Marital Myths...

Things Our Therapists Believed Before They Got Married

By Kelly Urbon*, MA

 

"Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century..." —Mark Twain

 

I'm not sure I want to be the one to tell her, but someone should definitely break the news to Cinderella. Marriage, for almost everyone, is not a happily—ever—after affair. There are many positive things that we could tell her. That marriage is a wonderful adventure; that living with your best friend can be as comfortable as wearing your favorite pair of perfectly—worn—in blue jeans; that sharing the good and bad experiences of life together — day after day, year after year — really can double your joys, and cut your sorrows in half; and that no other relationship in your life has the ability to help you become a better person than this one. But what we couldn't tell her is that everything she hopes for and expects in marriage will actually be there, just as she envisions it. We hope she won't be too disappointed to hear the truth.

 

February is usually the time we do a newsletter focused on couple— relationship issues. And this year is no exception. But this time we decided to get our information not from textbooks or clinical articles, but right out of our everyday lives. So we decided to survey each of our therapists, asking the following question: "What did you believe about marriage, before you actually got married, that you now would say was a mistake?" You will find a summary of our answers below — all anonymous of course. Let's say the anonymity is about wanting to protect our spouses' privacy...even though the real truth might be that we are just a little embarrassed that we had some unrealistic expectations ourselves.

 

MYTH #1: LOVE WILL GET US THROUGH ANYTHING.

This seems to be a pretty common myth. We expect that the power of the feeling we have toward one another at the beginning will be the glue that holds us together during the tough times. What we fail to take into account is that during the moments of real relational conflict, that powerful positive feeling just isn't there. In fact, it is often replaced by other feelings — jealousy, anger, distrust, disgust—that make us want to flee one another, not move closer. Thank God we have the memory of that feeling of love to remind us of what can be, and to motivate us to try to find it again, but as one of our therapists said, "[While love] certainly helped, it was perseverance, tenacity, continuity in the face of adversity, just keeping on keeping on [that] got us through the really dark times."

 

MYTH #2: OUR FINANCES WILL BE ABUNDANT AS WE GO FROM ONE INCOME TO TWO INCOMES, SO WE WON'T HAVE ANYTHING TO ARGUE ABOUT WHEN IT COMES TO MONEY.

We've all heard it said that money issues are one of the top areas of conflict for couples. Yep! Seems that is true for our therapists as well. In the words of one of our therapists, "I neglected to think about our combined debt, eating out more, and having to live on a negotiated budget." This myth makes an assumption that financial harmony will be easy if there is just enough money coming in the door. What it doesn't take into account is that each partner may have very different ideas about how to spend that money. Save it? Spend it? Spend it on your list of priorities, or on mine? It turns out that our attitudes about money are composed of a whole set of values that influence each spending decision we make. It takes more than a calculator to work out our money differences. It also takes a number of conversations about what each spouse values and prioritizes.

 

MYTH #3: THE WAY I INTERACT WITH MY FAMILY WILL WORK JUST AS WELL FOR INTERACTING WITH MY SPOUSE'S FAMILY.

One of the other most common areas of conflict for couples? Inlaws. Each family has "rules" that develop over long periods of time. Not every family system develops the same rules, and no family system likes the attempts of an outsider to change it. "I was shocked to find out that my spouse's family handled conflict so differently than mine did," stated one of our therapists. "In my family we confronted each other directly and out in the open. In my spouse's family, conflicts were avoided or swept under the rug as soon as possible. Boy was I surprised at the negative reaction when I openly discussed issues in his family." If you have the idea that you can be a major force to change your spouse's family, set that thought aside. A more realistic goal will be for you and your spouse to discuss together things like how you want to handle holidays, which of you should be the one to bring up issues that may be conflictual, how open or closed you want to be in terms of sharing information. And then do your best to follow the guidelines that you have established between yourselves.

 

MYTH #4: ONCE WE GET MARRIED AND ARE LIVING TOGETHER, WE WILL HAVE PLENTY OF TIME TO BE TOGETHER.

This myth doesn't take into account the reality of the end of courtship. During the courtship phase of a relationship it is typical for many other parts of life to go "on hold" while extra time is invested in getting together with one another, and then in planning and carrying out a wedding. After the honeymoon it is typical to have a feeling of wanting to get back to "normal" life. There is also often a desire to put time back into neglected friendships, career development and other personal interests that took a backseat during courtship. While couples may spend more minutes of the day together, their attention often becomes more divided. Interestingly, because they now see each other so regularly, couples may not spend as much time planning their interactions with one another. Early in a marriage is a good time to establish how you will set aside time for dates, for talking and for romance. Outside responsibilities, and the addition of parenting responsibilities, can quickly erode time spent with each other.

 

MYTH #5a: ALL THAT WILL BE REQUIRED TO HAVE A WONDERFULLY EXCITING PHYSICAL RELATIONSHIP WILL BE FOR BOTH OF US TO SHOW UP IN THE SAME BED AT THE SAME TIME...and,

MYTH #5b: IT WILL BE EASY TO TALK ABOUT SEX TOGETHER.

 Despite the fact that I had heard my friends talk about the cooling of passion as a marriage progressed, it honestly never occurred to me that could happen to us. How can you go from chills running up and down your spine when you just hold hands, to having to work at being intimate with one another? And, a comment from one of our other therapists: "I was surprised at how the increased vulnerability of a sexual relationship made talking more difficult." Along with finances and inlaws, sex is the third hot topic of conflict for couples. Typical areas of disagreement include frequency, preferred behaviors, and how the quality of the rest of relationship is affecting sexual desire. The essential building block of a healthy sexual relationship is an attitude of mutual respect. Respect will help each partner to make necessary compromises regarding frequency and behavior. More importantly, respect is the key to creating the environment of mutual caring during the day, that translates into a desire to be sexually intimate at night.

 

"What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility." —Leo Tolstoy

 

Additional Resources:

Marital Myths Revisited: A Fresh Look at Two Dozen Mistaken Beliefs About Marriage — by Arnold A. Lazarus

 

Four Myths (and how to help your children debunk them) — by Anna-Mae Ridley and Cari Bacon.

 

Kelly sees clients in the Yorkville office*
The Yorkville office supports Yorkville, Oswego and surrounding areas.

 

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