This May Be a Bitter Pill
Sometimes in our relationships we reach a point where something needs to change or it just won't work for us. But is that even possible? Or do you have to break up? Libby goes over two losing strategies that a lot of people try when they want something different from their partner than what they're getting, and offers what she believes is a better way to get what you want.
Transcript
If you are in that place of righteousness or you're in that place of feeling like a victim and you're pushing again, it's not that you're not right about your feelings. It's just that the complaining or the making the case or pressuring or pushing or constantly bringing it up over and over again, it just doesn't actually help anybody solve problems.
So how many people listening to this show either are currently or have recently or at any time been in a relationship where your needs just aren't being met. It's a tough situation to be in. It's an even tougher situation to be in. If you're currently in a relationship with someone where your needs aren't being met and you don't wanna break up, what do you do? I've been wanting to talk about this for a while because obviously, it's something that comes up a lot with my coaching clients. So I'm actually gonna give you three made-up couples who are in situations where somebody's needs, aren't getting met. And then I'm gonna talk about how it can go wrong. And then I'm gonna talk about what you can do instead. And I'm gonna go ahead and say the thing that I have to suggest that you might need to do instead in order to get your needs met.
If that's what you're gonna strive for is not maybe the thing you think it is. And it may be something you don't like that I have to say, just gonna prepare you for that, but let's go ahead and dig into it. Shall we? So couple number one, imaginary, couple Shayla and Ryan, both. She, her, they are non-nested partners and Shayla is always the one initiating time, texting, Messaging, et cetera, with Ryan. Ryan is not a planner. Ryan also has two other partners, one of whom she lives with. And honestly, Ryan really struggles with setting boundaries with her nesting partner, especially, and she's constantly canceling on Shayla or having to reschedule because of accidental double bookings. And she really struggles with showing up for Shayla the way that Shayla needs her to. And Shayla's pretty frustrated because she feels like she's doing a lot of work that Ryan isn't doing to be in the relationship and is dealing with a lot of feelings of being dropped or feeling unimportant.
Another example is Chris and Marta. So Chris and Marta, Chris, they, them Marta, she, her, they live together. They have two kids and they both work full time. Chris is in the position of like family manager. Now, if you are the family manager of your family, you know what I'm talking about? They make a lot of the decision for the family. They hold onto a lot of the mental load. They make the doctor's appointments. They make sure the kids have enough clothes that fit them, that the bills get paid, that the kids get to school on time that the staples and the cupboard get replenished before they run out, et cetera. Now, Chris often feels because of all the things they're holding, that they are just juggling plates in the air and they need more help from Marta, their nested partner. They've asked Marta to take charge of certain things like maybe laundry or preparing breakfast for kids in the morning.
And Marta is just regularly dropping the ball, which makes Chris feel like they really do just have to do everything. Now, Marta and Chris have periodically also been talking about possibly opening up their relationship. But Chris has so far been resistant because when they think about possibly watching the kids, while Marta goes on a date, they get flooded with resentment. Chris really needs Marta to step up more. And Marta is really struggling. Last example, Rob and Bella, Rob, he, him Bella she, her. Bella is a stay-at-home parent. And Rob has a full-time job that supports her and their three kids financially. Though Rob has a high-profile job. His family's the most important thing to him and he prioritizes family time pretty much over everything recently, Rob and Bella opened up their relationship. And Bella is in full-on NRE with a new partner. She's spending a lot of time with her even planning trips together, going away on weekends, et cetera.
And Rob feels like whenever he is with Bella, she's constantly texting her other partner. And she even does this when she's supposed to be watching the kids. And Rob is starting to feel bitter about this. The story in his head is Bella is a stay-at-home parent and he feels like he's doing as much childcare as she is sometimes. Rob might feel better or maybe more entitled to ask for more from Bella if he had another partner, but his work and his family commitments take up a lot of his time and bandwidth. And so it's hard for him to find time to meet someone. And he is definitely growing resentful around feeling like Bella isn't giving him or the family as much time as he would like. Maybe you identify with one of these scenarios or more than one, or maybe there are some other way that you don't feel met in your relationship.
And maybe you really struggle with what to do if you don't wanna just break up with a person. So one thing that can come up when we have an unmet need in our relationship is wondering if it's even reasonable to want it or expect to be met. You know, we all have to settle, right. You know, as the rolling stones say, and as I often say to my children, you can't always get what you want. Another problem that can come up though, is if you are clear that your need is valid. And in fact you have no problem meeting this need for other people. And so then you don't understand why other people can't meet that need for you. So in both of these situations, it can be tricky to figure out whether you can get that need met and how to get that need met.
And what I see a lot is people using one of two losing strategies. The first losing strategy is the being right strategy. Now, a lot of people tend to use this strategy when they're not sure if their need is valid or not. And so they want to like make a case for why it is. Now, some people do this, even if they're not sure if their need is valid, they'll still make a case for it. And they're hoping their partner's gonna like argue back with them about why maybe it's not a valid need, but either way, they're not sure about it. And so they're trying to like justify that the need is valid. And so they get into this place of like arguing and pushing and just whenever their need is met. And they're feeling those disappointed feelings, they just make a whole case like a lawyer might for why their feelings are valid way.
It's reasonable, that they're upset and why their partner should fix it for them. Then the second thing that I see happen a lot, and this usually comes from the place of I'm doing this. Why can't you other people do this. Other people have this kind of relationship. This isn't that hard. Why can't you be this way is a losing strategy. I call unbridled self-expression and that comes straight from Terry Real and his five losing strategies. It's unbridled Self-expression also known as word vomit, also known as everything in the kitchen sink. How this can show up is just kind of complaining loudly about the unmet need, how bad it feels, how it keeps happening, how frustrating it is, how it happened last week. And it happened three months ago. And when is this gonna get better? And why can't you do this? And you should be able to do that and et cetera.
So I wanna, before I get into why these are losing strategies and why they're bad, I wanna just honor why, why they get used. I think it's because that oftentimes we have the idea that if our partner could just hear us out, either hear the case for why it is that I need you to step up. I need you to do something differently or just see the patterns, see the patterns of behavior, understand why this is not okay. If all of that could just be clear to them and they could just understand if they could see how upset I am, then my partner would be motivated to a change. They think that the issue is either a lack of agreement or a lack of understanding or a lack of empathy. And so it's just, you complain. And if it's still not getting met, you complain louder. And you know, you can even, to a point, if you start getting really upset, you might end up acting out or you might end up taking it personally, or you might start yelling or you might get really trapped in this feeling of like victimhood and like unfairness or, you know, righteous anger.
And the hard thing about this is that I really do think we deserve to have the relationships that we want to have. We deserve to be met in our relationships. We deserve to be loved and cherished and trusted and met with intentionality and effort and care and graciousness and follow through. We deserve to have partners show up consistently for us. We deserve to have them grow with us and sometimes bend for us and make compromises and tell us what they need so that we can compromise for them. Yes, we don't get everything we want all the time in every moment. But I do think we deserve to have the relationships we wanna have. And our partner may not be able to give that to us, even if we deserve it. So I get the anger, I get the frustration. I get the feelings of unfairness. I think it's justified. The problem is that if you are in that place of righteousness or you're in that place of feeling like a victim and you're pushing. Again, it's not that you're not right about your feelings. It's just that the complaining or the making the case or pressuring or pushing or constantly bringing it up over and over again, it just doesn't actually help anybody solve problems.
I wanna say that again, complaining and laying into somebody or making a case for why things should be different or whatever it is explaining it calmly. Even it actually doesn't help figure out it's not happening and actually solve the problem. Let me tell you what happens when you do use one of these two strategies, either that being right strategy or the unbridled self-expression what's gonna happen typically is the person is gonna take the blame and go into shame and beat up on themselves, or they're gonna get defensive and push back. So I'm gonna use my couples here as an example. So with Shayla and Ryan, you know, Shayla tries to be flexible and easy. Maybe she understands the complexity of Ryan's situation and wants to meet Ryan more where she is. But when they have their relationship, chickens, Shayla will still just go off at length and building her case as to why Ryan needs to be better at scheduling and keeping her commitments with Shayla.
Ryan often just feels like super ashamed and bad about herself. After these conversations, she agrees to do better, but the struggle never actually gets better. Ryan already has problems with shame and feeling like she's not enough. And that's why she has a hard time setting boundaries for herself in the first place. It's why she's always double-booking herself. She doesn't wanna disappoint anyone and has a hard time saying no. So the more Shayla points out Ryan's deficiencies, the more Ryan feels ashamed and guilty. And the more she beats up on herself and feels enough adequate. And that actually leads her to hide more from Shayla and avoid her. And that actually means Shayla has to keep doing more and more of the reaching out and making Ryan feel better. And then, you know, ultimately Ryan's in this pleasing thing with Shayla, even at the expense of her own wellbeing, which it ends up causing problems in her other relationships, which causes more and more shame and around and around until Ryan just feels like she's messing up with everyone and can't do anything right.
And it's a downward spiral for everyone. And again, there's Shayla. And even though Ryan is feeling terrible, Shayla, still sitting there not having her needs get met, not great. So then let's look at Chris and Marta. So every time Marta drops the ball, Chris just flares up with anger and explodes. They rant about how frustrating or upsetting it is that they just can't count on Marta. And they feel trapped and alone and overwhelmed and Marta feels terrible and cries and promises to do better. She actually goes into more of a fawning placating response mode with Chris because she just wants the anger and the yelling to stop and the loving connection to come back. Marta agrees. She's dropping the ball with Chris and she wants to make Chris happy. The problem is when Marta is in placating mode, she makes a bunch of promises to do better, but without any sort of a plan for how to actually do that or support to follow through.
And so things don't actually get better. And then when Marta drops the ball again, Chris gets angry again. And now they feel that even though Marta seems to understand what needs to happen and has made these agreements because Marta's still failing. Maybe she's just not taking it seriously enough. Maybe she doesn't mean it when she says it. And so now, Chris doesn't feel like they can rely on Marta or maybe think that Marta doesn't care or isn't trying, that's, it's a tough one. And I wanna just own here. Yes. Yelling at someone when you're upset with them is not a good behavioral strategy and I'm not justifying Chris's behavior here. In fact, I'm saying it causes a problem. It's not actually in Chris's interest to do this, but I also just wanna say, sometimes people get upset and they yell and I'm not gonna label this dynamic as abusive.
Okay. And you can come at me and tell me I'm wrong. I'll hear that, but I think it's unhealthy. I think the behavior abusive, but I think the relationship, I'm not gonna say that it is cuz I think these are two empowered people who are struggling with a difference inability to function. Okay. So with Rob and Bella, Bella knows that she's getting super wrapped up in this new relationship and that it's taking up a lot of her time and attention and she preemptively feels really guilty about it. She's a mom. She knows that she's supposed to put her kids first. And all of a sudden this new relationship is just really lighting her up and exciting her and making her feel in touch with parts of herself that she has kind of let fall by the wayside as a parent. And it's very exciting and also scary.
And the fear and the guilt causes her to downplay this new relationship with Rob. And then with Rob, when he sees how excited she really is about it. And he gets a sense that Bella isn't being totally honest with him. He gets really upset and feels really hurt and shut down. And that guilt causes Bella to get defensive and angry and pull away from him, which just reinforces his feelings, that he doesn't matter so much to her and reinforces those fears of being replaced. When Rob sees Bella texting her other partner, he gets cold and withdrawn and he complains that she doesn't care about him, that her girlfriend is more important than her family. And of course, that plays on Bella's own feelings of guilt already and it's yucky. And then Rob begins to resent her new partner too and begins constantly comparing and you know, keeping score on how much energy and attention Bella is giving her new partner compared to Rob.
He complains that he and Bella aren't having enough sex and that she isn't even trying to be a loving partner, and he points out that he's the one asking for date nights. He's the one trying to get her to do family time together. He feels a lot of times that he's not working. He's actually watching the kids while she's out with her other partner. And when, of course, when Bella does try to give Rob attention, initiate more sex, being more thing, it feels like she's just pouring into a bottomless pit half the time she tries to connect and she gets that coldness and that resentfulness and he never seems to appreciate what she does do and how hard she does work and how much she already does give to the kids. And so it never feels like she's doing enough or loving him enough to satisfy him.
In addition to these strategies, not working, if you are in one of these dynamics where you are unmet and you are in a cycle of just really coming after your partner about it in some kind of way, it probably feels pretty bad to you while you may feel in this righteous victimhood, which I wanna be clear. It does feel a little bit good when you feel like clearly wronged. You probably also bounce into shame and regret when the negative impact of you complaining to your partner hits them and they feel bad. And when your partner just can't deliver for you, maybe instead of blaming them, you might get into a situation where you're blaming yourself. You know, if only you'd said what you needed more clearly or in just the right way, or if you just hadn't gotten upset or, you know, maybe if you were prettier or younger or you hadn't messed up that one time 10 years ago, maybe then your partner would be willing to come through for you.
Or maybe you're just too needy. Maybe your needs are too high or unrealistic. Maybe you just have it all wrong. And now you gotta recalibrate your own expectations, you know, et cetera, maybe you need to lean into gratitude. Like everybody tells you to and just appreciate what you have. And of course, you can get in that cycle of going through that and then feeling unmet and disappointed, and then you get angry all over again and you get angry for trying to let it go. I mean, it's, it's a whole thing. The other problem with righteousness and that righteous, angry victim mentality that you can get into here, Is that there's not a lot of room for compassion for where the other person might be and what their context is because I'm a believer that generally when people aren't meeting your needs, there's some kind of reason.
So with Ryan, for instance, sure, she needs to learn how to set more boundaries. And she inherently has a hard time with this, but it's worth saying that one of her strengths, one of the reasons why Shayla loves her is that she's also so super flexible and compassionate and gracious and loving. She really does her best to put others first. And she gets so much joy from being just giving to others. Polyamory is such a good fit for Ryan in many ways because she just has so much love that she wants to give other people, she does need to learn how to set better boundaries. She does need to learn how to follow through on commitments and figure out how to prioritize and figure out how to disappoint people. And also probably how to put herself first sometimes. But there are reasons that she hasn't developed those skills yet, and it doesn't have to do with how much she loves Shayla or not.
And sure, Chris has valid grievances with having a partner that isn't doing their fair share of domestic and parenting and other sorts of mental load type stuff. They probably find it incredibly frustrating and also like a super cliche to be in this relationship where they have a full-time job and they have to do all of the kid wrangling and all of the household management stuff. And Marta just gets to kind of show up and do their thing. And Chris has to be constantly nagging them to do other stuff that Chris needs help with. Like that super sucks. And Marta turns out has a legit hard time with activities that go under the title executive function. So things like remembering to do the laundry, remembering to put the kids' lunches in their lunch bags, and all of these like task-oriented type things. Her brain just works differently from Chris.
And she was pretty good at executive function before they had kids she'd figured out ways to compensate, but the kids just added a whole nother level of stuff to do. And it just really overloaded Marta and, and Marta really needs a lot of help. And there are ways that the way Marta's brain works is the strength is also really creative and innovative. It's something that Chris really loves about Marta. It's also a big part of why she's so successful in her job. And at her job, her company gives her a lot of accommodation around her executive function difficulties because her strengths of creativity and innovation are what her position in her job really require.. And Marta really needs this at home too. She might need some additional ways of operating that can accommodate her differences. But Marta at this point has avoided bringing up these sore topics to strategize more deeply with them because she's honestly afraid to bring it up with Chris, cuz she just doesn't wanna get yelled at.
And then there's Bella, who has always been the good girl and she's always done what other people expected her to do and then received love in exchange for that. But she is actively trying to get off of the self-sacrifice bus and to start leaning into things that she deeply wants for herself. She's trying not to cave in to pressure, to be a certain way or to feel certain things, but instead is truly trying to live her truth. But the guilt has been such a powerful force that it has kept her from really figuring out what she wants. And so the more Rob complains and pressures her from this righteous place. The more she shrinks from him and doubts herself and feels unable to speak her truth. So if Shayla, Chris and Rob were to like say hop on a Facebook message board and layout their situation and ask for advice.
I think probably what would happen most of the time is that the people responding would just back up their grievances and it's appealing. Like I said, to paint yourself as the good guy as the victim and your partner as the bad or the one who needs to do better and you can get caught in this place of like shoulds, they should do this. They shouldn't do that, et cetera. The problem is there's nothing empowering for your partner. If they're the bad guy. Again, if they agree with you, then they're gonna feel like about themselves. And if you've ever been in that situation, you know that when someone else is shut down and beating up on themselves, they can't actually have any room to hold space for your needs or take any action to do better. It's just not possible from like a pit of shame.
They can't see past it. And again, you often then end up being in the situation of trying to make them feel better about how they're letting you down. And then that can make you feel even more pissed off. And if they don't agree that they're the bad guy, well then they're gonna get defensive. They don't see themselves the way that you're painting them, they're doing the best they can. And they want you to see that they want you to see all of the things that they're trying to do. They want you to see their good intentions, their decisions, or their reasons for failing you. Feel valid to them or your expectations feel just unreasonable or maybe they even are gonna be able to point out how it's hypocritical. They might take this opportunity when you complain about them, to tell you all the ways that you aren't perfect or have done the same thing in the past. So this doesn't work path goes nowhere moral over again.
Like I said, a lot of the times the issue isn't actually that your partner disagrees with you about the unmet need being a valid need that they would like to meet. It's not that even that they fail to empathize with your feelings and that they need to hear more about them. The issue more often than not is that usually there's something else getting in their way.
And I think it's important to say here, okay. It is a valid decision to break up. I know I said at the beginning that if you're in the situation and you don't wanna break up, I wanna help you. But I do just wanna point out that even if someone can't meet your need and they're doing their best, but they just can't do it. It's valid to break up with them. Not because they're bad. Not because they're not good enough, but because sometimes what you need just can't be met by the other person. In the first example, it may be that Ryan just isn't actually skilled enough to successfully juggle three partners and that it will simply take too much time and heartache for Shayla, for it to feel good for her to remain in that relationship. While Ryan starts to learn to set boundaries for herself, it may be that Chris really just needs more help around the house and with the kids.
And it's just taking too much of a toll on their mental health and wellbeing. And they're also getting too Ragy for their own good and for Marta's own good. And Marta might just not be wanting to take that abuse. And so it might really not be a healthy, happy relationship for the two of them to remain in. And it may be that Bella can't actually be enough for Rob right now. Maybe Rob really just isn't polyamorous or can't be okay being the primary breadwinner in his family and having his partner be dating other people like maybe that inequity just isn't acceptable to him. And he can't do it. It's so much better. I wanna say to break up though, than to stay in this loop of, you know, getting in these fights of feeling like this righteous, angry victim, where your needs aren't getting met and your partner feeling like about it.
And then you, I mean this whole loop, right? It's people do this loop for years and they are miserable. And I think it's better to be apart and happy than together and miserable. And the thing is in order to decide that a need is valid enough to be a deal-breaker, you don't have to objectively prove it. You can want what you want, if your relational experience, without this need getting just can't work for you. If it's causing too much pain, even with all the wonderful things you're getting with your partner, it's okay to let it go. If your partner isn't meeting that need it, isn't a sign that you don't deserve it or that they don't wanna do it or that you're wrong for wanting it. But your partner just may not be able to do what you need by just agreeing that you need it. Or they may not be able to get there on the timeline that you need them to get there. Or they may never get there. It just might not be possible.
But I did say I would give you advice about what to do if you don't wanna break up. And the truth is I think all of these situations and many, many more can turn around. So if you have an unmet need in your relationship or several, and you would like to turn it around, here's what I wanna tell you. But here's the part you're not gonna like, okay, you're gonna have to let go of that righteousness. You're gonna have to stop arguing your case. You're gonna have to stop trying to prove it. You're gonna have to stop feeling entitled. You're gonna have to let go of those feelings of victimhood and resentment and shift gears with your partner. I know it's hard, but that is just a path to downward spiral and consistent misery. Instead, what I have seen actually work is to roll up your sleeves, get with your partner, collaborate on solutions, help them out, ask for what you want. Set caring boundaries, stick up for yourself with love, and empower your partner to do better. And all of that is going to require you to be very, very patient.
I'm sorry. In my experience, if you decide to go this route, it's not a fast process in all of these situations, what's at the root of the unmet need is a lack of certain skills or abilities or a lack of awareness of behavioral patterns or unhelpful habits, which means what needs to happen is behavior change and behavior change just does not happen overnight. Acquiring skills, forming habits, rewiring. What your typical go-to responses to things are that can take months, sometimes years to transform and simply pointing out the failure. Doesn't actually, help you learn anything. What helps you learn is consistent practice, repetition, positive reinforcement, debriefing, and tinkering and troubleshooting ideas. I know it's tough. The other tough part when we're caught in a loop and all three of these couples are caught in a loop of shame and blame and defensiveness and hiding and all of that stuff. It literally forms a chain of neurons, all firing together. It's like a groove that has become well-worn over time, such that both people's brains are already predicting the negative outcome before anything has ever happened. So it's not just a matter of, oh, I need to shift gears and empower my partner. I also might need to unwind a really bad pattern first.
And that often means you have to stop the pushing and the fighting and the picking and the sighing and the grumping. Before you even see one bit of meaningful change, often it can take majorly backing up and letting go of this change because You both just need some breathing room to reset. But if this is the route you wanna go, if you wanna see some kind of significant change in your relationship and get unmet needs met by your partner, here are my tips to make it possible.
So first of all, I want you, you to be allowed to feel your righteous, angry victim feelings like they're gonna be there and they're gonna keep coming up. Okay. Just because I'm telling you that they're not helpful. Doesn't mean you're not gonna feel them. Okay? So you need a container in which you can feel them. And I think it's really important though, that you don't let them loose on your partner anymore, but they're gonna be there, feel them, listen to them and then maybe be in conversation with them and remind them that, Hey, like, I feel you, I understand where you're coming from and you can't be the person talking to my partner because when you talk to them, it doesn't work. Okay. That's the first thing. Second thing, it can be really important to pick the right people to support you in working on this relationship.
Because in order to get to the other side of this journey, you're gonna need a lot of faith and commitment and a friend or family member who is just gonna join you in your righteousness rather than support you in patiently working on this is probably gonna undermine that and make you feel naive or foolish, or like you're being a chump. And it's really important to say that the reality is there's not a lot of scripts for getting down and really working and shifting on something we're really taught to be in a relationship and just sort of, you know, just react to whatever we get and then hope that it shifts over time. Fingers crossed, but like getting down and, and muck and really working together and really helping each other and empowering each other. You don't see that a lot actually. And so you really will need to find people who will be supportive of this project. And if you don't have any supportive friends or family, Have a journal or a daily practice of just holding space for yourself and your feelings, or find a professional to support you in this, Because it's gonna be hard and you're gonna feel frustrated sometimes. And it's important to get support.
It's also okay to grieve that this isn't easy and may not feel fair. You know, it cannot feel fair that like, maybe you've done all your own work to become the great person that you are. And here you are having to help someone do their work instead of just getting what you want and deserve right away.
So the next thing is to actually do a little reckoning with yourself too, because again, I wanna say breaking up is always an option, but if you've decided not to, it's really good to catalog for yourself. Why it's worth it for you to stay. Even if things aren't where you want them to be. I might even write this on a sticky note or on an index card and put it somewhere where you can easily come back to it when you need reminders, include things like what you love about your partner, what you love about your relationship. Why, what you're getting is really worth this work and sticking around to see if you're gonna get what you need. I might also include things like the values you hold or dreams for the future together, okay. After you've felt your righteous feelings and allowed them to be there, gotten clear on why you're sticking around, have a support network for yourself.
I would create a practice of breathing yourself down so that you are able to access compassion with your partner and be at their level that you are the same. If you're feeling self-righteous, if you're feeling better then that's gonna put you in this one up position with your partner, and it's just not a respectful position to be in. If you don't breathe yourself down and hold your partner in loving, in warm regard, they'll probably pick up on that superior energy coming from you. And that's just not gonna probably feel good to them. Nobody likes to be talked down to or tolerated, right? And so it's likely to reinforce those feelings of shame or provoked defensiveness. And those are just huge obstacles to change. Remember, change requires empowerment, accountability, and compassion. Here's another thing you gotta release yourself from hyper-focusing on any setback or micro disappointment.
And this one's gonna be hard, but really important because behavior change really looks like a lot of two steps forward, three steps back, eight steps forward, one step back, et cetera. And if you are flipping out over every little setback thinking, oh, this is the end and it's never gonna work. And you start to catastrophize, that's probably gonna sabotage your partner's progress and your ability to have Goodwill towards the experience. One thing that can really help with not catastrophizing and flipping out over setbacks though, is to set a deadline, to assess whether there's been any progress and decide if you wanna continue working on this. Cuz a thing that can happen is we'll get this fear that it's always gonna be this way and that can make you feel trapped and it can SAP away your patients for incremental progress. In fact, it can even make it invisible, especially if there's setbacks here and there.
But if you give yourself a deadline, I'm gonna do this for six months. And if things haven't gotten better, I'm gonna look at transitioning the relationship or restructuring things significantly or resetting my expectations or whatever, you know, but that part of you, that fears being trapped can relax a little and then you maybe won't be so hyper-focused on little setbacks and little steps forward and stuff like that because you know that in six months, you're just gonna evaluate it from a longer view. Because even if your partner has committed to behavior change, I wanna be clear. It doesn't mean they're gonna succeed or that they're gonna succeed to your standards or show progress at a pace that you're willing to put up with. And I wanna say again, we only have this precious life and sometimes you gotta tell yourself that there's a certain point that I just can't do the work or the work is too slow and painful.
And it's okay to say, I will work for this long. I will do this much. And if it doesn't show meaningful progress, I'm not gonna keep banging my head against a brick wall. Right? Next thing it, and this one is really, really important. You then wanna communicate with your partner about this in a different way, tell them you wanna change the pattern. You're both locked in and maybe be accountable for your side of the street. Be accountable. If you've been angry or resentful or passive-aggressive or punishing, or you know, righteous, angry victim, et cetera, and say that you want things to be better. And that you commit to backing off on your side of things and shifting your attitude, but that you also really need things to be different on their end and ask them if they're willing to do it with you to work on it together and be open to that answer being no, you know, they might say no and decide then if that's a deal-breaker and if they say yes, take them in good faith and assume they do wanna do better. And this is really important because again, there might be setbacks if they're saying yes to you, that they wanna work on this, take them in good faith.
Next thing. Start having plan B conversations about the problem to understand it better. What do I mean by a plan B conversation? So I'm actually borrowing this term from Ross Greene, who is a pediatric psychologist who helps parents with kids with all kinds of behavioral challenges, solve problems that they're having with their kids. Essentially you express your needer concern. And then you try to get an understanding of what is happening, that's causing that problem to happen. So instead of just saying, Hey, this needs to change well, they know that they know that something's not working. They've heard you say it a million in times, but that isn't helping them solve the problem. So instead you just need to understand the problem better. What is getting in the way of, you know, Marta doing the laundry every week? What is getting in the way of Bella not looking up from her texting when Rob wants her attention, what is getting in the way of Ryan initiating more time with Shayla and making sure she doesn't double book?
What are the stumbling blocks that keep happening and how can we help move the 'em out of the way, come up with plans together on how together you can both do things differently. You might also find that you have to shift something in yourself in order to help get what you want from your partner. In these examples above I mentioned Ryan's problem that she has a hard time setting boundaries and disappointing people. Well, she might really need to feel like if she disappoints Shayla that Shayla's gonna be okay with it, that Shayla can still reassure her, that she loves her. Even if she's disappointed, you know, Ryan might also need to work on her feelings of self-worth and value and get some help unlearning conflict avoidance, but she may also need a lot of reassurance while she's doing it.
Frankly, It also might be true that if Ryan has three partners and Shayla has one partner, Ryan, that Shayla might have to accept that she has a little bit more bandwidth than Ryan to make plans and initiate things. And in that case, what she might need is for Ryan to just do something else that might be more reassuring to Shayla to let Shayla know that Ryan is really invested in the relationship in the case of Marta. As I said, Marta, honestly just struggles with executive function. And so some things that seem really easy and obvious to Chris just are really hard for Marta. And so they may need to get more educated on neurodivergent, housekeeping, and find ways to support Marta in doing the things that Chris needs her to do. And Chris also might need to let go a little bit of like the how of when of it getting done.
You know, cuz sometimes I know this happens a household, you know, I hand off a task to my partner, but then I have a thing that I have a way that I really want it to be done. And then when they don't do it in that way, then I'm really bothered by that. And then I'm all micromanaging and then they mess up because they get super anxious that I'm overseeing them. And that it's just a bad look altogether. So they may have to really shift the dynamic of how they work together as a team, in order to help Marta do things better. And also there might be certain tasks that Marta's really good at and finds less difficult. And there are other ones that might just be way too hard and that just shouldn't be on their plate. With Bella and Rob, Rob may need to learn to be more assertive, but in a kind way in asking for attention and connection from Bella, like it's just really normal and reasonable that when someone is an e their hormones are going bazongkas and they can't always remember to focus on the other things that are important and it might be that Rob needs to just help Bella with that.
It also might be that Rob needs to be in curiosity about some of the shifts that are happening inside Bella and what she's really learning about herself through this new relationship and through other ways in which she's trying to grow. And Bella may have to make some commitments to Rob around containing the texting to certain times or, you know, making sure that phones are put away during family times or date nights between the two of them. And you know, Rob might also have to deal with some of the comfort that he's feeling about being in an open relationship and learn how to be more flexible in, you know, accommodating something that he's not comfortable with. Next thing, when your partner makes a move in the direction that you're asking them to go or makes an attempt to do something different than what they have been doing before acknowledge and appreciate it.
I'm gonna say that again. When your partner goes in the direction, you've been asking them to acknowledge and appreciate it. Even if it wasn't quite right, even if it totally didn't work, acknowledge the effort, acknowledge the intent. That doesn't mean you can't give feedback about how they could do it better next time, but you first have to acknowledge the effort and the intent. And it's gonna be disappointing when they're trying and it's not quite there and it's gonna be so easy to jump into criticizing, but that's just gonna make both of you feel defeated and it's gonna really make your partner feel like crap.
Now, after your partner has made the attempt and after you've acknowledged the effort and intent, then you can give some feedback. You can debrief troubleshoot, and it's important to do this collaboratively. If something didn't go well, it's important to say what you were hoping for or what would've made it even better. This is, the part that a lot of people have a hard time with because it really is that you helping your partner do better. You're helping them give you more of what you want. And that, that can just feel really hard to take, but take a deep breath and remember getting what you want is in your interest. So it's for you. So talk together about how it went for each of you get feedback from your partner about how their attempt to do something different felt for them. Ask if they're open to feedback and then make sure that you are sharing from your own experience, stay away from telling 'em how hard they were trying or how they were feeling or what they were thinking and try to stay out of the objective of what they should have done when wanna give them a correction or an improvement, try to be really specific and behavioral.
Here's another important one, find ways to enjoy each other while you're doing this work. If all you're doing is the work work work, and there are no moments of pleasure and joy. It might feel grueling to be in this relationship and that might cause you to avoid it. So when you're able to enjoy your time together, it's really important to highlight it. It's really important to appreciate your partner for the things that are good and going well. It can also be really important to find pleasure outside of your relationship in ways that nourish you doesn't have to be other partners, but it can be. You can also take a pottery class or do an exercise routine or watch a Netflix show that your partner would never watch, take yourself on dates even, and practice enjoying your own company and breathe. Because this will take time. There will be disappointing days. There will be days when you slide back or when they slide back and that's okay. You repair, you acknowledge and you keep trying.
And then if you do reach a point where it's just too hard or things aren't getting to where you need them to be, try not to be in a place of blame. You're not wrong for wanting what you want, but your partner's not wrong for not being able to do it or not wanting to do it even. And it can be a really loving thing to do when that's the situation to just break up. And it's easier to have a loving breakup. If you're able to say that no one was wrong, everyone did their best, but it just wasn't a fit. Here's another thing. When you finally get what you're asking for from your partner, you might have some tough feelings. You might find it hard to trust it. You might find it hard not to be in a place of grief or resentment for all the time that you weren't getting it. It can be hard to move the disappointment and pain that you've felt for so long out of your body. But when your partner is actually finally coming through for you in a way you've always asked them to do, really do everything you can to try to open yourself up, to receive it and celebrate it. And that probably will feel more vulnerable than you realize because it is vulnerable. It is vulnerable to being open, to trusting that your partner will actually meet your needs.
That leaves you open to disappointment again, but I think it's worth it.
So I wanna leave you with this. Again, this path of change that I'm suggesting, the path of true lasting change in a relationship it's actually a pretty rarefied path. Most people don't take it, I think because it's hard, but I've seen it work. It's worked in my own relationship. It's worked in my client's relationships. I I've seen it take months. And I sometimes it takes years. I've people turn things around though and find more, love a happier home, more security, more sexy times, less fighting and less pain. Yes, relationships are never perfect because we're all imperfect humans. But with time, practice, patience and commitment, things can get better. So to recap, if you aren't happy with your partner and you really want change, change is possible, but you aren't gonna get change from a righteous, angry victim place.
You're not gonna get changed If you're complaining if you're lashing out, if you are arguing them into it or pushing them or otherwise blaming and shaming them into it, that is more likely to just reinforce the behavior you don't want. And more likely to have you locked in a pattern where you are never satisfied and they never feel like enough. And either they're getting defensive or crashing into shame. If you wanna stay on the relationship and you wanna see change, what actually tends to work is to approach it collaboratively. What actually tends to work is you helping your partner and empowering them to give you more of what you want. On the other side of that though, is well, the relationship that you always wanted, you just had to create it together.
