Power of Change | Counselling and Coaching Services

If you’re thinking about ending your marriage, you’re likely to be facing one of the most difficult decisions of your adult life. Many people struggle for a very long time before making a firm choice about whether to stay or go.

 

Today I am going to cover :

 

 

The eight red flags that could be occurring in your marriage

 

  1. You are not communicating anymore outside what is necessary and even that content is negative. Most of the things that you are saying to each other are just black and white. Very surface. At this point, you will be finding it difficult to make decisions on simple, insignificant issues like where do we go for dinner? What will we do on Sunday?
  2. You feel in your heart the relationship is unhealthy. You have tried everything to improve your relationship. You’ve read personal development books. You’ve talked to friends and families. You’ve talked to your partner endlessly. You know that you cannot keep on going on like this. You’re living in a toxic environment. The energy is draining. You can feel the energy between the two of you isn’t getting any better. It’s getting worse.
  3. An unwillingness to change. You both need to change. It takes two of you to make changes in your marriage. Having the motivation and the commitment to make the changes. You’re both not perfect and you both need to change. There needs to be a willingness.
  4. Seek support. You have asked, you’ve begged your partner to see a counsellor. Maybe you’ve gone to a counsellor and done your work. You’re now hoping, living in hope that your partner will as well. You are feeling a strong resistance from your partner for counselling. It’s very difficult when you have a partner who will not seek support when you can clearly see that there are problems.
  5. You fantasise about a life without your partner. This isn’t unusual, but if it’s something that you do often it is time to seek some support from a therapist. Daydreaming that you will have a much better life without your partner is not healthy.
  6. The bad outweighs the good. Marriages become breeding grounds for vicious cycles and patterns of behaviour and one problem leads to another.
  7.  You don’t share your thoughts and feelings. You’ve both stopped turning to each other to share how you feel and think. Problems can’t be worked through unless you are both aware of the problems and talking and sharing with each other needs to happen. If you don’t share the gap of connection, disconnection will get bigger.
  8. Engaging in negative defence mechanisms. Do you or does your partner become overly defensive when you express a concern? Do you or your partner just dismiss each other needs? Does your partner criticise you or engage in stonewalling? If either of you engages in negative defence mechanisms this is a major red flag in your marriage and you are building more problems and solving nothing.

 

Primary reasons people stay together

 

 

Questions to ask yourself

 

 

What to do before making any major decisions

 

 

You may need some time away to view your marriage more clearly. Getting away by yourself even for a weekend can help you sort things out. And for many people, this is when something clicks inside, and they know what to do. Take your time, do not rush this decision.

 

Seek support and even if your partner won’t come with you, reach out. For someone who works with couples a couple’s counsellor or relationship coach. Whether you stay or leave this marriage/ relationship, you need to help to process your emotions. Set healthy boundaries and expectations and steps forward.

 

Finding a therapist to work through a very big life decision can be enormously helpful because struggling this, struggling with this for a long time causes a lot of heartaches. Being able to get to a decision and you can decide a firm choice. I’m staying or going.

 

Tune into to my Empowered Marriage Podcast to learn more about this topic – Knowing when to end your marriage. There’s a new podcast each week – https://www.powerofchange.com.au/empowered-marriage-podcast/