The One Thing That Should Never Happen In A Good Marriage, No Matter How Normal It Seems
Relationships can feel like a no-man’s-land sometimes, but they don't have to.
Necati Anil Cakirman | Canva Love alone does not ensure the success of a marriage — communication plays an important role, as well. Unfortunately, we are over-prepared for the love part and woefully under-prepared for the communcation part. That can lead to a communication shut-down that many relationships can't survive.
Perhaps you are looking at your marriage and wondering where it went wrong, or who this person is who sleeps beside you at night.. Relationship problems keep popping up and never seem to get resolved.
6 ways to fix the one thing that should never happen in a good marriage
1. Consciously recognize how important it is to communicate well
When you stop communicating with your spouse, the content of your communication reduces to only the administrative imperatives. It can get so dry and shallow that it makes your heart hurt.
When you're not communicating in a way that grows closeness, you can't resolve problems or express yourself. This can lead to distance, resentment and even contempt. So, no matter how "normal" it may seem to stop communicating well in a marriage, recognize that it won't work for you and that you want something more.
2. Make a timeline to know when communication fell off
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Did the entrance of children obliterate anything not relevant to feeding and diaper changes? Did your careers and financial pursuits creep in as headliners?
Or did you settle into the disillusionment stage of love and decide you knew all you needed to know about your spouse? Perhaps you worry that you chose the wrong person.
3. Remember what made your love work: listening
Before going any further, pause and go back in time to when you and your spouse were first together. You wanted to know one another. You looked into each other’s eyes and smiled more. You were curious and listened more than you spoke. You validated, supported, and looked for ways to make your new love interest happy.
Let that sink in for a moment. How do you feel looking back on that time? Now, brave the exploration into how that started to evaporate.
Talking is the lifeblood of all healthy relationships. It is the vehicle for expressing feelings, thoughts, needs, wants, and curiosity. We connect through communication. Imagine having smoke alarms all over your house, all of which have dead batteries in them. You rely on them to warn you of a fire, but without charged batteries, they are useless.
When there is a lack of listening between partners, the batteries of your relationship get drained — you can’t count on it for anything more than the bare essentials.
4. Stop assuming you know what your partner will say
When you stop engaging on an emotionally intimate level, you stop seeking to know one another. You might think you already know everything there is to know about your mate. Or, like many couples, you make assumptions about what your spouse is thinking, feeling, or how they will react.
You may have withdrawn because your partner is critical, and you assume they always will be. Or maybe you're afraid to say certain things for fear of angering them. When you stop communicating with your spouse, it drains the lifeblood of your relationship and eventually kills it.
When things get to the point of "administrating" a marriage, arguments become unproductive. No one wants to fight, so conversations are kept to a no-risk minimum to avoid conflict. This happens in particular when we assume we know what is coming next, stop listening, and stop trying to understand.
5. Recognize your different communication styles
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Try as we might to bridge the gap, communicative differences remain to some extent.
There’s a reason that some people can talk, laugh, and cry all night with friends and a reason why others can walk away from a party feeling on top of their game even though they never talked about anything personal all night.
We all need different things to feel safe in a relationship. Some people need an emotional connection to feel intimate, while others need a physical connection to feel close. It’s a wonder we ever get together when you think about it. And when it comes to conversation, some need to feel heard at a heart level to feel validated. They don’t want to be fixed or squeezed into a budget matrix and analyzed. They want to be understood and accepted on a deep level.
Others seek to feel respected. They need to feel validated for their competence and will often become defensive or shut down if they perceive criticism. These tendencies masquerade in countless detailed costumes. However, the wearer of the mask is always the same.
6. Remove your masks
When therapists deal with communication issues with clients, they are always seeking to remove the masks.
Some questions they may ask are:
- "What’s underneath that?"
- "What is the primary emotion that causes your anger to come up?"
- "What do you think he is saying when he interrupts you or tells you what you need to do?"
- "What do you think she is saying when she counters your ideas with ideas of her own? How do you feel at that moment?"
Intimacy dies when you stop communicating with your spouse. Communication is the balm of life — it softens the rough edges and helps us navigate life’s inevitable challenges. We feel less alone and supported through communication.
But, intimacy requires vulnerability, an uncomfortable state for some people. To be vulnerable is risky and can feel dangerous, especially if a person has been betrayed after they’ve trusted a person with sensitive information in the past.
We choose what to do with the vulnerability that is shared with us. We can bless another by cradling vulnerability offered as an expression of trust and confidence, or we can use it as ammunition.
7. Get vulnerable
There is no intimacy without vulnerability, and there is no marriage without intimacy. Everyone has an innate yearning to be heard and understood. The only reason we repeat and rephrase ourselves is that we aren’t convinced we are being listened to beyond the transcript.
We want an emotional engagement with our spouse. And we don’t want to have to go to war to accomplish that. When you stop communicating with your spouse, it’s a signal that something in your relationship isn’t quite right.
Couples that explore what’s going on and make the changes necessary to address the underlying causes often regain their connection and start talking again.
If you have trouble identifying the reasons you’ve stopped talking, seeking the help of a therapist might save your marriage. Love isn’t a competition. But when it is treated as the gift it is, both partners — and the relationship — win.
Mary Ellen Goggin and Dr. Jerry Duberstein offer relationship coaching for individuals and offer private couples retreats and couples counseling. They are co-authors of the book Relationship Transformation: How to Have Your Cake and Eat It Too.
