The Top Five Worst Marriage Mistakes

Posted on March 10, 2010 by Hadley Earabino, One of Thousands of Career Coaches on Noomii.

by Hadley Earabino, Martha Beck Life Coach & Relationship Coach

We’ve tried getting our partner to do things. We’ve wished our partner would just know what we wanted. We’ve thrown tantrums, shot poison darts, needled, and lobbed anger bombs. Some of us have even given up all together. If you’re one of the millions of Americans struggling with their marriages, it might be time to change tactics.

One of my favorite marriage counselors, Terrence Real, has been helping couples for nearly 30 years, and he has developed some solidly scientific theories about what makes relationships succeed or fail. In his 2008 book, The New Rules of Marriage, he identified five losing strategies which are guaranteed to sabotage your most intimate relationships.

I’ve seen these lizard-level attempts at intimacy in my own relationships, and those of my clients, so I thought I’d shed some light on them in the hope they’ll scurry away. Here’s my spin on these five losing strategies:

1. THE LAWYER

Have you ever found yourself telling your friend/sister/counselor/coach a story about a recent argument you had with your spouse, insisting that your version is accurate?

Real calls this “Needing to be right,” and says this tactic never works because it’s not a battle for the relationship, it’s a battle to save face. We know we’re ‘needing to be right’ when we find ourselves acting the part of a lawyer in court presenting the evidence:

“The fact is, you were following that car too closely.”
“You did not tell me we had an appointment.”
“Yes, you did slam the door when you left.”
“That is so not what happened.”

If you start to feel like an attorney, like you need to start keeping better records, like you need to do a better job of writing things down, or you feel an uncontrollable urge to Google the facts to prove your point, you know you’re acting the part of “The Lawyer.”

Interestingly enough, Real says underneath these misguided attempts to prove our point, there’s probably a legitimate request. Instead of hauling his butt into ‘court,’ we’re more likely to get what we want if we just ask for it. Instead of trying to prove her wrong, we might just say something like:

“I’m nervous, could we slow down a bit?”
“I want to keep our appointments, they are really important to me. What can we do next time?”
“I felt rejected when you left. If you need to leave, could you let me know when you’ll be back?”

Basically, we want to bring less lawyering, put down our briefcases, and make a few loving requests. Antidote: Ask for what you want.

2. THE MAGICIAN

Ever wish you had superpowers and could magically make your partner do what you want? Do you find yourself reading books with titles like “Get Anyone to Do Anything?” Are you expecting that real life will start when your plan works and your spouse finally changes?

Real calls this “Controlling your partner,” and says this tactic never works because, well, people don’t generally like to be suffocated and oppressed.

We know we’re controlling our partner when we start thinking that if we chant, pray, wish, meditate enough, we will get our partner to change.

“I could be happy, if only she would be more responsible with money.”
“You know, if he really loved me he’d be more physically affectionate.”
“What he really needs to do is tell his mother what he thinks.”

If you find yourself wishing for a magical remote control, you know you’re engaged in the “controlling your partner” strategy. Real says when we do this, we are really just wishing for a happy ending. We marry people who hurt us just like our mother and father did, in the hopes that we can rewrite the tale.

The irony is that we can write a better ending to the story, but we can only create our own character, not our spouse’s. It’s not “How can I get ’em to change?” but “Is there anything I can change so I can be happy now?” Antidote: Work your magic on yourself, not on your partner.

3. THE PERFORMANCE ARTIST

When I was a kid, my mother had a framed illustration of a very charming chicken leaping dramatically across a bare floor. Under the chicken were the words, “Express Yourself!” In my childhood home, family members generally yelled at each other across the house like banchees in heat, but we were artists, so it was ‘ok.’ This was the 70s and 80s, anyway, before therapists knew any better.

It turns out, “Express Yourself!” is not always the best directive when it comes to intimate relationships. Real calls this the “barf-bag approach to intimacy,” and says that “Unbridled self-expression” is one of the most common losing relationship strategies.

Ever found yourself writing long letters to your spouse about exactly what is wrong with them and the relationship in general? What about launching into a twenty minute lecture about how they’ve hurt you? Ever act on the urge to just vent to your partner—to lay it all out there?

If an argument with your spouse is explosive and dramatic, and afterwards you get a huge feeling of relief, you may have just emotionally vomited all over your marriage. Real says that constructive self-expression can be very useful in relationships, but we don’t need to express ourselves to the point where we draw a crowd. Antidote: Express yourself with care.

4. THE SHARPSHOOTER

You know it’s your job to take the trash out, but he worked instead of coming to dinner last night—so you just leave it there to stink. He calls you irresponsible, so you call him a control-freak. He walked out after the fight, so you lock him out of the house. Real says the fourth losing strategy is “Retaliation,” taking revenge on our partners, either aggressively or passively.

The impulse to hit back is apparent from about the age of two in humans, but the truth is, we’re all grown up now. We have the ability to not act on that impulse. Most of us manage not to literally hit back, but sometimes we give in to more subtle forms of vengeance.

If you find yourself getting a thrill out of the mean-spirited banter that goes on at your house, you might be engaged in retaliation. As intimate partners, we have access to all the buttons, and we know how to push them.

We know our partner’s Achilles’ heel, and we can aim the arrows just right if we want to. We might want to extract justice, but acting as the sharpshooter doesn’t take out the evil-doer, it cripples the relationship. The way to justice and healing is through repair and reconciliation, and not petty revenge. Antidote: Be a lover, not a hater.

5. THE HIBERNATING BEAR

The difficulties involved in maintaining modern intimate relationships can seem overwhelming—especially if all we do is argue over facts, throw rocks, or withhold sex in a vain attempt to change our partners. After trying for years to maintain a marriage using the above losing strategies, some spouses just give up. They’d rather have the peace and quiet than engage in any more struggle.

You take your ball and go home. With the help of some choice substances, you go comfortably numb. You go into your cave to hibernate. You’re sleepwalking through your marriage. If you find yourself spending more and more time at work, just so you can avoid the headaches at home, you might be engaged in what Real calls the fifth losing strategy, “Withdrawal.”

What is ironic is that Withdrawal is actually a close cousin of a winning strategy: Acceptance. Both of these strategies involve taking some distance, but they have very different qualities. While Withdrawal is resentful and bitter, Acceptance is loving and kind. If you’re in Withdrawal, you will feel hurt, angry and self-righteous.

If you’re in Acceptance, you will feel calm, peaceful and centered. In Acceptance, you recognize you cannot change your partner, but you can change the way you relate to your partner. There may be some needs and wants you can’t get from your partner—may even be a whole set of things you can’t get from your partner—but you grieve it and move on. You find a way to compromise, to get your needs and wants met in other responsible ways, or put them on hold for a while.

You make a choice to stay with your partner because you love them, not because they can’t or won’t meet your needs. This is what Real calls a “relationship reckoning,” the ring of fire we must pass through if we are to make it to the promised land of happy marriage. Antidote: Acceptance and True Love.

Each of these losing strategies is born from a grasping attitude toward relationships. We try desperately to hold on to the facts, to save face, to change the outcome, to force a solution, to hold on to our anger. But the real magic happens when we surrender all of it. When we can let go and trust that we will be okay, no matter what our partner does, we find our way home.

Hadley Earabino is a relationship coach in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia. She can be found at HadleyCoaches.com. Read her blog, send an email or call for a free coaching sample. She’d be delighted to hear from you.