​Affairs seldom start in the bedroom. Most affairs start out as emotional affairs. Emotional affair is the term used to describe a relationship that has crossed the line from friendship to a connection level that should be reserved for your spouse. An "emotional affair" is an affair which excludes physical intimacy, and is usually based on emotional intimacy I have found in working with hundreds of couples through the years, that emotional affairs can be just as damaging as sexual affairs. The challenge with emotional affairs is that they can be so easily rationalized and even spouses who were not looking to be unfaithful can find themselves caught in these types of relationships. Emotional affairs are the result of a significant connection that usually starts out at the friend or colleague level. The truth is your relationship with your spouse most likely started in a similar way. The two major problems with emotional affairs is that while you are connecting with this individual you are not connecting and becoming more disconnected from your spouse. The spouse who is having the emotional affair ends ups spending the relational energy on their emotional affair partner as opposed to their spouse. The second problem with emotional affairs is that when they continue they frequently end up becoming physical. To affair proof your marriage be certain that you are not crossing the “friendship” line with anyone other than your spouse. How do you know if you have crossed the line? Here are six signs that you may have crossed the line:
1) You share personal information about your marriage and particularly your dissatisfaction with your spouse. It is easy to fall into the “I was just looking for the opposite sexes perspective” or “We were merely supporting each other”, but this is never healthy for your marriage and can definitely lead to an emotional affair. 
2) You spend a great deal of time with this person, and this time is extremely important to you. Your time with this person is more important to you than spending time with your spouse. When you would rather be with this person than your spouse, you have crossed the line.
3) When you share good news or bad news with this person before you share the same information with your spouse or when you have the need to share personal intimate details of your life with this person, you have crossed the line.
4) You change your dress or your appearance for this person when you are going to see them. If you are concerned about your image with this person, chances are you have crossed the line.
5) You keep secret the amount of time you are spending with this person. You minimize or would be embarrassed if your spouse knew how much time you were putting into this relationship. If you have conversations that you would not repeat in front of your spouse you have crossed the line.
6) You start to contact this person at hours of the day that are different than normal “Friend” hours.
If you are having an emotional affair, do yourself and your marriage a huge favor and stop it immediately. Create healthy boundaries and distance between yourself and this person. Stop moving towards this person and begin to actively work on strengthening your own marriage. You may need the help of a relationship coach to end the inappropriate relationship and save your marriage, but the good news is that emotional affairs do end and marriages can survive them.    If you would like to learn more about my alternative approach to marriage counseling, more information about booking a day long intensive, or to schedule a coaching session go to themarriagecoach.com or call me at 314-606-4272.  Until next time, keep falling more in love!
 

​My favorite holiday of the year is Easter.  I love it because the day represents the Resurrection of Jesus and the greatest day in history.  But I also love it because of its potential for marriages.  It is a day that we remember how dim things looked on Good Friday, but on Easter morning, mourning was turned into joy.  I see this happen all of the time in my coaching business.  Couples come to me in crisis thinking that all is loss, and then they experience the joy of new life in their marriage.  As much as I love the day, I also know that Easter can be a very stressful day for families.  Many times the expectations of extended family, travel, Easter gifts, big family dinners and the rush of the day can cause significant strain on the marriage.  To this end, I would like to offer four strategies to help make this Easter a little easier for you and your spouse.  1)  This Easter make your marriage your highest priority.  In the midst of trying to make the holiday special for children or pleasing extended family, it is easy to lose the connection with your partner.  Make connecting with your spouse your number one priority this Easter.  Make sure they know how much you love them and how special they are to you.  Modeling this connection is the greatest gift you can give your children and it sets the standard for other people’s expectations of your time and your priorities.  2)  Develop an agreed upon Easter plan.  Take some time now to discuss expectations of the day.  What are your priorities in terms of the day?  Is it spending time with family?  Attending a worship service?  Doing activities as a family?  Agree upon the priorities and activities before the day arrives.  This will eliminate stress and disappointments the day of Easter and especially the day after Easter.  3)  Be comfortable saying “No”.  Give yourself permission to say no for the sake of your marriage and your family.  One of the greatest gifts you can give yourself, your spouse and your kids is the gift of not getting sucked into unhealthy family rhythms that do not serve your marriage.  I know of some families who have routinely made three to four “mandatory” dinner/party stops every Easter.  They hate it, but just can’t say no.  Consider saying no this Easter.  Chose one and tell the other three that their turn is coming.    4) Consider starting a new Easter tradition as a family.  Find one activity that you might add to your day that could enhance your marriage connection and bring your family closer together this Easter.  Please share these four tips with anyone who might benefit from them this Easter.  I want to wish you and your family the most Blessed Easter ever!  If I can ever be of any assistance to you as you strive to bring new life to your broken marriage, or make your good marriage great, please visit my site at themarriagecoach.com or call me at 314-606-4272.   Until next time, keep falling more in love!
 

​Several years ago, my Farmers insurance agent (and friend), Kyle Heywood shared an analogy on the importance of having insurance.  When you have something of great value, your natural inclination is to protect it. For most of us our most expensive assets are our homes and cars. For this reason, most of us have home owner’s insurance and car insurance. The truth is, our most precious asset is our marriage. Unlike our cars and homes, our spouse is not replaceable. (Or at least they shouldn’t be.) In the same way we protect our financial assets, we must have a plan to protect our marriage. One of the elements in creating a phenomenal marriage is to have a plan in place to protect the marriage from forces that have the potential to lessen or destroy the marriage. Imagine that your marriage is a beautiful castle that is located in hostile territory. If you owned a castle in hostile territory you would most certainly build a moat around it. The moat would serve as an advance warning system and defense against invading enemies. In the same way you can build a mote around your marriage. There are many ways to build this moat and protect your marriage, but for today I want to share my top two ways.  
The first way to insure your marriage against outside forces that seek to weaken your relationship is to make your marriage your number one priority. Make your spouse more important than other family members, your friends, your jobs, where you live, your home, hobbies or money. When many of us were married we included the phrase, “Forsaking all others” in our wedding vows. When we made that promise we were saying to our spouses, you are going to be my number one, forever. What about children? Shouldn’t they be our number one priority? Your children are your number one priority, next to your commitment to each other. The best gift you can give your children is put your spouse number one. It is the way to ensure sparing them having to be parented by another man or another woman in the future. Parents who make their marriage their number one priority, stay married and have extremely healthy children.  
The second way to insure your marriage against outside forces that seek to weaken the relationship is to speak life over your spouse. I tell people to imagine that their marriage has ears. Everything that you say about your marriage has tremendous power over the quality of the marriage. When you talk about your spouse or your marriage to others never talk negatively. Several years ago, I met one of my wife’s co workers. It was a person that I had never met with but who works closely with her on a daily basis. I will never forget her opening line to me. She said, “David, I can’t believe I am finally having the opportunity to meet you. I have heard so many amazing things about you. Your wife adores you, you must be quite a husband.” I graciously thanked her, and it reinforced two things that I already knew about my wife. One, she really did adore me. And two, she spoke life over our relationship. Imagine if she had spent days on end complaining about the dishes that I leave in the sink, my working too many hours and my habit of clicking my toes. Imagine if she had gone to work and regularly complained about the ball and chain at home. Imagine if she had only referred to me as her “old man”. Instead she clearly had spoken life over me and our marriage. She had a picture of our family on her desk that her colleagues regularly asked about. In this way, people knew what her number 1 priority was outside of work and she had the opportunity to speak life over the relationship. These two insurance policies to have a phenomenal marriage are free, but if you neglect them they will cost you much more than money.  Start protecting your most precious asset today, you will be glad you did and you will have a phenomenal marriage.
If I can ever be of any assistance to you as you strive to create a phenomenal marriage or if you would like more information about my alternative to marriage counseling, please contact me at 314-606-4272 or check out the stlouismarriagecoaching.com website. Until time keep falling more in love.

​Does true love exist?  For the past 35 years, Keven Clark has given his wife a single red rose every week.  It is a tradition he started before he and his wife were married. Kevin came upon this tradition when he was a young insurance agent.  He was delivering a life insurance check to an elderly widow when a package arrived.  The women started to cry as she opened the box and found a single rose.  Her husband had faithfully bought her a rose every week during their 60 years of marriage.  Before her husband died, he had made arrangements with the local florist to continue the weekly deliveries for the rest of her life.  This moved Kevin so deeply, that a few years later when he met his wife, he adopted the tradition.  Aisha Sultan shares this story and many others in this past weekends issue of the St. Louis Post Dispatch.  I can hear someone saying, “This is too extreme” or “This is too expensive” or “Why would you have to do this, it seems like my spouse ought to just know that I love” or “I don’t have to give my spouse anything to show my love”.   I hear all of these things on a weekly basis in my coaching business.  Unfortunately, I hear these things from people whose marriages are broken.  This beautiful story from the Post has two incredible lessons for all of us who want phenomenal marriages.  The first lesson is that great marriages are marked by thoughtfulness and giving.  I don’t know Keven Clark’s wife or the elderly widow mentioned in the article, but I can imagine that they both felt and feel incredibly loved by their spouses.  I can imagine their friends saying, “Your husband does what every week?”  I can imagine their faces lighting up and their hearts being warmed every time they receive that rose.  I was on the receiving end of this kind of love my entire marriage, and I can honestly tell you there was not a day that I did not feel incredibly loved.  As we roll into 2018, what love tradition can you start with your spouse?  Maybe you are not in a position to buy a rose a week but certainly you could write a handwritten note on a weekly basis.  Make a commitment to get into the habit of giving on a weekly basis.  The second lesson deals with the power of modeling.  Mr. Clark was impacted by the actions of this widow’s husband.  The truth is people are watching how you treat your spouse.  If you have children, they are watching.  Your friends are watching.  What kind of legacy of love are you leaving for people who are observing your marriage? Make a commitment that in 2018 you are going to model for your children, friends and family what true love looks like.  You will be glad that you did, your spouse will be blessed and you will have a phenomenal marriage.  Please share this post with anyone who might benefit today.  The truth is, true love does exist!  If I can ever be of any assistance to you in your marriage journey, please know that I am available to you.  You can learn more about my non traditional approach to marriage counseling or schedule a coaching session at themarriagecoach.com or by calling 314-606-4272.  Until next time, keep falling more in love. 

What do The Beatles, Diana Ross, The Doors, Mariah Carey and Rod Stewart all have in common?  All of them had songs that made it to the top charts about today’s topic.  (I will share the titles at the end of the post).   Many relationships are suffering from the medical condition known as “Failure to Thrive”.   In the early 1900’s, Dr. Luther Emmet Holt was known as one of America’s first and finest pediatricians. Dr. Holt came to the conclusion that parents were spoiling their children by cuddling and holding them too much. Good parents took notice and immediately followed his order, beginning a trend of “hands-off” parenting. Within just a few years, doctors across the nation started to notice a dramatic increase in infant deaths-particularly in seemingly healthy babies. It soon became apparent that these infants experienced “Failure to Thrive” simply because they were not getting enough human contact through touch. There are a host of studies of babies in orphanages concluding that those infants who suffered from touch deprivation achieved only half of the height normal for their age. This condition has come to be known in the medical field as “failure to thrive”.
Working with couples for the past two decades, I have learned that many relationships also suffer from “failure to thrive” because of the lack of touch in the relationship. Many couples have a “hands-off” relational style that is negatively impacting their relationship. Touch is critical to a phenomenal marriage. In fact, one of the ways to begin to transition a roommate marriage to a soul mate marriage it to begin to insert touch into your relationship on a daily basis. When you are standing in line at the grocery store, put your hand on your spouse’s shoulder. Make the decision that when you are walking, hold hands. Gentle caresses, cuddling, sitting close to one another both privately and in public, holding one another, and simply reaching out to touch are great disciplines that create great marriages. Touch creates a love connection. Many relationships start out with a great deal of touch but begin to neglect it later in the relationship. It requires being intentional. I have found that even when one spouse is obstinent and checking out of the relationship, touch is an incredible tool to begin to recreate a connection. I share with my clients that as they are touching their spouse, think to themselves, this touch means that I still believe in you, I still believe in us, and I am not giving up on this marriage. Every time I touch my wife I think, you are the only person in the world that I touch like this, and I touch you because I adore you and I am so glad that you are my wife. If your relationship is suffering from “failure to thrive”, there is hope. The remedy for this disorder is loving touch. Start today! You will be glad that you did and your relationship will improve.  Please share this post with anyone who may benefit.  The five songs that I referenced at the beginning of this post were I want to hold your hands, Touch me in the morning, Touch me, Touch my body and Love Touch.  If I can ever be of any assistance to you and your marriage or if you would like more information about my non traditional alternative to marriage counseling visit stlouismarriagecoaching.com or call me at 314-606-4272.  Until next time, keep falling more in love and keep touching.

​Through the years I have received hundreds of thank you letters for my coaching services.  The letter I received this month from Richard will always be one of my favorites.  His letter highlighted for me what is hanging in the balance when we have children.  I want to share his letter with you to highlight the reality that our children are constantly watching and learning from us.  Here is what Richard wrote:
 
Dear Mr. Rispoli,
We have never met but I have heard your name plenty of times in the past two years.  My name is Richard and you worked with my Mom and Dad two years ago in our home.  I was fifteen years old and starting my Junior year of High School.  Prior to your coming my Mom and Dad were constantly fighting and were on the verge of divorce.  Our world was falling apart.  Our home was being blasted apart and everything seemed so hopeless.  I though for sure they were going to divorce and I was going to have to choose who I would live with.  It was the worst time of my life.  After you came everything changed.  It was like my parents fell back in love.  Thank you for saving my parents marriage.  I head to college in the Fall and I know that my Mom and Dad are going to be OK.  This makes me happy and I wanted to say thank you.
Richard
 
I want to make two observations about Richard’s letter.  The first is how he was feeling in the midst of his parent’s crisis.  He uses words like falling apart, blasted apart and hopeless.  His fear of having to decide which parent he might have to live with is especially telling.  This young persons’ life was in shambles because of his parents fighting and the instability in the home.  The second observation I want to make about Richard’s letter is his comment about my saving his parent’s marriage.  The truth is, I did not save his parents marriage, his parents saved their marriage.  They saved their marriage the day they decided that while it would be easier for them to divorce and go their own separate ways, they would fight for their marriage and for their family.  They saved their marriage the day they told their friends who were telling them that Richard would be better off if they separated, that the advice to divorce for the sake of Richard was the worst advice they had ever received.  They saved their marriage the day they decided to stop fighting with each other and together they started to fight for the marriage.  They saved their marriage the day they decided to positively move forward and stop focusing on the past.  They saved their marriage the day they decided to reach out and get help.  For Richard’s sake, I am so glad they did.  The trajectory of Richard’s life will be incredibly different and much better because they decided to save their marriage.  If you are in a marriage crisis and you have children, I am certain that people are telling you that your children will be fine and that kids are resilient.  I am certain that people are telling you that you should never stay in a bad marriage for the sake of the kids.  I am saying, don’t stay in a bad marriage period.  Make a commitment to make it better.  Like Richard, you will be glad you did, and so will your children!  Please share this post with any of your friends who have children and may be thinking about ending their marriage.  It might just be the source of inspiration to give them the will to fight for their marriage. 
If I can ever be of any assistance to you on your own marriage journey or if you would like more information about my non traditional approach to marriage counseling, please call me at 314-606-4272 or visit my website at stlouismarriagecoaching.com 

​Today is my wife’s birthday!  She asked me to share this post with you last month, but I wanted to wait until today.  The purpose of this post is to encourage you to make your marriage your number one priority, because life is short.  This week’s homework is found at the end of this post.  What would you do?  On February 15th 2017 my wife and I were feeling great.   Our careers were going wonderful, our children were successful and healthy, we had incredible friends, a great church family and our marriage was strong.  Life was all good!  Within two weeks we would learn that Cathy has stage four lung cancer that has spread to her brain, liver and lymph nodes.  We were initially shocked and devastated.  This came out of nowhere.  She had never smoked, was working out four times a week and has always been healthy and strong.  Our plan had always been for me to finish my pastoral career in St. Louis, for Cathy to retire from Mo-Dot and eventually move to Destin Florida where I would continue to coach couples on making good marriages great and save broken marriages.  Now what?  After shedding many tears, going from Doctor to Doctor, praying and consulting with family and friends, we decided on a plan.  Four words would guide our days and all of our actions.  The four words are Live, Love, Fight and Trust. 
 
Live:  We have always lived everyday to the fullest.  We are known for squeezing the most out of life, and we decided that this could not and would not change.  God has given us this day and we are going to make the most out of it.  We know we have today, we will probably have tomorrow and there was never any guarantee for that third day.  So we are joyfully, making the most of everyday.
 
Love:  The quality of your life is directly proportionate to the quality of your relationships.  There is no greater relationship than the relationship between a husband and a wife.  We always have loved deeply and we are committed to continue to love deeply.  My wife is as beautiful to me bald as she was with her beautiful hair.  We are committed to continuing to love people.  We love our family, our friends, our church, our clients and even strangers. 
 
Fight:  Cathy is a fighter and she is fighting cancer daily.  We have the best oncologist in St. Louis (Dr. Melissa Rooney).   We are using the best and most cutting edge treatments in the world.  We are using traditional and non traditional cancer defeating regimens.  We are positive and not giving up. 
 
Trust:  As the St. Louis Marriage Coach, I seldom talk about my faith because I am given the opportunity to work with people of all different faith backgrounds.   I love it when my clients share their faith with me, which enables me to share my own personal convictions about faith and marriage.  But, the cornerstone of our marriage has always been our faith in Jesus Christ.  We credit God with every wonderful thing in our life.  We know He loves us so much, that there is nothing impossible for Him and that He has the power to heal.  Whether he does or whether he does not, we are going to continue to trust Him.
 
What does this mean for my coaching practice?  It means that I am more committed to helping people save their marriages today, then ever before.  This whole dilemma has thrown gasoline on our passion to help people create phenomenal marriages.  In the month of March, I had over 70 appointments where I helped save broken marriages and helped make good marriages great.  Here is what I am asking you to do today.  First, pray for Cathy and I.  We are not looking for pity, just prayers.  We are good.  Really.  Secondly, ask your partner the “What would you do?” question posed at the beginning of this post.  Have a discussion around this topic.  Use this topic to love more passionately.  Thirdly, identify some key words that you might use for your marriage.  Words that govern who you are as a couple and the actions you should be taking daily to make a great marriage.   Fourth, share this post.   Fifth, send Cathy a birthday wish.  And finally, if your marriage is in crisis, reach out and get help.  I would love to help you make your good marriage great and help you save your broken marriage.  If you would like more information on my non traditional approach to marriage counseling check out stlouismarriagecoaching.com or call me at 314-606-4272.  Until next time, keep falling more in love. 

​I was recently asked by a St. Louis radio talk show host what I believed was the number one problem facing married couples today.  Is it affairs?  Is it finances?  It is children or extended family?  Is it pornography?  Is it work schedules or home stress? What is it?  While all of these are serious issues, they are all symptoms of a greater problem.  I have worked with hundreds of couples through the years and I am convinced that the number one problem couples face is that they lose their loving connection.   Most of the couples and individuals that I work with tell me that at one time they had a deep loving connection with their spouse.   They could talk for hours and loved spending time with one another.  They had a sense that there was no problem that they could not solve as long as they were together.  Most of these couples married and at first things were great.  But shortly after marriage, they stopped doing many of the things that had created the initial connection.  Then, as these couples focused less on each other and less on the relationship they began to drift apart.  This drifting causes a loss of connection.  This is usually followed by discouragement, disengagement and disillusionment.  All of a sudden the problems in the relationship seem insurmountable.  Instead of connecting, there is a great deal of fighting.  For many, the easy solution is to divorce and start over with a new spouse.  This explains why the divorce rate for second marriages is significantly higher than first marriages.  I love having the opportunity to work with the couples that say they are going to fight to save the marriage.  Sometimes initially, it is only one person in the relationship who wants to save the marriage.  By refocusing on connection and having a plan to move forward reconnection is established and marriages are restored.  Take time out this week to check in with your spouse about your current level of connection in the marriage.  Here are three questions that you might use this week in a conversation with your spouse to access your connection level.
 

1.  On a scale of 1 to 10 how would you rate the level of our connection or closeness?  What would we have to do as a couple to improve this score?
2. Are we doing the same things we used to do when we were dating to keep our connection strong?  What activities could we reengage to revitalize our marriage?  Can we start this week?
3. What is one thing that you need from me that would help our level of connection?

 
 
If you are not satisfied with the answers to these questions, make a commitment to do something to improve the connection.  You will be amazed at how quickly things can turn around.  Please share this post with anyone who might benefit.  If I can ever be of service to you and your marriage or if you would like to learn more about my non traditional approach to marriage counseling, please visit my website at stlouismarriagecoaching.com or call me at 314-606-4272 to schedule an appointment.  Until next time, keep falling more in love. 
 

​I recently looked up the phrase “Guys’ Night Out” in the popular online Urban Dictionary.  According to the Urban Dictionary, “Guys night out is a harmless activity that male friends participate in for the purpose of reinforcing friendship or simply getting together to do something positive.   Such activities include but are not limited to beer drinking, discussing business and finances, watching or playing sports, playing videogames or card games, occasionally talking about women or watching a movie that doesn’t suck.”  I followed this search with the Urban Dictionary definition of Girls’ Night Out.  Clearly the editors of the Urban Dictionary are men.  I found the definition disturbing, so I am not going to share the definition here, but in today’s post I want to talk about the role of guys’ and girls’ night out in healthy marriages.  Is it appropriate for your husband to go out every Tuesday night with the guys?  Is is alright for your wife to play bunko every Friday night with the neighborhood girls?  How often is too much?  What are the danger signs?   Having a sense of individuality can be healthy for the marriage relationship.  The research is conclusive that having same sex friends improves health, makes us more attractive to our spouse and improves the overall quality of our lives.   Having same sex friends to hang out with occasionally can be extremely healthy and beneficial to the marriage.  There are two main challenges with the concept of guys’ night out and girls’ night out.  The first challenge is that many couples have never had conversations about what behavioral guidelines are acceptable for the marriage.   The problem with this is that when boundaries are crossed it creates conflict and a relational disconnect.  When this happens the night out with friends becomes a constant source of conflict and chaos in the marriage.  Take some time this week to talk about healthy boundaries in regards to this issue in your marriage.   Make sure you have conversations about frequency, types of activities that are acceptable, and mechanisms to have conversations when it is not working for either one of you.  The second challenge with girls’ night out or guys’ night out is the reality that we only have a limited amount of time.  Our marriage needs to be our highest priority.  If you want to know what your true priorities are look at your check book and look at your calendar.  Some people are more intentional about their night out with their friends then they are the weekly date night with their spouse.   If you are having regular guys’ night out or girls’ night out but are not having regular date nights your marriage is in trouble.  Make a decision to fix this immediately.   Make spending time with your spouse your highest priority.   I have some of the best guy friends in the world.  I truly am blessed with wonderful relationships and friends.  But my very best friend is my wife, Cathy.   There is no one that I love spending time with more than her.  We have always gone on at least one date a week.  I get with my friends and Cathy gets with her friends monthly or every other month.  This works for us.  Figure out what works best for you and your marriage, just make sure your spouse gets the number one place in your priorities.