Make no mistake: Good communication is a by-product of both skills and connection. Learning to communicate together takes practice and time. You have to agree to work on it together and learn the specific skills. Understanding these important steps will help improve communication between you and your partner.
[Read more…] about How Do We Improve Our Communication Skills?Therapy Resources and Support for Your Mental Health
How Will I Know When I am Ready to Date Again?
After a painful divorce or if a relationship falls apart, it is important that we take a honest look and understand why the relationship fell apart to ensure that we are whole and ready before we can be a good partner to someone else.
[Read more…] about How Will I Know When I am Ready to Date Again?Is My Past Trauma Causing Issues in My Marriage?
We have a tendency to believe that our marriage will “always be there” and never be in crisis. We also realize that all relationships have their ups and downs, and this helps prepare us for difficulties down the road. However, when a significant crisis or traumatic event happens, the stability of any relationship can be put in jeopardy.
[Read more…] about Is My Past Trauma Causing Issues in My Marriage?Why Does it Hurt So Much When We Fight?
The process of “becoming a couple” is filled with many emotions, feelings, attitudes, risking and identification with another person. Relationship problems happen when these same emotions are injured in any way. When one “sees and hears” much blaming and emotions between a couple, it is clear that there has been an “attachment bond injury” that has to be healed before the relationship can continue and be healed.
[Read more…] about Why Does it Hurt So Much When We Fight?Why Do I Keep Choosing the Wrong Person?
We often ponder why we find ourselves in challenging relationships that “go sour” despite their initially “promising” nature. Frequently, we find ourselves choosing the wrong person repeatedly, puzzled by this pattern. Often, we blame the other individual, believing the world is filled with “wrong people,” leading us to think we should either “avoid relationships altogether” or just “tolerate the situation.”
[Read more…] about Why Do I Keep Choosing the Wrong Person?How Do I Get My Spouse to Change?
The other day, I had to fix a broken light switch. Yep, I didn’t know those could stop working either. Fortunately, I remembered enough about electrical wiring that it was a simple task: Trip to the hardware store, turn off the electricity and swap out the faulty switch. Unfortunately, fixing our spouse or partner isn’t as easy.
[Read more…] about How Do I Get My Spouse to Change?Why Does My Relationship Feel Like a Trap?
The Freedom of Choice is the most valued factor in our lives. Human beings will do most anything to insure that they can have choice in all of their decisions. Much of what counselors, therapists and psychologists hear in therapy is related to a sense that the individual does not have a sense of choice in their lives.
[Read more…] about Why Does My Relationship Feel Like a Trap?Warning Signs of Violent Acts
There are ways of evaluating the potential of future violent acts by those people we associate with in our daily lives. Part of the problem is that we “choose to ignore” the signs and symptoms that suggest future problems in our relationships out of our “hopes, needs and desires.”
[Read more…] about Warning Signs of Violent ActsWhat Makes a Relationship Last?
Psychologists have studied couples for years in order to find out what makes for a lasting relationship. However, predicting what is going to work “before” the marriage is more difficult. Ted Huston, Ph.D. found that marriages fall into four distinct groups: Married and happy; married and unhappy; divorced early, within seven years, or divorced later, after seven years. Ultimately, the distinguishing factor between those who divorced and those who remained married was noted in the amount of change in the fist two years of the marriage.
[Read more…] about What Makes a Relationship Last?How Do I Come to Terms with my Divorce?
If you do end up getting divorced, the loss of this relationship will be a very difficult time for all concerned. It brings out many emotions, causes much confusion, and affects children, adults, parents, and the community. Relationships are important to our lives and it is difficult for us to experience the loss of them. As we experience the changes of divorce, it is important that we understand what has happened.
[Read more…] about How Do I Come to Terms with my Divorce?It’s Easier to Stay Married than to Get Married Again
All marriages have difficult times that at times can seem overwhelming and confusing. We all ask the question about whether or not it is worth the efforts to stay married. The question of, “Should I stay or should I go” weighs heavily on us. Sometimes, we end up stuck with the conflicting thought that our partner is too good to leave, but too bad to stay.
[Read more…] about It’s Easier to Stay Married than to Get Married AgainHow to Swim with the “Difficult Sharks” in our Lives
No one wants to swim with sharks. Yet difficult people are, by their very nature, sharks: Aggressive, territorial, and tribal. When we unexpectedly find ourselves dealing with a difficult person, we often give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they will “play fair”. In our desire to “get along with others”, we often just make the situation worse. The hard truth is that we must learn how to identify and respond assertively to difficult people without being “eaten alive”.
[Read more…] about How to Swim with the “Difficult Sharks” in our Lives