withdrawal Archives ⋆ Mike and Susan Dawson

Unhealthy Marriage Patterns: You Can end the Damaging Fear Dance

While sitting down to write this post about unhealthy marriage patterns, I was reminded of a movie scene where an overweight man was lamenting how big he had gotten. He said, “I eat because I’m unhappy, and I’m unhappy because I eat. It’s a vicious cycle.” I bring this up because, as humans, we have a tendency to fall into all sorts of cycles or patterns in everyday life — many of which are not only damaging but can feel never-ending. A perfect example of an unhealthy marriage pattern is the damaging fear dance. As couples, we fall into well-worn patterns when our fear button gets pushed. We’ve written a [...]

Are you just Existing Like Roommates?

michaeldawsonlpc@gmail.com2024-01-08T01:17:48+00:00Relationships|

Are you living like roommates instead of having the intimate, close relationship you want with your spouse? There are lots of reasons why we grow apart. When Mike and I were young marrieds with a little one it was easy to do the necessary communications (work talk) to make the household functional without stopping to talk about where we were emotionally. Expressing emotions can be hard for some people, especially when you’re stretched thin by the demands of work, family, community, and other responsibilities. Trying to carve out time with your spouse to talk about deep things may even make them nervous or anxious, which creates a barrier of its [...]