Stress and Marriage
Posted: Monday, April 11, 2011
by Jim Anderson
Weddings That Last
A recent poll revealed that 47% of adults feel more stressed than they have in the past. The primary concern for the increased stress was their personal finances (Booth Research, 2008) When people feel more stressed, it takes a toll on their marriage relationships. In fact, you often hear experts say there are two major sources of problems in marriages that lead to divorce, sex and money. So when people are getting more stressed over finances, something needs to be done. Stress tends to exaggerate our perception of negatives and decreases our ability to use good relationship skills. We tend to think more negatively about our relationships when we are stressed.
Stress is one of the key factors that needs to be managed. Stress is a reaction to an external factor, so that means it is more about how we respond to that stressor than the stressor itself. We need to learn to cope with things we can’t change. The top 5 stressors for married couples, according to Prepare/Enrich surveys, is your spouse, your job, feeling emotionally upset, inadequate income, and too much to do around the home.
One way to reduce stress is to see the sources of stress in their proper perspective. Even though we may see our spouse as the top source of stress, we can’t change them. This only creates more frustration and stress. So it is more productive for couples to work on things they can control. One of those changes is often as simple as changing the way they speak to each other and the way they resolve conflicts.
One of the best ways to reduce stress is to gain a new perspective on your problems. First of all, you can cast your cares on the Lord. He is in control of all things and if you put your trust in Him, he will help you. If you truly trust Him, then the worry over that stressor will go away when you lay it down for Him to handle. One way to help you do that is to identify which problems are critical issues that you can actually change. Simply identifying one of those issues and resolving it can go a long way to reducing stress.
Another way to help reduce stress is to start balancing your priorities. We need to realize that our spouse is a high priority in life and we need to make sure there is time set aside for them. There may be a lot of work pressure, but that should be given a strict time boundary and seen as a lower priority than your spouse. Spend time with your spouse and nurture your relationship. That will also go a long way to helping you manage the work stress, and help make the relationship more positive too.
When a spouse is empathic towards the other’s stress, that is the first step to handling it. Next, working together to prioritize the stressors is important. Couples need to have a plan for how to approach resolution for conflict. This is an extremely important skill next to good communication. If the couple can work together with these skills they will have a powerful arsenal to fight the attacks against their relationship, and they will go a long way toward marital success.
In my premarital counseling program, I have a conflict resolution process that is used with an active listening protocol that can be applied to any issue that comes up in any relationship to keep the relationship from suffering damage from the conflict. If you want to have a successful relationship, you need to learn these skills. If you do, you will increase the chances of a successful relationship. Go to my website at www.weddingsthatlast.com for more information on my premarital counseling program, even if you are not married, or even just dating, this program can benefit you.
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