Communication is key. Not love, not passion, not romance and definately not connection. You could be the most compatible couple in the world but if you do not communicate well, there's no point.
Communication holds a lot under its umbrella. It starts with being able to talk about the healthy things in a meanigful way. Laughing together even about weird situations, making each other laugh comes under commuication. If a funny situation is not handled well it turns into an argument. How many times did you or your partner use the words "It's not what you said it's how you said it". Yes that applies to good topics too.
Talk about everything and anything. Never let your partner feel like they need to pick the 'right time' to talk to you. Talking about your marriage, your likes, dislikes, sex, kids, other people, your parents and your friends freely and openly. Even if any of these topics have become a sensitive area to discuss, you should still be able to get through it without a fight. The secret is listening and validating. Accepting how the other one feels is sometimes hard when you disagree with them. Start by validating their emotions and thoughts instead of dismissing. Dismissing them is what makes them avoid coming back to you with these topics which leads them to spiral about having any other conversation with you.
My biggest problem was my mother inlaw, she caused me a lot of pain and anger but the reason my feelings towards her kept taking a darker turn is becuase i couldn't talk to him about it. He neglected, blamed or usually told me to get me shit together and accept her because she is his mom. Years passed and i reach a point where If i heard her name i'd get angry. I had no support system and no backbone and unfortunately i was forced to deal with her on a weekly basis as she lived right next to us and was a very demanding person and an attention seeker. After we had kids she pushed her way in to see us twice a week to spend time with the kids and my life was getting harder and harder. It didn't matter. I had to bottle it all up and deal with my own shit as he requested.
Be able to talk about sex openly. Men don't understand how women's bodies and emotions work in this area and think we can act like them and just be machines. Men! we don't need sex to release stress, we need your love and we would gladly have sex if you are emotionally connected to us, believe me we want it too, but we need to be emotionally satisfied to give you that. Tell him that. Make him understand how you see it. Be open to tell him what are things you like and don't like in bed as well. They actually love that as they focus on what does make you happy because they care about hearing you be loud.
Discussing matters about kids was another tough conversation to have in my case. Not because we disagreed, which we did, but because we both loved them so much that we wanted to give them more and more and ended up fighting on who will give them more, who will spend the day with them, who will raise them, scold them and love them. As the mother I know for a fact that i know better. Because i take care of more things and know what they prefer and what words they will respond to. Even if i lose my temper at times, i still know them better. Instead of fighting, begin by explaining we only argue because of how much we love them. So let's give them the best together, listen to each others point of view and if we disagree let's go with what is a less risk for this specific situation.
But most fights happen because mommy is exhausted and he just walts in like saved the day without having done anything. don't fight about what he hasn't done, if he doesnt help by him self he won't do it when you fight for it. Make him understand calmly that you are overwhelmed and exhausted and need him to take care of you more than changing nappies or holding the baby when she cries. It's you he needs to hold, even if you are too busy with the kids to go to him yourself and dive into his arms. They don't understand that being overly stressed stops us from asking him to hug us, hold us, comfort us and love us. We think we need to be active and alive the whole time that taking a few minutes to breath while putting our heads on their shoulders is a waiste of time. Believe me men, we need that 2 minutes hug more than anything! Instead we get the "why are you always mad?". I havn't slept, been puked on a 100 times, I'm leaking, I'm emotional, I cried 3 times today, I yelled at my kid and I feel guilty, I took care of the house and the laundry, I'm dead inside and you are no where to be found!
You need to be able to communicate your needs without making them feel attacked. This sentence is a lot more harder to do, I swear I know. But it's the only way you can get anything out of them because we are exhausted and hormonal and not in complete control of our reactions. But do your best in order for you to win in this. They aren't women, they aren't mothers, they aren't hormonal, they aren't as overwhelmed as you are. And the day they get tired of your fighting and say something stupid to you like "you're too emotional" or "you're over complicating things" or my favorite "You don't appreciate what I do do". You will attack them so hard and unfortunately that may be the start of your road towards a divorce.
I've had many mothers talk to me about problems they have in their marriage but they are too scared to communicate it due to their reaction. I'm sorry to say this, but who cares about their reaction. Your mental health is more important, so don't bottle up. Talk! Communicate! Do your part then ask, Now what?
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