What Happens When We Blame Our Mate?

When couples struggle in a relationship, someone or both might see their mates as the one who caused the hurt. If this is the case, then one or both might blame the other for making them feel bad.

This is very common among couples. I know this intimately because as a young girl I blamed everyone who hurt me. I did not know another way to communicate my hurt to the person who caused me pain.

I blamed the one who caused me difficulty and it was usually a family member. It would be strange if I did this alone, but we all did this. We just didn’t learn a better way of handling our hurt emotions.

Often in relationships couples will fight with each other. Both want the other person to hear them, but the arguments usually continue without one person giving in, so there is no resolution. And that’s exactly what both people want.

Often when in a disagreement partners will tell the other person mean things. They might call them names or discuss the way they act, all to point out that they have something that they need to share.

Many of us bring our old childhood habits into our relationships. They appear whenever our feelings get hurt and if we haven’t worked though these old patterns, we will use them on our partners. Like blaming them when we get hurt.

I grew up getting mad at the people who hurt me. I know this is not a good way to let people know they hurt you, but I was not trained to do any better. My single mother was overwhelmed trying to manage three rambunctious children and she often just got frustrated and yelled at us.

This is what I saw, so this is what I learned. When things didn’t go my way, I yelled. Of course, when I grew up, I didn’t yell that much, but when I really got my feelings hurt, I did. It took a while to figure out that I was bringing a lot of the chaos into my life by just getting angry.

It’s easy to spot resentment. You can feel its power and its force. Resentment is like a wall of dislike coming at you and you have no way of getting around it.

You know it is there, you wish it would not be, but everything you have done has not made it crumble and it is a mystery to you as to how to dismantle it.

I have worked with many couples that experience this.

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.

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.

Often in relationships there are two different kinds of people. I have noticed this in the many years I have been counseling couples. One is very clear about how they got their feelings hurt, and the other is likely to keep everything inside.

I see this play out in every couple I have ever counseled. It is very common. The one who emotes, (that’s me), often feels alone in the relationship because their partner doesn’t communicate with them on a deep level.

All of us who fall in love want that love to stay as beautiful as it was in the beginning. This is only natural. When we finally meet our special someone and we feel the amazing connectedness we just want it to last and last and last.

Unfortunately, there is a name for this wonderful time. It’s called the “Honeymoon” period. It’s the time when everything is perfect. You get your person, they get you, there is never a hassle or disagreement, everything is wonderful.

But this time doesn’t last forever. In fact, it probably lasts somewhere between a year or two, depending on the people. This time is designed to meet our special person and that’s about it.

Wondering how to stop blaming others for your feelings? Blame can undermine relationships and impede the love and empathy you crave when feeling hurt. Are you ready to learn where blame comes from, how to end it, and how much richer your relationship might be if you do?

It’s not unusual to describe what happened after an argument occurs. Many of us do this. We think about who said what and how we responded and we explain that what was said was not helpful and we talk about what might have been better and we do this with complete confidence that we see things the way they are.

I have worked with couples where one person is excellent at detailing what went wrong and how those things could be avoided. I listen to the explanations that are extremely detailed and I think to myself, “But how does this help?”

Tag Archives: blame

What Happens When We Blame Our Mate?

When Our Partner Causes Us Pain

When We Blame Our Partner

My Husband (or Wife) Resents Me! What Do We Do?

Do You Blame, Reason or Argue With Your Mate?

When Couples Fight

When One Partner Blames and the Other Shuts Down

Why Relationships Make Us Grow

How to Stop Blaming Others for Your Feelings in Relationships

When We Analyze Instead of Connecting