Angelina Jolie – Extreme Blonde Moments

Bringing the 2016 tally to 43 celebrity relationships that have ended, yesterday Angelina Jolie shocked the world and filed for divorce from Brad Pitt. Damn real life intrudes on the wealth and the seemingly carefree lives of a beautiful high-profile couple yet again! Hmmm

If you read the headlines on the covers of the magazines that line the check out lanes at the grocery store, you’d think every relationship, celebrity or every day Jane & Joe, ends up doomed to failure.

Today the Huffington Post ran an article warning women to watch out for signs that their husband has become “emotionally disconnected,” but you can search the internet and find similar headlines in one women’s magazine or another nearly every month. I just googled, “have you lost interest in your relationship?” and Google returned 9,230,000 results! Headlines on these articles range from blaming, “What you can do to fix your broken relationship,” to therapeutic, “Signs you (or your spouse) are losing interest,” but all circle back to the same things:

Relationships are hard
Day-to-day stresses of life wear equally on both parties in a relationship
To make a relationship last takes work, love and understanding

So, because I love all of my loyal Extreme Blonde Moments followers, I’ll summarize the latest articles so you can:

Troubleshoot your own relationship
Figure out if problems you have are minor or deal breakers
Decide if you’re in a relationship worth salvaging and either: A) Cut through the bullshit and get back on track; or B) Stop the bleeding and get out

First, there are some universally agreed to signs that you or your partner have disengaged from your relationship:

Do you dread spending time together, prefer time with friends instead of time with your significant other, feel like it’s an obligation, feel exhausted or mentally drained after a day together? Do you start fights to avoid plans together, do you fight more often than not?
Does your relationship lack intimacy? Hugs and kisses, casual touches, hand holding, and other small intimacies are the first thing to go when a relationship is dying, the absence of these things is a big warning sign.
Does your relationship lack sex? This is a huge problem! Dry spells of a week or two, even a month happen with the everyday stresses of life, work separations, illness, etc., but when you go months at a time without one (or both) of you desiring the most vital of intimacies, you have a serious issue. If the thought of making love to your spouse stirs NOTHING in you, and you don’t miss or desire an immediate change (as in take steps to change the status quo) then your relationship has very little hope of survival. This is especially true if it is only one partner that is disinterested in maintaining the sexual relationship.
Are you withholding everyday stuff, sharing conversations, concerns, stresses with someone else, seeking someone else’s opinions instead of your significant other’s? That’s a death blow for your relationship.
Do you not care what your significant other is doing? If hearing the details of their day, their opinions, stories, or even their voice is of no interest to you….I think you get the picture. Doomed
Are you losing your self esteem? If you have become unhappy, feel unwanted, undesired, and so unimportant that deep inside you know you should get out of the relationship, you can start feeling trapped, angry with yourself that you’re still there, and wondering how you ended up with this person. This can lead you to start questioning your own judgement which leads to increasingly negative feelings about yourself.
Do you hate coming home, spend extra time at work, at the gym, in other activities, anything to avoid being in the same place as your significant other? Do you complain about unimportant things, are you passive aggressive, or have you become verbally or physically aggressive toward your significant other? Get Out
Are you fantasizing about others or acting like you’re single when you are not with your significant other? Do you daydream about what life would be like without your significant other, are you reaching out to old flames, do you use “I” statements instead of “We“: “I am going to Costa Rica next week” vs “We are going to Costa Rica next week.” You are testing the waters to see what the response would be (and how it would feel) to you being single.

The Huffington Post article pointed out gender specific indicators that a spouse has checked out of a marriage:

Men:

Hypercritical of everything his spouse does, less generous of mistakes
He stone walls or is in constant “Silent Treatment” mode: closed off body language (crossed arms, pursed lips, turned back) and/or zero verbal feedback or engagement, even when a response would be appropriate and expected.
Visibly angry when tasks aren’t done, impatient and short
No playfulness, not visibly happy hanging out with spouse, appears distant or to be just going through the motions, or to be putting on a show of attentiveness when others are present
He confides in others or has more intimate talks with others than he has with his spouse

Women:

Men complain to therapists that “she seems to have changed overnight.” He fails to recognize warning signs like requests to improve the relationship have been ignored or belittled and she’s finally become fed up, stopped seeing him in a romantic light and become disillusioned with the marriage.
He starts hearing “Nothing” or “I don’t want to talk about it,” when he notices she has withdrawn or changed her behavior. She’s tired of tying and given up hoping for change.
You barely touch anymore.
It feels like you are living two separate lives.
All you talk about is the kids and household logistics (or jobs, etc.).
Your wife speaks brutal truths instead of being kind, considerate and accepting of your quirks and idiosyncracies.

If you feel a kinship to any of the behaviors you have two choices, talk about them and reolve them, or resolve to move on. None of the behaviors are healthy for any romantic relationship, especially if it’s a marriage and there are children involved. Children observe and learn what you are living, so give them the best chance of having healthy, loving adult relationships by living them yourself.

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brangelina The internet, gossip rags, and television are all abuzz about the breakup of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie today. But, once the OMG has passed, deep inside didn’t we all expect it? To me it seemed inevitable: he seems way too laid back and she seems far too high strung for bradjen their relationship to last forever. I don’t feel sorry for them. They had many years to figure their relationship and parenting styles out. Sometimes relationships, especially those that began in the clandestine manner theirs did, while he was still married to Jennifer Aniston, just run their course and end. The person I really feel sorry for is Jennifer Aniston’s new husband. As if being the man she finally married after 11 years of her being the famously single former Mrs. Pitt and the never-ending Brad / Angelina/ Jennifer media hysteria wasn’t enough, now Brad’s single just over a year into their (if you believe the tabloids) already rocky marriage . Let the reconciliation speculation begin…

But let’s move on.

There are a few other important things happening today, like:

It’s 49 days until the election. www.usa.gov wants you to know these important things before you place your vote:

Make sure you are registered to vote. Check your voter status at: www.canivote.org. If you’re not registered go to www.vote.gov, select your state and get registered ASAP!
Research the candidates, the League of Women Voters has a guide that can help give you tips on how to evaluate the candidates at www.lwv.org. You can also find a guide on what to listen for when you are watching the debates. There will be a lot to sort through in the 3 debates: all of us need to ignore the personal attacks, smoke screens, and non-answers, to hear the candidates real intentions and plans for the country moving forward.
If you know you won’t be able to vote in person on November 8 2016, make sure you have registered to cast your ballot via mail. To find out your state’s requirements for casting an absentee ballot, visit www.usa.gov/absentee-voting.
Make sure you know your polling place and put it in your schedule like any other appointment. Make sure you schedule ample time, as polling places could be crowded. Also make sure you bring a form of government accepted ID. If you don’t know your polling place, or want to review your state’s election day requirements, visit: www.usa.gov/election-day#item37327.

News has leaked that former Republican President(s) are voting Clinton

Kathleen Hartington Kennedy Townsend, the former Maryland lieutenant governor and daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy posted a photo of herself with Former President George H.W. Bush with the caption, “The President told me he’s voting for Hillary!!”
Our 92 year old, 41st President reportedly made the statement at a private event held in Kennebunkport, Maine yesterday. CNN says that according to sources close to Bush, he shared his plans with board members of the bipartisan Points of Light Foundation Monday. So, I wonder if the rest of the Bush family is following suit. Hmmm

Congress is working to protect Americans’ right to give negative Yelp reviews. The Senate has already passed a similar Bill, now the House of Representatives are voting on a Bill that guarantees companies can’t enforce clauses that attempt to intimidate customers’ with threats to sue if they post negative reviews to popular websites like http://www.yelp.com, http://www.amazon.com, and http://www.tripadvisor.com. Once passed, the two Bills will be reconciled and an agreed upon unified Bill will be presented to the President for his signature into Law.

Companies are hiding “non-disparagement” clauses in their terms of use agreements and penalizing customers if they post negative reviews of services received from those companies. Example: “In California, Yelp is asking the state Supreme Court to overturn a lower court’s ruling that asked the company to remove some negative reviews of a law firm, saying it could set a precedent for the removal of other negative reviews and leave consumers with a skewed assessment of restaurants and other businesses. The firm has said the reviews are defamatory.” (Source: www.cbsnews.com)
While the non-disparagement clauses are still legal, Yelp is trying to let users know about them. The company is now tagging some companies’ Yelp pages with a warning: “This business may be trying to abuse the legal system in an effort to stifle free speech, including issuing questionable legal threats against reviewers. As a reminder, reviewers who share their experiences have a First Amendment right to express their opinions on Yelp.” (Source: www.cbsnews.com)

While Hollywood, it’s stars, and the projects they produce are certainly important means of diverting us from the everyday stresses of life, there are so many more important things that we should be spending our time worrying about, like the rapidly approaching Presidential election, as well as the sometimes serious, sometimes whimsical things that make me go hmmm. 😉