Navigating the Turbulent Waters of Overseas Marriage
Written by Marci Renée
Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash
When we moved overseas, we were expecting all kinds of challenges—navigating a new culture, navigating a new language, navigating life away from our family and friends back in our homeland. What we didn’t expect was the added challenge of navigating the turbulent waters of our marriage.
It seems like living overseas adds even more stress and strain to our relationship.
To our marriage, we have added:
stress from living in a different environment (language barriers, new lifestyle, etc.)
lack of support structures and community (family and friends)
underlying incompatibilities that are exacerbated in a new environment
“The overseas experience can certainly enhance and/or exacerbate whatever was existing in the marriage in the first place. If there are cracks, they are likely to widen and spread from a variety of sources. Even a good marriage can bend under the combined stresses of uprooting your personal and professional lives, potential culture shock, and unmet expectations.”
We knew that we needed help. We had heard about “Navigating Desires & Decisions Training,” but we didn’t know what it was all about. Was it having someone come alongside us as a couple—advising us and coaching us to be better spouses, maybe teaching us how to communicate in healthier ways?
When we first heard about See Beyond’s “Navigating Desires & Decisions Training,” (NDDT) my husband and I were curious. We decided to give it a try, feeling that we had nothing to lose. Perhaps we would pick up a few helpful skills along the way. There was certainly lots of room for improvement in our relationship, and we could use some extra help and encouragement.
We signed up for the five-session training package, and we were amazed to discover the process. It was not at all what we expected.
Rather than having someone tell us what to do, our trained, professional facilitators actually trained my husband and I to “coach” each other in our own marriage!
This is what a typical session looked like:
Through a video that we could go back and watch again later, the trained NDDM facilitators (a married couple) explained the new skill (one of five) that we were going to learn and practice during the upcoming live session with them. Some of the skills were reflective listening, inviting and sharing our desires, asking meaningful questions, etc.
Then, they modeled the new skill for us in another short video. They always walked through a real-life situation in their marriage, one that they had not discussed previously. It was helpful to see this couple work out an actual situation in their marriage. This had a huge impact on my husband and me to see that even they had areas to work on. These skills really worked!
My husband and I then identified what we observed during their conversation, how they used the skill, etc.
During the live session with them, we took our own real-life situation and practiced that skill together in conversation—always talking to each other and not to our coaches. When we got stuck and didn’t know where to go, when we were getting off track, or when our emotions and words were flying in unhealthy directions, our facilitators were there. They were like a safety net under us—there on the sidelines to encourage us, give us suggestions, challenge us in new areas, and push us to a deeper, more intimate place in our marriage.
Finally, we debriefed together the practice experience—what it was like, how we felt, what was difficult, what we could have done differently. . . with our facilitators giving us helpful feedback.
At the end of the session, my husband and I took some time to decide how we would practice and apply the new skill during the upcoming week.
What NDDM Did For Us
NDDM changed our relationship. It taught us the skills we needed to stop our unhealthy patterns. We learned how to slow down long enough to listen to one another’s hearts and desires. Together, we learned how to ask each other powerful questions to get to the heart of the matter. We also learned to work through the “groan zone” of difficult issues and come to joint decisions and action steps, so that we could move forward together in a healthy way.
Honestly, as a result of this training, we learned how to love each other better. Who doesn’t desire that for their marriage?
Wherever you are living today and whatever the state of your marriage relationship—could you and your spouse benefit from this kind of training?
Maybe you need to learn how to navigate your marriage in the turbulent overseas waters. Or, perhaps you need to polish up some old, rusty skills that have been sitting on a shelf for a while—a marriage refresher.
We loved having someone help us navigate these waters, and we wanted to let you know. We highly recommend this training event!
Guest author, Marci Renée, along with her French husband and four boys, is a global nomad who has traveled to more than 30 countries and has lived in the United States, France, Morocco, and Spain. She loves to travel, speak foreign languages, experience different cultures, eat ethnic foods, meet people from faraway lands, and of course, write and tell stories. She is a published author of children's picture books, memoirs, short stories, and poetry.
You can find Marci and her books on her website.
"The Cultural Story-Weaver," at www.culturalstoryweaver.com