A marriage crisis It constitutes a very peculiar personal relationship problem and, at the same time, very complicated to manage. However, marital problems can be resolved as long as both parties want and strive to improve the situation..
In this article we will discuss 8 marriage tips for marriages in crisis that can help many couples who have already tried to act to solve their problems but have not seen results..
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The study of marital conflicts has increased explosively in recent years in the field of psychology.
Data shows how the total number of marriages gradually declines over the last few years.
Likewise, the age at which marriage is contracted has increased, the number of total births is decreasing and the number of separations and divorces is increasing..
In fact, there has been an increase in separations and divorces of 25% in the last five years, to the point of reaching almost half of the total number of marriages contracted in the last two years..
Thus, marital problems today constitute a phenomenon that has been completely established in the conjugal relations of our society..
Taking into account the notable destabilization that these situations produce in the people who experience it, the study of marital crises has become one of the pillars of current psychotherapy.
Different experimental models have been built that attempt to explain the origin and reasons for the emergence and maintenance of marital crises..
Among all of them, it seems appropriate to briefly comment on the 4 cognitive-behavioral models that have been used the most in the design of therapeutic plans for the resolution of this type of problem..
One of the fundamental theoretical premises is the one that maintains that a low rate of mutual gratification exchanges explains and predicts the subjective feeling of discomfort and complaints within the interpersonal relationship..
In other words, satisfaction or conflict within the relationship will be a direct function of the rate of positive and negative exchanges..
Thus, Oregon suggests that couples in conflict use fewer rewarding elements and more punitive elements than couples without conflict..
He argues that couples in conflict are not only different in terms of the exchange rate they experience, but also that they differ in terms of the ability to solve problems and carry out the changes they wish to produce in the behavior of the partner. other.
According to this model, those couples who come into conflict do so, not because they necessarily have to face more problems, or problems of greater severity, but because they have fewer skills to solve and deal with them effectively.
Harmonious couples are distinguished from conflictive couples not only in the exchange rates of reinforcements and punishments, but also in the relationship between the efforts initiated by one and the other..
Gottman and his collaborators demonstrated this in detail. The ?? punitive ?? behaviors and dislikes are immediately returned, while positive behaviors not so much.
Behavioral approaches to marital therapy emphasize the functional relationship between environmental aspects and the subjective elements of each member of the couple.
Thus, marital satisfaction in the relationship is seen as both a cognition and a reflection, albeit an imperfect one, of the quality of the daily events that constitute the relationship..
Weiss and Isna conclude that specific behavioral aspects better reflect what both members of the couple value as satisfactory within the relationship, than global cognitive evaluations.
From these 4 models it is extracted that "what is done" within a couple ends up being key to determine the quality of the relationship between both members, so to overcome a marital crisis it is very important that we focus on this aspect.
Below we explain 8 behaviors that we can perform to try to resolve a marital conflict and recover the quality of the relationship with the couple.
The first step you have to take in order to overcome a marital crisis is to begin to empathize with your partner. In other words, you must be able to put yourself in your partner's shoes, understand their situation and understand how they may feel about each event.
We have commented that the basis of the proper functioning of a marriage is framed in what is done within the relationship, but the behavior that is carried out should not be framed on an individual level but integrating the two components of the couple.
In this way, you must be able to identify how you see things and how you feel in different situations, but at the same time, identify what your partner's own reactions are.
You can work hard to improve a marriage situation but it will be useless if you do not take into account the feelings and needs of your partner.
Therefore, in the face of any discussion or conflict, it is very important that you be able, on the one hand, to detect how you interpret it but, on the other hand, how you interpret it and how your partner feels.
To be able to do this effectively, you just have to do the mental exercise of imagining how you would feel if you were your partner..
There are probably few people who know your spouse as well as you do, so if you make the effort to put yourself in their shoes, you can easily identify how they feel and how they interpret each situation..
As we have seen in the explanatory models, most marital crises are not based on the problems themselves in which a couple can be immersed, but on their ability to solve them.
In this sense, one of the main factors that can make it difficult to solve marital problems is framed in the communicational style. That is, in how we express and communicate our opinions or thoughts to the other person.
Many times we stop little to reflect on these issues, since the communicational style that we have with our partner we build little by little and we easily get used to maintaining it.
However, this way we communicate can be the origin of all the evils of the marital relationship.
Identify how you express your thoughts to your partner and work so that they are not offensive or conflicting.
Anything can be communicated in many ways so if we don't make a minimum effort we will be able to express the same thing in a more friendly and less offensive way..
Another fundamental aspect reviewed in the explanatory models of marital problems is based on positive exchange. In this way, the couple can fall into a routine where the positive stimuli they receive from their spouse are extremely scarce..
When this happens, the couple finds themselves in a framework where solving their problems will be much more complicated because they will not have positive aspects that can lessen the effect of the negative ones..
So, even if your marital situation is not the best at the moment, work together to build situations where both of you can receive positive stimuli from the other..
Plan activities that you both like and situations that you used to enjoy, to be able to do them often and benefit from the positive exchange that those moments can bring you.
If you manage to increase the positive exchange between the two of you, the negative aspects will probably begin to have less impact on your married life..
However, on a daily basis, thousands of situations can arise that cause hostility or bad mood in an unexpected way. Knowing how to control these emotions is of vital importance since they can cause a very negative effect on the relationship.
So, when faced with situations that unnerve you, stop to think for a few seconds about the repercussions that responding in a hostile or moody way can have..
It is probably not worth it, and being able to retain the momentum and express your feelings in a calmer way is the best solution both on an individual level and on a marital level..
Actually doing this exercise is quite a selfish practice. "What will benefit me more, release my hostile impulses that I have right now and be in a bad mood with my partner for a week, or manage to retain him and have marital well-being during this time"?
If you think about it like this, both members of the couple will come to the same conclusion. It is always healthier for both the couple and each of the members to avoid unmotivated conflicts.
However, the couple does not have to make the mistake of not expressing feelings, both positive and negative..
If you try to omit the conflicts and not express what each one feels, the couple will "accumulate" all the unresolved situations, trust will decrease and sooner or later it will take its toll..
In this way, both so that you can carry out the exercise of empathizing with your partner and that she can do the same with you, it is important to express feelings.
However, the expression of sentiment, both positive and negative, can be done in multiple ways.
It is important that you make an effort to do it in a calm and respectful way. Probably, the best time to express a feeling is not when the emotion has taken hold of you, but after a few minutes, when you are calmer and can communicate them in a healthy way.
If we express our feelings in a healthy way, on the one hand we will avoid offensive situations and, on the other, we will be able to empathize and understand how our partner feels.
So, if we are able to know how our partner interprets each situation, we can detect what their needs are. At this point, we have to start considering what their needs are and how we can satisfy them..
However, this work should not be done in a unidirectional way, that is, it should not be done only by one member of the couple towards the other, but must be done by both at the same time.
Thus, a very beneficial exercise is to make strategic pacts. That is, if one member of the couple has the need “X” and the other has the need “Y”, the satisfaction of both needs can be agreed upon..
In this way, neither of the two will be giving or trying harder than the other, and at the same time, the positive exchange of the couple will be increased..
As we have said, the basis of marital conflicts is not usually the problems themselves, but the ability of the couple to resolve discrepancies. However, everything is easier if you can solve the marital problems.
It is very important that this aspect is not done separately and both members of the couple work together to solve possible problems.
Sit down to analyze the problems that threaten your relationship and propose possible solutions until you reach an agreement that can be materialized.
Finally, a last exercise that is usually very beneficial for marriages that are in crisis is to remember good times.
You have probably been sharing your lives for a long time and, despite the fact that you are living through bad times now, you will have lived many better times..
Remembering these "good times" together will give both of you thoughts and feelings that your partner has enough potential to be well, so your motivation to solve problems will increase..
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