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Category: marriage

Relationship Counseling: When Is It Time?

When couples think of relationship counseling, their minds might go into panic mode. For some, counseling is a sign that their relationship is doomed to fail. Others might see it as a waste of time that doesn’t work. However, being proactive about fixing your relationship is the key to making it work.

Relationship Counseling: When Is It Time?

Avoiding the “point of no return”

Most couples like to think that they can handle their issues on their own. After all, it’s their relationship; they don’t need “outsiders” to get involved, right? However, what this means is that couples will try to fix things alone until they can’t anymore. In effect, they cross the point of no return without even realizing it. 

To avoid crossing this point, it’ll require some humility and willingness to put pride aside. So what if someone else helps you with your relationship? What’s important is that you’re taking steps to fix things. In the end, willing to accept you need help is a much smaller price to pay than potentially losing your entire relationship.

Being proactive

In life, you’re generally encouraged to be proactive about the essentials. You go to the doctor for check-ups, you go to the mechanic for tune-ups, etc. So why not be proactive about your relationship? Instead of letting things build up, why not take the same kind of proactive approach here as well?

Of course, that doesn’t mean you need to go to relationship counseling for every disagreement. There’s a fine line between “normal” arguments versus unhealthy ones. Ultimately, it’ll take some self-reflection through your own sense of happiness and beliefs to know when that threshold has been passed. If things escalate too far, however, then you might want to reevaluate your relationship as a whole.

What really is counseling?

On paper, relationship counseling is a way for you and your partner to address your issues together. You both can figure out what is the root of your problems and get strategies for how to fix them. You’ll learn what each of you need and how to best fulfill those needs. 

However, it’s also a call to action. It’s a way for you and your partner to learn and grow in a way that will also help your relationship. It’s not an admission of failure, but rather a way to say “we are worth it”. Relationship counseling is a small investment to make to preserve your relationship, and is worth putting aside one’s pride for. 

Wanting Children: My Spouse Changed Their Mind

One of the central topics for most married couples, is when will you begin having kids? The general population just seems to assume that every couple will eventually procreate, and build a family of their own. Maybe this has always been something that’s very important to you, and you could never see yourself not becoming a mother/father. However, lately, your spouse has begun to shift their opinion on children. Suddenly, you’re feeling blindsided, and heartbroken, at the thought of not creating your own family. After all, you can compromise on a lot as a couple, but wanting children (and not wanting children) is a tough issue to make both parties happy on. So, what do you do? How do you address an issue that is so large, and overcome it together? 

Wanting Children: My Spouse Changed Their Mind

As we’ve mentioned briefly above, this is an issue that can be hard to find compromise on. After all, you’ve always pictured yourself with a family. Maybe two kids, three, four, or more. You’ve pictured family dinners, building traditions with your spouse and children… We often have large expectations for our future, and kids are a common goal for adults and married couples. So, when it seems like the tide has shifted, it can be a hard issue for couples to overcome. 

Childhood experiences often affect us in different ways 

As we get older, we begin to see our past in a different light. We understand things differently, feel experiences differently, and it helps us to make these big decisions. Maybe your spouse always considered having children, but over time— they considered a few different factors and put the idea to bed. Maybe finances aren’t what they had hoped, maybe illness runs in the family, or maybe they just don’t feel like they’ll ever be ready. No matter the reason, when one of you is wanting children— and the other has lost their desire, it can be hard to reach an end that everyone will be fully happy with.

Where do we go from here? 

When your spouse comes to you with the news that they no longer want children, your future may begin to feel a little lonely. After all, you had big plans, and likely were hoping to start reaching that future sometime soon. So, the first step is obviously to communicate with your spouse. Consider the fact that they did want kids sometime before, and now they don’t. 

Address their concerns, see if their holdup is an issue that you can tackle together, and express your feelings on the matter. You never know if they’re just doubting their abilities, their family line, or the relationship itself. By communicating over these issues, you can decide together whether or not you’ll be able to overcome this issue 

If you both are not willing to give… 

You know, and have always known, that you will be a mother/father someday. So when your spouse decides otherwise, and is firm in that decision, you have to make a choice… Ultimately, you have to decide what’s more important to you: creating a family, or your spouse. By addressing your concerns, and reaching a decision with your spouse, you will likely also come to a decision on your marriage as a whole. 

We wish you luck in this difficult time. Furthermore, we offer our condolences for the hardship, and extend our services if you find that you may need them. 

Emotional Abuse Signs: Identifying Signs of Abuse 

When you begin the divorce process, one of the first questions you’ll have to answer is ‘on what grounds?’ What is happening that justifies a divorce. For every divorcing couple, the answer will be a bit different. From irreconcilable differences, alcoholism, an abusive spouse, and so forth. There are plenty of reasons for a couple to divorce, and abuse is absolutely one of the most pressing. When you think about abuse, you likely think of physical violence. But, emotional abuse is just as prevalent, if not even more so. When you’re consider emotional abuse, and if they’re happening to you, it’s important to be able to identify some of the emotional abuse signs.

Emotional Abuse Signs: Identifying Signs of Abuse

Threats

One of the most obvious signs of emotional abuse, is making verbal threats. In most cases, an emotionally abusive spouse will use threats as a means of gaining control, and getting what they want from the other spouse. Those threats can range from a threat to leave you, embarrass you, take something away, or threats of violence unto themselves or to you. By your spouse making these threats, you may feel a responsibility to the outcome, and to making sure you don’t lose someone or something you care about.

Withholding Affection

Another means of emotional abuse can be through withholding affection. This can be as a means of punishment, or even one of those communicated threats we discussed above. This can also be as a means of getting something that they want, making you suffer, or as a means of ‘breaking you down’. For the most part, once you break down emotionally, the abuser knows they have control and will let up.

No Respect of Privacy

One of the more subtle aspects of emotional abuse, is to take away your sense of privacy. This can be due to a lack of trust, or to create paranoia. By doing this, they make you feel as if you’ve done something wrong even when you haven’t. For this reason, you may become paranoid and nervous about your every move or doing something they can misunderstand.

Emotional abuse can come in many forms, and can be unique to your relationship

Each relationship, and divorce is different. In that same sense, emotional abuse is not a one-size-fits-all system of abuse. Instead, it is calculated, precise, and tailored to your relationship. If you can relate with any of these emotional abuse signs, or relate to them— consider speaking with an attorney, a therapist, or someone who can help you determine a next step. No one deserves to live with abuse, and you do not have to…