If You Finally Want To Change Your Relationship For The Better, Stop Doing These 26 Things
Sometimes it's not about adding more effort, it's about cutting out certain habits.
Patrik Velich | Unsplash It can be hard to accept that you’ve found someone who has the ability and willingness to treat you the way you deserve to be treated. You should always expect the best for yourself.
Healthy, fulfilling relationships are hard to find, but once you find yours, hold onto it. Love takes work, honest communication, and selflessness. A truly healthy relationship will change and adapt to every one of life’s challenges.
But when it comes to the things that don't happen in a healthy relationship, if you find that either you or your partner is guilty of any of them, it's important to reevaluate your relationship.
If you finally want to change your relationship for the better, stop doing these 26 things:
1. Not kissing
Couples should be kissing every single day. Intimacy is such an important part of relationships; it's essential to express your love physically every day. Whether it's a peck on the cheek or the lips, a kiss shows your partner how much you adore them.
Research has shown that kissing reduces stress, enhances feelings of intimacy and connection, and can improve intimate satisfaction. Kissing is also a powerful form of non-verbal communication that signals desire and affection, which helps maintain emotional connection and overall relationship satisfaction.
2. Nagging each other about small things
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Your partner will no doubt, at one point or another, get on your nerves. But rather than putting them down and nagging about the small stuff, pick your battles.
3. Go to bed angry
If you go to bed angry, you go to bed assuming all these bad things about your partner, and you wake up bitter. If an argument needs to wait, then let it, but try to calm down before settling in for the night.
4. Forgetting to text your partner back
Whether it's a text about picking food up on the way home or remembering to do a load of laundry, the least you can do is text your partner back. It takes just a few seconds and shows that you actually care about what they have to say.
5. Being mean or aggressive for no reason
Even if you're fighting with your partner, you're making the situation worse by being rude for no reason at all. Lead with kindness always, both in and out of your relationship.
Research has shown that unchecked aggression creates a hostile environment, and the recipient often experiences stress, anxiety, and depression, which harms their mental and even physical health. For a relationship to become healthier and more satisfying, partners must learn to communicate without hostility and foster a sense of security and warmth.
6. Being hyper-critical
Even when your partner does things you don't like — loading the dishwasher the "wrong" way or leaving out their clothes — there's no reason to criticize their actions. Asking for what you want is much easier when you're not so negative.
7. Forgetting about your friends
Couples should have lives separate from each other, at least to some degree. There's nothing healthy about codependency, after all.
8. Refusing to accept each other’s differences
Accepting your partner makes them feel safe to share their true selves with you. And you don't want to deprive them of that, right? After all, there are certainly qualities in yourself that they, in turn, accept wholeheartedly.
9. Taking each other for granted
It's easy to let life pass by quickly and get caught up in work, chores, children, and the little things that detract from time together. But it's essential to make sure you take the time to let your partner know they are loved and appreciated.
Neglecting appreciation leads to feelings of being unseen and unheard, resulting in resentment and disconnection. A 2018 study suggested that successful couples intentionally practice appreciation, express gratitude for their partners, and actively look for and acknowledge the good, preventing stagnation and strengthening the bond.
10. Not holding hands
Romance should never truly die in a relationship, even if it tends to fade over time. Of all the things people in healthy relationships never do, it's forgetting that holding hands is quite an intimate act.
11. Refusing to be vulnerable
Vulnerability leads to a long-lasting bond with your partner. When you refuse to open up emotionally and share a deeper part of yourself, you're telling your partner that you don't trust them.
12. Always putting yourself first
A relationship is 50/50, and while it's okay to be selfish now and then — meaning you get a sweet treat for just you or buy yourself that blouse you've been eyeing — putting yourself first all the time shows that your partnership isn't as healthy as you thought.
13. Having doubts about your feelings and your partner’s feelings
Being in love and staying in love is a choice couples make every single day. When you're in a truly healthy relationship, there will never be a doubt in your mind about how you feel towards your partner and their feelings.
When couples make time for open communication and validating each other's feelings, couples can explore the root of their insecurities, address deeper fears, and build a stronger, more secure bond. Relationship experts at the Gottman Institute argued that overcoming self-doubt and fostering mutual understanding allows for increased relationship satisfaction and a more resilient connection.
14. Setting up false expectations
When you enter into a partnership, your expectations should be clear to your partner. But when you set up toxic expectations — "Who cares about your football game?" or "I'm fine the way I am and don't need to change," for example — you're setting your relationship up for disaster.
15. Keeping your emotions bottled up instead of talking about them
Partners who can't be vulnerable with one another don't trust each other completely. But couples in healthy relationships feel encouraged to open up and discuss their true feelings, without worrying about being judged.
16. Forgetting to make enough coffee for both of you in the morning
It truly is the little things! Making coffee for your partner may seem like something small that doesn't really matter, but the truth is that it can deeply affect your bond. Luckily, if you're in a good relationship, brewing a cup for you and your partner comes second nature.
Research shows that consistent small gestures, like making coffee for a partner, are powerful rituals of connection that cultivate intimacy, appreciation, and a sense of shared meaning. Small, daily gestures contribute most to long-term relationship happiness, rather than grand but infrequent ones.
17. Neglecting to talk about what both of you see as your future
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Planning for the future together may seem scary, but it's one of the most important decisions you make as a couple. And if you don't eventually talk about where you see your relationship going, it may be time to reconsider being together at all.
18. Forgetting to regularly check in on your feelings
Did your partner say something that hurt you? Are you tired of picking up their dirty laundry? Do they put on the roll of toilet paper the incorrect way? These are all situations that require you to be honest, even if it's about something as simple as your preferences.
19. Not growing together
It's normal for healthy couples to grow in their relationships, helping one another become better people along the way. But it's not a good sign if you start growing apart instead of growing alongside each other.
20. Not adjusting to each other's sleep styles
Even healthy relationships don't always have compatible sleep styles, meaning one partner may opt to sleep in a separate bedroom altogether. And that's perfectly fine! But what's not fine is when you don't address your issues with sleeping arrangements and let it build into resentment.
21. Talking to your friends about your partner instead of your partner
Just like talking to a therapist instead of your partner, discussing your ups and downs solely with your friends, yet neglecting to bring up those problems to your partner, isn't a good thing. Think about how you would feel if your partner spilled the tea to their friends instead of talking with you.
A 2011 study explained that friends, because of emotional investment and limited information, tend to offer unhelpful, reactive, or even damaging advice. Direct communication with a partner allows for a more accurate understanding of conflicts and a path toward resolution, rather than strengthening negative feelings or promoting external opinions that can sabotage the relationship.
22. Getting too comfortable
It's amazing when you can find someone who lets you be yourself, but don't let that stop you from still trying to win them over as you did in the beginning.
23. Expecting too much from your partner
Over-relying on your partner is something people in healthy relationships never do. There's no such thing as a perfect partnership, so the best thing you can do is let go of those ridiculously high expectations and trust your partner.
24. Forgetting that love is a challenge that takes work
Love is something that must be tended to every day. For couples in happy, healthy relationships, they make it a point to check in with their partner and stay open to all the changes that come with a relationship.
25. Not reminding your partner that they are wonderful
It's easy to let days, weeks, or months pass by without doling out compliments and niceties. But it's important to let your partner know how much you love and adore them, without letting too much time go by in between.
26. Not nurturing and fighting for each other and the life you’ve built together
Relationships are something couples need to work at every day they are together. When you stop fighting for your relationship and each other, it's a sign that the bond isn't as strong and may require reevaluation from both partners.
An article by Oklahoma University explained that healthy conflict provides a path to a deeper understanding of each other's needs and perspectives. Avoiding conflict leads to negative outcomes like decreased happiness and reduced commitment, which highlights the importance of actively working through disagreements to build a stronger, more enduring connection.
Gigi Engle, ACS, CSE, CSC, is an award-winning author, writer, and certified intimacy educator. Her work has appeared in Cosmopolitan, Elle Magazine, Marie Claire, Glamour, Ravishly, Mashable, Esquire, InStyle, Refinery29, and many others.
