2:00 p.m.  As the group reassembled, Dr. Guerney began by cautioning us that enhancing a marriage does, in a sense, change it.  "When you want to enrich your marriage in some serious way," he said, "your opinions about how you're doing it might conflict.  Each of you will have different expectations and levels of commitment to the change.  Learning the next step - the discussion skill - will teach you how to travel comfortably between being the expressive partner and the empathic one." Back to our private chairs - and our work.  It's important to know that, in theory, I'd always liked Kirk's idea of our cooking full-scale dinners during the work week.  But for some reason, I never followed through.  Kirk had often complained that he was fed up with our evening routine.  Get home from work at seven, feed the cats, throw a pot of pasta on the stove for us, open mail, return phone calls (eating the pasta was squeezed in somewhere along the way), watch the news and fall off to sleep. I, on the other hand, saw forgoing a relaxing dinner hour as a necessary sacrifice for being a dual-career couple.  What's more, the idea had a history of failure with us - which made us all the more skeptical about being able to change our ways. I kept the instructions in my lap.  They looked straightforward enough: I. Partner A: Express in a positive way why you want the change/enhancement activity.  Partner B: Empathize.  Partner A: Approve or amend B's empathic response.  Partner B: Once approved, express your feelings.  Repeat the process as many times as necessary until all feelings are aired. II.  Set a date on which to start your enhancement activity. III.  Set time intervals at which the activity will occur. We started: Kirk as the expresser: "We both appreciate good food, and I like to cook, but we don't make time for it.  I know we're both busy, but I'd like us to set aside time to create and eat delicious, homemade meals. This way we'll have healthier, more varied meals, and have time to relax together - neither of which we have now." Lisa as the empathizer: "You feel we're missing out on being together during the evening because we get home so late.  And you're unhappy about that.  You'd like to share your day with me over a home-cooked meal." Kirk approving my empathic response: "Yes, that's right.  How do you feel about that?" Lisa as the expresser: "Well, actually I don't like to cook, which is partly why this has never worked in the past.  But I know you're compromising because when you lived at home, your mother cooked semi-gourmet meals.  But I don't want to do a lot of cooking, especially when I feel I can get by on soup and salad and pasta." Kirk's empathic response: "You're skeptical about this idea if you have to do a lot of cooking."

We agreed that we wouldn't try making any dishes his mother used to make, that we would get new cookbooks in an effort to start fresh, and that we should share in all parts of the creation of a meal. We set a date for the following Wednesday to start our cooking; we agreed that we would cook together three times a week.  And this would be time just for us - home from work by six, and no competition from the television or phone. 4:30 p.m. Dr. Guerney ended the day by gathering all the couples together for a group discussion.  Did we feel the enhancement assignment would be something we'd stick with?  Were we learning to freely express our feelings?  Did we think our partners were understanding our feelings when we expressed them using RE skills? Those who wanted to could comment to the whole group.  I was so pleased by what I felt Kirk and I had accomplished that I had to speak up.  "We worked out a plan we're both excited about,'" I told the group.  "Before, when we'd tried to discuss this issue, we never got anywhere.  Our conversations would end with things like, 'Oh never mind, we'll talk about it later,' or 'Forget it, you don't understand.'  But now Kirk understands where I'm coming from and I understand what he wants." The other couples nodded, suggesting they'd had a similar experience.  One woman said she hoped more heated issues could be approached and resolved in a similar way.  I was wondering about that, too.  When the going got rough, would empathy hold up? Dr. Guerney told us that the next day we would focus on conflict resolution.  Also, he warned us, using the skills would be more difficult, precisely because each couple would be asked to discuss (privately) a problem that has built walls between them.  In other words, each couple's Sunday topic would probably be loaded with resentments, assumptions and even hostility. With our first day of enrichment behind us, Kirk and I were tired.  Learning new ways of communicating had been hard work.  Still, that night we talked about how much closer we felt already.  And we realized how in the past, when we'd had a conflict, we'd fallen into distinct roles: Lisa The Nurturer and Kirk The Compromiser.  Surely not a satisfying or healthy way to continue a marriage.  We were both looking forward to Day Two. Dr. Guerney had been listening to our exchange, and at this point, he took on Kirk's role, offering a more probing empathic response.  "You feel I've been compromising for the past several years, and you feel bad you can't cook like my mother."  Dr. Guerney looked to me to see if I would approve his statement.  Once again, he was on target. Kirk and I then continued to use our new skills to talk about what had initially seemed like such a simple subject.  By 4:30, a number of issues had been raised for the first time and, more important, we really understood each other. Kirk had never intended that I do most of the cooking.  That was something I'd incorrectly assumed all these years.  He was willing to do 50 percent of the work - and more if necessary. I admitted that I felt like a failure as a cook - in comparison to Kirk's mother - especially since a number of dishes I'd tried to make for him hadn't turned out well and he had teased me about them. Kirk said his teasing was his way of reassuring me, of telling me not to take it all so seriously.  He wanted me to have fun cooking with him.