A Marriage Therapist's Blog
Thoughts on Marriage Counseling
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.
Tags: Communication, suggestions, television
This entry was posted on Sunday, April 13th, 2008 at 4:18 pm and is filed under Marriage Therapist's Tips.
2 Responses to “Marriage Therapist’s Tip: Turn Off the Television!”
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April 13th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
I couldn’t agree more! TV is a relationship buster.
May 5th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
An Italian study published in early 2006 reported some very interesting findings. The two results that really stood out for me were: 1) Couples who had a TV in their bedroom had sex half as frequently as couples who don’t have TVs in the boudoir. And that number gets worse as people age. 2) Couples are also half as likely to make love after watching shows containing violence. Even reality shows were said to dampen a couple’s enthusiasm for canoodling by one third.
Your suggestion of turning on the TV one hour later (or off earlier) is a good one. I think people will amaze themselves how much this small step will improve their relationship.