Linda's Relationship Counseling Blog

When We Are Too Hurt To Change

Most of us believe that when we fall in love with our special person that everything in our life will be just perfect. In fact it is for a while. But after the initial stage is over then reality sets in and things are different.

Misunderstandings Are a Natural Part of Relationships

Misunderstandings and hurt are natural over the course of relationships.

The first thing we might notice is that our partner doesn’t always understand us and sometimes makes us unhappy. This is just a natural process when two people learn more about each other.

But it doesn’t feel good, especially since before the hurts happen there was peace and love and connection. Many couples just wonder what happened to those good old days.

This stage occurs with every relationship. The question to you and your mate is what are you going to do about it? Most of us just use our old habits and try and make things work. If your habit is to blame the person who hurt you then that is what you will do to your mate.

Our Protective Habits Can Emotionally Distance Us from Loved Ones

The habits we use to protect ourselves when we feel hurt, like the woman pictured disconnecting from her husband, can distance us from our loved ones.

If you have the habit of stuffing your uncomfortable feelings and not saying anything about them then that is what you will do. And if you have to leave the situation every time you get your feelings hurt then you will continue to do that.

These are our habits that we bring into the relationship. We all have habits of protecting ourselves when we get hurt. But if we are with the person we love, then we might have to do something else or we could destroy the connection that we so desire.

When we are hurt we need understanding. Are you capable of asking your mate to listen to you about your pain? If you can present what happened to you in a way that your partner can hear you then you can begin to heal.

Your Partner’s Support Can Show You There’s Another Way

Supportive partners can help you grow into better habits for handling when you feel hurt.

I didn’t know this was possible when I connected with my husband-to-be. My old habits were to blame the person who hurt me and then stay hidden for a while until I could calm down. I used this habit all my life. I didn’t know another way. But getting mad at someone who was not trying to make me mad or hurt me was something I had to figure out, because my old habit was not working.

So I did. I learned that every time I was angry and loud, no one ever listened to me. But when I was in my vulnerability and cried about what happened to me, well my partner was there to help me. And that was the first time I ever felt such tenderness.

Exploring Vulnerability Helps Make Relationships Stronger

Vulnerability is essential to the kind of openness that makes relationships succeed.

I know your habits are important to you. They helped you survive your environment and were necessary. But this is a new day for you. You have found someone who cares deeply for you.

Find your vulnerability. You don’t have to be good at it in the beginning. But I promise you, if you use it, it will be the best journey you have ever taken. And it will secure your relationship like no other. Have courage. You deserve to have someone treat you tenderly too.

Connect with Your Partner

Read a Book About Relationships

'Safe. Happy. Loved. Simple Skills for Your Relationship.' A book by Linda Nusbaum.

Learn how to more effectively communicate with your partner, by reading Linda’s book, Safe. Happy. Loved. Simple Skills for Your Relationship. It might help both of you feel happier, more loved, and even more connected. Give it a read.

Get Couples Counseling

Come in for couples counseling. Couples counseling can help you and your loved one get the most out of your relationship. It'll equip you with coping strategies and tools for communication that can help you argue less and love more.

Most of us come into our relationship with our old habits. These are the ways we handle getting our feelings hurt and feeling disappointment. If we handle these experiences with grace, then nothing needs to be done.

But most of us don’t. Many of us get really mad at the person who hurt our feelings. Others repress their feelings and appear as if nothing happened, and still others often can’t take the pain of being hurt so they have to leave.

Many of us in relationships want our partners to be different. It is so common for one mate to insist on helping their mate to become different. We do this so we will feel more comfortable.

A lot of couples fall into this habit. People want what they want and they do things so they will get what they want, including wanting their partners to become different.

But there is a catch to always wishing that our mate will change. When does this end? In fact, it doesn’t. If we don’t like some things, we will end up always wanting the things we don’t like to be different. And if we find success in changing one thing, well, then we will continue this practice until we get exhausted.

Often when our partner does something that we don’t agree with we do something. Some of us get mad at our mate. Others try and reason with their logic. And some of us even blame them for what they are saying, doing, or thinking.

Do you fall into any of these categories? It’s easy to do, in fact if we have one of these habits we usually bring them from childhood. I know in my home when I was a child, all of us argued with each other, and sometimes we yelled our arguments.

It took me a long time to unwind my old habit and build something new, and that is the reason I am writing this article.

Many of us get our feelings hurt by our mate. In fact, it is a guarantee that if you are involved with the person you love then they will at some time make you unhappy.

They don’t do this because they stop loving you, no, they do it because we all bring our habits into the relationship and that’s where our habits rub our person the wrong way.

All of us create our habits when we are little. I know it would make more sense if we could make them when we are fully grown, but that is not how humans work.

We all have to figure out life as a single digit little person. Let’s say you had a perfect family and your mother and father and siblings were always kind and caring. If this happened to you then wonderful. You are probably a fully formed human and your habits might be fantastic.

It’s not uncommon for two people who fall in love to realize that they are not the same. Sometimes people even think that they have nothing in common because they are so different.

This is very common among couples. We fall in love with our mates and everything is glorious. But something happens after a year or two where we start to see that they don’t really get us like we thought they did.

All of us want the perfect relationship. We want our loved one to be who we want them to be and act the way we want them to act. This is just how humans are. We like what we like and we push away what we don’t like.

But when we are in a relationship, we all go through wanting our partners to be different. I remember early in my relationship I wanted my partner to speak the way I spoke, from the feeling perspective and from a deep place.

Broken trust in a relationship is something you and your loved one can come back from, but it takes delicacy, the desire to rebuild, and effort.

Sometimes in a relationship people do things that cause the trust to break. Let’s say one person calls or texts someone outside of the relationship. This can have a devastating effect on the other person.

All of us in relationships get into misunderstandings. It is common to not thoroughly know what another person thinks and sometimes we end up stepping on our partner because we believe one thing and they believe something else.

But what if one partner gets upset and the other partner tries to get them to understand that their reasons for getting upset are not valid? This can happen in relationships too.

Linda's Relationship Counseling Blog

When We Are Too Hurt To Change

Misunderstandings Are a Natural Part of Relationships

Our Protective Habits Can Emotionally Distance Us from Loved Ones

Your Partner’s Support Can Show You There’s Another Way

Exploring Vulnerability Helps Make Relationships Stronger

Connect with Your Partner

Read a Book About Relationships

Get Couples Counseling

Changing Our Old Habits

Criticism and Acceptance: Which One of Us Should Change?

Do You Blame, Reason or Argue With Your Mate?

How Our Resentment Hardens into Something Worse

How Childhood Habits Prevent Connection

When Couples Don’t Understand Each Other

Accepting Our Partner Instead of Wanting to Change Them

What to Do About Broken Trust in a Relationship

When Couples Fight