AisleDash

Although he's celibate and admits to having no personal experience with intimate relationships, Father Pat Connor has seen his fair share of both marital bliss and strife in his 51 years as a priest. That's why he's now talking to high school age kids about what to look for in a spouse. He directs his counsel mostly to young women, because they are more interested, more likely to listen, and more likely to heed the advice. And he wants to get to them before they fall in love, when emotions take over and reason seems to fly out the window. On the warning list are guys who are tied too tightly to their mother's apron strings (because they can't make their own decisions), guys with no friends (because they don't know how to maintain a long-term relationship), and guys with financial troubles (because of the obvious reasons). While that may leave you wondering who's left to choose from, Connor stands behind his advice, warning that you can't change your partner after you're married, so it's a good idea to choose carefully from the get-go.

Couple's therapy moves online with the launch of eHarmony's (yep, the match-makers) new website, eHarmony Marriage. Here couples can get help with their relationship problems from an online therapist. The process starts with each person filling out a questionnaire that spans key marital issues from money to spirituality. The questionnaires are culled into a report that highlights the strengths and weaknesses of the relationship. That's just the free stuff. If that sounds a little too automated, you can subscribe (starts at $150 for three months) to the program and access a library of videos and articles to help with your specific issues. It could be that online counseling is the perfect starting place for struggling couples – it's less expensive than a series of appointments and it's relatively anonymous. But, its effectiveness is yet to be proven.

Marriage therapist Mira Kirshenbaum has a controversial theory about affairs: an affair, she says, is not necessarily the death knell for a marriage. Instead, it can be the spark that saves the relationship.

Kirshenbaum's assertion comes with quite a few qualifiers, though: the affair has to be the "right kind," for one thing, one that is pursued for love rather than as a conquest, and the cheating spouse must NEVER confess to the adultery, because it is the revelation of the truth that does the real harm. In a new book released this week, When Good People Have Affairs, she asserts that one approach to an affair is to "think of it as a radical but necessary medical procedure. If your marriage is in cardiac arrest, an affair can be a defibrillator."

Her point, it seems, is that under the right circumstances, an affair can jolt a person back into a marriage, rather than destroying the marriage. And while many of her Kirshenbaum's peers disagree that the affair itself may be theraputic, they agree that an affair can indeed be a sign of other issues in a relationship. Says Phillip Hodson, fellow of the British Association for Counsellors and Psychotherapists, "Maybe this book goes too far, but we do need to take a sociological view of affairs. To think, 'what are we going to do about them?' rather than to say 'it can't happen', when it clearly does."

I find it hard to agree with Ms. Kirshenbaum, if only because I agree with part of what she argues: I think that an affair often is a sign of issues with a marriage, but I am resistant to the idea that the affair can save that marriage ONLY if it is kept a secret. But I have also never been down that road, so I am only speculating.

What say you -- could an affair be good for a marriage? Or is it always the end?

Dear AisleDash,

My fiancee's father died of cancer a few months after we got engaged. She was very close with him and I know she's devastated that he won't be there for our wedding. What could we do to honor him at our ceremony that won't change the mood from our celebration to feeling like a funeral?

Grieving Groom

Dear Grieving Groom,

I am so sorry about your fiancee's father. Honoring him, and his relationship with his daughter, is a great idea, and there are lots of tasteful ways you can handle this. Memorial candles are a popular way of honoring loved ones at weddings.

Ever had a partner cheat on you? Ever want to know what was really going through the person's mind who helped your partner cheat?

Friday's Oprah show delved into that dark territory as four women discussed in detail the thought process of cheating with a married man. Some women were regretful ... others not so much. But, they all offered something to learn from. Click on the pictures below to find out more.

In any relationship, it's perfectly normal to appreciate the beauty in others (as long as you're appreciating away from your partner's presence and far, far away from the object of your appreciation). However, the following is never acceptable behavior, especially when it's a known problem.

Today contributor Dr. Gail Saltz recently answered an online question that pretty much answered itself ... you know – with common sense. In short, a woman's husband, known to drink and feel up other women, did exactly that during a party with close "friends."

Earlier today, Christina Sbarro wrote a lovely post at ParentDish, where she asked what the secret to a happy marriage is. "Being relatively new to the partnership game (my husband and I have been together for 8 years) I always get romantic when I spot an elderly couple holding hands and window shopping. I want to know what makes them tick, and of course, I want us to be like that. Happy, satisfied, supportive."

My husband and I have been together for over 15 years, and married for 13, and while we are not the elderly couples Christina refers to (not yet, at least) we do have a happy and successful marriage. Years ago, when we were still, as Christina says, "new to the partnership game," we asked some friends what their secret was.

A shared sense of humor and a shared sense of outrage, our friends said. That's the secret to a successful marriage.

It sounds so simple, but I think it's true. My husband can still, after all these years, make me laugh until I cry, and while he doesn't always share my soapboxes, he is sympathetic when I climb up on one and hold forth. We don't agree about everything, and we don't always get along, but at the core of our relationship are those two things: an ability to laugh together and an ability to respect each other's anger at larger injustices.

What do you think -- is there a secret to a happy marriage?