Blog Articles and Resources
When Your Spouse Is Mentally Ill How do you know? What do you do By Catherine Aponte Psy.D. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/marriage-equals/202002/when-your-spouse-is-mentally-ill Everyone has personal issues that we collectively describe as our insecurities that may affect our marital relationships. Most of us can learn to manage such insecurities, often with help, so that we lessen their impact on our marriages. However, self-management of personal insecurities is not the way to deal with significant emotional and/or mental impairments that a partner may have, such as bipolar disorder, debilitating anxiety, clinical depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, drug addiction, and serious personality disorders such as narcissism, paranoia, and borderline personality.
If your spouse is engaging in actions and behaviors that are detrimental to establishing a successful marriage beyond the general insecurities, it’s important to recognize that—and to respond to it appropriately. You may choose to stay in the marriage. You may find it necessary to think about how and when to divorce your mentally ill spouse. Either way, it’s important to have some idea of what to do if you believe your partner is suffering from a mental/emotional illness. How Do You Know? How do you know and what do you do when your wife or husband suffers from mental illness?[1] How can you tell the difference between a series of bad days and a real problem? When repetitious arguments, unfounded accusations, lengthy withdrawals from the relationship, unwillingness or inability to discuss important issues, and/or standoffs between the two of you persist despite your efforts to engage your spouse, you must consider the possibility that serious problems are occurring. Excesses in behaviors can also be warning signs—being obsessed with ritual cleanliness, withdrawing completely from sexual contact, staying up all night and not being able to function the next day, and excessive drinking or drugging are examples of problematic behavior. When problems like this continue to occur in your marriage despite repeated attempts to identify and discuss issues that bother your spouse, it may be that something other than marital disagreement is occurring. Taking the First Step So, what can you do if you think your husband or wife may be suffering from mental illness or serious psychological problems? You can take a page from what we have learned about confronting the problem of alcoholism or drug addiction. Here are the suggested steps you can take:
How to Live with a Mentally Ill Spouse Living with a spouse who is mentally ill will be challenging. The condition from which your spouse is suffering will determine what steps you’ll need to take in order to live with and to help him/her. You will find a list of articles on dealing with spouses with specific illnesses at the end of this article. It is important to learn as much as you can about the particular condition you are dealing with to know how to help your spouse manage his/her illness and how to take care of yourself in the process. If your spouse neither recognizes his/her illness nor is willing to seek individual or marital therapy, the situation for you is difficult. You must seek professional help for yourself in this situation, work hard to maintain your own work and social life, stay informed about your spouse’s illness, and seek out personal support from friends and family. If your spouse continues to refuse to own their illness, however, it is likely that at some point, you will consider divorce. When to Consider Divorce Deciding to divorce a spouse who has a mental illness is a painful and complex decision. There will be enormous social pressure and guilt in deciding to end your marriage to someone who is mentally ill. You took those wedding vows to be married “in sickness and in health,” after all. Here are some suggestions for you to consider if you ever find yourself in this situation.
Don't Let Keeping Secrets Become Divisive to Your Family
Millions of people keep at least 5 secrets they've never told anyone. Jennifer Guttman Psy.D. https://www.weebly.com/editor/main.php#/ Millions of people keep a range of secrets from each other with the best of intentions, but secret-keeping can often have serious and damaging negative outcomes, especially to families. Psychologists Slepian, Chun, and Mason of Columbia University found that people keep an average of 13 secrets at a time, five of which they have never told anyone. Some of the most significant secrets fall into categories such as illegal and criminal activity, infidelity, financial problems, or a family member’s substance abuse or death from a drug overdose. They also found that carrying secrets correlates with a negative sense of well-being. There is a difference between having certain things you want to keep private to yourself versus a family secret. Individuals do have the right to maintain their autonomy in a family by having privacy. However, it becomes an issue when the topic they’re keeping private has reverberations that could impact other family members such as in the issues delineated above. The statistical data reinforces how keeping significant secrets and adversely undermine core relationships within a family. Alicia Walker of the University of Missouri’s Department of Sociology and Anthropology cited in 2017 that rates of infidelity are surprisingly high, most recently reported to be higher than 50 to 60 percent. The APA has found that infidelity is responsible for 20-40 percent of divorces in the US. In 2017, more than 70,000 people died from drug overdoses. making it a leading cause of injury-related death in the U.S. Roughly 130 Americans die every day of opioid usage. Reports show that secrecy regarding drug use followed by death by overdose arouses feelings of anger, guilt, helplessness, and deprives family members of information that could enable them to take action. An estimated 13 million Americans have hidden a bank or credit card account from a live-in significant other partner or spouse (31 percent of millennials, 24 percent of people ages 38 to 53, and 17 percent of boomers). And 80 percent of parents keep financial secrets from their adult children. In many families, secrets are kept because of fear that the receiver of the information couldn’t cope with the truth. Individuals believe that the anger, shame, humiliation, or recrimination the receiver would feel would alienate them from the family or from society. However, this backhandedly sets up a power dynamic in which the “secret keepers” have all the power in a family. This unexpressed power dynamic impacts how family members communicate with each other, typically resulting in restricted emotional communication. Here are some reasons to consider transparency instead of secret keeping: Keeping secrets destroys relationships. Psychologists Slepian, Halevy, and Galinsky, (2017) note that there is a dichotomy between secret-keeping behaviors and human beings as social creatures. In addition, they found that secret keepers had generally lower life satisfaction, and felt fatigued, lonely, sad and hostile. Keeping major secrets creates an atmosphere of mistrust in a relationship. Rebuilding trust when it’s been broken is challenging because the person who has been excluded from the information needs regular reassurance that there are no more secrets being kept. The constant need for reassurance doesn’t help build trust, it just placates fear. Resentment and suspicion are hard to overcome. Keeping secrets creates a false narrative. When secrets are kept and then revealed, those kept in the dark often feel they were living a “false” life. They become confused by what actions, reactions, and feelings were “true” and which were representative of a false reality. Because this secretive behavior was normalized, it can be repeated throughout generations as secret keeping becomes an inherent part of the family legacy. Keeping secrets can make you physically sick. Carrying secrets is a burden that causes guilt, shame, and stress, with co-occurring symptoms of anxiety such as headaches, digestive issues, and sleep problems. Internalizing problems has somatic consequences; some people may even turn to substances to manage the discomfort they experience. This further alienates them from family members. If you are considering sharing significant secrets with members of your family, here are four tips to make it easier for you: Be straightforward. Know what you need before having the conversation and ask for that. Do you need your partner to listen or advise? Reveal enough information to make the situation clear without overburdening them. Do not answer questions for which you don’t have answers; for example, if someone is very sick. “Are they going to die?” “I hope not, but honestly I don’t know, they’re very sick.” Pick a time and place that feels comfortable for you. Don’t be impulsive when revealing the secret. Be mindful of location, timing, and circumstances. Think about having a third-party present. If the information is something that might create distress between the two of you (infidelity, bankruptcy) think about the pros and cons of having a third-party present. A couple’s counselor would be a good option. Don’t ambush people to reveal secrets. Being ambushed by information leaves people feeling on unsteady and on unsafe ground with relatives. It also sends a child or adolescent (who might find out a secret during or after sleepaway camp) a message that the family didn’t think they were mature enough or strong enough to cope with the information until after it happened. This not only undermines their sense of family trust, but also their self-confidence. Even though on the front end the idea of exposing a secret may seem daunting, even terrifying, the relief people feel has been shown to have positive effects for the individual and their family. The research by Slepian, Halevy and Galinsky (2017) demonstrates that those who unburden a secret feel happier, more authentic, and closer to their family members. In addition, the benefit of teaching compassion in the face of flaw and transparency instead of secrecy is an intergenerational message you want to pass down to your family members. If you are searching for a relationship partner, or if you are currently in a relationship, is it in your best interest to maintain high standards or to relax your ideals? Research suggests that it may be better for our relationships and for our own well-being to do a little bit of both.
Maintain High Standards When we ask people which traits they see as essential in a romantic partner, they often cite characteristics such as respect, honesty, and trustworthiness (Fugère et al., 2016). In fact, these traits are associated with better relationship outcomes. Mutual respect is even more strongly linked to satisfying romantic relationships than feelings of liking and loving one another (Frei and Shaver, 2002). Further, not only does dishonesty often cause relationships to end, but increased honesty is associated with both better relationship outcomes and greater individual well-being (Brunell et al., 2010). On these essential traits, it is better for us as individuals and as couples to maintain high standards. But what about other important characteristics? Relax Your Ideals In a large international research project assessing mate preferences, respondents ranked their top three most important traits (Lippa, 2007). Across genders, sexual orientations, and cultural backgrounds, individuals rated intelligence, a good sense of humor, honesty, kindness, and good looks as the most important traits. However, there may be good reasons to relax our high standards with respect to some of these characteristics. Some characteristics may not be as important to relationship initiation or maintenance as we think they are. As part of a research project, Eastwick and colleagues (2011) created a fake profile for an interaction partner. This profile matched each participant’s most desired or least desired traits. Intuitively, participants expected to like the partner who possessed their most desired traits and dislike the partner who possessed their least desired traits. When the participants met their partner in person, the partner delivered scripted remarks which did not reflect or contradict the assigned profile. The researchers found that after meeting in person, the participants' most and least desired traits had no influence at all on participants’ actual liking for their partner. This research suggests that a match between one’s ideals and a partner’s actual characteristics is not a necessary precursor to attraction. Furthermore, in established relationships, we tend to downgrade the importance of our previous trait preferences when our mates do not possess those traits—and to upgrade the importance of the positive traits our partners actually do possess (Fletcher et al., 2000). It may be particularly beneficial to our relationships to relax our standards relating to physical attractiveness. Individuals who are attractive themselves hold higher standards with regard to partner attractiveness than their less-attractive peers. More attractive individuals not only rate others as less attractive but also expect that relationships with others will be less satisfying (Montoya, 2008). Moreover, Shaw Taylor and colleagues (2011) found that although online daters tended to contact dates who were more attractive than themselves, they were more likely to receive positive responses from dates who matched their own levels of physical attractiveness. Repeatedly being rejected by potential dates decreases our self-esteem and our perceived self-worth while also causing us to decrease our standards for relationship partners (Charlot et al., 2019). Furthermore, the more we reject others as potential partners, the more we may adopt a “rejection mind-set” which may lead to less openness to relationships in the future (Pronk and Denissen, 2019). Do Lower Standards Increase Satisfaction? In Thibaut and Kelley’s (1986) seminal book on interdependent relationships, the authors review social exchange theory, which stipulates that in any relationship we will experience both rewards and costs. However, not everyone views those rewards and costs in the same way. Thibaut and Kelley include the notion of a “comparison level” in their theory. A comparison level is roughly equivalent to your “standards” or your general expectations for your relationships. If you usually have high standards, you would tend to expect more rewards and fewer costs from your relationships, and you won’t be satisfied unless your relationships deliver increased rewards and fewer costs. You might suppose, then, that individuals would actually be more satisfied with their relationships when they have lower standards. Indeed, a person with a low comparison level expects fewer rewards from their relationships and therefore can be satisfied with a relationship which reaps fewer benefits. However, lower standards may encourage some partners to stay in very unrewarding relationships. On the whole, the research suggests that upholding some high standards and relaxing others may lead to the most rewarding relationship experiences. What is Your Partner’s Relationship Attachment Style? Understanding the four adult relationship attachment styles
By Preston Ni M.S.B.A. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/communication-success/201602/what-is-your-partner-s-relationship-attachment-style What is your partner’s relationship attachment style? Based on the works of Bartholomew and Horowitz, etc., there are four adult attachment styles: Secure, Anxious-Preoccupied, Dismissive-Avoidant, and Fearful-Avoidant. Most people have various degrees of the four attachment styles, which may change over time. Below are some of the most dominant traits of each attachment style in romantic relationship. "It is relatively easy for me to become emotionally close to others. I am comfortable depending on others and having others depend on me. I don’t worry about being alone or having others not accept me." — Bartholomew and Horowitz RQ Those with a strong Secure Attachment Style manifest at least a number of the following traits on a regular basis:
Anxious-Preoccupied Attachment Style "I want to be completely emotionally intimate with others, but I often find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I am uncomfortable being without close relationships, but I sometimes worry that others don’t value me as much as I value them." — Bartholomew and Horowitz RQ Those with a strong Anxious-Preoccupied Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
Dismissive-Avoidant Attachment Style "I am comfortable without close emotional relationships. It is very important to me to feel independent and self-sufficient, and I prefer not to depend on others or have others depend on me." — Bartholomew and Horowitz RQ Those with a strong Dismissive-Avoidant Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
"I am somewhat uncomfortable getting close to others. I want emotionally close relationships, but I find it difficult to trust others completely, or to depend on them. I sometimes worry that I will be hurt if I allow myself to become too close to others." — Bartholomew and Horowitz RQ Those with a strong Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
Although those who are predominantly the Secure Attachment Style tend to make strong partners, it is also possible for those who are predominantly the other three styles to be in successful relationships. Self-awareness, mutual-support, mutual willingness to grow, and courage to seek professional help when needed are some of the crucial elements to positive relational development. The absence of these elements, however, may generate issues of incompatibility in relationship. ick here to edit. By Preston Ni M.S.B.A.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/communication-success/201507/what-is-your-relationship-attachment-style What is your interpersonal attachment style, and how might it affect your relationship? Based on the works of Bartholomew and Horowitz, etc., there are four adult attachment styles: Secure, Anxious-Preoccupied, Dismissive-Avoidant, and Fearful-Avoidant. Most people have various degrees of the four attachment styles, which may change over time. Below are some of the most dominant traits of each type in relationships, with references from my book “7 Keys to Long-Term Relationship Success”. Secure Attachment Style Those with a strong Secure Attachment Style manifest at least a number of the following traits on a regular basis:
Anxious-Preoccupied Attachment Style Those with a strong Anxious-Preoccupied Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
Those with a strong Dismissive-Avoidant Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
Those with a strong Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style tend to manifest at least several of the following traits on a regular basis:
Although those who are predominantly the Secure Attachment Style tend to make strong partners, it is also possible for those who are predominantly the other three styles to be in successful relationships. Self-awareness, mutual-support, mutual willingness to grow, and courage to seek professional help when needed are some of the crucial elements to positive relational development. The absence of these elements, however, may generate issues of incompatibility in relationship. |
Michelle Stewart-Sandusky
I write articles based on my experience as a therapist or a training or conference attendee. Many of these articles are written by others who are experts in their field and I share their information as resources for others. Categories
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