“ Why Can’ t You Just Say, Thanks?”

If this sounds familiar it is because most of us have said it or heard it.

• Most people want to feel appreciated, particularly by the person closest to them but too often the expression of gratitude gets lost in the fabric of couple’s lives.
• Recent research in the field of positive psychology informs us that feeling gratitude, the awareness and appreciation of what is valuable and meaningful to oneself, has many benefits including positive mood, enhanced physical health and optimistic outlook. Actually expressing gratitude has proven to have even greater benefits in terms of personal happiness and relationship enhancement.

Then… Why is it difficult to express gratitude to a partner?

People are complicated. Add in couple dynamics, prior history, unconscious factors, cultural context and you multiply those complications.

• Most partners don’t consider how often they thank their partner or if not-why not?
• Few are aware of the proven benefits of expressing gratitude on their personal feelings, their view of the partner, the patterns and value of the relationship.

Consider Recognizing Your Resistance and Understanding the Possible Benefits of  “Just Saying Thanks.”

Recently the question was raised by some of my colleagues as to whether there can be happiness in a sexless marriage. An article on the subject refers to the research of Robert Epstein, a psychologist who reports that 10 to 20% of the romantic relationships in the U.S. are sexless.

According to Epstein, a sexless relationship is defined as one in which the partners have had sex less than once a month or less than 10 times a year. Others writing in the field take the word more literally – suggesting that many couples happy with that schedule would not describe their relationship as sexless.

Maybe the question of how sexual a marriage is and whether or not the partners are happy is a far more complicated one than the rate of sexual intercourse over time.

Work with couples would suggest that happiness from sexual relating must account for the trust and special connection partners feel for one another, the way they hold, touch, laugh, tease, celebrate, walk together, worry about, lean on, cry with, nickname, argue, text and call each other — the many dimensions of sexual intimacy.

The news of Bin Laden’s death has erupted on national and international levels in a mix of feelings. Attached to the thrill of justice served and military courage recognized are shadows of fear and the pain of catastrophic loss.

For survivors and the thousands who lost so many loved ones on 9/11 this is not only long awaited news, it is a déjà vu of that September day.

Once again there are ongoing calls of condolence and remembrances, non-stop media reports, and the visceral pain of losing a Dad, a child, a partner, a firefighter, a friend, a community, and the illusion of safety.

What Does this Mean for Emotional Healing?

It Invites Revisiting:

Highly charged events like Bin Laden’s Death are quite likely to trigger traumatic memories that unlike ordinary explicit memory for daily events are encoded under fight/flight conditions in those centers of the brain dealing with sensations and emotion. They can be sequestered for years – untold, intrusive as nightmares and flashbacks, haunting but never integrated into the story of one’s life.  While this event might trigger pain, it may offer an opportunity to bear witness, to share and transform traumatic memories.

To err is human. To blame seems to be human also.

We blame nature, we blame God, we blame our enemies, our spouses and ourselves. We even blame politicians for never taking the blame!

Why?

The definition of blame is to hold responsible, to find fault with, to censure, for something that has happened, has failed to happen or which has had a negative impact in some way.

We need to blame for regulations of feelings, reparation of harm and restoration of order on personal, interpersonal and broadly social levels.

The Uses of Blame

In the best of circumstances blame for wrong doing once acknowledged results in apology, concessions to meet the demands of restorative justice or punishment to meet the demands of retributive justice.

Once again the recent holidays were pierced by the tragedy of a local high school senior who died by suicide. Having taken pills, she went to sleep. Her parents were sleeping in the next room. She never woke.

The reality of this type of event is horrifying.  Pain and grief reverberate on every level of the community. There are always unanswered questions that haunt family, friends, school and community connections. The unthinkable has happened.  Any parent, if only for a moment, dares to ask, “Could My Teen Commit Suicide?”

The Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide (SPTS) would say that if that question motivates parents to learn more about the warning signs of suicide, find to a way to speak to their teens, and reach for help– it might be one of the most important questions they consider.

In the last blog (Part 1) we began our interview with Laurie Abraham, author of The Husband and Wives Club: A Year in the Life of a Couples Therapy Group. Here we continue and ask Laurie about the group leader, what really happens in the group, gender differences, and whether couples therapy can actually make things worse.

Can you tell me a little bit about Dr. Coche and how the group felt about her?

She was a very experienced and active leader. I think the couples respected her. They did not always agree with her. She came across as a tough maternal figure. I think what mattered most was that they felt she was the expert.

Was there actually a process between the couples themselves or mainly between the leader and each of the couples?

Well, she would set the stage by asking something like “What do you want to take away today?”  In the course of the group, she would often work with a certain couple and ask for input from other members.  In addition, over the course of the year, the couples did jump in on their own to point out each other’s patterns.  Someone might say “That sounds so harsh” or disclose a feeling they were having. Someone might begin crying while observing the painful reactions of another couple or share a similar crisis or loss that they had experienced.

On Tuesday, I blogged about different types of guilt and the impact that guilt can have on relationships. Today, we’re going to look at apologies and why they can be reparative:

Apology — The Expression of Guilt

In the interaction between partners there is a difference between feeling guilt and expressing guilt. In those cases where guilt is both a product of self-judgment (You really feel guilty) and judgment by your partner (he/she is clearly hurt by your actions or inactions), the expression of guilt is reparative.