Making Your Intercultural Marriage Successful with Foreign Women

According to statistics, 41% of intercultural couples end up divorcing. Find out how you can make your marriage last.

“We don’t develop courage by being happy every day. We develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging diversity.” - Barbara de Angelis

In every marriage, couples must communicate and make compromises. The same rule applies to mixed marriages. As a matter of fact, intercultural couples need to exert twice the effort to make their relationship last.

Here’s an interesting fact: Couples in an intercultural marriage have a higher risk of ending in a divorce compared to couples who marry within their own race.

Why? It’s because they face more complex problems compared to ordinary couples. They have to deal with language barriers, culture clashes, and negative stereotypes, all of which can be draining and difficult to overcome.

Although these difficulties exist, interracial marriages can still survive. Staying together and making it last forever is a personal choice. Despite the challenges life throws, couples must remain resilient to overcome them.

If you want to know how to overcome cultural differences in marriage, continue reading this article.

Dealing with Culture Clash

All relationships are bound to face conflicts, especially the ones where couples come from different cultural backgrounds.

Aside from disagreements concerning life views, communication styles, habits, and expectations, intercultural couples will also have to deal with culture-specific differences, like having different religions, customs, political beliefs, and traditions, among many others.

When these differences cannot be resolved, the relationship may end.

Here are some strategies you can use to avoid, reduce, or eliminate culture clashes in your marriage:

Try to stay open-minded. Be optimistic. Believe that you can reconcile your differences. Find a way to not react in anger. Instead of attacking and defending, make an effort to hear each other’s side. Respect one another’s viewpoints and empathize.
Be considerate of each other’s needs. To put it another way, be mindful. Take the time to see things from your partner’s perspective. Show her that you understand, followed by an effort to make things right.
Keep a positive attitude towards cultural differences. Get rid of cultural biases, ethnocentric viewpoints, and prejudices. Replace them with a willingness to learn. Be genuinely interested in each other’s culture. You’ll never know, there are practices you might like and appreciate.

It takes effort, patience, and understanding to make mixed marriages work.

Make the effort to learn each other’s language. Make every effort to improve communication in your relationship. Take a language course together. Learn each other’s language or opt to learn an entirely new language.
Be willing to make compromises and learn to communicate. When something bothers you, speak up. Feel free to tell her if any of her customs or traditions offend you. When doing so, be calm and respectful. Compromises are more likely to be reached through calm communication.
Cultivate emotional maturity and empathy. Tantrums and vindictive behavior have no place in healthy relationships. Personal customs, beliefs, and traditions should be respected. Likewise, differences should be dealt with maturity.
Be constructive, never destructive. It takes love and support to make a marriage work. Thus, be as kind and positive to each other as much as you can. Help build each other and abandon toxic behaviors.

It can be difficult to navigate through cultural clashes. The good news is, going through it strengthens your bond as a couple. In other words, overcoming struggles helps the relationship become stronger.

Respect Your Differences and Embrace Your Similarities

“A great relationship isn’t when a perfect couple comes together, but when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.” - Unknown

There’s nothing wrong with wanting your spouse to be more like you. Trying to influence her and giving her the option to embrace positive aspects of your culture is okay.

On the other hand, being manipulative, controlling, and nagging to make her succumb to accepting your belief is not okay. No one should be forced to change their views and beliefs, they must do it willingly. Otherwise, it’s abuse. That is something you should avoid at all costs.

Don’t stress over intercultural marriage problems. Instead, accept one another’s differences and love each other as you are.

Diversity in a relationship is a good thing. Our worldviews are expanded when we are with someone that is different from us. We grow intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually by being in a diverse relationship.

Being different from one another is something to be proud of. You get to look at things from a new perspective and discover things you might never have discovered on your own.

Lastly, when we accept and respect each other’s similarities and differences, we bring peace and happiness into our marriage.

See the Good Side

“Love is the universal language that transcends countries, borders, barriers, and differences.” - Susan C. Young

Interracial marriage presents some difficulties, for sure. All struggles, however, are worth it in the end.

Your marriage to a foreign woman was a result of love. Though you’re different in a lot of ways, your hearts share a mutual feeling. That’s love felt towards each other. It’s powerful enough to overcome struggles and difficulties you’ll meet along the way.

Below are a few reasons to help you see the positive side of intercultural marriages:

The option of living between two countries. You’ll have the choice to have a new life in a new place. Additionally, you will have more places to visit on vacation, meaning more exciting places to see.
More holidays to look forward to. Holidays vary from culture to culture and from country to country. When you combine two cultures and their respective traditions, you’ll get twice the holidays and celebrations.
You will have the chance to try amazing food. Taste foreign flavors and interesting dishes that are new to you.
You get to learn a new language. You can learn a new language from your foreign spouse. Rather than enroll in a language class, you can have your wife teach you her language.
Being able to raise mixed babies. It has been scientifically proven that children of mixed cultures will grow up smarter, taller, and prettier than kids of a single culture.

Despite having different cultural backgrounds, you can still make your marriage work.

A Love Story Worth Fighting For

Marrying someone with an entirely different culture can be challenging. Nonetheless, it’s these challenges that make being with them more enjoyable and rewarding.

This experience helps you to become a better partner and, ultimately, become a better person.

It takes a lot of work and determination for an intercultural marriage to succeed. If that’s not a problem for you, then join our website and find the foreign woman of your dreams.