GetLusty for Couples is all about -- couples. Marriage is full of happiness and beauty until it's not. Heated arguments, mismatched libidos, and difficult transitions into parenthood can take it's toll on any couple. We've all been there; working through issues and traumas to have the best marriage. To continue with our favorite books on marriage, here are 10 more to help you have the best marriage possible and enhance your relationship. Think your marriage/ couplehood life together is amazing? Now is the perfect time to continue to work on having the best relationship. GetLusty staff writer Jason Estrada reports.
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#1 The Five Languages of Apology: How to Experience Healing in all Your Relationships
Author: Gary D Chapman and Jennifer M. Thomas
According to ChristianBook.com, this book will help you identify your own language of apology and will clear the way toward healing and sustaining all your vital relationships. Through field-tested research the authors detail proven techniques for giving and receiving effective apologies.
"The authors stress that you need to learn the "language" of the person you are apologizing to: for one person, it may be expressing regret, while for another it's accepting responsibility or making restitution. Especially useful is the chapter that helps readers learn which language of apology feels most sincere to them." (Publishers Weekly)
#2 How We Love: Discover Your Love Style, Enhance Your Marriage
Author: Milan Yerkovich and Kay Yerkovich
According to Amazon: In How We Love, relationship experts Milan and Kay Yerkovich draw on the powerful tool of attachment theory to show how your early life experiences created an “intimacy imprint”–an underlying blueprint that shapes your behavior, beliefs, and expectations of all relationships, especially your marriage.
#3 Wired for Love: How Understanding Your Partner's Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship
Author: Stan Tatkin PsyD MFT and Harville Hendrix PhD
According to Amazon: Every person is wired for love differently, with different habits, needs, and reactions to conflict. The good news is that most people's minds work in predictable ways and respond well to security, attachment, and rituals, making it possible to actually neurologically prime the brain for greater love and fewer conflicts. "Wired for Love" is a complete insider's guide to understanding a partner's brain and promoting love and trust within a romantic relationship. Readers learn ten scientific principles they can use to avoid triggering fear and panic in their partners, manage their partners' emotional reactions when they do become upset, and recognize when the brain's threat response is hindering their ability to act in a loving way. By learning to use simple gestures and words, readers can learn to put out emotional fires and help their partners feel more safe and secure.
#4 The Sex-Starved Marriage: Boosting Your Marriage Libido: A Couple's Guide
Author: Michele Weiner-Davis
According to Amazon: 'The Sex-Starved Marriage' offers candid and sensible counsel for couples with mismatched libidos. Seasoned sex therapist Michele Weiner-Davis skewers two stereotypes about sex in marriage. First, she jettisons the idea that husbands are hot and wives are not, giving examples of "low-desire" men in her practice.
Next, she upends the longstanding model of sexual response and advises readers: "Just do it. Desire is a decision. Once the low-interest partner allows him/herself to be touched and aroused, this will trigger a strong desire to continue being sexual." The strength of her approach to the causes of sexual stalemate lies in her insights about the struggles of both partners. Her suggestions (how to break the ice, how to court your partner, nag busting, and the Hallmark solution) are not gimmicky and are presented as techniques for couples, not individuals."
#5 Marriage Rules: A Manual for the Married and the Coupled Up
Author: Harriet Lerner
According to Amazon: Marriage Rules offers new solutions to age-old problems ("He won't talk"/"She doesn't want sex") as well as modern ones (your partner's relationship to technology.)
"This book is an astonishing blend of down-home wisdom and clinical experience. I can't think of a better comprehensive guide to making marriage work for today's couples. Read it for your own relationship and give it to every newlywed you know." William J. Doherty, Ph.D., professor at the University of Minnesota and author of "Take Back Your Marriage"
#6 Conscious Loving: The Journey to Co-Commitment
Author: Gay Hendricks and Kathlyn Hendricks
According to Amazon: Here is a powerful new program that can clear away the unconscious agreements patterns that undermine even your best intentions. Through their own marriage and through twenty years' experience counseling more than one thousand couples, therapists Gay and Kathlyn Hendricks have developed precise strategies to help you create a vital partnership and enhance the energy, creativity, and happiness of each individual.
#7 Babyproofing Your Marriage: How to Laugh More and Argue Less As Your Family Grows
Author: Stacie Cockrell, Cathy O'Neill, Julia Stone and Rosario Camacho-Koppel
According to Amazon: Babyproofing Your Marriage is the warts-and-all truth about how having children can affect your relationship. The transition to parenthood can be a tough adjustment for any couple, but the good news is: you are not alone. Better yet, there are hundreds of simple but effective ways you can stay connected as husband and wife and still be good parents. The authors' evenhanded approach to both sides of the marital equation allows spouses to understand each other in a whole new way. With loads of humor, compassion, and practical advice, the Babyproofers will guide first-time parents and veterans alike around the rocky shores of the early parenting years.
#8 Fighting for Your Marriage: A Deluxe Revised Edition of the Classic Best-seller for Enhancing Marriage and Preventing Divorce
Author: Howard J. Markman, Scott M. Stanley and Susan L. Blumberg
According to Amazon: New and revised, Fighting for Your Marriage is based on the widely acclaimed PREP (Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program) approach. Groundbreaking studies have found that couples can use the strategies of this approach to handle conflict more constructively, protect their happiness, and reduce the odds of breaking up.
#9 Love Busters: Protecting Your Marriage from Habits That Destroy Romantic Love
Author: Willard F. Harley
According to Amazon: How spouses treat each other has a tremendous bearing on the success and failure of marriage. In this completely updated and revised edition of Love Busters, Willard F. Harley, Jr., helps couples identify and overcome the most common habits that destroy the feeling of love, including selfish demands, disrespectful judgments, angry outbursts, dishonesty, annoying habits, and thoughtless behavior. Harley also explains how to resolve common marital conflicts such as career choices and financial planning. You can't eliminate conflict altogether, but once these Love Busters are eliminated, conflicts can be resolved with love and grace. With Harley's expert guidance, couples will be able to avoid those behaviors that tear a marriage apart and focus instead on building their love for each other.
#10 Fight Less, Love More: 5-Minute Conversations to Change Your Relationship without Blowing Up or Giving In
Author: Laurie Puhn
According to Good Reads, In Fight Less, Love More, readers will learn how to identify the bad verbal habits, instinctive responses, and emotional reasoning that can cloud judgment and ultimately lead to the deterioration of otherwise healthy relationships.
"With advice that is nonjudgmental, extremely efficient, and clearly understandable, Puhn covers all aspects of romantic relationships, from problems like infidelity to boundaries giving couples of every strip something of benefit. Eschewing frustrating vagaries, sweeping generalizations, and gender-based assumptions, Puhn's extremely specific guide focuses on simple, rational solutions that primarily revolve around maintaining respect for one's partner. Readers will gain a great deal from her contribution to the genre." (Publishers Weekly)
Jason Estrada is currently working on his master's for creative writing, in the hopes of becoming a very rich screenwriter some day. His other interests include photography, cinematography, and video editing. His favorite book is The Great Gatsby. Favorite movie is either The Crow or When Harry Met Sally - can't decide. And his all time favorite show is Doctor Who.When he's not enjoying any of those things, you can find him at home, drinking and smoking way too much while listening to VNV Nation. You can email him at jason@getlusty.com, or try his Facebook page.
