Nurturing Your Relationship

Being in a relationship can be one of the most loving, gratifying and fulfilling experiences of your life. It can also be challenging.  Every relationship has its ups and downs.  Whether you're going through a good time or a challenging time, it's important to remember that all relationships need nurturing.

Nurturing Your Relationship

Often, people who are in relationships, especially long term relationships, forget that their relationship needs love and care.  Nurturing each other can make the difference between a relationship surviving a rough patch or not.

Here are some tips for nurturing your relationship:

Communicate in a Tactful and Honest Way
In the heat of an argument, it's easy to forget to be tactful.  And, yet, you might regret something that you say that you can't take back once it's out.  Even if you need to take a break from a heated argument, it's important to treat your spouse with respect and care.
See my article: The Challenge of Keeping Small Arguments From Developing Into Big Conflicts in Your Relationship

Provide Each Other with Emotional Support
Listening with empathy can make all the difference even if you can't change whatever your spouse is going through.  You both need to be there for each other.

Show Compassion
During difficult times, your relationship can degenerate fast if you're each blaming each other for your problems.  Put yourself in your spouse's shoes and think about how you would want him or her to respond in a similar situation and then show the same compassion that you would want.
See my article: Relationships: Moving Beyond the Blame Game

Express Gratitude
It's easy to take each other for granted, especially in a long term relationship.  No one wants to feel taken for granted, so express your gratitude to your spouse for the things s/he does or says
See my article:  Relationships: The Importance of Expressing Gratitude to Your Spouse

Persevere Through Difficult Times
Along with providing each other with emotional support, it's important that you both remain committed to each other when things start to get rough.  Of course, this doesn't mean that you should put up with abusive behavior.  But, under normal circumstances, when life presents challenges in your relationship, your attitude to see it through together is important.

Admit When You're Wrong
If you realize that you've made a mistake, it's important to admit it, make amends and move on.  Holding onto an attitude of "I'm right" when you know you made a mistake will only make matters worse
See my article:  Relationships: The Courage to Admit You're Wrong

Have a Sense of Humor
In many situations, seeing the funny side of a situation can help lighten the mood and help you and your spouse to deal with a difficult situation.

Share Common Goals
One of the signs of a happy, healthy relationship is that both people share certain common goals.  This helps to make your relationship more meaningful.

Create Special Times Together
It's very easy to get bogged down with responsibilities and family obligations, but you and your spouse need to have time together for just the two of you.
See my article:  Creating Special Times Together to Enhance Your Relationship

Nurturing Your Relationship:  Creating Special Times Together

Be Open to New Shared Experiences
It's easy to get into a rut in a long term relationship, so being open to new shared experiences can keep your relationship alive and fun.
See my article:  Being Open to New Experiences

Getting Help in Therapy
There are times when couples go through tough times when they're unable to work things out for themselves.  During those times, it can be helpful to seek help from a licensed mental health professional who has experience helping couples to work through their problems.

When you seek help, you're acknowledging to each other that your relationship is important enough to make the commitment to attending couples counseling.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individuals and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

The Emotional Vulnerability of Being in a Romantic Relationship

Being in an intimate relationship can be one of the most healing experiences in your life when you feel loved and nurtured in your relationship.  At the same time, it can also be one of the most hurtful experiences when the one you love hurts you.

The Emotional Vulnerability of Being in a Romantic Relationship

It's often hard for many people to understand how it's possible for both things to be true at the same time in the same relationship, but this is a common experience.  Let's go beyond the surface and take a deeper look at these experiences, which can seem so contradictory, but really aren't.

Intimate Relationships
When you're in a serous relationship, you're in an intimate relationship.  Emotional intimacy can bring both feelings of love and nurturance as well as emotional pain because your spouse or partner is the closest person to you emotionally in your adult life.

When someone is that close to you emotionally, mentally, physically, and sexually, there is the potential for him or her to say or do things, often unintentionally, that can hurt on a much deeper level than it would if someone else did or said the same thing.

Expectations That the One You Love Will Always Be There For You Emotionally
There is often an expectation that the one you love will always be there for you emotionally and will never hurt you.  In a perfect world, this would be true.  But we don't live in a perfect world and people often say and do things that hurt our feelings.  When it's the person who is closest to you, it not only hurts--it feels unjust.

It's important to make a distinction at this point:  What I'm referring to are common, occasional interactions between two people in a relationship--not physical abuse, frequent emotional abuse or major breaches of mistrust like infidelity.  I've written blog articles in the past about these topics and, of course, these are the most hurtful.  Here are some common examples of what I'm talking about:

Examples:
You and your partner get into an argument and, in anger and without thinking, he makes a critical remark about your weight gain.  You feel hurt and angry.

You come home happy and excited to tell your spouse about a major accomplishment at work and your spouse, who is tired and distracted, barely pays attention to what you're saying.  You feel hurt and deflated that he isn't sharing what was, until now, a happy moment for you.

You come home from a difficult day at work and feel the need for a little tender loving care from your spouse, but she is under a lot of stress too and tells you to look for another job if you're unhappy with your current job.  You feel hurt and misunderstood because you're not getting what you need at the moment.

As you can see from these example, these are hurtful experiences, but they're not, by themselves, reasons to end an otherwise good and stable relationship.  But, at the time, any of these experiences can leave you wondering, at that moment, how someone, who is usually loving and caring towards you, can be so unattuned to what you're feeling at that point in time.  You might say to yourself, "How can this be the same person who's usually so there for me and loves me?"

How You Respond to Your Partner Often Depends Upon Your Childhood History
How you respond to these occasional hurts often depends upon your childhood history.  So, on the one hand, if you were fortunate enough to grow up in a loving, nurturing home, you might feel hurt and annoyed at the moment, but when your spouse or partner apologizes for being so thoughtless, you'll  probably forgive him or her and make up, knowing that, as human beings, we all make mistakes.

Current Emotional Pain Can Trigger Emotional Pain From Childhood Trauma
On the other hand, if you had a traumatic childhood where there was a lot of physical or emotional abuse or emotional neglect, you might respond differently, especially if you haven't worked through your traumatic history.

For someone with an emotionally traumatic childhood history, even relatively minor slights can feel big.   This is because current hurts often trigger old hurts.  So, what happens is that you're not only feeling the emotional hurt from the present, you're also feeling the emotional pain from the past.  But it usually happens so fast that it's hard to distinguish the two feelings.

So, you often won't recognize that your emotional reaction contains the older traumatic feelings.  And your spouse or partner might not understand why you might be having such a big reaction to what's happening between you.  In turn, this can lead to more arguments and misunderstandings.

Getting Help in Therapy
There's no such thing as a perfect relationship.  Whenever you're in a stable, intimate relationship, it can cut both ways where you feel loved most of the time and you feel some emotional pain occasionally.  This is a common experience.

But if you realize, once you've calmed down, that your reactions to occasional emotional misattunements are out of proportion to what's going on in your current relationship, you might be responding to unresolved trauma, and you could benefit from seeking help from a licensed mental health professional who works with trauma.

About Me

I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to overcome emotional trauma so that they could live more fulfilling lives.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

A Happy Family Doesn't Have to Be a Perfect Family

In my article yesterday, Happy Families: A Strong Family Narrative Can Build Resilience, I wrote about family narratives, based on an article by Bruce Feiler, and how these narratives can help build resilience and cohesiveness.  Today, I'm addressing the misperception that a "happy family" is problem free.

A Happy Family Doesn't Have to Be a Perfect Family

There's No Such Thing as a "Perfect Family"
Most people would agree that there's no such thing as a "perfect family" that is without its ups and downs and moments of crises.  But, as I mentioned yesterday, the idea that most families are dysfunctional is so prevalent in our culture that many people think that in order for a family to be considered happy and stable, there shouldn't be any problems.

A Happy Family Doesn't Have to Be a Perfect Family

That's like saying that in order for people to see themselves as having a happy life, they shouldn't have any sadness or any difficult times.  Once again, when we look at it this way, we can see the fallacy in this reasoning because we know it's impossible to live a long, full life without there being hard times.

Happy Families Often Share a Sense of Meaningfulness 
Part of the problem is with the word happiness.  What does it mean to be happy?  I believe, and I think many people might agree, that having a happy life doesn't mean being happy all of the time.   For me, in a nutshell, it means having a life that is meaningful, which includes having people that you care about and who care about you.


Similarly, there will be sadness, loss and crises in most families sooner or later.  There will also be struggles.   This is true for every family.  What matters is how a family responds to these losses, crises and struggles and how well they bounce back from these events.  An attitude of "we're in this together and together we'll get through it" helps families to weather the inevitable difficult times.

A Sense of Family History:  Standing on the Shoulders of Previous Generations
It's also helpful when a family has a sense of history that the current family members and previous generations have overcome difficult times together and have been resilient enough to bounce back.

It's like saying, "We stand on the shoulders of previous generations who made it through difficult times and  remained united."

In most families that consider themselves to be happy families, there are often shared values and traditions.  Of course, there isn't an absolute.  There are happy families where family members respect each other's right to have differing opinions.

I believe the most important aspect of a happy family is a loving, nurturing environment.  Once again, this doesn't mean perfection.  There can be times of discord and conflict.  But, usually, in families that consider themselves to be happy, even when there's conflict, there's a foundation of love and trust.

If there are periods of discord in the family, a happy family is more likely to allow for there to be a way to make amends rather than holding grudges.

When I see clients who describe themselves as coming from happy families, they often have a sense that whatever they're going through, ultimately, they will be all right.  They have a sense that, somehow, they'll get through their problems, even if they currently need the help of a therapist and supportive family and friends.  They usually have much more of a sense of hope about life than people who don't come from happy, stable families.

Having grown up in a family where there was a foundation of love and trust, often gives these individuals a sense that they are rooted in something much larger than themselves.

It's often a matter of perspective.  I once met a man at a dinner party who told me he came from a happy family and he considered himself to have had a great childhood.

Then, he proceeded to describe a childhood filled with many personal and family struggles.  It was very far from a carefree, easy childhood.  But he told me that he knew he was loved by his parents, siblings, and grandparents.  He also knew he came from a long line of survivors and strivers.

So, as far as he was concerned, he came from a happy family with meaningful family relationships, and he considered himself to be fortunate.

So, my point in yesterday's and today's blog posts is that, far from all families being dysfunctional, as I often hear people say, there are happy families, and we can learn a lot from these families about what makes for a happy, meaningful family life.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.
I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Relationships: The Importance of "Unplugging" From Cellphones to Spend Quality Time Together

It's so easy to underestimate the importance of spending quality time together in your relationship.   These days it seems that so many people are working harder and longer hours, and they're so much more accessible to their work relationships and other distractions because they don't take time to "unplug" from cellphones, iPads and other gadgets--even when they're, supposedly, trying to spend quality time with their loved ones.

The Importance of "Unplugging" From Cellphones to Spend Quality Time Together

Relationships Need Nurturing

There's no substitute for spending time together, without distractions, to nurture a relationship.  Unfortunately, these electronic gadgets, which are such great conveniences in so many ways, can also become obsessive habits to the point where it's hard to "unplug" from them.

The Importance of "Unplugging" From Cellphones: Relationships Need Nurturing

A friend recently told me that her husband responded to the "ping" of his phone while they were making love.  It completely destroyed the moment for her.  Needless to say, she got angry, and in their next couples counseling session she told her husband that he needed to learn to "unplug" from his Blackberry if their marriage was going to last.

Ingrained habits are hard, but not impossible, to change
"Unplugging" from electronic gadgets doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing endeavor.  You and your spouse can come to a compromise about getting "unplugged."

I also recommend being specific.  For example, if you hate the idea of your spouse responding to a cellphone while you're at dinner, but you can live with it while you're watching a sitcom together, tell him or her this.  Then, come to an agreement about it.  Or, if it's hard to find a couple of hours together on the weekend without distractions, plan ahead for this time and agree that this is "unplugged" time away from electronic gadgets and other distractions.  Expect that this might be a "two steps forward/one step backwards" process, especially at the beginning.  Try to be flexible while keeping your goal in sight.

If you're the person who is tethered to your electronic gadgets, expect that you might go through some "withdrawal" symptoms (obviously, nothing life threatening!) as you learn to have this "unplugged" time.  There has been research that has shown that people responding to "pinging" and ringing of electronic gadgets actually get a boost in feel-good chemicals in the brain.  This is one of the reasons why it's so hard for many people to get "unplugged"--it feels good.

For more information about the feel-good, dopamine, chemical that can make getting "unplugged" so difficult, see the Psychology Today article by Susan Weinschenk, Ph.D.:
"Why We're All Addicted to Texts, Twitter and Google"

Getting Help in Therapy
If you or your spouse are unwilling to spend any time "unplugged," there might be deeper problems in your relationship.  Sometimes, spending a lot of time using electronic gadgets (or watching TV or other distractions) can be a way to avoid each other.  If you can't resolve this issue on your own, you can benefit from seeing a couples counselor who can help you and your spouse to deal with this issue.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.  I work with individuals and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Also, see my article:  Creating Special Times Together to Enhance Your Relationship