Are The Little Things Hurting Your Relationship?
Sometimes in a marriage or relationship, the little problems are not really visible at first. What you can’t see is the growing pile of small hurts that are beginning to grow. When the pile gets too big the person realizes they are simply miserable and this can lead to divorce. Not all marital problems are composed of big arguments and callous activities. Some marriages get into trouble because one person begins to tire of always feeling hurt or neglected in a marriage.
Neglected In Marriage
The hurts may be small ones, but they can build into a wall of anger or resentment that is damaging to a marriage. If you looked at the list of hurts it might not even look as if it’s really worth the trouble of making. But when you start to think in terms of each hurt or offense happening dozens of times, it is easier to see how a spouse can finally decide they have had enough.
Don’t Hold Grudges
One of the quickest routes to a marital blow-up is when a spouse begins to hold grudges. A grudge is when you don’t forgive someone for a perceived hurt. For example, when your husband forgets your birthday it may be hard for you to forgive because you always make sure his birthday is celebrated. It is the small hurts which can cause you to feel unimportant to your spouse.
Small daily hurts include things like forgetting to let you know he would be late for dinner after you spent 2 hours cooking. The first few times were forgiven but when it continues to happen it indicates a lack of respect. That hurts. Your wife criticizes you all the time in front of your family. That hurts. Your spouse makes important decisions without your input. That hurts.
One after another the hurts pile up until their weight becomes unbearable the whole pile topples down. When that happens the chances are that there will suddenly be a major emotional explosion that takes your spouse by complete surprise. Of course, sometimes there were signs this was coming. A spouse who gets sullen for no apparent reason or appears to be unhappy with no explanation is probably nursing plenty of hurts.
You can’t have a healthy marriage and nurse grudges and refuse to forgive. This is not to say you are supposed to endure the hurts without saying anything. In fact, quite the opposite is true. You do need to talk about the hurts and then explain why they hurt. By beginning a dialogue with your spouse you are able to give expression to your needs and feelings so your spouse understands how his or her actions are impacting the marriage.
Learning to forgive can take practice. It is a process of letting go. You have to let go of the negative emotions and feelings. You have to let go of the memories of the hurt. You have to let go of the past and move forward with the belief that the marriage is solid and healthy. You should never let small grudges pile up until they become a major problem.
Struggling With Day to Day Hurts
When a couple has been married for a while, they learn to hide the true nature of their marriage from their spouses and the rest of the world. What the hurting partner doesn’t realize is that he or she is not alone. Couples everywhere struggle with the day to day hurts that can eventually inflict so much pain. If the hurting person would take advantage of their support system they would find they are not alone at all.
A person who feels they can’t forgive their spouse should seek marriage counseling. When you can’t forgive there is no way the hurts can be erased. That means you are never seeking a solution to the problem. If you don’t want to talk to a counselor right away then you should talk to your spouse first. It may be that your spouse simply did not realize that you were feeling so bad about the marriage. Once you begin talking about the problems and f8ind ways to address them then it will feel like a tremendous load has been lifted.
Small hurts may be small, but they can be just as painful as the larger ones. In order to change a course leading to divorce, you can erase those hurts and learn how to forgive. It’s a lesson you will carry with you through a stronger marriage.
Where Has Love Gone?
Keeping the love alive in a marriage can be a real challenge for many over the years and any relationship advice feels useless. Sometimes a wife or husband decides that the marriage is no longer a happy one and that all love has died and they are therefore living in a loveless marriage. What can they or you do? At this point there are two choices. They are the hardest choices to make, because there is usually sadness attached for all involved. One choice is a divorce whereas the other is a new start and perhaps in the future, a new happy relationship.
Happy Relationship
It can be tempting to think in terms of divorce as a ‘cure-all’ for all the problems in your marriage. You can leave the person causing the heartache and start over. Maybe you can meet someone who will treat you the way you want to be treated. Perhaps you can find true love and live happily ever after. Of course, isn’t that the way you felt about your spouse when you got married?
The point is that you may not have a loveless marriage at all. You probably have a marriage that is showing signs of being a bit battered due to the stress of daily living. It’s not easy living with another person which means marriage is not easy. Anyone who says otherwise has probably not been married. But marriage should not be just drudgery either. There should be plenty of fun that you share too. When all of the fun stops and the marriage becomes just a seeming burden, it can appear to be loveless.
Flickering Passion
When you have been married for a while it is all too easy to begin concentrating on just the problems of daily living. Usually in this day and age both people work and lead separate lives during the day. When you begin to have children a lot of time and attention that was spent on each other is now spent on the children. The days of hand holding dates are over and instead its crying children in restaurants. Or you don’t go out at all because it’s too much trouble.
When you get married, the early feelings of passion felt so good. If you think back, life seemed to hold so much promise and joy and excitement. The physical and emotional connections were strong. Because early love ignites such passion it is often seen as belonging only to the young. That is such a fallacy and fortunately the baby boomer generation has not bought into that theory.
Marriage passion can be kept alive for a lifetime but only if you make an effort to do so. A marriage should not be just about work and responsibility. It should also be about passion and fun and keeping the emotional and physical bonds intact. Many times what seems to be a loveless marriage is really a marriage where the passion flame has been allowed to die down to the briefest flicker.
Roaring Flames
Often when it seems that passion has died in a marriage, the truth is that the passion has been delegated elsewhere. People are passionate about their work or their family, but those same passionate people may be forgetting to share those feelings with their spouses. To keep love alive in a marriage requires that attention be paid to the relationship. You can’t ignore feelings and expect them to stay alive. You have to nurture relationships including the one you have with your spouse.
There are many different ways to turn your flickering passion flame into a roaring fire like you once had. You can begin by doing some of the same things you did as newly weds. For example if you used to get dressed up and go dancing then you should do so again. If you used to spend long evenings drinking gourmet coffee and just talking then it’s time to start visiting.
This is true no matter how long you have been married too. You may not be able to take mountain hikes anymore due to age or physical problems, but you can walk in the local park and have just as much fun. The point is to include fun activities in your marriage and not just chores and responsibilities.
Re-kindle The Flames of Passion
What one couple called romantic may not work for another couple. However you define romance though, it needs to be a part of your married life. Keeping romance and physical love strong will keep the passion in your marriage alive. So if you think your marriage is loveless and divorce is inevitable, it’s time to rekindle the flames of passion you once enjoyed. Start having some fun with your spouse once again and you will probably be delighted to learn the love still exists – it had just been ignored.