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 Marriage 101 - Expert Advice
Courage to Love…When Your Marriage HurtsBy Gerald Foley  "Who Supports This Couple in Marriage?"Where does a couple turn when they face marital difficulties? Awareness of the problem is the first step toward change. But particular stresses and problems still stand in the way of intimacy. Powerful negative feelings have built over years. Resentments over a spouse's actions, hurtful behaviors, and emotional unavailability have accumulated for a long time. Couples who have been together for many years have deeply entrenched patterns of relating to one another. Even if both are willing to change, old patterns are difficult to alter and often the negative feelings remain even after the behavior has changed. Moreover, couples in troubled marriages find it hard to find anyone who will support them in their marriage. Our society today has created a climate for divorce. In some circles it seems more acceptable to have gone through a divorce than to be confined to one marriage for life. Not only is adultery seen as part of the sexual freedom gained in the '60s, but people are even featured on TV talk shows because of their infidelity. People tell me again and again, "You wouldn't believe how many people encouraged us to get a divorce when we were hurting." The common assumption is that people who suffer over an extended period of time in an unhappy marriage could do better to get out. Often, thinking that they're helping those who are struggling, friends, co-workers, and acquaintances try to support one spouse by running down the other. While an angry person in the misery stage may be eager to hear reasons for the pain and isolation he or she is feeling, this kind of support from others only keeps the person stuck in an unhealthy phase of the relationship. Derision of a spouse hints that the relationship is no good, that the problems are all due to the other spouse's failings, and that the solution is out of this person's hands. When people are hurting, the "liberation" of divorce looks attractive. But the kind of support these well-meaning people give only helps to postpone any solutions to the underlying problems in the relationship. Too many people are ready to welcome others to the world of marital breakup because it justifies their own struggles. Irene, facing an unwanted divorce, complained that several support groups she tried encouraged her and other recently separated people to proceed with divorce rather than consider reconciliation. People at the same precarious point in life can form a dependent bond that perpetuates a situation of avoiding solutions. While divorced friends may draw a couple further toward divorce through commiseration, married friends may suddenly take on a new role with a hurting couple as protector, guardian, or parent. Hurting couples may threaten their relationship, so they come up with all the reasons their marriage flourishes while someone else's is in difficulty. In the process, they point out how wrong the hurting couple have been in their relationship, hinting that they themselves are superior. This merely increases a couple's feelings of failure and inferiority.
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