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Cinco de Mayo 2009

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

At this point we were about halfway through the 50-minute session, meaning that it was time to delve into the issues and events that brought Cliff and Claire to my office. When I asked the question, they nervously looked at each other as if neither of them wanted to be the first one to answer. Finally Claire spoke up and said, “We’ve been arguing a lot more than usual and the intensity of the arguments has ratcheted way up. Lately whenever it gets bad we are calling each other names and threatening to leave each other. We never did that before.”

I asked if they were arguing about the same issue over and over. Claire replied, “Well, we had been arguing about about bills a lot.  I mean I’m sure you think we must make a lot of money, since Cliff’s a doctor and I’m a lawyer. But since we moved to California our income has gone way down.  Plus we have always spent way too much money and we have never saved any.  Now we have over $20,000 in credit card debt.  I think each of us blames the other for spending too much money…you know, we both like nice things.  But anyway, the last big blowout argument happened when I was looking at the cell phone bill and I noticed that Cliff had been calling one particular number almost every day and talking for a long time…like 45 minutes or so.  This really got my attention because Cliff has never liked talking on the phone and I’m lucky if he calls me at all during the day!”

Claire went on to say that she asked Cliff whose phone number it was, hoping for a reasonable explanation but fearing something much worse.  He said that it was cousin’s phone number and that he had been trying to help out this cousin, who has been going through hard times because he lost his job and the health care coverage for his family. Claire said, “I actually believed this story for a while, but the more I thought about it, I didn’t believe it, because he hardly ever talked about this cousin before.  So I told Cliff I was skeptical and that I was going to call the number, picking up the phone as I spoke.  Cliff stopped me and said, OK, you’re right, it’s not my cousin.  Well, he finally admitted that it’s a woman, a former patient of his, and that they had become friends.  He admitted that they met for lunch once a week in addition to talking on the phone.  He claims that nothing physical happened between them, but I don’t know if I believe this or not.  He said he is sorry, but I just think he’s sorry that he got caught.” Cliff was looking out the window as his wife spoke, watching the squirrels run up and down the trees behind my office, trying to remain calm in what must have been an embarassing moment for him.

(to be continued.)

ACE Train Rolling

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

Cliff and Claire’s first session with me was scheduled for Wednesday at 6:00 PM. They arrived at my office a few minutes early, sitting down in the waiting room, having braved a driving rainstorm that had begun about an hour before. Both of them wondered what to expect from the session since neither had been in counseling before.

At 6:00 PM I went to the waiting room, introduced myself, and invited Claire and Cliff into my office, pointing out the couch my clients sit on, and welcoming them to my practice. They handed me the paperwork that I had emailed them after they scheduled the appointment. They had filled out the background information forms and had read and signed the Informed Consent document which covers some of the parameters of the counseling process.

I asked them if they had read and understood the Informed Consent document, knowing that some people sign forms without reading them, and wanting to be sure that they understood important things like my cancellation policy; they said they had read the document and agreed to it. Next I took a few minutes to look over the background information forms they had filled out, noticing that Claire was on a medication to help her sleep and that she had suffered from an eating disorder as a teenager. Cliff reported that he had somewhat of a problem with alcohol, occasionally drinking too much in social situations.

Having the formalities out of the way, I began getting to know my new clients.  Claire told me that she is a partner at large law firm, specializing in consumer law, and had recently won a lawsuit against a car repair company. Cliff said that he is a physician in private practice. Cliff and Claire were both born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, and had moved to the San Francisco area about five years ago, wanting to get away from the winter cold of New York, and hoping to advance their careers faster in California.

I asked them how they met. Claire answered with a smile, saying that when they were in undergraduate school at NYU they were in the same American Literature class, and each thought that the other was “cute,” but for a few weeks they didn’t talk to one other, each being too shy to approach the other. But when it came time to form groups for a presentation, the two of them made sure to get into the same group, and the ice was broken. Now having reason to be together, their friendship blossomed rapidly, and very soon they were dating.

Next I asked what attracted them to one another, knowing that this question usually lightens the mood in the counseling office, at least temporarily, since each person will be speaking positively about the other. Cliff and Claire both said that the other person was physically attractive, and Cliff added that he loved (and still loves) Claire’s eyes. Claire grinned at the compliment and countered that she has always loved how Cliff can make her laugh. 

As I always do in the first session, I asked them about the history of their marriage.  Did they consider it to be generally happy?  Mostly unhappy?  Or has it been up and down?  Claire said that in her opinion the first five years of marriage were very happy. After that, a slow decline set in as increasing job responsibilities meant more time spent at work and less time with each other. She had travelled frequently during the early part of her career, and many times they were apart for five days of the week and saw each other only on weekends.  Since they were spending so little time together, they began to drift apart emotionally and physically.

Cliff agreed with most of what Claire had said regarding their history together and added that he blamed her work habits for a lot of their difficulties. He said that a 12-hour work day was routine for Claire, and that he resented it because he knew that as a partner in her law firm she was not required to work long hours.  He said he sometimes wonders if Claire worked so much because she prefers not to be at home with him.

Sailboat Racing, S.F. Bay

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

My clients’ confidentiality is of the utmost importance. Hence this story is not about a real couple, but the problems that bring the couple to marriage therapy are drawn from various people with whom I have worked. I have blended the issues from a broad range of my actual cases into the lives of one fictional couple, Claire and Cliff.

When Claire and her husband Cliff came to me for marriage counseling, they were on the verge of separation, living unhappy lives, no longer enjoying being together, even feeling contempt for one another as they cycled from one fight and short-lived make-up to the next, gradually losing hope that their relationship would ever improve. Like so many couples, they had waited too long to begin marriage therapy, not seeking professional help when troubles began to invade their lives after the birth of their child, hoping instead that things would get better on their own, convincing themselves they didn’t have the time, money, or energy to see a marriage counselor. I have heard this many times and I always wonder why a happy marriage isn’t at the top of a couple’s priority list and thus more deserving of their time, money, and effort than just about everything else.

Neither Claire nor Cliff had been in counseling prior to meeting with me, other than a few sessions of pre-marital counseling with their pastor, a requirement for getting married in their church. They had seen depictions of therapy on TV and in the movies,  assuming them to be accurate depictions of the process, not realizing that screenwriters often sacrifice reality for the sake of plot development, dramatic value, and, occasionally, humor. 

Once Claire decided that she wanted to attend marriage counseling, she brought it up with her husband. Cliff, like some men, was unenthusiastic about the idea, saying that he was uncomfortable with the thought of airing their “baggage” to a third party. Clair countered that an unbiased third party was precisely what was needed in their situation because they were unable to discuss their more contentious issues in a civil and healthy manner.

Not long after that first discussion about counseling, Cliff and Claire had a particularly nasty argument, raising their voices to one another, calling each other names, which they had done only once before, and the prospect of separation was brought up for the first time. They wondered out loud whether things could ever get better between them, despairing at the thought of spending the rest of their lives just tolerating each other, losing just about any hope for improvement. At that moment Claire again suggesting marriage counseling, and Cliff agreed, not really wanting to leave his wife and child, panicking at the thought of being alone.

Claire called me the next morning and scheduled their first appointment, giving me some background on their situation and asking the usual questions about cost and duration. Fortunately I was able to schedule the appointment for later that same week.

Once Claire and Cliff knew they were about to embark on the counseling process, tensions lessened to some degree and a glimmer of hope returned.  They were able to go the next few days without any arguments.

Claremont Resort, Oakland

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

Usually my reading interests are limited to photography magazines and the occasional spy or murder mystery, but right now I’m reading a fascinating non-fiction book, Making a Good Brain Great, by psychiatrist and neuroscientist Dr. Daniel Amen (Three Rivers Press, 2005). As you might surmise from the title, the book is about improving your brain function now as well as keeping it working well even as you age, which, alas, is something that is happening to me.

Amen talks about the importance of being in a loving and physically affectionate relationship. He writes, “men and women need touching, eye contact, and sexual connection to stay healthy. When you feel loved, nurtured, cared for, supported, and intimate, you are much more likely to be happier and healthier.”

St. Michael Church, Livermore

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

There have been many marriage, relationship, and love books written over the years, some quite good and very popular, but in my opinion, not enough has been written about the corrosive effect that low self-esteem inflicts upon a marriage, a problem that I see on a daily basis.

Individuals with self-esteem problems may view themselves in one or more of the following ways: deficient, lacking, a “loser”, hard to love, or unworthy of love. Now, since I believe the key relationship question is: “how much do I matter to you?”, those people with a self-image of unworthiness are going to be haunted frequently by doubts about how much they matter to the spouse, because they don’t feel deserving enough.

As a result, low self-esteem individuals tend to be on-guard to an extreme degree for perceived slights from the spouse or for any sign of a problem in the marriage. They typically will react defensively and strongly when they feel some type of threat. This means there will be more conflict than is normal when self-esteem is an issue.

Another problem exacerbated by low self-esteem is non-communication, and I’ll talk more about that in my next post.

Oak Trees - Pleasanton

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

Sometimes when I am listening to a man and a woman talk about a difficult issue, a problem that has become divisive and has impacted their happiness as a couple and may even be threatening their relationship, I try to use my intuition and my experience to figure out what is “really” going on, in other words, what is being felt but not being said.

I have come to believe that in a couple’s relationship the bottom-line question that lurks unseen, unspoken, and frequently exists outside of conscious awareness is this: how much do I matter to my spouse?

I have chosen the plainest way I can think of to state the question, but it can be said and thought of in other ways, some of which might make the sentiment a little clearer, so consider the following variations.  Are we still a happy couple and are we going to remain so?  Am I the most important person in your life? Is there anything I don’t know that I should be worried about? These are the questions that can cause so much pain to someone who is no longer sure what the spouse’s answer would be.

The issues that a couple argues about and that frequently land them in my office are frequently not the “real” issues. My job is is see beneath what is spoken and figure out what is really going on.

Trumpet Vines

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

As I mentioned in my previous post, marital satisfaction tends to go down after the arrival of the first child if the pregnancy was not planned or, if it was planned, if one (or both) both parents were not in agreement about having a baby or were not enthusiastic about it. Put another way, couples who planned their pregnancy and where both spouses were excited about it can maintain or even increase their satisfaction after the baby arrives.

Parenthood sometimes causes a couple to revert to the “traditional” gender roles because the woman quits her job to stay home with her child. Some couples are quite comfortable with the traditional roles, but for others it can be a source of stress.  The man way resent his wife for not contributing to the family’s income, and the woman may resent her husband for not helping with housework and childcare. Hopefully, the couple had decided well in advance whether the woman would stay home or would continue working, and had planned accordingly.

New York City, Seen From the Hudson River

Photo © 2008 Jay Slupesky

Some young people in unhappy marriages think that having a child is a good way to improve the happiness and satisfaction of their relationship. I get a little uneasy when I hear this because I know it’s not always true. I know that sometimes having a baby adds enough stress to a marriage that divorce is the eventual result. The child that was hoped to bring happiness winds up being a child of divorced parents.

Studies show that marital satisfaction levels can drop when a couple becomes parents for the first time. This is more likely if the couple didn’t plan to get pregnant or weren’t in full agreement about getting pregnant, and if the couple didn’t talk in advance and plan about life with a newborn.

On the other hand, if the pregnancy was planned and the parents were both enthusiastic about parenthood, the couple can maintain their satisfaction, or maybe even increase it, after their baby is born.

 

Sails

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

It’s been almost nine months since my Turn Off the Television! post, and I’d like now to follow up with another plea, to wit: Turn Off the Video Game!

I work with couples as young as their early 20s, and I work with couples as mature as their 60s. In my work I’ve noticed that some men up to about age 35 or so spend a lot of time playing video games. 

I am curious about that age 35 cutoff because I can think of two possible explanations. The first possibility is that once they reach their late 30s, men begin to lose interest in video games. The second possibility, and the scarier one, is that men don’t really lose interest in video games, but that the guys who are about 35 now were the first group of pre-teens to be around when video games became really popular: they were around the impressionable age of 10 in 1983. If memory serves, that’s when the Atari video consoles were just beginning to catch on.

Regardless of which explanation is correct, I do know this: some men spend so much time playing video games that their marriages suffer as as result. To make things even worse, now that people play games against one another over the internet, it’s more common for people to become online friends with another player of the opposite sex (yes, there are some women out there playing too) and to have the relationship turn into an emotional affair.

Grand Piano Strings

Photo © 2009 Jay Slupesky

The research journal Personal Relationships has published a study about - and I am not making this up - whether it’s possible to predict if a couple will stay together just by looking at what words they use in their instant message (IM) conversations. The answer they came up with is yes, it is indeed possible.

The study showed that the use of certain pronouns and emotion words is an indicator of relationship satisfaction and stability.  Some words indicate happy relationships and some other words indicate unhappiness.

So, what are the words?  I’m glad you asked.

For women, the use of the word “I” indicates satisfaction with themselves and the relationship. Men’s use of the word “me” indicates more of a dissatisfaction. Hmmm.

Men’s use of positive emotion words (e.g. “happy”) indicates satisfaction and stability, and women’s use of positive negations (e.g. “not happy”) indicates dissatisfaction. One additional interesting tidbit is that the use of sarcasm (e.g. “oh, great”) is a bad sign when used both men and women.

So I’m wondering: did they really need a research study to figure this out? I think I could have told them - and saved them all the time and money they spent on the research!