Trust & Marriage Counseling

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Monday, May 19th, 2008 by Jay Slupesky

Suspicion Some couples who come in for counseling have severe “trust issues.” I see this most often in younger couples who are not married. The couple may not have been together for very long, and most likely were in previous relationships where one or both had experienced a cheating partner.

In the most severe cases, a person may be obsessing over whether or not their partner is cheating, even if there is no evidence or reason to suspect. A nightly checking of the partner’s cell phone to scroll through the text messages, or looking for multiple calls to an unrecognized phone number, or breaking into the partner’s email account to look for any incriminating emails are all things some partners do to convince themselves that no cheating is going on.

There are a couple of questions to address here:

What can be done when a person is obsessing over his/her partner’s trustworthiness? In this case, traditional treatments for obsessions, such as the “thought stopping” technique, can be valuable. Three simple methods to use are:
1. Thought Replacement: when an unwanted thought enters your mind, immediately replace it with a healthy, rational thought. You can only think about one thing at at time, so crowd out the “bad” thought.
2. Thought Stopping: when you catch yourself with the unwanted thought, immediately shout Stop! either aloud or only in the mind. Continue to shout Stop! until the unwanted thought ceases.
3. Thought Disputing: Challenge the unwanted thoughts that come into your mind, asking: “Is this a rational thought? If not, what is irrational about it? What do I need to do to change this idea?”
How can I really learn to trust the person I love? (I am assuming, of course, that the person really does deserve your trust, in other words, that they are not cheating.) Trust can be defined as “a measure of belief in the honesty, benevolence and competence of the other party.” How can you expect to spend the rest of your life with someone you will always suspect? Some believe that when you enter into a new relationship, you are starting all over again and can leave the baggage from a previous relationships behind. While that may be possible, it doesn’t always happen. The fact is that when you move onto a new relationship, hurts from the past are still present. Give yourself and your relationship time to build trust. If we have spent enough time with our partner to develop strong feelings for them, trust should be part of that. Do some research on the topic of trust: what does it really mean and how can each of us reach the goal of trusting together?

Trust is a vitally important part of any relationship. If you feel the need to do any of the checking mentioned above, how about trying some of these ways to start trusting your partner?

Tags: cheating, Trust

This entry was posted on Monday, May 19th, 2008 at 12:29 pm and is filed under Specific Problems.

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