This Valentine's Day, give your relationship the attention it deserves, take this opportunity to strengthen your bond, communicate better, and reignite the spark that brought you together. Don't wait until there's a breakdown to address any issues - be proactive and invest in the health of your relationship. Show your significant other how much you care by ensuring your relationship is running smoothly and efficiently. Just like a car needs regular maintenance, relationships also require a tune-up every now and then!
Mental health expert Noel McDermott looks at what makes a relationship roadworthy, focusing on three crucial areas that can significantly contribute to the success and longevity of relationships. By understanding and addressing these fundamental aspects, couples can strengthen their relationships and promote overall well-being.
1 - Set the right emotional tone – this is key to staying the distance. Conflict is a part of life but in our love relations we want in general the emotional background noise to be about kindness and love. Oxytocin is a hormone produced when we are safe in our relationship to another. It produces a sense of wellbeing, a feeling of being bonded and contributes to our health. It’s produced when we look into another’s eyes, when we touch skin to skin in a non-sexual way and when we hug etc. Make time to look at and touch each other, cuddle on the sofa and hold hands, these actions promote bonding creating a loving tone to our relationship. Dropping the tone of our voices also produces wellbeing and affection.
2 - Learn better conflict skills - having good conflict resolution skills keeps our relationships on track. Sometimes we must learn to let things go but in other cases it’s better to get it all out in the open. Verbalising how you are feeling is so much more productive than being angry as is owning our part in a problem. Creating emotional distance from conflict issues to problem solves helps. Stress from everyday life impacts us but it doesn’t indicate our relationship is in trouble. Assertive communication is essential for effective conflict management.
3 - Put flexible role boundaries in place - it's important to establish flexible role boundaries to foster authenticity and openness in our relationships. By embracing our unique roles and allowing ourselves the freedom to express our true selves, we create a more fulfilling and genuine connection with our partners. Accept that you have different skills and roles, don’t try to force one person to take it on because it’s a societal norm for example. Find out what works for your relationship. Discuss what you want in all aspects of the relationship.
So what does ‘healthy love’ look like?
The keys to a healthy and successful relationship are well known and they fall into three areas of functioning, it comes from the global assessment of relational functioning (GARF)
Problem solving: not just dealing with conflict when it arises but also how effective one is at letting go of conflict that is not helpful.
Ask yourselves - Is the ’structure’ of the relationship clear? Are boundaries understood? Are tasks allocated fairly? Is power shared appropriately? Are roles adopted with personal autonomy?
Is the emotional climate and feelings towards each other generally in the arena of love and positive regard, are positive views held by members about being in the relationships? Is sexual functioning healthy and positive?
Dealing with Life’s Challenges Together
In any intimate relationship, understanding external stressors that may impact the relationship is crucial. It is important to recognize that challenges from outside factors do not necessarily reflect the quality of the relationship itself. Distinguishing between internal and external sources of problems can help individuals navigate difficulties in a healthy and constructive manner. By acknowledging and addressing these stressors, couples can strengthen their bond and foster a deeper connection. It’s about normalising stress responses to stressful life experiences rather than saying they are signs of danger or problems.
External circumstances can challenge the perception that our current love relationships are not meeting needs effectively, it is important to recognize that this can cause a sense of internal stress. However, it's crucial to understand that experiencing this internal conflict doesn't automatically mean that the love relationship is bad. It's a normal part of the human experience to face challenges and reevaluate our needs and expectations. By acknowledging and addressing these feelings, individuals can work towards strengthening their relationships and achieving a deeper level of understanding and connection with their partners.
Mental health expert Noel McDermott comments:
"We know a lot about how relationships work these days and it’s possible to improve all the time how we work in partnership with our loved ones. The X factor in romantic relationships isn’t what you think it is. It’s not the butterflies in the stomach, the X factor is the willingness to forgive. We forgive someone because we want to keep them in our lives.”
Mental health expert Noel McDermott is a psychotherapist and dramatherapist with over 30 years’ work within the health, social care, education, and criminal justice fields. His company Mental Health Works provides unique mental health services for the public and other organisations. Mental Health Works offers in situ health care and will source, identify and co-ordinate personalised teams to meet your needs – https://www.mentalhealthworks.
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