Trying to save a marriage by working on yourself first
Author Winifred Reilly didn’t try to change her partner; she focused on herself
Winifred Reilly wasn’t unhappy in her marriage, but she wanted the constant squabbling between herself and her husband to stop.
“I didn’t want to spend this life being in this frequent, ridiculous combat,” said Reilly, a marriage and family therapist who tied the knot nearly four decades ago.
Instead of trying to get her partner to change, she took a look at herself.
Reilly, author of It Takes One to Tango: How I Rescued my Marriage with (Almost) No Help from my Spouse — and How You Can, Too, started breaking out of her own destructive patterns in hopes of changing the trajectory of her marriage.
It worked. Her husband changed once Reilly tweaked her behaviour. Reilly gives her top tips on how to help a troubled marriage with mini- mal help from a spouse.
Recognize bad patterns. Paying attention to your own shortcomings after being so fixated on your partner’s missteps can help you gain valuable insight, Reilly said. Maybe you’ll come to realize that you are actually the one who starts most fights.
By becoming aware of these patterns, she explained, you will realize how much power you hold over the relationship’s well-being.
Choose one problem to work on. Do you have a hot temper? Next time you catch yourself blowing up over something your partner did or said, take a breath and try to calm down. Do you tend to interrupt your spouse midsentence? Hone your listening skills.
For Reilly, it meant that she had to physically leave the room to cool off. Change didn’t happen overnight.
But, she writes in her book, “one day, a year or so after I’d launched my campaign, we were in one of our typical idiotic go-rounds and, to my astonishment, I didn’t need to leave.”
Fully accept your partner. “We pick a person who is introverted or who is messy,” Reilly said. “And then we think, ‘I can’t live with this.’ ”
Making peace with those traits that annoy you in your partner, she said, will reduce frictions and boost your overall happiness.
So how do you learn to tolerate something like chronic lateness if you like being on time? One tip: put your pride aside.
Get vulnerable. Be the first to address sensitive issues you both avoid discussing — topics such as a dull sex life or an alcohol problem.
Have patience. A particularly stubborn spouse can be slow to adjust to the new, positive dynamic you’re trying to create, Reilly explained. It took her a year to get in sync with her husband.
“He started saying constructive things,” she recalled.
You know you’re making progress when, for instance, you’re taking turns stopping fights in their tracks or you’re pausing to search for gentler words during an argument.