For the second year, the Alabama Healthy Marriage and Relationship Education Initiative is helping Auburn couples prepare to take the plunge into marriage.
Whether engaged, dating, considering marriage or any other status, couples can attend the 'Ready to Take the Plunge?' workshop through AHMREI to better prepare for life after marriage (the wedding?).
"We don't want to focus on the rings, the dress, the honeymoon or getting engaged," said Ami Landers, AHMREI direct partner and public relations coordinator.
Landers said the workshop encourages couples to consider how they will resolve issues and questions for life after marriage, such as future employment, higher education, number of children and extended family.
"They [couples] tend to forget about the life after the wedding day," Landers said.
The workshop is a mix of lectures, activities, discussions and role-play, and is meant to be interactive for everyone involved.
"Some people are really intimidated by therapy and counseling," said Julianne McGill, human development and family studies graduate assistant. "And this a less formal way of learning about issues that might come up in a marriage and how to deal with them."
One lesson attendees learn is what Sheena Stewart, human development and family studies graduate assistant, calls the "heart lock-in." Couples are taught how to deal with conflict or highly emotional situations by stepping away and thinking about positive aspects of their significant other before they return to resolve the issue.
Stewart said she sees attendees after the workshop and they report how the heart lock-in and other tips are helping their relationship.
"We just want to provide and foster an atmosphere for them to have the most effective communication about things they may not have thought about," Landers said. "It's such a fun way of getting to know the person you're thinking of spending the rest of your life with."
The workshop is practical and addresses numerous topics that people in any stage of a relationship will find useful.
Emily Burch, a campus minister in Auburn, was interested in the workshop to further her ability to counsel couples preparing for marriage.
"It was presented in a very engaging way," Burch said. "It was not boring at all."
The workshops are offered to the public free of charge, and include food and childcare. Each workshop covers two days, a total of 6 hours, with the first starting on Friday, Feb. 1 from 6-9 p.m. and continuing to Saturday, Feb. 2 from 9 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
The second workshop is April 19-20, following the same times listed above. Workshops meet at the Auburn Chamber of Commerce at 714 E. Glenn Ave.
Both McGill and Stewart facilitate the workshops along with Dr. Thomas Smith and Dr. Scott Ketring, associate professors of human development and family studies.
"We're not in the business of getting people married," Landers said. "We are marriage and relationship education."
To register online for either of the workshops, go to www.auburn.edu/cconline and select Ready to Take the Plunge. Additional workshops are offered on topics such as stepfamily relationships and developing healthy relationships in marriage.
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