping things either.
I like it much better living in the land of make believe where hope and dreams live. This reality world – where hope is lost and one little sentence can cause your whole world to come crashing down around you – sucks.
I just can’t stop thinking about it. How calm he was saying it. How he watched me sob. How what I wanted or had to say didn’t matter.
How I didn’t matter.
I didn’t ask for this life. This caretaker role. This head of household, bring home the bacon role. I didn’t think I’d be the bread winner.
What I did ask for was a conversation about bringing a homeless child into our home for us to care for and love. A conversation.
And what did I get in return?
Hopes and dreams shattered by a single sentence.
4 words that keep ringing through my head – “I don’t want kids.”
Thank you dr whoever and therapist whatshisname. Thank you for determining my future. Thank you for ruining my life.
I need to sleep but the tears keep falling. How am I supposed to go on?
The world of sunshine and roses, of hopes and dreams is long gone. I want to go back in time. Just one stinking day.
I had hope then.
Now? I just have tears and emptiness and a heart beating behind a bandaid ready to be ripped out again.
