Manchester Psychotherapy

Counselling in Manchester

5 Ways To Stop Arguing With Your Partner

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5 ways to stop arguing with your partnerHow many times have you been angry with your partner because they didn’t guess what you were thinking? How many times have you presumed you knew what they were thinking and shouted at them for it? I know I’ve done both. My personal favourite saying to illustrate this is “If you loved me I wouldn’t have to tell you”! Boy, that’s a toughie to get out of! Let’s face facts though. Humans can’t mind read. When we presume our partners can, we discount them. Here’s what to do instead:

Ask for what you want. Don’t presume your partner knows.  We all have the power to do this and its a great way to start practising straight transactions.  It also gives your partner a clear understanding of your needs or wants with no hidden agenda which will build up trust in your relationship.

Use action/feeling statements. These are a great way to talk to another person about your feelings. “when you (insert annoying behaviour here), I felt (insert feeling here), so in future I’d like you to (insert preferable behaviour here)”.  These are brilliantly explained in Claude Steiner’s book “Achieving Emotional Literacy” (see my book reviews). Once more this is a straight way of talking and gives your partner a lot of information about how you feel without blaming.  Which brings me neatly onto…

Stay away from blame. This is where the old mind reading comes in again.  Chances are pretty high that your partner has not done something to deliberately annoy or upset you so use the action feeling statement above and avoid resentment building up.

Don’t presume you knew why your partner behaved in the way they did. If you are unsure, ask them.

Forgive and move on.Collecting up bad feelings (called stamp collecting in TA language) is harmful to relationships and erodes good feeling.  It often leads to big arguments later so it’s important to let things go and focus on the bigger picture – a strong, healthy relationship.

Interested in having Marriage counselling?  Just ring me on 07966 390857 or click “contact me” on the bar above.

How To Lose Weight The Therapy Way

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weight loss and therapyI’m sure you’ve been there, most of us who have ever dieted have.  You’ve just spent the last 4 weeks (months/years – insert as appropriate) dieting and you’ve now reached your target weight.  Somewhere in your brain a switch flicks and all that denying yourself chocolate, chips and crisps seems to have come to an end.  At last you can eat freely and you can reward yourself for all of the effort you have put into that diet.  The result?  Within a few weeks you are back to where you were before you started dieting – only more fed up and disillusioned because you have failed, again, to lose weight.

It may be no surprise to you – diets don’t work.  The vast majority of people who diet put the weight they have lost back on.

So what’s the answer?  Start with a head first approach.  If you get your head right then your body will eventually follow.  It’s important to ask yourself some serious questions about your relationship with food and why you feel the need to overeat in the first place.  A good therapist with experience in this area will be able to work with you to reveal the thoughts and feelings you have about food that may be out of your awareness.  It could even be that you have decided, somewhere deep down, that being overweight protects you in some way from danger.

We make all sorts of decisions when we are small about the best way to look after ourselves and get our needs met.  Sometimes those decisions can have a negative effect on our lives when we are adults.  the important thing to remember though is that as adults we have the power to change  those decisions.  If you have made bad decisions around food its unlikely that a diet is going to work long term for you.  Contact a good therapist and sort it out the “head way”.