There is nothing worse than being betrayed by the one who promised to never betray you or to be hurt by someone that is supposed to love and care for you. So when the unthinkable happens and your spouse cheats on you or your family member abuses you, how do you heal? How do you move on? And, if the one who wronged you is both remorseful and repentant, how do you reconcile? To tackle this difficult subject, we’ll look at the most common questions (pitfalls) that arise when … [Read more...]
New relationships are like a drug. The intensity of new love is our Kryptonite and once struck we feel invincible. Like an “on fire” super hero with a new muse at our side, nothing can stop us now. After a night of intense love making we find sleep is unnecessary. Lust is confused with true intimacy, but we don’t care. Having nestled in the arms of our beloved, the next morning we show up at the office blissful and energized. Married and partnered friends smile at us while … [Read more...]
The term cheating is one that elicits cringes of fear, gasps of horror. What comes to mind when you hear it? Most likely you imagine that a partner in a committed relationship had sexual intercourse with someone outside of their relationship. But cheating can look like many things to many people. To some it may indeed refer to sexual intercourse only. To others it could be anything from an emotional attachment to another, fantasies of other partners, a kiss. Rather than use … [Read more...]
“It’s not like we had sex or anything!” he says. To which she responds with, “No, it’s worse than that!” He throws up his hands in an exasperated plea to the therapist to help him explain this to his wife, who just doesn’t get it. The wife is, of course, crying and seriously considering whether or not she is going to leave this man. Now, this scenario could be happening in any relationship, gay, straight, married unmarried and with any gender being the cheater or … [Read more...]
1. Think about how you react when that special person in your life makes complaints. A primary predictor for relationship failure, according to marital research expert Dr. John Gottman, is responding poorly to relationship complaints. In my experience as a marriage therapist, it is quite common for people to have a defensive, unskilled, and/or dismissive response to servicing relationship complaints. For example, a defensive response can include changing the topic to making your own … [Read more...]
