The Good Marriage: How & Why Love Lasts

by Judith S. Wallerstein, Sandra Blakeslee

Incorporating the experiences of fifty couples who consider themselves happily married, the author distinguishes four types of marriage, identifies their natural stages, and details nine psychological tasks essential to a good marriage. By the authors of Second Chances. Tour.

Genres: Marriage, Relationships, Nonfiction, Psychology, Self Help, Love, Communication

352 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 1995

Reviews

[Kimberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book years ago and still think about it every now and then. The author interviews real couples and categorizes good marriages into types. I found it to be quite insightful.

[Krista Winward Flinders · Rating 4 out of 5]

LOVED!
Found it really beneficial to read real couple’s examples of how they maneuvered the “9 inherent tasks of marriage,” partnered with insights from the marriage/family therapist who conducted the study on happy marriages.
Therapeutic for me as I made self discoveries and made goals for my future.
The study was conducted in the 1990s, so it felt a bit outdated— but what shone through is that the institution of marriage and the principles that strengthen it remain the same.
Biggest personal takeaways:
-Marriage is dynamic and couples feel they have had “many” different marriages, because the relationship is reshaped and renegotiated to fit current needs; not stagnant
-Importance of detaching emotionally from families of origin and committing to relationship; not destined to repeat previous generations
-Conflict itself does not ruin relationships, create a safe zone for conflict.

[Andrea M · Rating 4 out of 5]

Judith, a marriage-counselor, sets out to study good marriages because they do exist, but they are successes and we tend to focus on the failures. She lists her goals for the study. The chapters contain specific responses to questions posed of all the couples she studies. I will not try to convey the gist of the anecdotes but only the main points. Wallerstein gives four archetypes for marriage and nine tasks. In reading this book I discovered which tasks I didn't negotiate well and gained other valuable insights as well.

Part 2: The Romantic Marriage
Expectations of love and marriage are shaped by relationships within the family of origin.
Interpretation of what an event means draws heavily of our self-image.
Courtship begins with a fantasy and a fear that nothing you wished for will come true. For some the fantasy outweighs the fear, for others the reverse is true.

The First Task: Separating from the Family of Origin or from a previous marriage/relationship. Each person in the marriage must commit to the relationship and build new connections with the extended families. For some separation is difficult. For some separation is easy. For some commitment is hard, for others it is easy. The couple helps each other accomplish this task.

Second Task: Build Togetherness. The couple must generate a new identity. They must begin to put their marriage first above other relationships. They must generate their own rules. Decisions must be for the “good of the marriage” not the selfish desires of the individual. Sexual intimacy can help with accomplishing this task.

For the relationship to be gratifying, it “requires the meshing of both partners’ conscious and unconscious wishes and needs and the acceptance of compromise as reasonably fair or at least temporarily necessity.” p. 68

Third Task: Becoming Parents. The addition of children to the marriage requires a period of readjustment. A new father may find himself suddenly displaced. A new mother may run from the increasing responsibility. The emotional richness of the couple’s relationship must be maintained. A balance must be found between nurturing the couple’s needs and sacrificing those needs for the children’s benefit.

Part 3: Rescue Marriage
Some people enter adulthood burdened by unhappiness. Good marriages can come from the union of two people who have mutual needs and yearnings.
“What distinguishes the rescue marriage is not that people have done it [heal] entirely on their own…but that they have recovered successfully with the marriage, itself, playing a major role.” p. 106

The Process
Separate from the frightening role models or abusive relationship
Build Trust
Allow Intimacy
Creating a sense of togetherness is the result.

The Fourth Task: Coping with Crises
Coping with crises involves several steps that people in good marriages tend to carry out instinctively. They are:
1. Separating emotionally from the crisis, seeing the extent or duration with realism
2. Protect each other by not blaming. Maintaining perspective so that every problem is not about the crisis.
3. Allow some pleasure or humor so the tragedy does not dominate life
4. Not being a martyr, or withdrawing. Instead, stay in control and don’t let the crisis harm the marriage.
5. Intervene and block future crises by seeing warning signs and acting proactively

“Troubled times forge a strong bond if you don’t let the disaster and coping mechanisms take priority over the relationship.” p. 128

The Fifth Task: Making a Safe Place for Conflict
“Happy and unhappy marriages alike face the same demons, but in a poor marriage they tear at the fabric of the relationship and may destroy it. In a good marriage the demons are carefully contained.” p. 144

“The first step is establishing a safety zone…Both partners have to feel sure that the relationship is secure.” p. 145

Part 4: Companionate Marriage
“A companionate marriage is founded on the couple’s shared belief that men and women are equal partners in all spheres of life and that their roles, including those of marriage, are completely interchangeable.” p. 155

The Sixth Task: Exploring sexual love and intimacy
“In a good marriage, sex and love are inseparable. Sex serves a very serious function in maintaining both the quality and the stability of the relationship, replenishing emotional reserves and strengthening the marital bond.” p. 192

The Seventh Task: Sharing laughter and keeping interests alive
“The distinctiveness of a good marriage lies in its electricity, in its power to light up the participants and enhance the excitement and pleasure of their lives.” p. 204

Part 5: Traditional Marriage
“Children are still central to the traditional marriage….Both husband and wife in the traditional marriage see the family as requiring commitment and, when necessary, sacrifice. Each person expects to give up something important for the good of the family.” p. 236

The Eighth Task: Providing Emotional Nurturance
“A partner is not required to heal all wounds, but he or she is required to hear and take seriously a cry for help or relief, however awkwardly expressed….It is a drastic mistake to overlook these frustrations and assume that time will automatically take care of the problem….It is always better to acknowledge unmet needs than to deny them; at least they can be recognized and examined in the light.” p. 243-4

“Maintaining and restoring each other’s self esteem is another important aspect of marriage.” p. 245

The Ninth Task: Preserving a Double Vision
“The Ninth Task of Marriage…is to carry in one’s head a simultaneous vision of past images and present realities. It involves holding on to the early idealizations of being in love while realizing that one is growing older and grayer and cannot turn back the clock.” p. 322 “It keeps love alive in the real world.” p. 332

[Brian Nwokedi · Rating 4 out of 5]

First let me start off by saying that this book was very informative and the content and insights gained from this book will help me in my marriage in a way that I can not fully express in this review!

For me, one of the biggest take always from Mrs. Wallerstein's study of marriage is the fact that in today's society, for the first time in our history the decision to stay married is purely voluntary. While this is a very "mundane" and "obvious" realization, for me it paints a new picture of modern marriage that is significantly different from the picture of my parents' marriage. Modern marriages are no longer exceedingly influenced by law, tradition, religion, and parental influence. And this fact makes it that much tougher to stay happily married in today's divorce culture.

Mrs. Wallerstein's book emphasizes the fact that regardless of the type of marriage you have, a happy marriage is far from carefree, and every single marriage in her study were haunted from ghosts of the past. I think this is a very important point to stress for those of us that are trying to create happy marriages: Constructing a good marriage is an ongoing process that continues throughout all phases of the relationship!

At the heart of each of the happy marriages Mrs. Wallerstein interviewed was a core relationship created out of the conscious and unconscious fit of each partner's needs and wishes. Each couple found the means needed to successfully balance togetherness and autonomy and we're able to ensure the right mixture of love and hate so that love was predominate throughout their marriage. And regardless of the type of marriage, no one marriage seemed to provide for all the wishes and needs that each person within this study brought to it.

The section on companionate marriage really hit home especially as I consider that this is the category that my marriage falls into. In summation: "Companionate marriage needs to be stronger and closer at its core to withstand the powerful external forces that tear a couple apart. At its best, companionate marriage provides the gratification of family life and the rewards of a successful career for both partners. But each individual's separate path may supersede the togetherness that happy marriage requires, leading to a loss of intimacy and emotional connectedness."

From my limited experience, I fully agree with Judith when she says that the companionate marriage is the hardest to maintain and it isn't very surprising that none of the couples married in the 1950s had this type of marriage. It does in fact require constant vigilance and I now find myself fully aware of the challenges that a companionate marriage will face and I believe that I am know better equipped to face these challenges head on but with eyes wide open.

Thank you Judith Wallerstein for an insightful and informative piece on the strategies and tasks that one needs to mater and focus on in order to push for a good marriages in today's divorce culture.

[Salsadancer · Rating 3 out of 5]

The authors interviewed 50 predominantly middle-class, northern California couples who had been married nine years or more and had at least one child. These strong marriages flourish, they argue, because every partner confronted a series of psychological tasks including separating emotionally from the family of childhood, carving out his or her autonomy and creating an environment where anger and conflict could be safely vented. The success of a couple's relationship had more to do with how strong a "we" they formed than any other factor.

[Li · Rating 5 out of 5]

A somewhat dated book that nonetheless stands the test of time. The author scrupulously and accurately anticipates limitations to her own research and proactively makes suggestions for further study. Wallerstein and Blakeslee outline their theory for the nine tasks of marriage, lay out examples on the four types of marriages, and give the reader a deeply personal look into the lives of good marriages.

Somewhat lacking in “good marriage” role models in my own life, I found this book helpful as I prepare to be married myself.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are, the authors posit, four distinct types of marriage: romantic, rescue, and companionate. Romantic marriages are based on a passionate romantic relationship where both partners feel they were almost fated to be together. Rescue marriages are those where the partners come from less than ideal circumstances and find their "sorrowful expectations" of life revised. Traditional marriage has clearly defined roles for men and women and creates a stable home life for the adults and children. Companionate marriages, relatively new, arose from the women's movement and features (typically) two working adults whose relationship is based in frienship but struggles between balancing work and family. Men and women share childrearing, chores, and most other tasks in the marriage. Both have their strengths and pitfalls, that the author delves into in some depth with a chapter or two devoted to one or two couples who typify that sort of marriage (the methodology consisted of in-depth interviews with 50 couples).

The authors also sets out 9 essential tasks that any marriage must complete and continually work at in order to create a successful marriage. These tasks are as follows:
1. Separating from the family origin
2. Building togetherness and creating autonomy
3. Becoming parents
4. Coping with crises
5. Making a safe place for conflict
6. Exploring sexual love and intimacy
7. Sharing laughter and keeping interests alive
8. Providing emotional nurturance

All of these tasks are important, and are sort of chronological, though some steps must be re-neogitated when the couple becomes parents, when the children move out, and when the couple retires. The authors tie these tasks into the types of marriage and couples spotlighted.

Overall, this was a good read that had a lot of good info. The authors also touch on retirement marriages and second marriages, especially those with children involved. My only complaints were that the couples were so homogenous - all were from California, the vast majority were white middle class, well-educated, decent incomes, and at least one child. While this is the first real methodical study of good marriages (how many books are there out there about saving bad marriages?), I can cut some slack, but would like to see the studies expanded. The effect of children on a couple's marriage was a big theme and I would have liked to have seen some childless couples included. A good read though, that'd I likely recommend.

[Paula · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this as I was searching for answers about my own unhappy, and ultimately unsuccessful,marriage. Has some good insights and examples about what traits are present in long-term successful marriages.

Some excerpts / summary of info:

9 tasks of a good marriage:
1. Separate emotionally from 'birth' family. Redefine the relationship with both families of origin.
2. Build togetherness by creating intimacy..(and also build automomy)
3.Parenting.
4. Confront & master life crises.
5. Create a safe haven for expression of differences, anger and conflict.
6. Establish a rich sexual relationship - protect it.
7. Use humor and laughter - share fun, interests & friends.
8. Provide nurturance and comfort to each other.
9. Keep alife the early romantic idealized image of falling in love.

Develop a sense ' we' ness'. A new shared identify of the relationship.

Comfort within a good relationship rests on mutual understanding and genuine caring. A relationship that does not provide nurturance and restorative comfort can die of emotional malnutrition. What breaks marriages is the anguish of being emotionally abandoned by a partner who is oblivious to these needs. Competition for the limited supply of emotional relief can lead to disaster.

In good marriages - each partner had a genuine respect for the other. They loved and respected their partners and were eager to provide encouragement. These people were not envious of what they gave. They did not dole out kindness with the expectation of immediate reimbursement. They did not weigh their gifts or keep records.

Happiness in a relationship meant feeling respected and cherished.

[Inder · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the only "self-help" book about marriage and relationships that I would whole-heartedly recommend. Judith Wallerstein conducted a formal (but necessarily anecdotal) study of "good" relationships, and tries to figure out what they have in common. In my experience, most books about marriage are full of platitudes about communication skills or the "five love languages" or whatever - this type of advice can be valuable, but it is really just one person's opinion about how relationships work. Whereas Judith Wallerstein backs up her advice with observations of real people, with some surprising results. For example, I may be more traditional than I thought!

[Zablon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Greatly recommend this for anyone contemplating marriage or wanting to enhance your present relationship. Good for couples to read while dating/engaged.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book, despite it being 30 years old, to be really interesting. Based on a series of qualitative interviews, she groups good marriages into 4 categories (romantic, rescue, companionate, traditional). I don't know that those categories would still hold up the same today, but I could see a lot of different marriages I knew that would fall into one of these 4. However, now I think we have a lot more "companionate" marriages, where the husbands and wives are more equally yoked with so many wives working, and much fewer traditional marriages. It led to some surprisingly intense conversations with my husband about how these marriages were defined and how our marriage would be categorized (we're honestly a mix of 3 of the 4). And I thought her work had surprising gravity because she had done so much work on divorce, and how divorce affected children, so she could easily understand and navigate the differences between good and "bad" marriages. It was well written, with "life lessons" for marriage sprinkled throughout the interviews, and it was very sympathetic to all parties involved.

[Sara Loves to Read]

This book goes through four types of marriage as well as nine psychological tasks couples need to navigate successfully in order to have a healthy, lasting marriage. The marriage typology didn't speak to me so much, nor did the many lengthy case studies of real couples, so I skimmed/skipped a number of chapters and paragraphs to get to the content that interested me (the nine tasks). That said, I got a lot out of this book.

The tasks are:
1) Separating from the family of origin.

Couples need to separate from their parents and renegotiate new ties with them as adults.

"It is common for family ties to be mended, come apart, and be mended again."

2) Building togetherness and creating autonomy.

This begins in the early years but continues throughout marriage.

Building togetherness and autonomy = putting together a shared vision of how you want to spend your lives together -- constructing the psychological identity of the marriage as an entity in itself.

Metaphorically, the marriage is the first child the couple produces together. Happily married couples talk about their marriage as an entity, i.e. tending the marriage, feeding the marriage.

Intimacy is rooted in love and self-disclosure. "It grows through learning to hear what the other person says and to use this information to understand the other and shape one's own behavior accordingly."

Happily married people learn the other person's life story and keep it mind at all times. They change in subtle ways to accommodate the partner's needs.

"It's not true that in a good marriage both partners help equally to deal with every crisis. Rather, each does what he or she can."

The process of expanding ego boundaries to include another is sometimes more gradual for men who may feel more distant from their emotional world.

"Because it requires parting with self-centeredness, the shared marital identity is always achieved against enormous inner resistance. Closeness inevitably evokes anxiety and reawakens fears of being laughed at, rejected, abandoned, or not loved."

Togetherness has to be balanced with autonomy. Each partner needs to make room for the other's "altering values, tastes, needs, and careers. Husband and wife continually confront the issue of how to reshape their shared identity so it continues to express what they want as a couple and what they need as individuals."

3) Becoming parents.

Time of enormous psychological change. Brings up unconscious conflicts with mother's own mother. It helps to know in advance that the post-birth period is stressful. Both husband and wife are very vulnerable to feeling rejected, hurt and unappreciated.

Parenting involves maintaining the marriage and setting aside the parental role at regular intervals.

It is possible to strike a balance so that the couple's life replenishes parenting and parenting enriches the marriage.

4) Coping with crises.

Two kinds: foreseeable changes that occur in life and unexpected twists.

"People in marriages that survive and become stronger after a crisis experience just as much anxiety and guilt as everyone else. They are just as distressed and angry, but instead of scapegoating, they help each other bear the new burden."

People in happy marriages cope with crises by trying to think realistically about the extent and duration of the crisis, protect each other by not blaming in spite of the great temptation to do so, allowing some degree of pleasure and humor to keep things in proper perspective, and not playing martyr or pretending to be saintly.

They support a partner in mourning without seeing the withdrawal or anger as directed at them personally.

5) Making a safe place for conflict.

This task is to build a relationship that is safe for the expression of difference, conflict and anger. Conflict-free marriage is neither possible nor desirable.

"powerful, primitive angers stemming from early childhood are revivified by the very closeness of the marital relationship."

"Powerful feelings rooted in early-life traumas often do not respond to mediation or compromise."

"Conflict in a good marriage occurs within a context of connectedness and caring."

Couples manage conflict by creating rules that govern what type of conflict is allowable.

What contributes to safe conflict is the couple's maturity, sensitivity to the partner's needs, their ability to remain connected even in anger, their sense of fairness, and their internal brakes.

6) Exploring sexual intimacy and love.

A good sex life is at the heart of a good marriage. "There is no better antidote to the pressures of living than a loving sex life."

"although building the sexual relationship is one of the most pleasurable tasks of marriage, it certainly is not the easiest. It requires delicacy, sensitivity, and patience. It takes time and a willingness and ability to accommodate to the other person's needs."

Everyone comes to marriage with a history that shapes their sexual needs and inhibitions. Each person's sexual needs are as individual as a thumbprint.

"Sexual intercourse combined with love demands trust. It's a risky business to come so close to another person emotionally and physically. Both partners must feel safe, and this takes time."

The combination of sex and love can feel scary. The risk of giving up physical and emotional boundaries.

People are very fragile in sexual matters, easily put off or discouraged.

"Sex is remarkably sensitive to what's happening in all areas of individual and family life."

"A richly rewarding and stable sex life is not just a fringe benefit, it is the central task of marriage. In a good marriage, sex and love are inseparable."

[Samara · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well-conceived and researched book. Honest, thought-provoking material that allows for deep self-reflection and understanding: maybe even (dare I say it) change.
Read this to better understand your own marriage, whether you think it's good or bad.

[Bridget Bernstein · Rating 2 out of 5]

2019 Reading Challenge: 11/24

I mostly just don't like it because of how heteronormative it was, but also, it's position on marriage isn't very nuanced. Additionally, the book is just outdated in general.

[Mylissa B · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm very grateful I had the opportunity to take a Christian marriage class in college and was introduced to this book. My husband read it before we got married as well and I think it has been helpful to know what kind of relationship we have.

[Walthea · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book that I have re-read many times. I am sad that it does not seem to be available on Kindle.

[Jessica G · Rating 4 out of 5]

As of the time the book was re-released (2002?) this remained the only study of GOOD marriages. Tons of advice on how to save a troubled marriage, only one study on how to have a good marriage. Really interesting to step inside the subject's lives and hear about the real trials and tribulations of being married, while getting a psycho analysis at the same time. It is helpful to see how good marriages work from people you don't know.

UPDATE:

All in all, an interesting book. I will probably reread sometime in the next year, a lot of what I read in the beginning had faded away before I finished the book. I really liked the premise, and a lot of the information is pretty timeless, but I wish there were a more modern version. The study looked at people married 10 years or more, so the entire book is about people who married in the 50's, 60's, 70's, and 80's. I couldn't help but think, especially toward the end, that the stories would be quite different if told today. A lot of the wives in the book were stay at home, there was a lot of male centric talk, and even the women who were interviewed who had outside jobs and had a "companionate" marriage seemed to fulfill the traditional wife roles. Personally, I couldn't relate to those types of thinking. The wives came off as doormats rather than women to admire. I think that if more recent marriages were examined, they would find the thinking much changed. The women growing up in the 70's, 80's, and 90's are less June Cleaver and more independent, and I personally would find it more helpful to hear from people with similar mindsets to my own, instead of my mother's or grandmothers. Still, as I said, a lot is timeless and the traditional wifely mindset is really just quibbles.

[Tamra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wasn't a fan. It's long-winded in all the wrong ways, for starters. I didn't find the approach to marriage particularly insightful or applicable to my own marriage. I thought a lot of the ideas were slightly outdated and hence not as useful as they could have been. And I didn't love the basis for the book. I assumed it would be based in research, but it was mainly the author re-capping interviews she did with 50 couples who had self-diagnosed "good marriages". This would have been fine with me, I think, if the format was a little better. I found it choppy and a little disorienting (wait, weren't we just talking about Tom and Sally? Who is this new person you're talking about? Were they in the study, too, or not?).

I read the first few chapters, skipped ahead to the chapter recommended to me (about couples and making dual careers work / not work in marriage), and called it Done.

[Peter]

Study of 50 happy couples and what they have in common. There are four types of happy couples: romantic, rescue, companionate, and traditional (can also have combinations). There are nine tasks that must be completed in a good marriage: separating with parents and reconnecting with the partner, balancing togetherness and autonomy, embrace the role of 'parent' while still having some privacy, confront and overcome crises, find a way to air out conflicts without things getting out of hand, develop a satisfying sex life, preserve a sense of humor, nurture and comfort one another, and keep alive memories from early in the relationship without losing track of reality and the future.

[Nara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting set of case studies of "successful" marriages. She defines "successful," if I recall correctly, as marriages in which both parties consider themselves to be "happy" and which had lasted, at the time of the study, for at least 9 years. All the couples she worked with had children of their own or from previous marriages.

It's hard to generalize from case study results, which is why I preferred the Gottman, but this is a pretty darn interesting book anyway; a good in-depth portrait of the stresses and bonds of couples who are genuinely happy together.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing, and so encouraging (esp for me, someone about to get married!). The author interviews all kinds of couples with good marriages and figures out what they all have in common. Most psychologists study divorce, not happiness, so this book is really unique. It's empowering too, because in her study good marriages happen in remarkably diverse ways and to the most unlikely people.

[Jens · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book for anyone who is married or thinks they may be married someday to read. It's qualitative research with all of the limitations that come with that - low number of respondents, taken from a limited pool (mostly lefty professional San Franciscans, I think). But it brings up a number of useful reminders and typologies in terms of the types of marriage and the tasks that most marriages face.

[Natasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a thought- and reflection-provoking book. I really enjoyed reading about the real couples and their stories, challenges, revelations. I would recommend this book to anyone who is married for just a few years or for many years, and also to those who are contemplating marriage. this book has something for anyone who is willing to look at their relationship and put an effort into making it last.

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book seemed a little dated, but I guess that's because it was published in 1996. Wallerstein writes about only hetero marriages. None of the categories seems to fit my good marriage, but it was interesting to read about many different healthy relationships. I learned of this book after reading Wallerstein's obituary: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/21/hea...

[Evans McGowan · Rating 4 out of 5]

a "realist's guide to marriage": written by someone who's studied divorce, this is full of very practical experiences and advice, without a simple 5-step solution. for those looking for a marriage book that's reflective but not overbearing, that deals with realities without giving cute quips for answers on how to make marriage work.

[Kipahni · Rating 3 out of 5]

this is less of a how to and more of a private look into what occurs in a good marriage. I found the 4 types interesting and immediately started looking at my friends and family to see what kind they had.
No suprise here- I have the romantic type.

What was more interesting to me was the steps that naturally occur in marriage and the importance of resolving them in a healthy way.

[Anne Martens · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful overview of what happy marriages have in common - breaking them down into four different types of relationships and detailing the nine major tasks that all marriages face. I particularly like how the authors wove in fables and fairy tales, which, after all, are teaching tales and which lent an anthropological flavor.

[Katharine · Rating 3 out of 5]

It changed the way I considered what makes a marriage "good." I think that the way she arranged her data and structured her argument is a little simplistic, but it made me think about marriage in a different way.

[Myrna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best marriage book I have ever read. Interesting from page one and I can't believe how much I learned, even after 45 years of marriage. Recommend to every married person, brand new or experienced , like me. LOVED IT.

[Jessica West · Rating 5 out of 5]

This self help book positively impacted my view on making a marriage last. It focused on the positive aspects of marriage and what couples did to stay together instead of focusing on the negative aspect. Loved it!!!