If we want our relationships to be successful, then we need to constantly be working on them. Jen and Sara talk about some research-based dos and don'ts to help strengthen the couple relationship based on John Gottman's book Seven Principles of Marriage. You wont want to miss this episode!
Listen here:
Can't Listen? Read the Transcription Here:
Jen: Hello and welcome to the Parents Place, a podcast put out by the Family Place for parents to develop skills that will strengthen families and provide tools that will help each of us in our parenting efforts. No matter our skills, we can always use reminders that help us work towards a safer, happier home. I'm your host. Jennifer Daly, the education director at the Family Place and my co-host is Sara Hendricks, a family educator at the Family Place. Every week, we will interview professionals that will provide valuable information that will make a difference when you apply it directly to your life. Thank you for joining us. Now, let's get started with today's episode.
Sara: Welcome to the Parents Place podcast, I'm your host, Sara Hendricks
Jen: I'm your co-host Jen Daly
Sara: Today, Jen and I would like to talk to you about strengthening the couple's relationship and what really can help our marriages and our relationships with our partners be stronger and healthier.
Jen: All of the information that we're going to be sharing today is taken from John Gottman’s book Seven Principles of Marriage. Now he's a big researcher in this area and has done a lot of studies and working with people. And he has come up with some really good tips and information to help strengthen our relationships. So, one of his things that his research shows is that it's the small daily acts of caring that can predict strong marriages. Now he's gotten really good at predicting if people are going to head towards divorce or if they're going to be able to, you know, continue on and strengthen their relationships. And so, this is one of those things, those daily small acts of caring that can help our marriages.
Sara: Well, and what I like about that is, are you in a relationship because you love each other or are you just roommates living together? And so those small daily things that we're doing together shows the other person that we care about them and that we want our relationship to work.
Jen: I think some examples of those small things that we can do, I mean, you know, maybe they're in a hurry in the morning and they can't put their dishes in the sink after breakfast. So, you go ahead and you take those dishes to the sink or that one time, you know, my husband does. This gets ready for bed and his clothes go right next to the hamper instead of in the hamper. So just instead of, you know, yelling about it or getting upset with him, I bend over and I pick him up and I put him in the hamper. So, it's those small little things that can make a huge difference in our marriages and relationships.
Sara: Mm-Hmm. One thing that my husband and I every single day we tell each other, we love each other. We never miss a day of saying those words to each other so that we never question if the other loves us.
Jen: We do the same thing and we never leave the house without giving the other one just a quick kiss goodbye. So, it's those little things of when we get off the phone, it's always All right. I love you. Goodbye. Mm-Hmm. And to me, I've thought several times, you know, that's so great because of something horrible happens to me on my drive home because I do have an hour drive home. I know I've told him I love him and he's told me, so I don't have to question or if something does happen, I'm sitting there in a car accident or something, and I'm thinking I didn't tell him I loved him. I don't have to wonder about those things, so that's a huge little thing that we do. I think also we need to remember that if we do have a negative within the day that we counteract that negative and they say five positives for every one negative, it's the same with kids. But any human being, if you have a negative interaction, let's make sure that we're doing five positive things for that person to kind of counteract that one negative interaction we had.
Sara: So, speaking of negativity, we know that conflict is always part of a relationship that we don't agree on every single thing. So, having conflict, it's not a predictor of divorce. It's how we handle our conflict that is going to either help or hurt our relationship.
Jen: No relationship is ever going to get away with never having any conflict that's just not humanly possible where they're always going to have some kind of disagreement. But things that we need to be concerned about or aware of when we are having these hard conversations. And this is what John Gottman calls the :Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse”. And those four warning signs is number one criticism. If we are in our disagreement or argument and we're using criticism like you always or you never. Or whatever that criticism may look like, that can be very detrimental to our relationship.
Sara: The next one on the list is defensiveness. I mean, if you think about when somebody is criticizing you, you instantly go into defending yourself and being defensive of the things that they're saying.
Jen: You can almost literally see that little wall being built up of I'm not going to let it in or I'm going to start now protecting myself, and when we protect ourselves, we kind of lash out sometimes.
Sara: And the conversation is no longer productive. If we're being defensive, we're not responding in a productive way. We're just trying to defend ourselves.
Jen: Mm-Hmm. The next one is contempt or sarcasm. Now this one's a tough one for me because I like sarcasm. But I think if you're doing it during an argument that is a no go, it should not be used there. It's not appropriate. And this is where we start rolling her eyes, looking away. You know, just not being there. And I would also say, like, the “Whatevers” drive me nuts.
Sara: The last one is withdrawn. And this is when you're no longer interested in the conversation. You're no longer participating. You're disengaged and disconnected from the things that are being said. And so again, the is no longer productive when we're in this state of mind.
Jen: I think that can also happen within the marriage if you just withdraw and you're not actively participating within your marriage. And John Gottman has said that marriages most often end in a whisper rather than a shout because one person has withdrawn from the relationship. So, I think we need to know how we can have these hard conversations with our partners because they are going to come up. And so, it's all about how we approach the conversation. And so here are some destructive ways of starting a conversation. And so, the first one, of course, we talked about defensiveness already, but statements that's going to put them on the defensive stop and think before we speak. Would this make me defensive or upset? And if it would, then we need to rethink how we're going to approach that conversation.
Sara: Another destructive conversation starter is over generalization. And so just thinking of the example Jen gave earlier about the laundry next to the basket, saying something like “You always put your clothes on the floor or you never put your clothes in the basket”, that's probably not true. There are probably times that those clothes do end up in the basket, and so over generalizing is a fast way to knock that conversation off track.
Jen: Mm-Hmm. As women are really good at this next one, it's mind reading. We always think that our partners are able to read our minds, and I wish they could. I mean, I wish people could just take what's in my brain and understand. So, I don't have to try to explain it because sometimes what's in my brain and what comes out of my mouth are completely two or different things, so my reading would be a great one. But it's not a reality. So, we need to not expect our partners to be able to read our minds.
Sara: Another one is using put downs, so we really want to avoid putting our partner down or saying things in a joking manner because oftentimes we're just speaking the truth, how we actually feel and just trying to soften it by making it into a joke or see how they react. And then just say, I was just kidding. You know, and so we want to be really careful of that, that we're not putting the other person down.
Jen: Yeah, that's a surefire way of putting someone on the defensive. But also, I mean, we love this person. And here we're going to call them bad names. I mean, that's just doesn't match and we need to make sure that we're not putting those are using those put downs with the ones that we love the most.
Sara: It's really disrespectful, and I would hope that we respect our partners enough to not use name calling.
Jen: Another one is Guni-sacking, so this is another thing that I think now we're probably all good at. This is just carrying that sack around of all of the things that someone has done wrong. So, sticking it in there and saying this'll be good for the next fight of then bringing up the last five years of all of the mistakes they've made in this one argument that we're having, we don't want a gunny sack. No one likes their past mistakes to be brought up. And so, leaving them there and just focusing on what is happening or what the problem is right then and that moment.
Sara: Especially if it's something that you and your partner have worked through what that past mistake was and you've forgiven and moved on, but then you throw it back in their face. The next time something happens, it makes it really hard to be able to grow and move on from those things if we're bringing them up again and again. So, the last one is annoying modes of delivery. How we say something is often more conflict inducing than what we're saying.
Jen: Your tone. I think that is the biggest thing. Your tone and how you deliver something. Mm hmm. You know, you hear people when they're upset with their partners and they use a term of endearment, but it's in that whiny voice and that just rubs me the wrong way. It's like nails on the chalkboard, someone going, honey, oh my gosh, drives me crazy. But you, I think using those terms of endearment during an argument in that annoying tone is not the best way to handle our conversation.
Sara: So, an example just came to me of how delivery could be really annoying or upsetting and condescending. You know, like if we're speaking in this way of like, “Oh dear, did you forget to put your clothes in the hamper again?” You know, like kind of that condescending sort of tone that would be really annoying and upsetting. And instantly you would tune that person out if that's how they're talking to you,
Jen: Because not only using that tone, but you're also using sarcasm a little bit and there as well. Yeah. So yeah, it's kind of like when you're talking to your two-year-old.
Sara: Yes. And nobody wants to be talked down to, and that's definitely how that would feel. So, I think it's important to say that when it comes to conflict and the things that are bothering us in our relationship, this doesn't mean that we nitpick every single little thing. I still think we need to pick our battles and decide what things we can live with and allow those things to pass and not nitpick every single little thing.
Jen: I often think about how we treat our friends and what we allow our friends to get away with versus what we allow our partners to get away with. We tend to nitpick at our partners, but we need to be more like how we're treating our friends of. OK, I can let that go. I can live with that. I know she's a crazy driver, but she's never been in an accident and I'm not going to get angry at her for being a crazy driver. But if I were to be with that like that with my husband and I am sometimes of “You need to slow down around the corners, you need to slow down when you're going into a parking lot”. I always remind him of those things, and that's got to be frustrating to him because I wouldn't do that to a friend. I wouldn't correct that are driving that way. So, I think if we can treat our partners more like we treat our friends and picking our battles and letting those little things go by, then our relationship is going to be that much better. Mm hmm. I agree. I think lots of times we think we can change that person if we're telling them everything that they're doing wrong. But really, what we're doing is just hurting our relationship because we can't make people change. Right? I think if we remember, we've talked a lot about stress before and how the brain reacts when we're stressed or angry and how our body is flooded with those hormones that shut down those parts of our brain are thinking brain. So, when we're in the situation, our brain is going to be cloudy and it's not functioning properly. So, when we're upset, we need to take a step back and wait. We can wait and talk about this when we're both settled down. That is the best time to talk about it is when you're both not angry or having your body flooded with those hormones. You know, lots of people used to say one of the best marriage advice is never go to bed angry. Well, I'm going to say nay “nay nay”, go to bed angry.
Sara: Go to bed!
Jen: There are lots of times. The next day you wake up and you're like, Oh, OK, that was really silly. And that doesn't mean we disregard it. But we can still say, “You know what, honey? Sorry, I was being silly or I wasn't thinking clearly” whatever the case may be, but lots of times that going to bed angry is the best thing that you can do.
Sara: Well, and oftentimes if we're having conflict before bed, we're also tired and that just adds to our emotions. And so, go to bed, get a good night's rest and then readdress that after you've slept it off. I love the visual of a glitter jar. I don't know if you've ever seen one where the glitter is all settled at the bottom and if we. Allow this to represent what our brains are like. With that glitter at the bottom, that's our brain calm. But then if we shake up the jar and the glitter is going all crazy through the jar, that's what our brains are like when we're feeling stressed. We have those hormones shooting around in our brain and we can't think clearly. And so, I often say when I'm feeling stressed that I'm in my glitter brain, but I have glitter going through my brain right now. I can't have this conversation. It's too much I need to calm down. Yeah.
Jen: So now that we've kind of given you some ideas of destructive ways to start a conversation. Let's give you some ideas on how you can approach it in a soft way. One that's going to be, you know, beneficial and constructive and really help navigate that hard conversation. And the first one is just using “I Messages”. Now this is really hard for me because I always I'm like, there's an elephant in the room. Still, if I'm like, I feel when? Because it was his behavior or her behavior that caused me to get upset. But then again, that's putting the person on the defensive and we're blaming and we need to remember that in an argument or hard conversation, there's always two people involved. It's never just one person's fault. So using those “I Messages”, so it goes, I feel, when, because. So, an example would be, I feel frustrated when you leave your clothes next to the laundry basket because I always have to pick them up. So that is saying, “This is how I feel”. And they can't disregard how you feel. No one should ever tell you that that's a wrong way to feel. So that's putting just sharing your feelings on how the situation is affecting you.
Sara: Another way to gently approach conflict is to focus on the specific behavior or situation. So, like we were saying before, not bringing up past things, we're just staying focused on the current what's happened and keeping it simple.
Jen: Yes. The next one is to be kind, and I think this goes both ways of being kind to them, but also being kind to yourself as well, realizing that conflict and disagreements is a normal part of a relationship. Let's just sit down, be kind to each other and come up with a solution and then actively work towards that solution if there's things that we need to maybe practice or change within ourselves.
Sara: And finally, the last one is to give the benefit of the doubt. And I think this one is so important to remember that chances are their intentions were not to be conniving or vindictive, that it was probably a misunderstanding in what they did. And we've taken it the wrong way, so give them the benefit of the doubt.
Jen: All right. This is the next part is my most favorite part, and this is building up your loving emotional bank. And I just think this is so important that we can build up our partners emotional bank. And to do that, we need to talk and talking to each other so that we know each other. So, lots of times our day revolves around what did you do for work, how to work? Oh, how are the kids all that kind of stuff. But we do need to take time just to talk to each other about each other, wishes, dreams, goals that they're working on, anything like that just so that you know them asking them, what's going to happen tomorrow and your day? What does your day look like?
Sara: And then because you know what's going to happen? Then you send a text message the next day after they had that lunch with their boss or something and you check in. How did that go? I've been thinking about you. Or maybe you do before, like, good luck today. I'm excited for you, you know, and it's just sending those messages to each other that you care about each other.
Jen: Yeah, my next one is having daily debriefings. So, my husband and I, we used to do this. We need to start this back up. I really liked it. But at going just going to bed, you know, naming what were some great things that happened today and what were some hard things that happened today? And I really like that just because it just helps my brain kind of settle down, especially if there was something hard. They don't have to think about it because he and I have already kind of debriefed about it.
Sara: So, I don't know if this is an official name for that, but I like to call it pillow talk. And I think that is something that's really important in a relationship when you go to bed that you have conversations before you fall asleep. So, in my home, that's something that my husband and I have decided not to have a television in our bedroom because that's a distraction that we're focused on watching shows instead of having those conversations. And I mean, that's not to say we haven't pulled out a laptop and watch stuff, but every time I fall asleep in the middle of a show. And so, there's not that conversation. And so, for our marriage, it's worked for us to not have TVs so that we can have that pillow talk.
Jen: Great idea. The next one is to tell them what you appreciate about them. So just letting them know those little things that they do that you appreciate. I appreciate you paying your dirty clothes in the hamper or I appreciate you putting your glass that you just used in the dishwasher. I appreciate you're opening the door for me going into a restaurant or opening the car door. I remember that's one thing that when we got married that the person marrying us told my husband to always open the car door for your wife. And I appreciate that my husband does that for me. It's just another one of those little small, little acts that lets me know that he is thinking about me.
Sara: I think what's so important about this one is that we're saying these things out loud and not just assuming that our partner knows that we appreciate these things about them. Because even though they probably do know that we appreciate it, it's still good to hear it out loud and have those reminders of just those little things that happen throughout the day or the week that they know that those are things that we value.
Jen: Yeah. Next one is to have small moment of affection daily, so those kisses goodbye or hello holding their hands. I know in the past, Dave Schram has said those little small moments of affection should take about six seconds. So, I told my husband this he's like, OK, so the next day, when I went to go give him a kiss goodbye, I just gave him a quick kiss. He's like, Wait, this has got to be six seconds, so I'm like, OK. So, it was just like, it was just funny because it was just like lip to lip. Nothing else. We just stood there, lip to it for six seconds. And by the end of the six seconds, we were just giggling because it was like, What's it like a kiss? It was just like you were lip to lip standing there for six seconds. And I, after the six seconds, I'm like, I don't think that's what he intended. But yeah, try it for six seconds when you kiss. Try making it a six second kiss
Sara: So that's something that my husband and I have done before, where I've told him that there's this information about kissing and I told him 20 seconds.
Jen: Well, let me tell you lip to lip and just standing. There was a long six seconds.
Sara: Right? And he kind of had that same sort of reaction to just like Touch, you know, and I was like, I don't think this is what it's meant to be. You know, like obviously, you're supposed to do more than that, that it's softening your feelings towards each other. Because you're having that interaction and connection.
Jen: So, yeah, and the last one is to turn towards each other in times of stress that rather than away from each other. I think this is crucial of being able to lean on your partner when you are stressed. My husband and I always joke that we're so grateful that it seems like our stresses take turns because he's always there for me. He says, You know, I'm your cheerleader during this time, and I appreciate that. So, I hope that for the rest of our lives, our stresses take turns so that we're both not in a stressful situation. So, because that is something that is really helpful is knowing that he's there and he can validate my feelings, even though he may not agree with why I'm having a stressful time.
Sara: Yeah, my husband doesn't express when he's feeling stress. I honestly don't know very often when he's feeling stressed because he's really good at being able to, like, leave work at work. When he's home with his family, he's with his family or, you know, whatever is bothering him when he's away from that situation. It does not cross his mind again, and he doesn't express it outwardly. And I am polar opposite of that. I don't carry stress well. I have to talk about it. It's on my mind constantly. And so, he provides good balance for me. I'm grateful that we're not both like me. That would be really hard. But I do think it's really important to turn to your partner when you're feeling that stress that the two of you can work through it and have that support you.
Jen: All right. So, we've provided you some do's and some don'ts and hopefully some good information to help you strengthen your relationships. So, my challenge for you for this next week is to find a way to build up your partner's emotional bank and really let them know that you love them and that you are in this relationship for, you know, the long haul that you want to work together. So just building up a loving, emotional bank, if you have any questions regarding this topic, you can reach Sara or myself at parents@thefamilyplace.org on Facebook at Jen Daly Dash, the Family Place.
Sara: or Sara Hendricks Dash the Family Place.
Jen: You can also receive parenting tips twice a week if you text “TFP” 33222. We hope that you have a great week and we will see you back here next week.
Sara: Thanks again for listening. The Family Place is a non-profit organization in Logan, Utah, with a mission to strengthen families and protect children. We call ourselves starfish throwers. If you're unsure what that means, refer back to our introduction episode where we explain it. The good news is you can be a starfish thrower too by subscribing to the Parents Place podcast and liking our social media pages. If this episode resonated with you, please share it with others and help us get our message out to more people. Also, be sure to check the show notes for links to information referenced in this episode. That's all for now, but we'll catch you again next time on the Parents Place.
Contact:
Record questions here: https://anchor.fm/theparentsplace
Email us: parents@thefamilyplaceutah.org
Text "TFP" to 33222 for weekly parenting tips
Find us on social media: https://www.facebook.com/jendalyTFP
The Parent's Place:https://www.facebook.com/groups/196037267839869
Comments