In the Times newspaper last Friday there was a report of a recent survey on the top ten irritations that people named in relation to their partners. These were:
• Leaving clothes on the floor
• Leaving wet towels around the house
• Bad bathroom habits
• Always using the phone
• Disagreeing about what film to watch
• Messy eating habits
• Deciding who is cooking
• Picking your nose
• Drunk sexting
• Looking at your ex’s Facebook page
From my experience as a therapist I would agree that many of these are expressed as points of conflict in the counselling room.
However I was interested there was no mention of such things as mothers-in-law, finances, housework, child care or sex, as the couples who come to see me more often talk about these as the major points of friction in their relationships. Perhaps it is a matter of what questions the survey chose to ask.
Being in a relationship means accepting your partner’s differences as well as enjoying the ways in which you are similar. Sometimes you have to let go of your preference to fit in with your partner and sometimes it’s the other way round. As an example the Times highlighted the number of men agreeing to watch ‘rom-com’ films rather than their preferred action movies. “Indeed, it is possible that Hugh Grant’s entire film career is based on half his audience wishing they were somewhere else”.
So what to do when you feel irritated with your partner’s bad habits?
• Take a deep breath
• Decide whether it is of real importance to you or whether it is something you can live with
• Wait, (if possible!) until you can have a calm chat about it
• Try not to bring it up in an aggressive way
• Use ‘I’ statements (e.g. when you leave the towel around the house, I feel like you are expecting me to clear up after you)
• Be prepared to listen to how they see it.
At Coupleworks we see people for couples counselling or psychosexual therapy who are not managing to resolve issues, often finding themselves arguing over irritations when there are deeper issues that are troubling them. We see clients face to face, by telephone or Skype.
Sarah Fletcher