fighting – Page 13

How Your Actions Outside The Bedroom Can Make or Break Your Sex Life

I have a little experience with bad sex. I’ve been married three times. This last one took. To tell you the truth my first two husbands would say my current husband was lying if he told them how often and how amazing our sex life is.

Honestly, I have been one of those fortunate women who have always enjoyed good sex. That doesn’t mean I have always said “Yes!” to it when my first husbands wanted me to do so.

Sex happens, not so much in our bodies, as in our minds. Before we can find someone sexy there are a number of things that have to happen in our brain. First of all, the prospect has to fit the patterns our unconscious set into place before we were six years old. Those patterns are based on our experiences as a young person with our caregivers. For some of us, that is a good thing and we meet up with really wonderful partners.

But for most of us this unconscious pattern locked into our brain is not necessarily in our best interest in the long run.

How It Works

My first husband was really smart, something I consciously found very appealing. But he also had some wounds of his own that resulted in his attempting to overpower me with his yelling and demands. This, it turns out (after much therapy), is how my grandmother acted toward most everyone in her household. I happened to be in her household much of my life prior to the age of six. Yelling and demanding behavior have an unwanted side effect on a persons sex life. It didn’t take long for this behavior to become a major turn off for me.

What transpired is that my survival instincts kicked in (this is a brain function, by the way) and I would freeze up in his presence after a while. My whole body went into shut down and the last thing I wanted was to jump into the sack with him. My brain made the decision for me.

My second husband appealed to me consciously because he was handsome and an entrepreneur like my Dad. The unconscious appeal turned out to be that, because of his wounds, he would totally neglect me and ignore my needs the way my father did. My resentment built up over time and there is no way I would choose to have sex him. My brain kicked into survival with him simply because it seemed to me that he was not someone safe in that he did not have my best interests at heart: only his.

It’s All in Your Head

Our brains dictate our behavior much more than we consciously realize. We can feel an unconscious pull toward someone and think this means we want to be sexual with them; this is why we will be so attracted to “bad girls” or “bad boys”. They appeal to the part of us that was hurt and neglected as a kid and it matches up like a lock and key with our unconscious memories of before we were six. We are wired to want the kind of relationship we had with our caregivers. I don’t know about you, but this was not a good thing for me!

So what if you find yourself already hooked up with someone whom your brain is now telling you to retreat from rather than gravitate toward sex with? Well, you have to make some choices with the more rational part of your brain. Is this someone with whom you want to make a life with? If so then you have to figure out how to change the dynamic that is making you not want to have sex with them.

Talk, talk, talk

First of all you need to open a discussion with this person about the things making you feel threatened or shut down. This, of course, is not an easy discussion to have with them because they will immediately feel threatened just by bringing up the idea of your having a problem with them.

So, you have to start with telling them how much you love them and want to work things out. Secondly, begin to talk about your feelings as being about you and your history, not about them being “bad” or “wrong” for behaving the way they do. After all, they act the way they do because of their history and family culture.

When you can open a discussion about how their behavior outside the bedroom is affecting your desire for good sex, then there is hope for things to change. Most of the time, if you want more sex, chances are, they do, too.

If your partner doesn’t want more sex, then you can be certain there is something in your behavior that has triggered an unwanted fear or shutting down response from them. The solution to the problem is to talk about what it is your partner needs to feel safe with you again. Find out what you are doing and see if it is something you can consciously choose to change. Get help and support if you need to, to change those behaviors. A relationship coach or therapist could be the key.

To learn more about Melody Brooke, visit OhWowThisChangesEverything.com.

What Are You Really Fighting About? It May Not Be What You Think…

By melody

Jeanie was so upset with her husband.

He had always been difficult to feel physically connected to.

He had always had a subtle pulling back when she would reach out to touch him, but it had gotten worse in the past few months.

She brought him into therapy fearing that they were on the brink of a divorce, if not an affair.

Why Is He Always Pulling Away?

Jeanie’s husband, Frank, was a sweet, mild mannered man with some anger issues that had been a problem in a previous marriage and were still somewhat of an issue with Jeanie.

The bigger problem was that she felt him pulling away from her touch, and she was certain this meant he didn’t love her any more. After a few sessions, it became clear what the problem really was about.

Frank was terrified of losing her to death.

He had witnessed his mother’s death at the age of four; she died mid-sentence while she was talking on the telephone on her bed in front of him. Then, at 15 he held a girl in his arms as she died from a drug overdose.

When he tapped into this in session the fear and pain he felt was palpable.

Recently he had lost his father to a lingering cancer that left his father comatose for months. The little boy inside of Frank felt that if he just didn’t allow himself close, then death could be avoided. Thus, he found himself pulling further and further away from Jeanie. The pain and shock of his early losses still dictated his emotional and intimate life.

Frank is not any different than the rest of us.

Our Behavior Is Rarely As “Rational” As We’d Like To Believe

We behave in unconscious ways that dictate how we interact with each other, what we feel and what upsets us. We go about our lives as if it were a logical, rational process and the choices and actions we take made some kind of sense.

That’s where “rationalization” comes in to play. Frank had convinced himself that Jeanie’s return to smoking cigarettes had caused him to withdraw from her. But actually, her smoking had started in response to his pulling away.

But that’s how our brains work to trick us into thinking that what we do makes sense.

Emotions make no obvious, logical sense. Emotions are always laden with the memories of times when we felt similar things at some time in the past and are linked together through a complex network of memories that links them to the earliest memories we have.

When Frank connected to his sense of pain about his father’s death it took him directly to the death of his mother, which he had experienced so traumatically, at four. And, the time of his father’s death, he went back into the emotional state of the four year old. He was no longer the 30 something man that seemed to be sitting before me, he was emotionally and mentally four.

This is what happens all the time in our conflicts with our partners.

Arguments Are Always About Something Deeper

We get angry with them for something they did or didn’t do and we think it’s all about what they did or didn’t do.

As irrational as it seems, our upset it NEVER about what they did or didn’t do! Now, it certainly triggered our upset, but our upset it not really about that.

Let me give you an example.

Sara and her husband Tom have been married for about eight years.

They have struggled with understanding each other from the beginning. Tom came from a very chaotic neglectful and physically abusive childhood, and Sara from a set of very over controlling parents who never considered her needs or wishes.

One afternoon Sara was toasting the meringue topping of a pie in the oven. As she was doing so she was taking care of something in the other room when she forgot about the meringue until she could smell it starting to brown, perhaps too much.

Sara then ran into the kitchen yelling her fear of burning it. Tom jumped up and ran to her aide. She tried to pull out the shelf without an oven mitt. Tom handed her one. She of course needed two to pull the pie out of the oven.

She yelled, “What am I supposed to do with that? I need two to get it out!” and promptly went over to get another one.

Tom became angry and yelled back at her, “I was only trying to help!”

To which she replied, “How can I possibly get it out with only one hand?”

The fight ensued and both felt justified in their position.

Later, Sara was able to say that she could see from the look on his face that he was in a time warp that put him back in the presence of his abusive father who was constantly telling him to do things that he had no idea how to do when he was under five years old.

Tearfully, Tom was able to verbalize that reality to her later, as they talked about it on the couch when they had both calmed down.

Empathy Is The Key To Understanding

In both the cases of Sara and Tom and Jeanie and Frank, their conflict and hurt feelings had nothing to do with what it looked like was going on.

On the surface, the logical rational side of things, there is no way to see the pain and upset that was hiding beneath the surface. Without taking the time to truly listen with empathy to what is happening inside the other person, neither Sara nor Jeanie would have had a clue as to what was really going on with their partner.

To get to the place of being able to provide that kind of listening for each other takes work and an ability to step out of our own skin long enough to see things from the others’ prospective. That is not always easy, often it’s downright scary.

But it’s always worth it.

Guidelines for Getting Along

By lelandbeaumont

Social relationships, and especially close intimate relationships, face many difficult challenges.

Conflict is inevitable unless we play fair and exercise restraint as we go after all life has to offer.

Here are some simple guidelines based on the principles of emotional competency that can help our relationships grow stronger.

Expect respect. Don’t tolerate disrespect. Don’t show disrespect toward others. Don’t ignore disrespect directed toward yourself or others.
Don’t take the bait. Don’t take anything personally. Ignore distracting, trivial, unfounded, or misguided provocations. Avoid pointless and destructive dominance contests. Discuss the facts, don’t attack the person.
Don’t make assumptions. Suspend judgment until you can gather representative evidence and confirm the facts. Challenge and investigate the source of rumors rather than passing them on.
Don’t tolerate Ad hominem (personal) attacks. Do not make them yourself. Do not ignore them when you hear them. They are a fallacy and a dangerous precursor to hate.
Refuse to hate anyone. Explain and reconcile your loss, hurt, or distress through careful analysis, not by blaming others or by hating others. Emphasize all the important things you have in common, not the small ways you differ. Hate is only sustained by cognitive error. Find and correct that error.
Don’t overlook logical fallacies or factual errors. They are clear evidence of poor thinking, and often of deliberate deception. Apply the theory of knowledge continuously to evaluate all you see and hear.
Always act congruently with your well-chosen values and beliefs. Be authentic.
Conflict is inevitable. Learn to resolve it constructively. Attend to both the relationship and the issues. Get along as you get ahead together.
You are a competent, autonomous adult. You are fully responsible for all your words and actions, as are other competent adults. Be impeccable with your word; do what you say.
Never resort to violence or abuse. Learn to recognize it in all its forms. Don’t cross the line, even in retaliation. There is always a better way; find it. Seek a constructive dialog.
You cannot change other people. You can better understand them, learn from their viewpoint, demonstrate empathy and compassion, dialog with them, help them resolve ambivalence, model desired behavior, describe likely outcomes, assist them in making changes they decide to make, and perhaps influence them.
Loss is often permanent. Accept the past, learn from it, and move on.
Know what you can and cannot change. Change what you can, and accept what you cannot change.
Dignity is unalienable; it is intrinsic to our humanity and it cannot be taken away. Consistently acknowledge the dignity inherent in yourself and all others.
You deserve to have fun and enjoy life. Balance optimism with a healthy skepticism to maintain a realistic outlook on life.
Seek gratification and significance. Life is not a dress rehearsal, do what matters now. Life is too short to indulge in destructive, wasteful, or meaningless activities.

Following these simple, but often challenging rules can keep your relationships healthy, constructive, and enjoyable.

Do your best each day.

More on helpful and unhelpful rules is at: emotionalcompetency.com. Guidelines for dialogue are available at: emotionalcompetency.com/dialog.htm

5 Ways to Survive Being Around Your In-Laws This Holiday Season

By lisa

Hardly anyone I know can say that their families don’t have “issues” of some kind or another. This is just part of life for most of us – navigating through our family’s overt or covert drama.

For some of us the complications in our families of origin are far more intricate and obvious than for others. For those lucky others, things are pretty peachy without too many old skeletal bones rattling in the closet. Regardless, we all deal with our own situations differently.

What if your partner has a decidedly more difficult family than your own?

What if, by default, you’re expected to engage with people who leave a sour taste in your mouth and for whom conflict is as much a part of their daily lives as your sleepy morning shuffle to the coffee pot is for you?

Many Couple’s Seek Counseling Because of “In-Law Issues”

One of the things couples seeking counseling often struggle with is just this – difficulty and frustration around navigating through the subculture of their partner’s family.

I call it a “subculture” because families operate with their own roles, rules, expectations and homeostasis. Many of us can relate to the feeling of nervous anticipation prior to a family gathering with another’s high-tension family. It can feel a little like walking on a tightrope to get to the other side – or into the car in which to make your getaway!

In this article, I will not go down the road of the decision-making around whether or not you should engage with your partner’s family. I will continue with the assumption that the decision has been made that you feel it’s necessary to learn to deal with the family in question.

Also, “difficult” will here be defined as common issues addressed in couples counseling where partners’ families are concerned, such as frequent arguments, acceptance by family, jealousy, alcohol use/abuse, etc. I am not including extremely serious issues like physical, sexual and emotional abuse as the presence of these concerns have far more implications than I’m addressing here.

Walking into the subculture of the other family requires a combination of skills, some “partner” centered and some “you” centered. Here are six tips to help survive your difficult partner’s family.

6 Steps To Help You Deal with Your Partner’s Difficult Family

1) Use Active Listening Skills

This is the first step in good communication in any situation but is particularly helpful in a potentially problematic exchange. Listen carefully to what the other has said then carefully reflect back, to assure that you heard them right and they feel understood.

If you have something to say that might illicit defensiveness by the other, begin your statement with “I feel” followed by an emotion, preferably one that will have a disarming effect.

For example, “I feel sad when I try to make conversation with you and it appears you’re ignoring me.” You can’t control what the other’s response will be but you can decrease the chance of escalation.

The idea is to listen, reflect, validate and empathize with the other.

In an ideal world, both people use this communication tool together – but at least you can try to do your part to avoid getting dragged down the rabbit hole.

Remember that there are many people who will still try to drag you down there.

Simply smile and say, “I can see this is upsetting you,” or “I can see we’re not communicating well and I’m sorry about that – enjoy your coffee cake…” Do your best not to further engage in a conversation that will likely turn ugly, no matter how much active listening you attempt to use.

2) Stay Focused on Supporting Your Partner

Your mate is very likely aware of the pitfalls of his/her own family. It possibly has caused a lot of frustration, headaches and possibly heartaches in his/her own life.

For this reason, try to remain focused on supporting your partner. Many people believe that “family is family” and you accept them no matter what. The idea of being cut off from one’s family is sometimes more painful than just “dealing” with them. Stay tuned into how your partner’s feeling and be supportive – regardless if the idea that slowly scratching an ice pick down a chalkboard sounds more appealing than spending the evening with them.

3) Activate Your Personal Force Field

As “Star Trek-esque” as this sounds, this is a great self protection tool that only requires a little visualization.

If you have a lot of emotional reactivity that comes up around the idea of spending time with your partner’s family, the day of the planned meeting, begin imagining a force field that encircles you in a protective bubble and can be activated at any time.

This bubble is invisible to others but you know it’s there and has the ability to deflect negative energy, criticism, hostility and any other irritation that fits for your situation when it comes to your significant other’s family.

Make it an inside joke of your own – you could even whisper to yourself, “force field up” when it’s needed or just think it in your head. You might determine a particular spot on your body that is the activator button. As silly as this may sound to some, this type of visualization can be extremely useful – and the humor around it makes it an automatic stress reliever. Force field up!

4) Avoid Triangulation Between Family Members

Bowen Systems theory states that when there is anxiety between two people, a third person will often be triangulated in to reduce the anxiety.

Don’t get caught in the middle between your partner’s family members.

You are a visitor to the family system (until you’re welcomed and accepted in) and you are asking for trouble by letting a member whisper in your ear about another person. If someone attempts to triangulate you into a situation, let them know you’d rather not get involved. If the person persists, politely excuse yourself. Danger Will Robinson.

5) Breathe

Whether you’re practicing your active listening, trying to remember to remain supportive of your partner, activating your force field or avoiding being triangulated between two family members, the skill of breathing effectively will ease you through it all.

With proper breathing technique (deep in through the nose, all the way down to the belly and slowly out through the mouth), your physiology has a much better chance of remaining unaroused – your calm place. If you have moments of frustration, irritation or the like, step outside or excuse yourself to the restroom to spend a moment taking a few good deep breaths. They’ll take you a long way.

The Little Known Secret to Getting What You Want From Your Partner

By melody

Men are from Mars. Women are from Venus. Really!

He leaves his things on the floor and then gripes about the house being a mess. He doesn’t seem to get it that I want him to listen to my feelings. He is so distant and in his head all the time. Why doesn’t he act like he cares about me?

That woman! She always acts like she knows the best way to do everything, and she is never listens to what I have to say and get irritated with me over the most stupid things. Why doesn’t she pay more attention to the important things? I hate it when she makes such a mess with her stuff in the bathroom and leaves those bottles everywhere.

Nagging At and About Our Mates is Almost a Way of Life

We build up a case against the person that we love the most and then wonder why they are unhappy with us. When couples come in for therapy they inevitably have a long list of complaints about their spouse. They have been unhappy with their spouse for years for one reason or another. They don’t like this. They don’t like that. By the time the come into see me they are convinced that their partner has been doing everything wrong and what they really want (though they won’t always admit this) is for me to tell their partner what is wrong with them and to help them fix their partners problems.

It is a rare event to have someone come in for therapy who understands that they, as a couple, have a problem and that it’s not one or the other’s fault.

The first few sessions are generally spent with both partners laying out their case against their partner and looking to me for validation. Then I begin explaining to them that they are each responsible for what has become a laundry list. Rather than spending all of their resources and energy pointing out each other’s flaws, they need to focus instead on what the other is doing right. I don’t know what it is about our culture that makes us focus on the problems rather than the blessings in our lives, but we do.

Is Your Partner Really That Terrible

Letting ourselves focus on the blessings our mates bring to us helps us to encourage the very traits we most want to build upon. We want our partners to listen to us, to support us, to care about what we care about. We want them to show us they love us through the things they say and do. How do we get that when our partners seem so far from being able to provide it? We start with “catching them being good”. We notice aloud the things they do that we appreciate and value. We refrain from nagging about the things we don’t like and we praise and celebrate the things that we appreciate about our partners. The more we share our positive feelings with them about what we like, the more likely it is those behaviors will be repeated. They will feel loved and appreciated and we get what we want.

Why is that so hard for us?

For one… We often don’t believe that we deserve the things we really want so we don’t do the things that will give us what we want. Then we blame our partners for not providing it, even though we have not done our part in providing an environment conducive to their being loving!

When we protest, “Why of course I want my partner to be more loving!” Yet we refuse to do the very things that will create the space for them to give us what we want. We demand, we nag, we criticize and we berate. We try to make them be what we want.

NEWS FLASH: You can’t make your partner do anything!

Help Your Partner Help You

Instead, create an environment that invites them to be what you want them to be. If you want your partner to be more loving, be more loving to them and verbally appreciate the things they do that make you feel good. Notice the things they do that are attempts to be loving, even if it’s not exactly what you wanted.

My husband hates it when I leave town. He is unhappy and for years he acted angry and distant when I was getting ready to leave town. Yet, he always, without fail, checked my auto fluids and tires before I got on the road. I saw this as a supremely loving act, in spite of his decidedly unloving angry behaviors. I let him know how much I appreciated his doing this for me and hugged him. I verbalized it to my friends when they were around to let him know that I was proud of his being so loving toward me. Now, while he still hates it when I leave town, he is never angry and distant.

Loving behaviors come in all sorts of forms, and we don’t always have the same idea of what it is to be loving. When we can notice what our partner is doing in an attempt to show us their love, even if it’s not in the form we want, we can encourage the loving behavior and then ask for what it is we do want.

Stop Criticizing and Start Praising

Criticizing focus’s on the negative behavior and leaves the other person feeling unappreciated and devalued. Praise creates an environment of joy and a desire to please. When we tell our partners, “I loved it when you did the laundry for me. It makes me feel so cared for to have someone in my life help me with those kinds of details” it creates a bond of appreciation.

I’m not suggesting that we shouldn’t tell our partners about the things they have done that displease us, I am just saying that the messages should, on balance be more positive than negative. Letting our partners know what pleases us is positive feedback that creates more of what we want. Negative feedback (criticism), when it is more frequent than positive feedback (praise) creates the very things we don’t want. It creates an unhappy partner who feels unappreciated and undervalued.

Share the joy with the people around you who know you and you grow the impact of the praise exponentially. Let your partner hear you bragging on them to your friends. Tell your partner how your friends reacted to things that you tell them about your fantastic partner. I guarantee you will get more of what you want through praise and “super praise” (bragging in front of others) than you will ever get through criticism.