Mid-week while meeting with my last client for the evening, I found myself repeating the same sentiment I had shared with two different clients earlier that day; a comment meant to help normalize the inevitable hurt that comes with intimate relationships. I tell them that all couples experience moments of feeling wounded and hurt, even if unintended. No one can keep a promise to not hurt the other. Within close relationships, emotionally speaking, there WILL be blood.
This session was with a heterosexual couple in their late 30s. They both work full-time and have one child. The male partner had recently engaged in a drunken one-night-stand which devastated his wife of over a decade. As I assess the relationship’s history, it becomes clearer that there exists an unhelpful dynamic of reacting to one another in a pursue/withdraw dance. This interactive pattern naturally leads to emotional distance and misunderstandings between the two of them. In Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy (EFT), we call these “relationship wounds”- moments of hurt in the relationship that when unattended, often become distancers of intimacy. As I work with them to make sense of the recent betrayal of infidelity, we start by slowing things down to help him enter into and begin sifting through a deeper emotional process. The husband appeared helpless as he talked about recently returning home from work to a scene in which he sees the impact of his infidelity on his family. When he saw his wounded wife lying in bed on her side, stunned by grief, his anxiety instantly flared up. He simultaneously noted their 7 y/old child playing unattended in the living room. He was quickly overwhelmed by a sense of shame, torn by guilt and fear. Watching the two people he loves the most in a state of unhappiness devastates his sense of purpose as a “protector” of their family. His shame boils over as he blames himself for the current situation in their household. He attempts to cope with his own guilt by trying to fix the atmosphere (rather than simply being present with his wife in her despair).
By bringing a more acute awareness to his anxieties, I help him slow down so that we can begin to go inward. I lean forward and more softly ask the questions: Where in your body does that sensation show up? If it had a texture, what texture would it be? If it had a color, what color would it be? If you had to use an emotion to name it, what might that be?
He takes a long pause and then responds: I feel it in my neck and shoulders. It is weighty. It feels rough. It’s almost like a brick. The color is dark, like black.
I ask, What happens to you when you watch your wife lying on the bed crying and you look over at your son and see him playing alone?
He responds with an exhale of pain. He begins to cry.
I lean in a little closer and ask, What do you imagine might happen if you were standing there watching them both, you noticed that dark, rough tension in your body, and you just stayed with it?
His head lifted as he let out a deep audible sigh, Wooooof!
He laughs at the intensity of my suggestion. His wife and I join in the chuckles, which soften the intimidation of feeling these more vulnerable emotions. I reflect on and validate the difficulty of my suggesting he stay with his unpleasant feelings. I acknowledge how scary and hard that is; how hard it is to sit with such heavy feelings. He comments on how his alcohol use had helped him numb all of these feelings in the past. Since the drunken hookup, he has abstained from alcohol to work on his marriage and build trust again. This challenge of paying attention to his feelings is a foreign and new experience for him.
A moment later he reflects on his personality and the sensations he consistently feels toward his family – the pressure to meet their needs, and his role as a protector (Here, one might suggest his abuse of alcohol helps remove him from often feeling the stress of such pressure. I save this hypothesis for another opening in later sessions).
He says, It’s constant! Like a bunch of balls bouncing around in my head all day.
I ask, What do those bouncing balls tell you about how you feel at that moment?
I feel worried, he says.
Checking in, I say, Ah! It is a constant pressure of anxiety and worry?
He nods.
And what do you think the anxiety is about?
He sits for a split second of silence, I don’t know.
I make a suggestion: Anxiety is often fear. What do you think you might be afraid of?
He begins to weep again.
I am afraid of failing my family. That I won’t be able to take care of them. That I won’t be good enough.
Ahhhhh, yes. I say this slowly to highlight the validity of such fears. Of course! You are afraid of letting them down; not being good enough.
We sit with that feeling just a little bit longer, attempting to increase his tolerance for such discomfort. Often, by turning inward, naming the emotion, and acknowledging it with compassion, we can both tolerate it and move through it, which is an experiential coping strategy.
These interventions come from Dr. Sue. Johnson’s attachment theory, EFT. I was able to use techniques of questioning, slowing, and softening my own tone to evoke emotions and reflect back to the client his emotive experience so he could access the underlying fears and hurt. This helps to increase his emotional vocabulary, thus identifying unmet needs and feelings around difficult experiences.
What is so lovely about working with couples, is that in this moment of rawness, his wounded wife turned to him and put her hand on him. She says, Aaawwwe, you aren’t failing. I love you. What I am witnessing here is so much vulnerability followed by a softening which leads to a deeper connection between the two of them. Although he still needs to focus on her hurt from the affair, here she is able to see deeper into his fears, while he can better express himself. This increases a sense of togetherness in how they parent and partner. Not only is he now more in tune with his deeper emotions, he has also moved completely out of a panicked, anxious doing-things phase and into his emotional self (the wounded child within who feels never good enough and always fearful of failing). This expands his awareness of himself and helps her to better understand what his pressuring and demanding behavior might really be about. It gives him the option of how he might want to respond to his family rather than reacting in functionary ways. His wife can begin to experience him in a much softer and more vulnerable way. Rather than her tendency to shut down and pull away from him when he presents as irritable or dismissive, now, they are both able to access language that gets to the root of their experiences. I summarize this process and make the bigger connection to their interactive pattern of him dismissing her vulnerabilities within the relationship:
These balls in your head go bouncing around. That fear kicks in, and you go into do-do-do-mode, which translates to her that you don’t have time or care for the minor details of her stories. She then shuts down and keeps from sharing with you out of fear of being snuffed out. This all results in more distance between the two of you, leading to feeling further and further disconnected and alone in your marriage.
We reflect on this pattern together and summarize the session. They still have lots of work to do in recovering from the infidelity, but I feel pleased with this new experience between the two of them. They end the session seeming more connected with more understanding. As he becomes more in tune with his own emotional experience, he will likely be better able to tune in to hers.
Here is the thing; hurt is inevitable. As parents, lovers, siblings, and friends, we will unintentionally hurt others in close relationships. Children internalize meaning that often isn’t there. Partners in intimate relationships have naturally perfected the art of triggering one another. We feel wounded when closeness, vulnerability, and trust exist within close emotional proximity. There will inevitably be blood! It is not a question of Will I hurt them/Will they hurt me? The best question is How will we repair when hurt happens? Success and closeness are maintained not by avoiding hurt in relationships, but by how those hurts get managed. Is there understanding? Is there empathy for the other’s experience? Is there responsibility taken? Is there clarification to help increase understanding of the intentions on both ends?
References
Brubacher, L. L. (2018). Stepping into emotionally focused couple therapy: Key
ingredients of change. Karnac.
Johnson, S. (2020). Hold me tight: Seven conversations for a lifetime of Love
(Unabridged). Little Brown & Co.
Nagoski, E., & Nagoski, A. (2020). Burnout: The secret to unlocking the stress cycle.
Ballantine Books.
Perel, E. (2019). The state of affairs: Rethinking infidelity. Yellow Kite.
The Word Mill 