Till Cheating Do Us Part: A Guide to Relationship & Marital Bliss

By Chidi Asika-Enahoro

Till Cheating Do Us Part utilized a wealth of pragmatic information from a variety of relationships and marital unions to fabricate a manual of tested and tried tips to prevent or mend relationships and marriage pitfalls.

Till Cheating Do Us Part is a must read for all couples but especially for those in serious relationships such as newly weds, those about to make life changing commitments to one another and those long married couples who are mired in marital controversies such as infidelity and or other challenging scandals.

Till Cheating Do Us Part is a relationship guide book that succinctly delves into the human psyche to uncover and realistically present well arranged basic concepts of what is needed to build and maintain a fun loving and stress free relationship.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 25, 2007
• ISBN: 9781465331649

Chidi Asika-Enahoro

My dearly departed mother (Enyi Gloria Asika) was fond of quoting an African proverb: “Nobody needs to tell a deaf person when a war breaks out.” In other words, “he who has ears, let him hear.” Chidi Asika-Enahoro is the founder of Love and Balance, Inc. Chidi is a motivational speaker, an empowerment trainer, a certified senior disability analyst, and was a talk show host. Chidi has authored three acclaimed books; A Slice of Africa, Innocence Interrupted, and Till Cheating Do Us Part. Website: www.loveandbalance.com

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Copyright © 2007 by Chidi Asika-Enahoro.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2007902740

ISBN: Hardcover 978-1-4257-7269-7

Softcover    978-1-4257-7266-6

ISBN:    ebk   978-1-4653-3164-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

39361

Contents

About the Author

Preface

Introduction

DYNAMICS OF RELATIONSHIPS AND MARRIAGES

Perceptions of Love

Commitment and Expectations

Why many gorgeous Stars cannot stay married for too long

Money Matters, Habits, and Extended Families

Peer and Family Pressures versus Positive Attitude

Dating Checklist

Marriage Checklist

Multicultural Effects

SEDUCTION BY DESIGN

Romantic Interlude

Seduction’s Destruction: Infidelity—Flirtation or Revenge

Women and Desires: Emotional

Men and Desires: Physical

SUCCESSFUL QUALITIES

Communication, Kindness, Endurance, Patience, Consideration, Thoughtfulness, and Discipline

Honesty, Humor, and Mutual Respect

Trust and Forgiveness: Be Impeccable

How to Prevent Heartbreak: Set Ground Rules

How to Mend a Broken Heart: Be Divine and Let Go

Illusions of Permanence: Be Prepared—

Twenty Things That Can Go Wrong

Relationship or Marriage Survey

THE END ZONE

Divorce: Beyond Pardon, Beyond Repair

Concluding Summation

Acknowledgments

DEDICATION

To the love of my life and soul mate Victor Maurice Enahoro. Victor, though we both err as humans, you are perfect when it counts; and when you are not, you give me the chance to strive to be divine. I thank you for complementing my soul with your unwavering support and undying love even when I was difficult. After twenty years of marriage, I feel I will always love you.

Also, to my two wonderful angels Tara Peaches Enahoro and Ritchie Anthony Enahoro who have been my enchanting rock through the unwinding spiral of my marital journey. May you both make the right choices and always find happiness in your committed relationships and life’s decisions.

About the Author

Chidi Asika-Enahoro is the author of A Slice of Africa and Innocence Interrupted. She is a motivational speaker and a trainer. She hosts a weekly Internet radio talk show Love and Balance with Chidi on Voice America networks. She is a rehabilitation consultant. She lived and traveled extensively between England, Africa, and the United States.

Chidi is a versatile cosmopolitan and socially conscious activist having grown up in three differently intriguing worlds. Chidi is an avid reader and a prolific writer. She has a Master’s degree in clinical and community psychology and is currently enrolled in a Ph.D program in pastoral counseling.

Chidi held various leadership positions including president of Florida Rehabilitation Association (two terms in Miami); board member of several community organizations; cofounder and operator of a nonprofit organization; a State of Florida trainer, contract manager, and rehabilitation consultant.

Chidi maneuvered her privileged upbringing to dedicate her life to excel in championing the plight of the needy to empower them. She has the unique advantage of a multicultural heritage and point of view. She has an extensive background in rehabilitation, spanning the cause of over twenty years between Connecticut, New York, and Miami.

She has a host of varied certificates and provided many well-received workshops across the nation on a variety of subjects ranging from professional ethics, relationship issues, cultural diversity, counseling skills, job development, management techniques, relaxation techniques, leadership skills, program designs, and social skills.

Chidi is an ordinary spiritual yet very intriguing character with varied life interests. Her main aim in life is to bring happiness to the world by creating little pockets of joyful moments for people she encounters on her life’s journey. In this current lifetime, Chidi strives to make a positive difference to those who know her and to humanity in general.

Chidi is uniquely qualified to write Till Cheating Do Us Part because she has been married for twenty years to a man who has tested their marital vows to the limit. She understands firsthand what it is to go through the throws of a breakup with innocent children embroiled in the middle of contentions.

Being a little off center from the mainstream mode of thinking, Chidi recognizes that she can be a challenge to handle in a relationship. That recognition is the key to her salvation. She is confident in knowing herself and understanding her strengths and shortcomings as a wife, mother, and a human being.

She has also studied relationships with many couples and can boast of many wonderful long-term relationships with friends and families. She has lived through the test of true love, trust, forgiveness, patience, and communication. It takes two to make a marriage work, and both have to be consciously progressive people.

Chidi drew on her experiences of having lived what she is preaching when she talked about forgiveness in a marriage. Personal lessons of infidelity to the brink of divorce a couple of times gave her a good foundation for Till Cheating Do Us Part. It was a sobering experience, as she truly understood what it is to make many personal hard choices.

Preface

This book will take steps to contribute a path or method of lifting the consciousness of those that read it. This is a topic that endlessly fascinates us all: the young, the middle-aged, and the aged alike because it is one that hits us all in the heart, or where it hurts the most.

There are thousands of books and hundreds of sources, all trying to find solutions to the complex and interwoven puzzle between the sexes, but there are no set rules and facts that have secured any clear advantage in this topic. This book will offer as much as the societies and people who read it are willing to accept in their quest to achieve the best ever in love, relationships, and happiness.

My hope is that after you read this book, you will, without any doubt, help yourselves and achieve a form of relationship that is really worthy of your status in life. With wisdom and knowledge come insights, better decision making, and, ultimately, the achievement of our goals.

Alex George

Chicago, Illinois

Marriage is a topic that is difficult to advise anyone on. No two marriages are similar; however, it is true to say that a successful marriage or relationship requires continuous hard work, compromises, and allowances. Love and friendship are major ingredients in a successful marriage.

Being good friends ensures that each other’s needs and feelings would be respected. Mutual respect, trust, and good communication are other important qualities of a good marriage or relationship. There is no panacea for a blissful marriage. No marriage is without its own challenges.

The trick is to love each other sufficiently, give each other room to grow, and support each other in this journey of the unknown. Chidi Asika-Enahoro has written a book that attempts to lay out with clarity the variables that may interfere with the dynamics of marriage.

She also has some good advice on what to do when things fall apart and the couple has to go their separate ways. This is a must read for young people starting out in marriage but is also recommended reading even for us old-timers.

Joan Onyekwuluje, MD

Stafford, England

Introduction

Modern-day marriages have taken a radical turn from the established traditional marriages of our forefathers. Many still go through the same processes and actually recite the same vows, but they are just empty words. Everyone can recite the words mindlessly. Marital vows hold no special meaning anymore. Marriages have become till cheating do us part, as is evidenced in the high rates of divorces.

Till Cheating Do Us Part is a book about the triumphs of the human spirit as it conquers insurmountable odds amidst the human odyssey. It succinctly delves into the intricacies of forming and sustaining deep meaningful relationships with other human beings. It provides a guide to attracting and sustaining the right life partner.

Till Cheating Do Us Part presents tips to maintain and solidify commitments. It prescribes how to get past seduction’s destructions to renew commitments with forgiveness and trust. In order to develop clear vision, you must encounter some illusions. You must be alert and vigilant at all times lest you become bedazzled and function ineffectively.

Till Cheating Do Us Part reviews what constitutes a worthwhile relationship that deserves investing the required energy for maintenance. The key to a successful relationship and marriage is that you develop a solid relationship with yourself. You become okay with yourself by identifying what makes you unique and interesting.

You must master yourself to have a good self-esteem and self-confidence with a positive attitude to life. The author utilizes her uncanny understanding of human nature and personal experience to manufacture hope for love and romance. She has been challenged to live what she was preaching about love and understanding in marriage.

Till Cheating Do Us Part is really a book about how not to throw in the towel at the first punch. It deals with how to give your relationship your very best shot for as long as possible before throwing in the towel. The author presents innovative and progressive tips on how to strategize and implement functional rules and regulations to accommodate both parties.

Till Cheating Do Us Part was able to capture what it means to be caught in a marital dilemma of deciding to leave, forgive, trust, and love. The crux of the book will be focused on marriage, but the same principles can be applied to any committed romantic relationship. Commitment is the backbone of any marital union.

Commitment cannot be based on subjective feelings and flimsy things such as physical beauty, desire, happiness, and so on. Those qualities are fleeting and will fizzle away in no time. Commitment can only be based on something that is concrete and constant in life, which is love. Genuine love withstands the test of time.

In order to be committed to a union, you must be of a certain level of maturity and age. Granted that maturity does not always rhyme with age, you must still become an adult to enter into a legal union. Maturity comes from knowing who you are and having self-confidence, high self-esteem, self-respect, and self-awareness.

In order to accomplish that, you must have spent a lot of introspective moments with yourself to the point where you can say, This is who I am, and this is what I am all about. You have to love who and what you are about. You can only give what you know how to give, and you must be able to receive when it is given to you.

It is true that you can grow in a marriage, but you must come with the basic foundation to build upon. Discover yourself first before encroaching on someone else. Relationships by their compositions are naturally complex because you have two complex elements interfacing and trying to find their foothold, so come prepared.

A marriage is the single most complete art of mastering human behavior because you are forced to be with one complex animal in very, very close proximity for a long time to come. To think of the implication is scary for many, and the actual experience is often catastrophic, hence the astronomical number of breakups and divorces.

Marriage is the ultimate test of human nature, and it is major league huge to master the required skills of the institution. Many people get married for all the wrong reasons. Some marry to please others or to look good or to have children or for financial security. Marriage must never be for convenience but for companionship.

Companionship is key because it includes, love, affection, understanding, trust, patience, self-discipline, forgiveness, communication, and respect. Any marriage with these listed ingredients is bound to be blissful even when lacking other things in life. To be a good mate, you must be kind and considerate to each other.

You must do unto others what you would like others to do unto you. If you would not appreciate your partner keeping secrets from you or cheating you, then you must not do those things. If honesty is important to you, you must learn to be honest and forthright. If you expect to be respected and appreciated, then degrading and disrespecting your partner is unacceptable.

When there is true commitment in a relationship or a marriage, no problem is insurmountable. Anything worth having is worth working for is a marital creed. Since perseverance brings success, you have to try and try again. You keep trying until you can try no more, and then you try some more. You must love selflessly.

Your love in marriage cannot be conditionally based on circumstances. When the going is good, you stay married; and when things go wrong, you bolt for the door. Packing things up is the easiest solution. We exist to learn and grow, but one can only go as far as their determination and push. Leaving is quitting the lesson plan.

Separation should not be an option after marriage because it is a premarriage issue. No matter what happens in a marriage, you must stay in the struggle and work it out. You commit to resolve your differences, most especially if you have children involved and there is no physical violence involved.

You must love yourself unconditionally. By the same token, you must love God without reservation because he is within you. You must love your mate the same way, so totally and completely. You have to love till it hurts, and then you find it within you to love some more. You keep up the faith and support each other.

Marital success is very individual and purely comes from practice, practice, practice. Both the pain we transcend and the pain we persist with are effective for our existence and are major influences on our life. Expect the best, and you will get the best in any scenario. What you get in life is a direct result of what you expect.

You must encourage and compliment each other because you reflect each other. When you pay homage and respect to others, it reverts back to you in many folds; hence, you are building on your blessings. You must dare to dream big. You need to have the courage to seek the truth and the strength to stand for what you believe in.

You cannot afford to dwell on your past imperfections, but you need the wisdom to know when to learn from your past experiences and from the experiences of other people. As much as marital commitment should be for life, one has to be realistic with expectations and know when a cause is completely hopeless and not worth fighting for.

That is when separation or divorce makes sense, for everyone’s safety. When you have given your marriage, your best shot, which includes seeking divine and professional intervention, you must throw in the towel to save yourself and retain your psychological well-being. Certain stressors are unnecessary in life.

As you go through this book, you will notice, what might seem like a contradiction, in the author’s beliefs about certain things. What it is, is that, she was struggling with those issues, in her personal life, and experiencing a paradigm shift, as the days went along. A key point at issue