CHARACTERISTICS OF HEALTHY FAMILIES AND STRONG MARRIAGES

There have been a number of studies done that have looked for the common traits or characteristics of “healthy families,” and we believe that putting your efforts into making these traits characteristic of your marriage and family will help to strengthen your ADHD marriage. Here are some of the traits that have been consistently identified in these studies:

Healthy families and strong marriages are characterized by supportive, encouraging, and honest communication. They practice the ancient advice of St. Paul in Ephesians 4:29, which says, “Don’t let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful, for building others up, according to their needs, so it may benefit those who listen.”

Work on making your words healing and supportive. Encouraging words can motivate people to do amazing feats!

Healthy families and couples with strong marriages spend a lot of time together. The average father in America spends less than 60 seconds per day in conversation with his children, while the average person spends over 40 hours per week watching television or playing computer games. There is no substitute for “quantity time” invested to build a relationship.

Healthy families and strong marriages tend to share a common faith, and practice that faith together.

Healthy families and strong marriages agree on key values. In fact, our experience is that most arguments between family members are over a difference in values. So it is important to purposefully discuss values, celebrate them, and live them out.

Healthy families and strong marriages practice love and mutual admiration. Love and Respect go a long way toward having a great marriage and family.

Healthy families and strong marriages have common goals and interests. Take time each year to discuss your family goals, and your goals for your marriage. Then take time each month to see how you are doing toward achieving those goals, and make whatever adjustments you need to in order to stay on track.

Healthy families and strong marriages are able to solve problems and negotiate solutions. Perhaps the skill most lacking in troubled families and marriages is the skill of problem solving. It is not hard to practice, but most people would rather solve a problem by impulsively doing the first thing that pops into their mind. Trial and error is not as good of a strategy as purposeful problem solving and then executing a plan.

Healthy Families make sacrifices for the good of the family. They value others more than themselves, and they put the needs of others in the family ahead of their own needs.

Healthy families and strong marriages exhibit trust among family members. And being trusted requires that one lives a trust-worthy life and makes consistently responsible and value oriented choices.

Healthy families and strong marriages are a place where parents actively instill their values into their children.

The reader might see the parallels between this overview of healthy families and the research study “Hardwired to Connect” published back in 2003. The report was issued by the Commission on Children at Risk, which was composed of 33 pediatricians, research scientists, mental health professionals, and youth service professionals. The study was jointly sponsored by the YMCA of America, Dartmouth Medical School, and the Institute for American Values.

The report set out 10 points, or "planks," on what our children and teens need in order to develop into mature and functioning adults, and cites the scientific studies supporting their conclusions. Here are the Ten Essentials, or "Planks" of the Report:

1. The mechanisms by which we become and stay attached to others are biologically primed, and are increasingly discernible, in the basic structure of the brain. We are born “hardwired” to make personal connections to others.

2. Nurturing environments, or the lack of them, affect gene transcription (and duplication) and the development of brain circuitry. Nurturing environments improve neurological functioning now, and benefits are passed on to future generations. Lack of a nurturing environment has an inhibiting effect on neurological development in the present, and the difficulties can be passed on to future generations.

3. The old "nature vs. nurture" debate is no longer relevant to serious discussions of child well-being and youth development. It is not simply one or the other.

4. Adolescent "risk taking" and novelty-seeking are connected to changes in brain structure and function. It is worth noting that this is especially problematic for those with neurologically immature brains that have difficulty inhibiting risk taking impulses – in other words, many ADHD males and some ADHD females.

5. Assigning meaning to gender in childhood and adolescence is a human universal that deeply influences well-being. It is no longer worth arguing about – males are different than females.

6. The beginning of morality is the biologically primed moralization of attachment.

7. The ongoing development of morality in later childhood and adolescence involves the human capacity to idealize individuals and ideas. We tend to take on the morals and values and beliefs of those that we look up to.

8. Primary nurturing relationships influence early spiritual development - call it the spiritualization of attachment - and spiritual development can influence us biologically in the same ways that primary nurturing relationships do.

9. Religiosity and spirituality significantly influence our sense of well-being and even our health.

10. The human brain appears to be organized to ask ultimate questions, and seek ultimate answers.

The report cites the high and rising rates of depression, anxiety, ADHD, conduct disorders, suicidal ideation, and other serious mental and behavioral disorders. About 21% of US children between ages 9 and 17 have a diagnosable mental disorder or addictive disorder.

According to the commission, social programs, mental health agencies, medications, and psychotherapies are useful, but they are inadequate to change the growing problem.

The solution to solving this growing problem, according to the study, is "Authoritative Communities."

There is a two-part conclusion to the commission's report. The first conclusion is that, "What's causing this crisis of American Childhood is a lack of connectedness - close connections to other people and deep connections to moral and spiritual meaning."

The second conclusion of the commission is that, "the human child is hard-wired to connect." According to the commission, humans are designed to need other people, to have moral meaning, to seek a purpose to their life, to be open to the transcendent, and to seek ultimate answers. And they concluded, "Meeting these basic needs for connections is essential to health and to human flourishing."

Authoritative Communities are defined by the commission as "...groups of people who are committed to one another over time, and who model and pass on at least part of what it means to be a good person and live a good life."

Families and churches fit this definition. So does your marriage.

"The weakening of authoritative communities in the US is a principal reason - arguably the principal reason - why large and growing numbers of US children are failing to flourish. As a result, strengthening these communities is likely our best strategy for improving the lives of children."

What is an "Authoritative Community"?

1. A social institution that included children and teens.

2. It treats children and teens as ends in themselves. (As opposed to treating them as means to an end.) It relates to the child or teen as a person and cares for them for their own sake.

3. It is warm and nurturing.

4. It establishes clear limits and expectations.

5. The core of its work is performed largely by non-specialists.

6. It is multi-generational.

7. It has a long-term focus.

8. It reflects and transmits a shared understanding of what it means to be a good person, or to live a good life.

9. It encourages spiritual and religious development.

10. It is philosophically oriented to the equal dignity of all persons and to the principle of love of neighbor.

Although the Report does everything that it can to avoid referring to God (using instead phrases like "seeking the transcendent" or searching for "spiritual meaning") their point is very clear. Even physicians and research scientists, in studying adolescent and child development, mental health, and dysfunction, agree that our children and teens will be healthier if they are involved in their families, and involved in a Church.

So, for the sake of your children, as well as for yourself, it is worth making every investment that you can into making your marriage and family stable, happy, and nurturing.