The Surprisingly Typical Attitude That Hurts Relationships Most
You may think your relationship is peaceful, but it's not.
Dean Drobot | Canva It happens to lots of people, especially women. You meet the person you believe is your soulmate. You believe you will live happily ever after and you will always have all your needs met because he will know exactly how to take care of you. Then you get married. You have a belief that it is your responsibility to keep things on an even keel all the time. You begin to work at keeping the peace in your house by never speaking up about what you think feel or need. You figure you must keep the peace no matter what, and therefore, you try to be easy-going.
He will just know what you need and want and make sure that you are loved and taken care of because that is what you assumed he would do. After all, he's your soulmate. You begin keeping the peace in small ways. Then as the children come along, you insist on taking on the “responsibility to keep everyone happy.” Your spouse asks where would you like to go, what would you like to do, or which restaurant you would like to go to, and you respond, “It doesn’t matter to me!” to be easy-going and agreeable. You convince yourself that this is the best way to keep the peace.
Then one day, say about 20-25 years later, you say to your spouse that you are not happy and you want a divorce. Your spouse is dumbfounded because he believed that you had a great marriage. You did all kinds of things together as a couple and as a family. He goes to get help from a counselor and gets you to come with him. When he hears from you that you “Never had a choice in anything,” he again is dumbfounded. He says something to the effect, “I always asked you what and where you wanted to go or do and you would say I don’t care, you choose. So I would and you would seem to be okay with it. Now you are saying that I always made all the decisions without your input! What are you talking about!?!” Let’s take a look at some things that have happened over time to you and your spouse and where the communication fell apart.
Here are 5 ways that being easy-going hurts relationships most:
1. Over time, you have begun to feel resentment toward your spouse
This is detrimental to your relationship. You believed that deferring to your spouse all the time to keep the peace was the best way to have a good relationship. However, you are not a very happy person. You feel neglected, unloved, and uncared for. You haven’t spoken up and revealed your true thoughts and feelings because you were afraid that the consequences would be discord. You are so intent on keeping things “harmonious” that you didn't let your spouse know that you were feeling truly unloved and uncared for and that your needs are not being met. In essence, you have not been truthful with your spouse, but he does not know that.
2. You are feeling more and more disappointed in your relationship
You believed that your spouse should just know what you need in your life to feel loved and cared for. You believe that if you keep the peace and let him have his “way” about things he will automatically show you love and care and that he will consider your needs above his own. How disappointed are you when that doesn't happen? Your disappointment continues to grow over time. You were so convinced that if you kept the peace your relationship would be a “happily ever after” one. Now, all you can think about is how hurt you are that he seemingly does not care about you and neither does anyone else, even your children, in your home.
3. You have set a pattern in your relationship that you and your spouse are always in agreement
Others look at your relationship and are jealous of what they see. They think that you have the perfect relationship and that you are always in agreement. Your spouse believes that you are always in agreement. You have done a great job of teaching him that you will always acquiesce to his desires and that you are very willing to do so. The more you do that, the more your spouse and your children (if you have them) believe you will and begin to expect that you will. You have developed a pattern of giving in and letting others walk all over you.
4. Your spouse begins to develop a false sense of security in your relationship
Your spouse believes that your marital relationship is great and that you are always in agreement with each other. The problem is that one of you is lying about how you feel overall in your relationship. That person is you. You feel that your spouse doesn’t care about what you think or feel, but really what has happened is he has been lulled into believing that you are both on the same page all the time and that you are as happy as he is with it all. Your spouse believes the lie he has been convinced of over time by you. You've done a great job of keeping the peace — but at what expense to your relationship?
5. By the time you reveal the truth about how you feel, it may be too late for your marriage relationship to recover
Your resentment has become so deep and your pain is so intense that you may feel all that is left is to get out of your marriage. Your spouse may feel so blindsided by your revelation that he is unable to come to terms with it. He will scratch his head and wonder how in the world this happened. He probably will be very overwhelmed with the fact that the marriage he thought he had has been a lie. He may believe he does not even know that person he thought he knew and believed he had married. He may try to do all kinds of things to show you that he loves you and cares for you, but you may believe that it is too little too late.
When you think about all the consequences, especially the end of a marriage relationship, the fear of telling the truth from the beginning is a much better way to go. You may experience some not-so-peaceful moments in your relationship, but it is important to work together and talk through each of your thoughts and feelings about what is important to you.
If you have not been telling the truth over the years you’ve been together, be prepared for your spouse to feel he has been deceived. You can teach him to believe you, but you have to be persistent and continue to follow through with telling the truth. The work will be hard, but you can do it. Stick with it. Don’t give up. If you need help, get professional help to guide you through the difficulty of making these changes in your relationship. You can have a relationship that is based on love and truth, but you have to face your fears related to what peace really is and that sometimes you have to “rock the boat” a little to get to a peaceful solution.
Drs. Debbie and David McFadden are relationship and life coaches with master's degrees in education and social work. They specialize in helping struggling and distressed couples improve their relationships.