Staying Focused

When discussing things that are a concern, we often start bringing up old arguments, situations, and experiences that may or may not have anything to do with what is happening currently. It’s important to try to stay away from this as much as possible and I’ll explain why.

When you bring up several situations – whether they are similar or not – it can muddle the discussion and confuse the other person. They tend to lose thread or reason of the discussion (the concern). This often results in the concern not being addressed. If your goal is to solve the problem, stop yourself from overwhelming the other person.

Furthermore, if you and your partner are trying to change your communication patterns, bringing up old arguments that weren’t part of that new attempt will not help keep both of you on track. Old arguments often have no grounds when changing your communication styles because in those arguments, no one was using positive attempts at problem solving. 

If you are the person who is engaged in a discussion and the other person starts pulling example after example out of past experiences, ask them politely to stop. Let me know that you hear their concern but you would appreciate if they would stick to the current situation so that you can work together to solve the problem for the future.

When it comes down to it, if you are concerned about making sure it doesn’t repeat, “venting” or repeating several incidences of the other person’s ‘mistakes’ isn’t solving anything. It’s just complaining.

Trust After Cheating

In relationships, one of the biggest actions that break trust is cheating – whether that’s a physical affair or inappropriate texts/conversations with another person or even an emotional connection that starts to take the place of the one that you have with your partner. Many people wonder how others can stay with someone who has cheating on them. However, sometimes when you have been cheated on, there are so many factors that are influencing your thoughts and emotions. 

If both people want the relationship, both may have to make sacrifices to get through the time of healing. I say both, because trust needs to go both ways and the rebuilding of the relationship has to happen on both ends. Sometimes negative patterns in the relationship has caused one or both partners to seek positive attention and affection elsewhere. I’m not saying this is the right way to handle the situation; I’m just saying that this is sometimes what happens. Finding out what was missing within the relationship leads to both partners making changes to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

However, as for trust, there may be certain things that the other partner wants to do temporarily in order to alleviate anxiety that comes with broken trust. This could be on a spectrum of checking the other person’s phone, replying to text messages after work hours more quickly, being clear about what activities are being engaged in, checking in more often when running late, not going to a certain place or activity without the partner. These things will be time limited and may be revised or revisited every so often to see how the trust is building or not building.

Trust

Trust isn’t easy to rebuild after it’s been broken. Even with forgiveness, trust may not easily come back for most people. The biggest thing that breaks trust is hurt. Hurt from being betrayed, hurt from being lied to. 

We’ve already talked about the first steps on what one partner can do – admit to mistakes and make actions to change negative behavior and stick to those actions. What about the other partner? How do you build that trust back even if you are willing to forgive the mistake?

Sometimes it’s a leap of faith into trusting again. This means knowing that you want the relationship to succeed and forgiving as well as forgetting. This means that you do not hold the mistake over the other person’s head and ‘punish’ them for it by saying ‘You did this to me so you need to do this now’ or ‘You did this to me so I’m doing this now’ or ‘You owe it to me.’ That is not forgiveness. That is resentment and retaliation. Some people can make this huge leap of faith and not look back. 

However, most people cannot. Most people have to start with small leaps/steps. Learning to trust smaller actions and words and promises and working up to the larger ones. You still may be willing to forgive but the forgetting and trusting takes longer. Be open with your partner that you want to work through the mistake and trust again but you are hurt. If both of you are open and working together, it can help to heal the relationship well.

Changing Expectations

After you have all of your information or even if you don’t have a lot, changing your expectations is the next step. You can do this in your head or you can write it out if you tend to be more visual. We already talked about recognizing what the expectations is. If the expectation was that they ‘should’ hold you when you are upset, say to yourself, ‘It would be nice if they would hold me, but I can get similar comfort by coming home and laying in bed by myself for 5-10 minutes. Then I can go and talk to him/her.’ Again, write it down if you need to. 

Reframing the expectation includes words such as ‘It would be nice if (this happened)...’ or ‘I wish they would (do this) but…’ The first part is taking the ‘should/should not’ out of the expectation/demand. The second part is phrasing how you are going to handle it by yourself. This is almost like the solution part of an ‘I’ statement but only in regards to yourself – not anyone else.

Just because you reframe your thought doesn’t mean that it just disappears though it does help to relax the expectation. It takes saying the new through over and over to yourself at times that the expectation comes up – and especially if you start feeling a reaction to your expectation. You may need to share with your partner how your progress is going. This way if you do get upset, they know you are working on it and might be able to provide you support and decrease their reaction to your feelings. Nobody is perfect and hopefully your partner doesn't just expect you to drop your thoughts, feelings, expectations, and reactions immediately. It's a process that takes time - just like their changes will take time as well.

Conflict Resolution – Non-Agreed Solution

We talked before about how thoughts and feelings affect your actions. Keep this in mind when you are living with another person. Even if you are in an intimate relationship with that person, they don’t always meet your expectations. They can’t read your mind and they may not agree to your requests – even if you have the best developed ‘I’ statement. Remember this when they don’t agree to your solution.

So if they don’t agree to the solution and a compromise does not seem to be in the making, the thing that may have to change is not the other person but your own expectation. This is no easy task but if you want your relationship to succeed, it may be something you have to at least attempt. 

The first step to changing your expectation is recognizing what that expectation is. Do you expect your significant other to hold you when you are upset? To do the dishes when you want them done? To give you words of encouragement when you discuss your family? 

Now let’s say that you have expressed these desired to your significant other with the appropriate respect and construction and there was no compromise that was going to make both people happy – whether you tried multiple solutions and none worked or there wasn’t one that your partner felt they were able to do. First and foremost, recognize the other person’s feelings. Attempt to understand their thoughts and thought process through clarifying questions is a must. The more information you have, the easier it is to come to terms with what is happening around you.

Your partner may not have answers to your questions. That doesn’t change the fact that your expectations may have to change. It just means that it might be difficult for them to word or even more difficult for them to change. Sometimes, especially in the beginning, people are hesitant to change because they think they will be doing all the changing. No one wants to be the only person putting in the effort. You might have to show them that you are going to put in effort too. Next post will discuss more about changing those expectations.