A Marriage Therapist's Blog
Thoughts on Marriage Counseling
Archive for the ‘Marriage Therapist's Tips’ Category
If your marriage is in trouble, be careful about discussing the details with your friends. This may seem like surprising advice, since friends can be a good source of emotional support. Women especially tend to talk to friends about their relationships.
So why do I say to be careful about it? Because I’ve noticed that friends are too quick to recommend that you divorce your spouse. Here’s why:
- Your friend is only hearing your side of the story. Yes, of course, you think your view of things is accurate and complete, but your spouse has a lot of important feelings and information to offer. This is why marriage counselors prefer to meet with both spouses.
- Your friend is not impartial. They may view your spouse as a jerk or a jerkette. And they may be thinking that they will get more of your time if you leave your marriage. A marriage counselor, on the other hand, is impartial.
- Your friend may be just looking for a quick fix. They may be a “problem solver” who thinks a quick solution is the best one. But repairing the damage to your marriage may not be quick and easy.
So trust your marriage to a licensed therapist who will hear from both of you, who is impartial, and who is trained in marriage therapy.
Marriage Certificate is just another term for a work permit!
When you saw your spouse standing at the altar, did you consider that you would have to work at this? Or did you just assume that you’d live “happily ever after?” Probably not. Most people think of the happily ever after part and don’t even consider the work part! However, to have a good marriage; and certainly to have a great marriage, will take a lot of time, energy, and just plain work. “I didn’t sign up for this,” you might think. I want the happily ever after. Yes, we all do, and yet, it is in the work that the happily ever after comes.
The reward is what makes the work worth it. When you work at a marriage and make it the best it can possibly be, the reward is worth a lot more.
Think of a couple who climb a mountain, going over the rough spots and enduring the dark nights, rain storms, and cold winds on the way up. They camp each night and endure hardships to get to the top. They probably disagree over more than on thing on the way up. But when they get to the top of the mountain, what a view awaits them! As they are holding hands, basking in the breath-taking view, a helicopter lands and another couple get out to share the view with them. Who do think appreciates the view more?
When you are in the midst of difficult times, press on: the view, and the rewards, await you!
Joke of the day:
- Marriage is love.
- Love is blind.
- Therefore, marriage is an institution for the blind!
We can laugh out loud (LOL) at that one. But I wonder if there is a kernel of truth in it?
Wouldn’t our relationships be less conflictual and more satisfying if we could be “blind” to some of our spouse’s faults? You know that your spouse is not perfect, and you probably can reluctantly admit that you aren’t perfect either. So overlooking some of the little things about your spouse that drive you crazy could be a good thing. Remember that you are doing some things that drive your spouse crazy too.
So consider those things that drive you nuts and put on your blinders. Try it for a day, then a week, and see what happens. I bet you’ll be amazed!
Remember back in high-school math class when you were panicked that you completely bombed that last test? And you were really worried about how that would affect your GPA? And that you might not be able to get into Stanford after all? But then Mr. Jones announced that no one had done particularly well on the test, and so he’d decided to grade it “on the curve.” When this first happened to me, I said “Huh? Curve? What’s that mean?”
Of course, I came to understand that the curve was a really good thing, because it took the best score on the test and, no matter how bad that score was, it got a grade of A+. This helped me because even though my score wasn’t the highest, I still had a good shot at getting an A or B on the test. And instead of lowering my GPA, that “bad” test actually might have raised it! (Hello, Stanford!)
I think marriages can be graded on the curve as well. I’m sure we would all agree that since there are no perfect persons on the planet, there are certainly no perfect (100%) marriages. However, there are probably many marriages that could be graded as an 85% or a 90%. Let’s assume for a moment that, grading on the curve, those 85%-90%-scoring marriages are actually the grade A marriages. Do you realize what that does for your marriage? When graded against perfection, yours might score a dismal 60%, but when graded on the curve, your marriage suddenly isn’t that bad! In and of itself, that is good news, and can it should give you hope that you can raise the “grade” even further.
The point here, of course, is that every marriage has difficult times, but those times are usually not fatal. And many marriages, even the 90% ones, can benefit from marriage counseling. Looking at your marriage on the curve helps you to see that there is hope and that the “grade” of any marriage can be raised. If you score a 75%, you could try marriage counseling and raise it to 90%. You may not be able to make your marriage perfect, but you can make it a lot better.
Why not try to “raise the grade” on your marriage?
John Gottman writes and speaks about how important it is for couples to have lots of conversation. He points out that a good conversation every day has a big effect of reducing stress between two people. In marriage counseling, I frequently find myself in the position of trying to get couples to talk to each other more than they do. I doing so, I have met the enemy, and the enemy is television.
I am amazed at how much television people watch these days. When I ask couples how they spend a typical evening, many of them say something like “eat dinner, watch TV all evening, then go to bed.” I point out to them that it’s hard to have a conversation with the television on. In response, some people say they talk during the commercials! This is when I roll my eyes (actually I can’t roll my eyes, but if I could, I would do it at this point). Even if you mute the television while the commercials are on, most people are still looking at the screen. So how good can the conversation be if (1) it can only be as long as the commercials last, and (2) instead of looking at the person you’re speaking with, you are looking at the television? Not very good.
Of course, this presumes that both people are watching the same television. Some couples tell me that one person watches television in one room while the other watches a different television in a different room. This is because they don’t like the same shows. Yikes! Don’t people want to be together anymore? And what happened to compromise, at least when it comes to deciding what to watch?
As a marriage counselor, I work lots of evenings because that’s the only time a lot of couples can attend counseling sessions. Because I work evenings, I couldn’t watch much TV even if I wanted to. I don’t even know who is in the running for American Idol. I’ve never seen House or Desperate Housewives. Oh well.
So, a modest proposal: turn off the TV an hour earlier (or turn it on an hour later) than you normally would, and do something (anything) else. Play a game (Twister, anyone?). Go for a walk. Give each other massages. Oh yeah, and talk to each other.
OK, I couldn’t pass this one up. According to a new report released by the Council on Contemporary Families, men are doing double the amount of housework that they were doing 40 years ago. And not only that, they are doing triple the amount of child care they were doing 40 years ago (to which I ask: how can it be “child care” if it’s your own children? Isn’t that what we call parenting? Yikes!).
The report summarizes the results of several recent studies. Another finding was that if a man is helping with the housework, the woman feels more cared for and more like an equal partner (and I say: they had to do a study to figure that out? They could have asked me - or any other marriage counselor - and saved a whole bunch of money!).
OK, now for the good news, gentlemen: the studies showed that if a man does more housework, it results in more frequent sex (again, I think I could have predicted that, but whatever…). It does seem obvious, does it not? If the man is watching SportsCenter while the woman loads the dishwasher and folds the diapers, she’s gonna build up resentment, and that is definitely not going to put her in the mood.
So men, I think the moral of this story could not be more clear: go grab the vacuum cleaner!
Create rituals. What is a ritual? I’m talking about celebrations, traditions, and routines that are a regular part of your marriage – or maybe even your whole family.
Developing family rituals provides meaning for family interactions and helps clarify roles and responsibilities within the family.
I’ll give you an example. One couple that I worked with has a ritual that I really like. For them, Sunday night is ice-cream and games night. The whole family participates and they invite friends too. They have a variety of ice cream flavors on hand and set up the containers in something like a buffet line. Sound like fun to me. The point is that every member of the family looks forward to all week long. It’s an important part of the family’s identity, and it gives the husband and wife a feeling of pride, of working together, and a sense of connectedness.
Another couple I know recites their wedding vows to one another every year on their anniversary. Then they take a limousine ride to a hotel – just like they did on their wedding night. The next day they go on a vacation – just like they did for their honeymoon.
Traditions also help to preserve the couple’s parable, or “story.” Families are eager to share their memories and experiences; the process of telling their stories seems to bring them together as they laugh and remember.
Many couples don’t talk much about their goals. Well, maybe they have a goal to own their own their home or the desire to retire by a certain age. But beyond that, people seem to be so busy with daily life: job, kids, chores, and paying bills that they feel like they don’t have time to think about their goals. Yet, these are the marriages that can be at risk when their kids leave home and the nest is empty.
So, how to avoid the empty-nest crisis? One good method is for you and your spouse to cultivate a deeper sense of shared meaning. In other words: what are you two of you about? What’s your parable? Do you have goals as a couple?
Those of you in business, I’m sure, know about writing a business plan. A business plan describes a company’s goals and expected course of action for some time period, perhaps over the next few years. You usually need to show your business plan to investors or to lenders. I say that if this kind of planning ahead is such a good idea in business, why not apply it to your personal life too? Why not sit down with your spouse and write a marriage plan, or maybe a family plan? You’ve just given yourselves a new shared meaning. And as you work to achieve those goals, you start to feel more like a team then just two individuals.
Empathy. What does that mean? By my definition, you are empathizing with your spouse when you understand exactly how they feel, and you even begin to feel the same way. If you would like to make your marriage even better, take this as a personal challenge: when your spouse is talking, try to put yourself in their shoes. Then imagine how you would feel in whatever situation they are describing. Chances are that by realizing how you would feel, you’ve just figured out how your spouse feels. Now go ahead and validate them. For example, “I’ll bet that made you really angry.” Or maybe, “you must be really excited.” When your spouse says, “yes, that’s how I felt,” when you’ve nailed the feeling, score one for yourself. That’s because when your spouse believes that you completely understand how they feel, you have accomplished something wonderful. You have been empathetic, and you have achieved an emotional connection. You are truly united at that moment. This can a very healing experience, by the way.
Of course, empathy gets a little harder when you are the subject of the emotion, for example, during a disagreement. This is when you get to take your skills to the next level and become an empathy master! You have to resist that tendency to be defensive. Those kinds of explanations can come later, after some tension has been defused. First, can you figure out and then say how your spouse is feeling about you? Can you say, for example, “I can understand that you were annoyed when I forgot to call you.” This can be a real tension-reducer.
Every couple has some issues that they disagree about. If you would like to make your marriage even better, you can polish your discussion skills. How can you do that? Here are five good ways recommended by author John Gottman:
- Start Softly. It’s important to start the discussion in a calm and respectful way. It’s good make I statements, not You statements, and describe the problem without making a judgment.
- Make and Receive Repair Attempts. Throughout the discussion, remember to point out the aspects that you agree about. This helps to deescalate tension. Maintain a sense of humor. If you realize that you’re wrong about something, don’t hesitate to say so. Apologize if you say something you regret.
- Soothe Yourself, Soothe Your Spouse. It’s hard to think rationally when you’re angry. So it’s best for an angry person to soothe himself or herself before continuing the discussion. Take a break. Go for a walk. Then come back and continue the discussion when you’ve calmed yourself.
- Compromise. In a happy marriage, there is going to be a lot of compromising. If one person gets their way most of the time, the other person is going to build up resentment. If you’re going to compromise, you can’t close your mind off to considering what your spouse wants.
- Be Tolerant of One Another’s Faults. No one is perfect. If you expect perfection, it’s going to be difficult for you and your spouse to solve problems. Instead, focus your thoughts on your spouse’s positive aspects so that you can live with their imperfections.
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