What Your Husband Isn't Telling You by David Murrow

Ever wonder what on earth your husband is thinking sometimes?  Yeah, me too.  I couldn't wait to get my hands on a copy of What Your Husband Isn't Telling You:  A Guided Tour Of A Man's Body, Soul, and Spirit by David Murrow!  And I'm glad I did!  This book is full of (not-so) top secret information about men and what makes them tick physically, emotionally, and spiritually.  And it's true because it's coming straight from the author's mouth...who is also a man!  The information answered so many of my questions about my husband...mainly things that drove we crazy!  And if gave me some information about my husband that I wasn't really ready for.  For example, did you know that when your husband enters a room full of other couples, he checks out all the wives in the room to see who has the best one and dubs the husband of said woman a stud?  Me neither.  That really made me feel pressured to be the one that he decides is the hottest compared to all the rest!  I asked my husband if this were true of him and he said yes! And ladies, our personal appearance ranks pretty high on our hubby's expectations for us, so throw away those sweat pants!

The book was truly eye-opening for me and has given me a better understanding and appreciation for my husband, and for men in general.  So many of what I thought were my husband's quirks that irritated me actually originated from his deep-centered need to provide.  How can I get irritated with a husband who wants to provide for his family?  This book has given me an entirely new outlook on what my husband does and says.  God wired men in this way and we need to embrace their differences instead of using them as a source of tension.    

How We Love Our Kids by Milan & Kay Yerkovich

I just finished reading How We Love Our Kids by Milan & Kay Yerkovich and let me start off by saying that I really enjoyed this book!  It was a huge eye-opener for me.  I knew my husband and I had completely different parenting styles and this book confirmed it!  The book explains the 5 love styles of parenting, but it goes much further than that.  It also explains why we parent that way, which is mostly due to the style of parenting our own parents used to parents us. 

In this book, the authors encourage us not to look at our children's behaviors, but our own.  We need to identify our personal parenting style, then work to correct those areas that need correcting in ourselves, not our children.  They have seen in their own lives how, by changing their own behaviors and reacting to our children differently than we normally would, their children's behaviors also changed.  Many of our children's less-than-lovely behaviors directly stem from how we are parenting them.  As a parent it's so easy to just pass the blame onto our kids, but the problem really does start with us.

In addition to helping us recognize our parenting style, they authors also help us to realize the effects that our particular parenting style has on our children and who they will become.  They identify several different "styles" of children such as the Avoider, the Pleaser, the Vacillator,  the Controller/Victim Child and several more.  Once we identify the types of children we have, we then can use the tips in this book to help connect to our children by understanding them better.

I think this is a great book for parents of both young and old children, as well as those who have yet to have children.  The sooner we can recognize how we parent, the sooner we can begin cultivating a more meaningful relationship with them.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for this honest review.