PREMARITAL COUNSELLING--- AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME

Victor Bloom MD

Much has been said about the ever-rising divorce rate, and the toll on children and society. It is often joked that we have to pass a test, written and practice, to obtain a license to drive a car. There is no such test to get a marriage license, nevertheless, young adults all too often marry and have children without the benefit of instruction or experience.

More and more members of the clergy are arranging for experienced mental health professionals to do premarital counselling with members of their congregation who are planning marriage and a church wedding. The amazing finding from preliminary experience is that a significant number of young couples decide not to get married after discussing the realities of marriage with a counsellor.

Rev. John Krueger of Grace Lutheran Church in Modesto, California says, "It's not theological. It's just good sense." He says that about 15% of those he counsels call of their weddings--- people who might have divorced later. There are many who divorce, or who are considering divorce, who think they would have been better off to have thought seriously and at length before getting married. Some programs require a four or six month waiting period of testing and counselling before getting married.

One man, twice divorced, thinks counselling saved him from a third. His pastor persuaded him to wait when he planned to marry again recently. It made him angry at first, but he ultimately agreed his pastor was right, he would have married impulsively. He realized he didn't have the feelings he should have had to get married.

Howard J. Markman, director of the University of Denver's Center for Marital and Family Studies says that for every dollar invested in trying to help young couples learn conflict-resolution skills, there would be at least a hundred dollars saved in the later costs of divorce and treatment for mental ills, not to mention the loss in work productivity.

In Modesto, California there is a stringent program available which requires ten two-hour sessions and a six month waiting period. The program director of the Orangeburg Baptist Church makes a temperament analysis which defines such traits as nervousness and hostility. He then counsels to resolve serious differences before the marriage ceremony takes place.

My own experience is that a conjoint interview in which the psychiatrist asks each one in the presence of the other about his and her childhood and family, their feelings about family relationships, their experience with love relationships in the past, provides much food for thought and discussion. It usually happens that each person brings up significant memories and feelings that were not known before to the other, and each person ends up feeling they know their prospective spouse and lifetime partner much better than before.

It is never too early to discuss potential in-law problems, religious and political differences, and the thorny topics of money and sex. Unconscious sources of conflict also include the will to power and the need for security.

Such premarital counselling sessions bring up sources of conflict and potential incompatibility early, so that many of their differences can be acknowledged, if not resolved before the wedding date. On the other hand, new information often leads to a greater understanding and a deepening of the love and regard for the other person. These sessions almost always are experienced positively and lead to a renewed and deepened commitment to each other and a greater feeling of security about their choice of a lifetime partner.

It is good for each person to share his and her fantasies about having children and parenting, talking about values and priorities. In this time of two working parents with the difficulties of parenting and working, cooperation from the start is necessary and beneficial. Professionals are trained and experienced in helping people to develop interpersonal skills, such as being able to make allowances, to compromise, to adjust to each other by being flexible and adaptable. Ways can be sought early on to redirect anger to constructive outlets, to prevent the development of undue anxiety and depression. If the couple can be helped to be empathic with each other, certainly love and affection will grow. Such a climate of warmth, generosity, good-nature and good humor is an ideal one for the children of the future.

In the words of Kirkegaard, "To cheat oneself out of love is the most terrible deception. It is an eternal loss for which there is no reparation, either in time or in eternity."