When Your Spouse Complains Chronic anger causes severe health problems. Did you know people in bad marriages actually have shorter life spans? Anger consumes our energy and wears us out. How do you deal with anger in your marriage? First, dont deny it. In Ephesians 4: 26-27, the Apostle Paul says that we will be angry. When this happens, admit it. Dont bottle it up. Suppressing anger may feel helpful in the short term, but unexpressed anger can be devastating. The pressure will build and build until you explode. Cultivate an atmosphere of honesty within your relationship, so you and your spouse both feel free to complain and express anger. You have to be able to share anything with each other. Ive counseled individuals before and one person will tell me something important about their thoughts or feelings. Ill ask, Have you told your spouse that? Theyll answer, Oh, no. Theyll go ballistic. What that means is the atmosphere in their home is not safe. They arent free to complain because that kind of honesty can be dangerous to their marriage. Allow your spouse to be angry. But when your spouse does offer a specific complaint, you must respond in a healthy way. Dont get defensive. The best customer relations counters are the ones that take back a defective product and replace it with no questions asked. Its easy. Thats the kind of attitude we need in marriage. Defensive behavior makes it difficult. It makes a spouse feel they dont have a right to complain. In fact, defensiveness is a major predictor of divorce. Dont let your anger age. Paul told the Ephesians not to let the sun go down on their anger. He meant that anger should be dealt with immediately. If you let it age—if you let it simmer and stew—it gets worse. It begins to fester. Long-term anger turns into contempt. It turns into bitterness. It becomes poisonous and hardens your heart to whatever made you angry in the first place. Dont hide your anger in hopes that it will just go away. It turns toxic. Dont stonewall. This is when communication totally shuts down. Its a response that means youre not willing to talk at all. Do not talk to me about the children. Do not talk to me about money. Dont talk to me about my behavior. A marriage with no communication is a marriage thats in trouble. We need to be able to complain to each other. We have to talk things out—but we have to do it without getting defensive, throwing a fit, or insulting each other. Dysfunctional families dont talk. Functional families are honest and work things out when one spouse has a complaint. What kind of family is yours?
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 08:31:08 +0000
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