The Couples Tool Kit
Working together as a team of three — by Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W., Specialist in Couples TherapyArchive for Shared Life
The Un-Romantic Bed
Bill Maher: If ever there were an unromantic guy, it is Bill Maher with his surgeon-like skill to slice away all artifice and get to the earthy or seamy underbelly of so much of life, political and otherwise. Recently, he made a comment about sleep which got me thinking about the unromantic aspect of sleeping together or apart.
But first, his comment. Mr. Maher, in an interview with guest Dr. Drew Pinsky on his HBO talk show Real Time while discussing the demise of Whitney Houston, made this observation about celebrities and drugs “…one thing you can’t command, any of us, is sleep.” In Maher’s opinion, “A lot of these deaths (referring to celebrity deaths) are about sleep.” In that context Mr. Maher reached as far back as Elvis, who, he believes, died in pursuit of a good night’s sleep. Mr. Maher and Dr. Drew were in agreement that prescription drugs, readily available to the rich and powerful, are often the pathway to untimely and tragic death. Why? Mega stars have entourages, including physicians whose role is to gratify their clients every whim. In Mr. Maher’s view, no one has the magic spell that brings “on demand” the elusive state of sleep without relying on a potentially lethal potion of chemicals and alcohol that ultimately can make sleep permanent. And no one can guess, neither those who may provide the drugs or drink, nor the imbibers, when that potion might take the lethal turn.
Sleep Over Romance: Mr. Maher speaks the truth when he says, ”No one can command sleep.” But almost anything can interrupt it for many. It is this conundrum of shared bedding that often puts even the best of compatible Coupledoms in a quandary over how to stay intimate and spoon in the double, queen or king-size realm, and still get a decent night’s sleep. Snoring, insomnia, spouses who talk or groan in their sleep, toss and turn and even strike out an arm or a leg sometimes smacking their unsuspecting partner, steal sheets, need the T.V. on, turn on a light to read, leave the bed several times to pee, get hot flashes and rip off the covers or their PJ’s in middle of the night, fight over windows open or closed: these are just some of the interruptions that can lead to serious sleep deprivation. Those are challenges enough to Coupledom sleep compatibility without adding the great sleep challenge that child rearing brings to the art of achieving a peaceful night’s sleep “together.” (See my previously published post on the subject, Musical Beds: Bedtime And The Coupledom).
In a blog published in the Wall Street Journal in 2009, the “sleeping separately” solution for those who cannot achieve sleep while sharing a bed with their partner is outed and normalized as a reasonable alternative to serious sleep deprivation. Perhaps a different issue than the celebrity search for a restful night, which may be complicated by serious emotional issues, a lifestyle of erratic hours, and drug dependency, the typical Coupledom may be suffering from the social pressure to appear “happily married” by co-existing nightly under the same set of sheets at the price of sleep loss, a potentially serious medical threat to one’s health and a surefire way to reduce emotional tolerance in any relationship.
Sex, Vacations and Visitors: We are a culture that tries to conform to conventional images that portray happiness and health. Isn’t that what advertising is all about? Happy couples in separate beds or bedrooms have not been pictured in catalogs, movies or television shows since Lucy and Desi. Yet, despite media displays of marital bliss as one bed, two spooning bodies, many couples sleep apart not because they are alienated from each other, but because they cannot forgo another night of sleep without losing all pleasure in living. When on vacation these same couples are challenged to find affordable options for separate rooms, and when visitors come to their home, they are faced with revealing this “anomaly” of coupling or spending a few nights back in the sack together sleepless again. That sexual contact is associated with sharing a bed is countered by anecdotes from many a couple who remain in the same bed while experiencing serious emotional and sexual alienation even to the point of seeing a divorce attorney. Bedding down together each night is no guarantee that intimacy of any kind is actually taking place.
Children: I have yet to find scholarly research on the impact on children of parents sleeping either in separate beds or bedrooms. Emphasis in blog posts and articles is on the relationship between spouses while they are awake ,which more fully tells their children the story of their parents’ relationship than who sleeps where. It is also useful to be clear why separate bedrooms work if the child raises the topic or has some questions. Children are not particularly eager to hear about their parents’ sex life, so a general sense that all is well is conveyed by affectionate displays and real life observations that their parents enjoy each other’s company, rather than grunts and groans heard through bedroom walls.
However, I did come across an article for parents who are getting divorced that includes an easy guide to understanding from a developmental perspective how children of different ages view their familial world, published by North Carolina State University. Understanding the stages of child awareness at all ages can help parents separate fears from facts.
The Un-Romantic Bed: My unromantic poster boy, Bill Maher, has the knack for flushing out hidden shame on many subjects. That sleep is important is not a new idea. But that in the search for a peaceful sleep, some succumb to the temptations that an “elixir” of sorts can, like the long sought fountain of youth, bring eternal happiness is exposed for the ruse that it is. And that “shameful fact” that many couples cannot achieve nocturnal bliss side-by-side should be outed as well, rather than guffawed over or sneered at as some skeleton in the marital closet. Perhaps Mr. Maher can out that fact as well? With all Coupledom issues, what is healthy is truth, earthy, often unromantic but not shameful. A good night’s sleep for each partner makes for a better Coupledom.
Have That Conversation. It is very personal but it is also very practical.
Sweet dreams.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2012
Nailing Down The Perfect Match
Hocus Pocus: Two articles appeared in the New York Times in the last week on couple compatibility. The M.R.S. and the Ph.D. article tracks the changing attitudes towards women’s educational achievements and marriageability over the decades. The early 1900’s through the 1950’s warned that “educated women” were less likely to attract husbands and were cautioned that if they revealed their intelligence in the presence of men, they were doomed. According to recent studies, this is no longer true. In fact, women with advanced degrees today are more likely to marry men who are less educated than themselves, less likely to divorce than their less educated sisters, and receive greater aid from their spouses in the home.
“The Dubious Science of Online Dating” appeared in the Times’ Sunday Review section and focused on research soon to be published in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest which questions the accuracy of online dating sites who rely on “matching algorithms” to locate suitable mates for their customers. The authors suggest that mathematical formulations based on such variables as similar personality type, ethnic and religious background, and likes and dislikes leave out at least two critical ingredients for compatibility: the quality of the interaction of the individuals which is not predictable from the profiles, and environmental factors including external stressors on the couple such as job loss, infertility and illness. Communication patterns, problem solving tendencies and sexual compatibility, which are significant in predicting successful relationships, emerge only after two people meet. The conclusion the authors’ reach from their research about predictors for successful partnering leaves little doubt that the Hocus Pocus of crunched numbers and cyber pairing just doesn’t cut it. Nothing replaces experience.
Our Cultural Obsession With Couple Compatibility: We are a culture that believes that a good relationship is at the heart of happiness and health. The fact that talk shows, websites and endless news articles attempt to define or map out paths to achieve success in this realm is no surprise. But nailing down the perfect match (we know nothing is perfect, don’t we?) in reality needs to rely more on self-knowledge and an astute tracking of personal reactions to another, along with sound assessments of the quality of the individual sitting across the table from you. The foundation for making a sound choice rests with listening to yourself, knowing your pitfalls, defenses and patterns, and not minimizing the signals inside you that say, watch out while simultaneously looking for signs that the other is capable of self-examination as well.
Time: All of us have heard these words, “I knew I should not have married him/her but…” and then the reasons pour forth. Deposits were made on wedding halls, invitations went out, biological clocks were ticking and loneliness sucked. But how did they get this far along in the process before they allowed themselves to question their decision? I often say to patients, “It is not that you got into an unsatisfactory relationship that is significant. It’s how long you stayed there.” which means simply that somehow denial or avoidance of the importance of their feelings or difficulties prevented aborting the mission sooner than later. What compels folks to choose partners who are not good for them? There are multiple roots but one of the deepest is “fear” that no one else will want them. If the onset of the marriage is going well but problems rear up over time, which they do, fear may foster denial and avoidance again which will delay addressing issues that might be easily fixed in the early years, but will only get more complicated and intractable with time and neglect.
Knowledge: Observing the quality of your interactions with your potential or current mate is the best tool to use in figuring out whether teaming up makes sense. The attribute most promising in a partner is their willingness to look at the nature of the interactions between the two of you with an eye towards improvement as well. If they are not inclined to do that from the onset, this doesn’t bode well for the future when the relationship naturally expands in complications of the shared life. There is useful research available on couple compatibility coming out of The Gottman Relationship Institute and also easily accessible in Tara Parker-Pope’s book, For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage, which offers useful perspectives on relationship dynamics.
The Informed Consumer: The late CEO of the Syms clothing chain use to end his radio commercials with the slogan, “An educated consumer is our best customer”, though some research suggests this may not be the case for buying suits as “the more informed a consumer or buyer is the more difficult it is to sell them.” But for choosing a life mate, this is clearly the way to go.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2012
Illness and Loss In The Coupledom: Reality Shifts
Loss: I had loss on my mind this week. In fact, I always do but this week a family member shared her profound sadness upon learning of the tragic death of a very dear friend in the “prime of life.” She asked if I had written on loss and grief specific to The Coupledom and I thought: there are so many losses, in so many ways. And so I began to compose this post. Coincidentally, Sunday’s New York Times had two articles on loss as well, which gave language to a new form of secular communal grieving in one piece and the concept of “ambiguous loss” in the other. Both speak to the variety of loss, its power and the need for comfort in a never ending human struggle that marks our Coupledoms, as well as our persons, as mortal.
Chronic: Loss of a spouse or partner from a degenerative disorder is perhaps one of the most debilitating for the Coupledom, as subtle changes in the climate of the relationship may be felt long before a diagnosis is rendered. A kind of tension has tinged the emotional airways. Someone who formerly enjoyed socializing seems disinclined to attend parties or movies, traveling to foreign ports or sharing the T.V. remote. “Set in his/her ways” may not truly reveal the whole picture. A hint of moodiness is sniffed in the air, or a spark of anger more intense than previously seen, is easily triggered. Inflexible positions are taken on how to spend money, or when to visit the relatives. A sharp powerful mind seems a bit clouded. The changes are subtle at first and irritating. Then mobility issues or marked forgetfulness are noticed, initially attributed to over-exercising or mild senioritis. But with time and visits to the internist and finally a neurologist, a diagnosis emerges, and The Coupledom shifts with a powerful jolt. Someone is becoming a caretaker, and someone else is losing their edge. This is a slow crawl with pockets of loss all along the way. And grief.
No Shame: Many today know this kind of loss where the person is still with you but their character is changing along with their body; an ambiguous loss, not a death but a dying off of the familiar attributes of the beloved and the consequent shift in the role of the partner. Can the couple talk about these changes, these losses, locate something new that can replace what is being lost? Yes, but typically the healthy spouse doesn’t want to burden their partner with their pain, sadness or weariness. Extended families are important and friends who need to validate the grieving process with reality, not with false hope, denial or disapproval when faced with the anger, annoyance or frustration of the caregiver. The caregiver needs support and is at high risk for developing their own illnesses due to the stresses of carrying the banner of the relationship, filling two pair of shoes to maintain the shared life. For the caregiver, there should be no shame in wishing that they were free to live their former lives, no shame in leaving their partner in the hands of someone else so that they can touch base with essential pieces of their personal reality. This is necessary and if not gratified, depression and illness might ensue, complicating an already challenging time.
Grief Is A Shared Reality: A Coupledom faced with a slow and steady loss can grieve some of this together. Though memories are fading for one, the steady reflections of the other offer up opportunities to shed some tears or share some laughs together. Why not? Pretending that all is the same protects no one and stresses everyone. Loss is normal, human and provides moments where the depth of the bond can be acknowledged by the shared pain of its changes and losses for both partners. There is no ambiguity in grieving together what is lost.
Acute: The sudden onset of a terminal illness by one member of The Coupledom freezes time like nothing else. There was pre-diagnosis life and post-diagnosis life and they have little in common. Time and energy spent on treatments dominate daily life and interpersonal transactions for the couple. Other family members, children and parents, need care and protection from overwhelming fears and distractions so they can get on with their lives while the fight for health unfolds. But as the illness progresses, or the treatments take their toll, losses are already occurring. Mom and wife, father and husband, daughter or son, look different, act different and can’t quite muster their characteristic oomph or interest in the lives of their loved ones. Patients of mine, whose parents became ill while they were still in the throes of their childhood, poignantly describe these losses but often with the caveat that the adults around them never acknowledged the reality of what was being lost. Grieving was put aside as if to protect the “innocent.” Sadly. For both spouse and children, sadness and loss need language even as hope is still in the picture. However long the journey, the button of emotional expression should not be on mute, in The Coupledom or with other family. Again, the depth of the bond is revealed and nourished in the moments of shared grieving. These moments remembered when the loved one is gone can ease the pain because of what was shared with them along the way: something real, mutual and honest.
Unexpected Loss: Tragic unexpected death is the ultimate “blind-sided” experience. Rips open the heart and leaves speechless the surviving partner. The staggering impossibility. Shock and groping. What makes this experience so bafflingly cruel is the absence of preparation, no file in the emotional cabinet for this loss. Blankness and blindness, and the person who might provide the light to find the way is the one who is gone. Here is where the community of family and friends need to wrap themselves around the naked survivor who has no map for this experience. No map at all. Each day, in ways that match the needs of the widowed, a path of small steps is sketched in, a new reality slowly traced out alongside the grieving process. The personal identity that the partnership formerly provided is overthrown in a moment and something new that identifies “me” has to be born, over time, with the support and love of others. This will take time. Yesterday I was a wife, a husband, a lover. Today I am a widow, a widower, alone.
Small steps: Each day, baby steps mark the way towards a tolerable reality. Unexpected loss strips the survivor of their confidence in the predictability of life and this can be quite debilitating. Rebuilding a trust in the everyday world might take some professional help as well as the passage of time. Time is a paradox in loss. It is time whose excruciating tred moves so slowly along in the grieving process and yet it is time whose gentle hand can be so healing.
Our Coupledom Life: When we sign on for the shared life, written in invisible ink along the margins of the contract to love another is the profound truth: one of our twosome will depart first. Does that keep us from love? Hardly. Loss is life’s most consistent theme. If you need a hand to guide you when you are faced with the unfathomable, seek out family, friends or experts. Don’t totter alone. This deepest of all human emotions needs company.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2012
The Singledom Blues
The Suitable Other: I have been asked by folks, who are negotiating the worlds of post-divorce, widowhood, breakups and unwanted celibacy, to share some thoughts on The Singledom, a phrase used here to encompass a life in search of the suitable other.
What’s New Under The Dating Sun? Mainly the pace and the method of contact. With online sites offering opportunities to screen and meet up in numbers hitherto unheard of, hopes and disappointments come with a new rapidity and frequency. Yet, the themes that emerge from the subscribers are oddly familiar, taking me back thirty and forty years to the dark ages of Singledom when reliance on a blind date or chance encounter in a classroom, party or bar was all you had. Disappointment, hurt, bewilderment, humiliation and anger lace most of the conversation when women from thirty to seventy years of age describe their experiences with men of interest. The men have a different spin on the disappointment aspect, rationalizations that are more oriented toward preserving their self-esteem, often summed up in the phrase “Where are all the women?” which reads to me “Where are all the women who want me?”
No One Is Getting Any Smarter: What emerges from decades of clinical and personal listening is the sense that no one is getting any smarter about this Singledom search. How come? When women are shocked and indignant that a male, with whom they have spent time and promised to call, doesn’t, I think of the opening scene in the movie “He’s Just Not That Into You.” Shifting from varying cultures and languages, an African village with a bunch of women squatting together over a fire, a subway station in China, several females in each scene are chatting away about why the guy hasn’t called or gotten back to one of them. Excuses abound. “He has been eaten by a tiger; he is shy; he is overwhelmed by your beauty.” Hilarious! Accurate. Finally, the real explanation emerges in the movie (taken from a book of the same name); “He’s just not that into you.” That’s it! Embrace this motto as the first step toward liberation. Denying that possibility because it appears at first glance so personally shattering means missing an opportunity to get “smarter.” It dumbs you right down to a level of ignorance that has to stem from some basic primal female instinct that warns, “He has to want me. There may not be another male around. He could be it. He has to want me.”
Survival of the species? Must be. Nothing else explains the steadfast attachment to the illusory thinking that a man, often a virtual stranger, can be worthy of so much speculation, projection and pain. While women embrace a personal explanation to the disappearance of the seemingly interested male, men utilize a different defense. Perhaps here again the primal survival strategy requires other artillery. What I hear from men eschews a personal interpretation, relying more on the deficits in the women who don’t show interest rather than imperfections in their male presentation. Perhaps the woman is money-hungry and they are not rich enough. That’s her problem. Perhaps the woman is too good-looking and not interested. Well, that is her problem too. Rather than driven to their knees in self-abasement and humiliation, the men rapidly move on. Is this a survival tool, find another cave, another gal and sow your seeds before the woolly mammoth or the next ice age gets you? No time to ponder or worry. For the man, there is always another woman around the bend, and if she too falls short of recognizing his worth, well, move on to cave number 3.
Mastery: A forceful dynamic in human survival, physical and emotional, is the drive to “master” challenges and overcome setbacks. Mastery might take the form of turning a stick into a weapon to master fear of the charging boar and puncture its chest. In the face of personal rejection, mastery might involve creating an acceptable scenario that explains the lack of interest on the part of a potential mate. Better to believe that he or she has taken ill than that they have forgotten about you the minute they left your apartment. Or suppose that perhaps you are too threatening; they are too shy; their mother died; the cat ate the cell phone charger; they are superficial and you weren’t rich enough. They were already dating when you met them, but lied.
Waylaid By Self-Doubt Or Trawling The Internet: However, time spent on weaving tales of courage or cowardice, loss or insecurity might be better expended on almost anything else, baking a cake, feeding the poor, or writing an opera. What I have noticed is that while women are waylaid by self-doubts and childlike disbelief, men have moved on to trawling the Internet for potential mates who will appreciate them. Rejection for the male seems to be a mere detour, but for the female a paralyzing blockade. My advice to women remains the same: spend time searching out a hobby of interest, a passion for fencing, being valued for nurturing the homeless, the elderly, or a renewed interest in needlepoint. Anything but spending hours worrying the mind about why someone didn’t call, or prowling the dot-com romance sites to find someone new. Addiction to online dating sites is one of the most common symptoms of a neurotic obsession with rejection and magical thinking. Going nowhere but down in the Nasty Singledom life.
To Dream the Impossible Dream: Is it the Don Quixote in each of us who gallops forth on a romantic quest? What motivates both genders, despite their contrasting defenses, to search for the suitable mate? To face the vicissitudes of challenging the Nasty Singledom? Is it simply the biological urge to be fruitful and multiply? No, it cannot be just that, or the seventy-year-olds would have stopped the search decades earlier. Women think that men never outgrow their need for sex and the one-night stand. Men are convinced that women love chains, especially around the ankles of their mates. But I have another idea.
There Seems To Be A Burning Yearning In Our Being To Share: Sharing. Yes, sharing the sunset, the sundown, the sunburn, the sunflower. Sharing everything from a great crème brulee to walking a pooch on the beach or recycling the water bottles. What hurts most when one loses a love is that vacancy…when there is something to share, no one is there. Even the most delightful moments can be filled with a profound aching pain because no true mate, for better or worse, in sickness or health, is there to say, “WOW! that is really something.” This absence hurts like hell…even when one rids oneself of a poisonous partner, the longing for someone new with whom to share crops up quickly, sometimes before the dust settles over the divorce papers.
He/She Loves To Share Too: Women are not men. Really? And their defenses are different. But strangely enough both genders have a common need, the need to share. Rather than ponder why someone disappears, ponder what you love to do, and go out and do it. Someone will be there eventually to share in the doing with you. That is our quest, the impossible dream come true…the hand that wraps around yours and takes the path with you. Waste not a moment on who isn’t here. Move along to your next moment of pleasure. He/She might be there too.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
Normalizing Love: The Gay Coupledom Gets Married
Love On The Margins of Society: New York State did it. They legalized same-sex marriage on Friday, becoming the sixth state in the country to do so, and the largest. The significance for same-sex couples who have endured loving on the margins of society’s approval is enormous. For some, civil unions may be sufficient or preferred. The French more and more are turning towards civil unions. But Americans are a fairly traditional group and sanctioned love still has its allure.
Something More: A gay male couple, with whom I have worked for several years, captures the meaning of this moment for many. They had a long-standing relationship, shared a home and were deeply involved with each other’s families, including the daughter of one of them, yet struggling at times with whether the commitment was truly solid. The themes were no different from heterosexual couples; both working too much, not enough quality time together, difficulty communicating feelings, family of origin issues, sexual chasms. The sessions were similar as well; setting aside time to be together, developing greater empathy and understanding, avoiding triangles, working on the sexual disconnect. But with one difference: their alliance resided in a sort of limbo. What exactly was it? Two males hanging out under one roof, sharing mortgage payments and meals? Or something more?
Permission To Be Normal: Then a critical impasse occurred and an emergency session was called. The couple came in and once again reiterated what was not working, with greater urgency than ever as someone was about to jump ship. As with many couples today, their visits with me were infrequent, using work demands as the rational for the customary avoidance of things that make us anxious, such as dealing with Coupledom issues. After some preliminary exploration, what emerged was one of the partner’s deep hurt at feeling neglected and taken for granted, which up until that point, had been expressed only as anger, and once translated into the pain at the base of the anger, a tenderness and caring emerged between the pair. That was all. Except for one added piece.
An Old Married Couple: When the usual panoply of coupledom inertia unfolded in the session, I threw out that they sounded like any old married couple, at that crossroads of familiarity and stale repetition, and that they needed to energize the relationship with some joint creativity and stimulation. What I didn’t know was that this interjection was the pivot that turned the process in a new direction.
A New Day: Months later I received an invitation to their wedding reception. I was floored. I had no idea they were even thinking of marrying. It never came up in the sessions at all, though the state of Connecticut legalized same sex marriage in 2008. Off to the reception I go, gift in hand. Therapists are not generally invited to or even approve of attending patients’ milestones but this was one that I wouldn’t miss. After the warm greetings, one of the partners whispered to me, “It was you, you are the reason we did this.” Me? Well indirectly perhaps, as the therapist. No, more simple than that. “When you said we were just like any old married couple, that did it! ” Wow! So there you have it. What meant the most to both was that their love was just like anyone else’s and their right to sanction it, equally so.
Permission To Love: For my couple, the words “like any old married couple” permitted them to take their love to next the place, legitimizing the bond. As New York’s Governor Cuomo was heard saying to someone “Their love is worth the same as your love,” Pow!
Who Judges Love Anyway? In conversations the world around, people ponder what is behind the love and marriage choices of others. “How could she marry him?” “What does he see in her?” “How have these two stayed together all these years?” Who judges the love between two people? The new term out there is marriage equality; equality is the operative term. How you treat your partner is at the heart of the alliance of two souls. Nothing else should matter. Nothing else really does matter. Hopefully our society is figuring that out, slowly but surely. Fingers crossed.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
Interracial and Interfaith Marriage: Triangle Traps?
Triangle Hell: Diane Farr’s piece “Bringing Home The Wrong Race” (the title alone speaks volumes) in the New York Times Sunday is a telling tale of a journey between worlds fueled by love. Ms. Farr, actress, author and caucasian, describes her courtship with Seung Chung, who is of Korean descent. I was intrigued by their united approach to Ms. Farr’s first “introduction” to Mr. Chung’s parents given that Mr. Chung revealed that his parents were adamant about their son marrying someone of Korean descent. Rather than letting that challenge create fissures, it bound them together in common cause. Apparently that first meeting lead to a future replete in children and close relationships with in-laws.
Family No No’s: However, more compelling than this “happy ending” of what could have been a road to heartbreak was Ms. Farr’s conversations with her peers regarding their families’ attitudes toward interracial and interfaith marriage. No matter the race, religion or political bent (her friends’ families were primarily of the liberal persuasion), adult children reported admonishment and even threats by parents if they chose a partner from a group parents marked as taboo. Ms. Farr noted that many families were several generations “American,” the melting pot of the world, yet still held strong beliefs regarding marital choices. For a variety of reasons, whether related to historic rivalries and wars between countries of origin, or tough experiences growing up in neighborhoods where racial clashes, or economic discrepancies lead to ugly encounters, seemingly fair-minded folk revealed some pretty deep-seated biases that were flung at maturing offspring.
Poisonous Triangles In The Making: As I read along, I thought, what a perfect triangle trap for couples. In a previous post I described the dangers of triangulation, where a third issue, person, or passion becomes a divisive force in The Coupledom. Side stepping such traps is a cornerstone to a healthy relationship but takes some clever maneuvering and an alert Coupledom. An interracial or interfaith alliance for life, if the families of origin register open disapproval or insinuate feelings of superiority, can provide just the wedge to cause erosion in The Coupledom. We see it all the time. Families even of the same race and religion may compete for the “better grandparent” medal of honor, or greatest holiday traditions, or superior something or other. And it is the very wise Coupledom who unites around what can often be almost laughable biases, archaic belief systems, and character flaws of family members.
Can Grandchildren Save The Day? Any belief system from family of origin that becomes fractious in The Coupledom needs deconstructing and questioning, whether it be religious, racial, philosophical or pragmatic. Inheriting a prejudice and striving to overcome it in the early days of courtship or after vows are taken, when it becomes clear that poisons of prejudice are being injected into marital veins, is critical. Can grandchildren influence and change old biases? Actually, I think so. I have seen grandparents, whom I never thought would accept an alien culture, embrace their mixed race grandchildren with unrestrained adoration, even developing friendships with the “in-laws.” It is a joy to witness and speaks to the flexibility of the human heart. But I wouldn’t wait for the grandchildren to unite the families. It may be too late for the scarring that a triangulated relationship can inflict. Couples who are facing attitudes similar to those of Ms. Farr and Mr. Cheung need careful thought applied to how to keep their bond and yet deal fairly and intelligently with their parents and potential in-laws.
The Changing World Of Love: We see it everywhere. In the malls, on T.V. sitcoms, talk shows, everywhere we go: folks whose skin tones are different are marrying each other like crazy. Just remember to take a page out of Avoiding Triangle Traps when you do it. Carry The Coupledom with dignity wherever you go.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W. L.C.S.W. 2011
Great Couples Therapy: Takes Muscle
What Does It Take: Great couples therapy…what does that mean? Couples who are great in therapy? Couples therapy with a great therapist? Great outcome to couples therapy? Here I mean the therapy couple who hunkers down and does the work with grit, fortitude and risk. It is awesome to observe.
A Profile of Great Couples: Over the years I have pondered the question, what are the shared characteristics amongst The Coupledoms with whom I have worked, who managed to move marital boulders in therapy? There is a kind of muscle that allows some to return each week to the room that strips them of their normal defenses, and pushes the truth out of their psychological insides. Gosh, it sounds more like a surgical theater, or a colonoscopy than a banal office with a couch, a chair, a desk and some windows. What is that muscle?
A Marital Probe Of Sorts: My style is to work deeply and intensively with couples, often putting in sequential sessions in one visit. The result is that however defended folks are when they walk in the door, walls up and pistols loaded, by the time they leave, we have broken through to the heart. It takes all that time to unearth the miscommunications and old wounds that lie like plaque on the marital wall, and to eek out the beginnings of mutual empathy.
Assumptions Tumble and Surprises Spill Out: One thing is certain, couples cannot read each other’s minds or intentions. The assumptions that are made are frequently off the mark, and not infrequently, downright contrary to the partner’s thinking or motivation. In fact, couples have a way of accusing each other of lying, because what their partner owns does not match up with what they have convinced themselves is true. When they disbelieve, reality testing is in order: “Do you think she/he is liar?” I ask. And when the answer is “not really,” then we move to further exploration. Either the partner is acting out something that stems from a more subconscious locale, or their spouse has to adjust their assumptions, check their “projections” and family history and question fast held beliefs. But all this takes time, focus and motivation.
How Do You Mend A Broken Heart? In couples work, hopefully together. The muscles required from The Coupledom are:
Curiosity; Individuals who find uncovering and understanding the workings of their psyche or their partner’s relevant and stimulating are well suited for the process of deepening mutual understanding.
Endurance or Stamina; Couples therapy is quite a work out. Emotions long suppressed push up with force and can be frightening at first. Folks try to retain some composure even as they cry or fight back, exerting enormous willpower to ward of the full punch of their hurt or anger, guilt, humiliation or fear. Folks often leave my office a trifle dazed, or even dazzled by the power of the process. And many are just plumb worn out. The Coupledom who sees value in that effort, weathering the emotional storms, fares well. It brings to mind how a visit to India is often described, ”It is not for the faint-hearted but it is well worth it.”
Humor: The ability to laugh at oneself and at some of the antics of The Coupledom is a critical muscle that needs exercising and strengthening throughout the therapy. When I see a couple who still has some shared humor, whose members exchange a look or a smirk of mutual understanding, whether it be about an in-law, the children, each other or the dog, I am heartened; there is some friendship remaining in this Coupledom. Let’s breathe life into it. The stronger that muscle, the brighter the future.
Flexibility of Mind: This is critical. Rigidity of thinking is like a really stiff muscle with no give. It impedes movement. A key ingredient to personal growth is flexibility of thought. To heal The Coupledom, growth has to occur. Perceptions and long-held belief systems will need to be explored, questioned, perhaps modified or changed. For example, if your family of origin approached holidays in a set fashion, and your partner has new ideas, the more able each to flex and be open to accommodate a mutual goal, the healthier the Coupledom. A limber mind, as with a limber leg muscle, has the stretch needed for the challenge…of growing together rather than apart.
Delayed Gratification: The quick fix doesn’t work here. Most couples I see have been together for years and years. There are a lot of layers of scar tissue to peel back, and much plaque of pain to scrape off the heart walls. Process is everything. Couples with the muscle to handle the slow fix, and who can wrap themselves around the notion of time as an ally in the healing process, are more able to do the work of ”great couples therapy” than those who have difficulty with more abstract goals and nuanced changes.
Mutual Investment As Muscle: There is no perfect balance in any Coupledom, in therapy or out. One partner may be more pro-active about engaging in the therapeutic process. The other may actually be more patient once the process begins. Someone who leans toward self-reflection may collect observations and insights for each session; someone else may cruise between sessions, hoping that nothing bad means all is good. One partner always walks in with an agenda. The other is often surprised to hear that. What counts is the sum of the parts; that is what wins the day here. The investment in a possible future for their Coupledom, whether because love still burns, and there has to be enough of a smolder of embers to catch a new flame, or the love that is born out of loving others, the children, or the shared life, the extended family, the desire not to lose all that has been built up over decades. These mutual investments are invaluable and provide the muscle to do the work, to stay the course and make the tough stuff of therapy worthwhile.
The Match Is Muscle Too: Now that I have described what characteristics make up Great Couples Therapy, The Coupledom with muscle to do the work, I must add that the team of three, the couple plus the therapist, has to have a chemistry too, a good enough cocktail that provides the punch and power to sustain the effort. That team can be one heck of a powerhouse, moving boulders that block marital happiness. Hard work for all but worth it.
Keeping The Couples Therapy Muscle In Shape: There are many couples who come back to therapy whenever their Coupledom gets derailed by some unforeseen challenge, or life passage. Once they have built up the muscle for couples work, it is theirs to keep in the relationship, to use day-to-day, to keep toned. If occasionally, toning up means coming back in, why not? No shame in that game. Not to me.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
Great Father/Great Mother: Failed Coupledom?
The New Yorker Captures The Coupledom: If ever you need a visual for what is happening to your Coupledom, pick up several copies of the New Yorker Magazine, and flip through the pages. Inevitably you will find the very image that corresponds to your moment. I did. While preparing my thoughts for this post, this cartoon caught my eye: it was in the April 4. 2011 issue, the one with Koren’s animal world waiting for a subway at the 59th Street station. I don’t even know if I have to use words.
A Disclaimer? Is it only in my therapeutic chambers, or in those of my colleagues as well, that a couple begins their visit by declaring that their partner is a great parent to their children? “She is a great mother”. “He is a wonderful father.” I do not quite get this. If this person is sufficiently caring, loving, available and interactive with your child, does he/she enter a phone booth and change into a different costume with you? Apparently so.
Cartoon taken from The New Yorker, April 4, 2011, by Harry Bliss (click image to see full size)
Magnetic Moment: In the above cartoon a wife spells out “I Want A Divorce” using her children’s alphabet magnets to alert her drowsy mate of the impending demise of their Coupledom: WAKE UP MAN, IT’S OVER! It appears that their shared life has been over for some time, except where it concerns the children.
The Child Focused Generation: I grew up in the fifties and early sixties, when a couples’ success at parenting was measured by how well their children’s behavior matched up with the phrase: seen and not heard. Parents went out, children stayed in. Parties were one generational, the adult ones at night, the children’s relegated to daytime hours, and attended almost exclusively by children. What an idea! Generational boundaries were tight. Too tight in my opinion. Then the mid-sixties came along and shifted our realities, morphed into the seventies with the women’s movement bending parenting away from the cuddly notion of stay-at-home moms, and finally settled down in the eighties when fathers were drawn into the child rearing picture… a change that introduced the expectation that dads were important to their children; a truly joyous and beneficial shift for all. Joint child rearing became the norm and began to define The Coupledom. For those of us who parented late, the distinction between how we were raised, and how our peer group of parents were approaching child rearing was striking.
Balancing Parenting With Partnering: The Honey Do List: About fifteen years ago a friend’s hubby responded to my inquiry regarding his plans for the weekend with the comment: “I was given the honey do list”. This phrase was new to me at the time but over the years has become for me a symbol of an unhealthy trend in The Coupledom. Parenting dominates the coupledom communication, sometimes for decades, depending on the numbers of offspring. Moms and Dads are worker bees who coordinate carpooling, shopping, coaching and homework. The race to be the parents of the year consumes almost every waking hour. Traveling dads or moms return home to a to do list, rather than a hug. It is the divide and conquer approach… and divide is the word. Battle scarred and estranged, couples limp into my office fatigued by the child rearing journey and often filled with pent-up rage and hurt towards their partner. What failed here?
Keeping Up With The Joneses: In the old days that meant trying to look as rich as your neighbors. I am sure that remains true even today. But there is another level of competition and status in our culture which is child focused. Today’s parents are variations on the Tiger Mom, even if it is with an American twist. To that end, children are signed up for teams, choruses, tutoring, internships and volunteer work around the clock. And who gets them there? Who checks on their homework, their backpacks, and makes sure that they practice piano or study for the SAT? The Coupledom. So the mom who tells you that her husband is a great dad, will also tell you that he is totally shut down to her; that he is never romantic but insists on sex. That he dismisses her feelings and withdraws into his work. And the husband who proclaims that his wife is a devoted mom also mentions that this very same woman doesn’t see him. That all she wants is for him to help her out with the kids. That he walks in the door, and she glares at him for not coming home sooner, or taking out the garbage or remembering to pick up the milk. Frankly, I think they are all exhausted, pressured beyond love to feel mostly exploited or invisible.
Boundaries: The children have consumed the parents and we have let them. Generational boundaries of the fifties have some merit….with distinct modifications. I would never want to go back to those times for very selfish reasons: I think our parents missed out. Spending a great deal of time with our children is enormous fun and chock full of vicarious pleasure. Sharing childrearing with our spouses can create profound bonds. But The Coupledom can get seriously neglected, dangerously neglected. Magnets on the fridge spell out “Beware.” How can I explain this, knowing that paying for baby sitters is expensive and exhaustion in those early child rearing years is pervasive, but here it is: If you don’t take the time to check in on each other, take the pulse of the relationship and make your partner a real person to you again, who also has value outside of the scope of the family business, then you may find those very same magnets on your refrigerator door: this partnership is over.
The Ways and Means Of Remaining Meaningful: I have written a host of posts related to preserving The Coupledom. Take a peek through the contents page and pick out the post that resonates. Rule of thumb though is that if you no longer see your partner as a person in his/her own light, but mainly as an aid or a deterrent to managing children and finances, then drop all else and reacquaint yourself with the other. Walks, talks, listening and inquiring: “what’s up with you? what’s important to you? hello in there.”
Children Are Great, But With All Good Luck, They Leave Home, Leave You and Leave Your Coupledom: Let’s hope that Coupledom is still viable.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
Like this:
Kate and William: The Royal Coupledom
Love In The Limelight: It is difficult to know which combination is more challenging: a coupledom where both parties are super famous as in Brangelina; one party is famous and the other unknown, by contrast, as is the case of Kate and William; or both parties are famous but one is a superstar; an example of this is Paul Newman, whose spouse Joanne wisely chose to take a back seat to stardom, ensuring the safety of their Coupledom.
The Royal Guarantee: Kate and William have a distinct difference from the general run of famous coupledoms. Neither has to earn a living. Neither has to keep cranking out photo ops nor publicity stunts to keep their fame. With the Royal Coupledom, some of the pressures of more plebian couples are fortunately absent. Financial support including housing and child care cannot qualify as genuine concerns. And unannounced visits from the in-laws can be ruled out for sure. Keeping up with the Joneses should be a no-brainer.
The Royal Pressures: What will be their pressures? The need to breed…and birth an heir to the throne, likely to be fairly easy; to appear at events smiling, dressed appropriately with seemingly earnest interest in the “people;” and the appearance of sufficient regard for each other, at least in public.
A Typical Coupledom: Kate and William have friendship in their favor, history, a shared peer group as well as an alma mater. Attending college reunions together will not be a problem. They may have already experienced a short bout of premarital couples counseling, rumor has it, and hopefully absorbed the basic tenets of healthy coupling such as mutual respect and flexible roles. But the key to nailing down a secure future as a married couple requires more. They will need to find each other of interest for decades to come, off the throne or on the throne. And that is not easy, especially if the roles that they have to embrace are rigid, gender restrictive and repetitive.
The Spin Has It: The media is casting this couple as quite modern, liberated and easy with each other. Very unlike Diana and Charles. But once the doors close on the wedding carriage and the coupledom becomes a family business, this twosome will have to be creative and truly protective of that third entity, The Coupledom. How that entity will fare next to the importance of the kingdom remains to be seen. One or both of the team will need to keep an eye on the basic tenets of a good marriage: keep it interesting; grow and expand your knowledge and share it with your partner; listen and try to think what it feels like to be he or she (King or Queen to be); fight for the Us as well as the I; and ensure that each partner parents the offspring.
Paul and Joanne: Paul Newman chose an excellent second wife, a woman who understood the movie business, being in it herself. And a woman who understood the importance of family, the dangers of fame, and the need to get out of Hollywood and settle the family in a place with space and something else going on besides the movie biz. Kate and William won’t have that option. It’s one castle or another for them. But if someone of the twosome has a handle on those essential earthy values of relationship and family, even with tiaras and swords, they may become an amazing model for a mature coupledom in a Kingdom that could use it. We have Michelle and Barack. Let’s see if the British can pull off a true matching of equal partners who can take turns on stage and off stage, with generosity and mutual support. This will be fun to watch.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
The Coupledom: Is It Too Late?
Inspiration: This post was inspired by a friend. He calls it “Nurture the Coupledom.” He and his wife arranged for their child to be left with grandparents for her first overnight to enable them to ”go out”, as in a “date.” I could hear his pride both in his daughter’s readiness for this big step and in being that couple who cares for itself.
Too Late? In contrast, many of the couples who come into my office have been married for years and years, raising children, paying bills, and losing their Coupledom each step of the way. It gets a back burner position to work, kids, house cleaning, in-laws, volunteer jobs, girlfriends and golf dates. Is it too late? Sometimes it is.
Ego: Western society has been celebrated and chastised for being the culture of I: narcissistic or egoistic or egotistical. Baby formula is mixed with vitamin success, personal achievement, and self-expression. When we partner, we convert the I into we, but a we that includes a very ambitious I.
Here’s the story: We meet, we marry, we agree on career choices and numbers of children, more or less. And then it all spirals out of control. why? We get caught up with the I: “bread-winner” I, mothering I, community I, overworked I, angry I, sexually frustrated I, overweight I. And the “us” which is not easy for us “westerners” in the best of circumstances, devolves into an unrecognizable “it” that doesn’t work anymore.
And Your Point? Don’t wait! Couples come in after ten, fifteen, twenty years of feeling disengaged or enraged. This slow-growing mold accrues over time, slips in between the bed sheets, oozes into the walls while you are busy being a “family” but not a couple. I know this is easy to say but hard to do. Someone in The Coupledom is sending out distress signals, even verbalizing “we are in trouble;” perhaps it is a whisper or just a thought never shared, or one of The Coupledom called a therapist, made an appointment but the partner refused to go.
Groans of Regret: Scared, you bet, so nothing happens. Or he goes but she won’t. So only so much can really change. Or they both go but neither likes the therapist. “Waste of time and money.” Fine. But don’t stop. There are lots of therapists out there. It is money, they say, or magical thinking (it will get better when the kids leave, we get richer, I lose weight, he loses weight, the mother-in-law moves out, we move back home), or fear that “I will get blamed, be less able to defend, have to acknowledge an addiction, an affair; the kids will find out and get scared.” I have heard so many groans of regret in my office: “If only we had done this ten years ago.”
Nurture the Coupledom: Too late are two of the saddest words we can utter as a Coupledom. If one of you, one I, thinks there is a problem, then there is a problem. One I is all you need to have an unhappy coupledom. Don’t dismiss. Fix.
©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011
