If you're frustrated with how you and your spouse interact on a daily basis, use these five tips to make immediate improvements. If you need to focus on only one of these tips, focus on the first:
NUMBER 1: It's not what was said, it's what was heard. Here's a common type of conversational battle:
"You said X"
"No I didn't!"
"Yes you did! I heard you say it! I can't believe you don't remember!"
"But I didn't say that!"
Bottom line? In most cases, it doesn't matter what was said. What matters is what was heard. Instead of getting derailed in a "he said/she said" fight, start over. Say "That's not what I was trying to communicate. Let me restate it another way" or "I must not have heard you clearly. Can you tell me again, perhaps using other words?" Clarity of statement from one spouse is for the purpose of clarity of understanding in the other. If your spouse didn't hear what you intended him to hear then don't get mad, try again. Remember, you are different people and will interpret the same words different ways (for a wide variety of reasons - background, "filters" and more). Seek understanding together.
NUMBER 2: Listen first, respond later. Too often, we are so intent on figuring out how we will respond to what someone is saying that we only listen superficially to their ideas. This is particularly true in an argument. Observe yourself. A better way is to listen fully, then, once you understand the subtleties of your spouse's point, you'll be better able to respond fully and constructively. If you have trouble remembering, consider even taking notes.
NUMBER 3: Think about body language that indicates you are both paying attention, and open. If your spouse is looking at his computer when you are talking with him, chances are good his attention is fractured and he won't hear all you have to say. Ask politely for him to turn around and look you in the eye. And, if you are furious, your body will show it and your spouse will become defensive even before you open your mouth. Consider going into another room to "cool down" before tackling a difficult subject. As a related topic, don't yell something from one room and expect it to be heard. If it's important, walk to where your partner is, say what you have to say, and make sure her body language - and confirming words - indicate he heard you.
NUMBER 4: Behave as you ask others to behave towards you. If you wish to be spoken respectfully to, then it follows you need to show respect to your partner. This doesn't mean becoming wishy-washy or giving up on getting your needs met. It simply means that it's hypocritical to expect respect from someone else if you won't walk the walk yourself. There will be times when your partner's anger is out of control, or sarcasm reigns supreme. Though you might feel better temporarily if you yell back, in the long run the situation is worse if you do. Instead of hurling invectives or insulting your partner, say something like "this is really making me mad and I can tell I'm about to lose my temper and say something I'll regret, so I'm going to leave the room for a couple of minutes to calm down, then we can talk about this some more." Think of it as an adult form of time out - one you give yourself before you lose control.
NUMBER 5: Give your spouse the benefit of the doubt and focus on the positive. It is common that even after a partner with problem ADHD symptoms starts to improve things, or a non-ADHD partner with anger issues starts to control her anger, the very first slip takes you both back to "see - this is just another example of how my partner can't do things right." Change, though, is a process, not an overnight wonder. So even if your partner makes a "mis-step," give him or her the benefit of the doubt. Think "overall we're making progress" rather than "this proves he'll never get it right." Your shift in attitude will work wonders in helping underscore to your spouse exactly why he/she is making all this effort in the first place. (Note - it's okay to express your disappointment, just stay positive - "well, that didn't work so well, but overall I think we're doing much better" is a more supportive response than "you never do anything right!"
Do these sound simple? Perhaps. But I'm guessing that if you are often arguing, you aren't doing at least some of them. And please, as always, remember that being polite IS NOT the same thing as hiding your feelings inside. You both need to know your needs are being met if you are to thrive. The question isn't whether or not you will express yourself - it is only what's the most productive way to do so.
- MelissaOrlov's blog
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Comments
DOES HE HAVE ADD?
My husband and I fell deeply in love in a later life marriage. After 3 years and much heartache from his 'adult' daughters who despise our marrying, we are very stressed. He has a son with ADHD and I do also. I am wondering if my husband has ADD also. I would never have guessed that until this morning when I searched for 'saying something and then not realizing he said it'. In addition to our adult children challenges we have this one. I would say that at least 5 times in our four years together, he says something strange and then vehemently denies it. We actually have a fight over it, as it is always something insulting to me. Then other times he has admitted he said something insulting but twists the content to something that becomes less insulting to me. Examples: When we were dating I told him I gave an engagement ring back to a man I broke up with. I feel my husband thought that was stupid of me. So, he said, "Remind me, if I want to buy you a gift, to buy you cut glass". To this day, 4 years later, he says he does not remember saying it and he actually does not believe me. My Mother died one month ago, husband's sister is dying, and we are running on empty. It is always about insulting me as he is so jealous. His deceased wife cheated on him, so he thinks I will do that. He has called me a fornicator, stated that when he dies I will have a 'good time' with my boyfriends {with his money he leaves me}. One day I mentioned that I should give my 1997 jeep which is in great condition to my granddaughter in college. He said "Can she afford the gas?". I was so incredibly insulted because he gives his grandchildren $10,000.00 upon HS graduation. So he assume that they CAN afford gas and says so. He says, 'they are taken care of' in regard to cars and gas. But he assumes mine are not as we are lower financial strata. We did prenups and he is a multi millionaire and I am ordinary. It is always 'my family' NOT 'our family' which has probably arisen out of the hatred of his three daughters. Last month we were in another state for my Mother's funeral. I had told him in the past that my sister dated a doctor's son in high school and then later married a different doctor's son. He said to me, as we were driving past the doctor's house that I pointed out to him: "Boy, your sister sure does like those doctors!!!" and then later denied vehemently that he said it. I am so stressed that I am in adrenal exhaustion and fatigue and cannot recovery. My life as I knew it when I met him (happy and positive) is now depressing and I am fatigued and overweight from the underlying familial stress. I went to 20 sessions of therapy and therapist retired. He went to about five with me. It is HIS daughters who stress our lives, but it was ME who sought an answer. ALSO, he has a mentally ill daughter, with OCD. She picketed our wedding, drove around insulting our guests, wrote him a letter threatening to do property damage at wedding, and after we were married two months, ON MY BIRTHDAY SHE THREATENED TO KILL MY BELOVED DOG OR STATED THAT HE WOULD BE FOUND MISSING. That was the worst of all. I still get physically sick when I think of it.
WHAT can we do? I am so depressed and just sick about the four years I have LOST. I want my life back and yet I feel that he and I could make it. Most of the time he is very considerate, loving, and honest.
And the worst part of it, is that he presents with NO OTHER SYMPTOMS OF ADD!!! I have a son with ADHD, so I am much more familiar with that.
IF anyone can help or give me an idea of what to do beside write the sentences down and confront him, I would appreciate.
Any opinions or advice would be great.
Thanks much!
something else?
Short term memory?
I found out that I have ADHD last year and I am 45 years old. I can understand the frustration of the mystery of it. Now, about your husband saying that he denied about saying things, I wonder if he has short term memory or of some sort? Try googling about that. Your husband's daughter having OCD, I recalled reading one of the websites that ADHD tend to pair up with something else like OCD, bipolar, eating disorder, etc... Try googling them up and perhaps contact his or your doctor about this. I hope for the best in your near future and let us know what you have found.
I plan to tell a bit about myself on how my husband and I, married for 23 years, NOT EVEN KNOW that I have ADHD later.
Regards,
Cindy
at a loss
basically I dont know what to do or where to go from here. I feel completely overwhelmed by my partner and his inability to complete things or operate as a functioning adult.
We have a 16month old son and in 7 weeks I am having another child. I feel like I have made a very poor decision being with this man. I read this information about living with someone with ADD and it does not seem a happy existence.
He had a business that failed that he denied was a bad business decision.. we are both 38. I have a good job and have worked for years to slowly get my life in order.
We have been together now for about 3 years. All my savings have gone.
At the end of last year it came out how much debt and how he has mismanaged his business and time. I had thought we could start thinking about buying a flat/ house, but we are unable to get a loan as he has debts totaling over 70k, as well we have debt for car and a tv and a bed.. these I knew about. All up 90K.
We could not get a loan to tie all the debts into place because part of the debt was he owed the tax department. He has apparently had these debts for years.. and done nothing
at my wits end and I went to someone in my family...I was 6 weeks pregnant at the time, unable to sleep, depressed and exhausted. I have developed clinical depression, I have developed eczema, and I tell him
They helped us get a loan - for the 90 thousand worth of debt.
I ahve never had financial help or had to do anything like this before.
A year ago he said would close his business down ( he has gotten a job which is really great). This hasn't happened.
He has still not paid off the tax debt fully - although the money is there is the account.
The credit cards are not closed down.
He lies to me about having completed things.
I am responsible for all bill payments now, all payments and running of the house. I look after everything. All house administration. he is nice to our son and a kind man, but i came into this relationship thinking that I would have someone i could rely on.
I am going to have 2 kids under two, and essentially an adult who cannot be trusted to do anything. Who spends their evenings catchign up with work - on their lap top- who cannot manage their own time, who does not finish things, who i cant rely on.
It is now almost 8 months since he said he would do things, and we are going to couple therapy and every week he says he will do things and he doesnt.
This is the second therapist who has suggested he has ADD.
I am so tired and broken by his behaviour, I dont know what to do.
I am in a similar situation -
I am in a similar situation - 1 year old son and a baby girl due in 12 weeks. ADHD husband who used up my life savings and ran us into massive debt due to failed business, lack of employment, and irresponsible spending. Wastes MASSIVE amounts of time on projects that he thinks will end up turning a profit but usually end up costing us money. Or wastes massive amounts of time playing video games. Like your husband, he is a very kind man with a good heart (and also extremely attentive, affectionate, and attractive), but completely unreliable.
I ended up being so stressed about the debt that I decided that bankruptcy was the best option for us to start with a clean slate. We tried couples counseling for a while, but our counselor kept telling him he needed to see individual psychiatric treatment. He put that off for several weeks until the therapist finally pestered him into making an appointment.
Once he finally agreed to start seeing a psychiatrist and get treated for his ADHD, things have gotten a lot better. He has been on three different meds so far. Nothing has really fixed it yet, but the simple fact that he is trying makes a huge difference to me. This experience has helped me realize that my husbands apparent laziness and selfishness is actually a symptom of his ADHD and not totally within his control.
Has your therapist recommended that he seek individual therapy and medication for his ADD? If not, I strongly suggest you steer him in that direction. The couples counseling is great and all, but the underlying source of the problem is that he needs treatment and medication for his ADD, and he won't ever get that in couples counseling.
Also, I don't know if bankruptcy is an option, but if you are 90K in debt, it might not be such a bad idea, especially if you don't have a lot of equity in your home.
Hopeless
It is very re-assuring to read some of the comments on this web site. I have been struggling in my marriage for over two years - not yet married five years. There is so much I've read here that makes sense. I sincerely believe my wife to have Adult ADD. She does, occasionally, recognize this herself, but is in denial about the full consequences of this. It has come to the point where a) MY mental health is under threat, b) she is determined that we should separate permanently. During our troubles she has consistently laid the responsibility for our troubles more or less solely on me and states that YOU need to change, YOUR behavior is unacceptable. At one point I took this on board and have been attempting to change my behavior in ways she would find more acceptable. I have undertaken counsel ling, I am beginning psychotherapy, I meditate daily to control my anger and frustration with her. On her part she has stated that she is "ALL right" and that she will not and cannot change. She now says there is no evidence of me making any effort to change and she is disrespectful of the measures (above) I am taking.
I recognize that I am not perfect and have my own short-comings and haven't known the right strategies for dealing with her issues. Lately, I have been too busy defending myself against her psychological attacks, (offense being the best form of defense on her part).
Our communication has broken down to such an extent that any verbal exchange with her, lasting more than about 15 minutes, degenerates into her giving a monologue of disparaging remarks about me. She uses all sorts of strategies to prevent me from responding or giving an alternative point of view to what she believes about me. She also use strategies to devalue or invalidate what I'm saying and she shows complete disregard for what I might be feeling.
It is uncomfortable for us to be in the same building yet, due to circumstances, we are still living in the same house. I have attempted to agree ground rules about causing each other discomfort during this situation, but her only response was that she was not going to talk to me at all.
I have always recognized she is a poor listener and appears to lack any empathy. She also appears to lack insight into her own mood/feelings/motives. Over the last five years she has consistently denied this.
I have tried to help her become more aware of the impact of her behaviour on me. My attempts have been perhaps clumsy and she has become even more defensive. I now feel she has a total steel reinforced, lead lined defensive wall round her which is impenetrable.
I have tried (some) of the strategies suggested on this web site. They don't work! Perhaps it is too late and she is too entrenched in her current state of mind.
The biggest obstacle, is her denial of the full extent of the problems caused by her ADD. However, she goes "ballistic" if I mention it, or even imply that I'm thinking it.
Overall, I think she is very frightened! Despite or because of this she now appears to be set on a path of destroying both our lives, because a separation at our age (me 59, her 57), both retired and on small pension will be devastating financially for the rest of our lives. I am finding it psychologically traumatic.
As implied above, it may be that I have left it too late to be pro-active about dealing with this, being too pre-occupied with helping myself rather than helping US. She is a lovely, caring, very moral and creative person who, in some respects I look up to. I now have to protect my own welfare and feel perhaps the best way forward for me is to get away form her with my full share of our assets and never have anything to do with her again. It is very sad that she will possibly never see that it was not solely my responsibility for our marriage breakdown and certainly not my responsibility for the breakdown of her previous two marriages. It appears she may repeat the pattern again and I am very sorry for this.
5 Tips
This is a great post and I can relate to the advice offered. I can recall times when I could have improved in all these areas. I'm going to post on my ADD blog about this article and link to it. My blog is pillsdontteachskills.com. Thanks!
- Jeff Hamilton