Regardless of how a lot you’re keen on your companion, there are most likely one or two—okay, possibly 4 or 5—little issues they try this drive you up the wall. Maybe your persistence wears thinner with each loud, obnoxious slurp of their seltzer. Or possibly you wish to chuck their treasured cellphone throughout the room each night time after dinner, once they can’t appear to cease scrolling lengthy sufficient to concentrate to something you say.
If a sure behavior actually will get underneath your pores and skin, it’s preferrred to carry it as much as your companion sooner quite than later—earlier than resentment builds up and also you instinctively snap at them, Sabrina Romanoff, PsyD, a New York Metropolis–primarily based medical psychologist who commonly works with {couples}, tells SELF. That mentioned, Dr. Romanoff provides, there’s one frequent mistake lots of people make when making an attempt to deal with or “repair” their important different’s irritating behaviors.
“Don’t criticize somebody with out an actionable request,” she says. For instance, she recommends avoiding critiques like, “You at all times overlook to inform me about your plans till the final second,” or “It’s so annoying that you simply don’t clear up after your self and I’m caught washing your soiled dishes.” Complaints like this is not going to solely make your companion really feel attacked (and subsequently defensive), however they’re additionally not very productive, because you’re not providing a constructive approach for them to resolve the problem.
So as an alternative of solely specializing in what they’re doing flawed (and the way they’re pissing you off), “clarify the impression it has on you and make a request for what you’d like them to do as an alternative,” Dr. Romanoff suggests. With the situations above, for instance, she recommends extra constructive suggestions like, “It bothers me once you don’t inform me about your plans till the final minute. Sooner or later, might you give me a heads-up, in order that I don’t keep up all night time questioning the place you might be?” Or, “I’ve observed the dishes pile up within the sink. How about we clear them collectively proper after we eat, so that they don’t linger and begin to odor?”
Shifting the dialog in the direction of an answer is extra more likely to result in a significant dialogue, Dr. Romanoff says, and fewer more likely to end in an argument. “Your companion gained’t really feel such as you’re nagging, they usually’ll most likely have a greater understanding of how they affect you and how one can operate higher collectively,” she provides.
You may even use this technique for much less critical points, just like the seltzer slurping we talked about above, she says: You may say one thing like, “I don’t wish to nitpick you, and I do know you’re not doing it on goal, however I really feel actually agitated once I hear that noise. May you probably drink slightly quieter?” That approach, once more, you’re protecting the deal with you and providing a fast repair, which ought to make your companion extra open to adjusting their habits—and forestall you from dramatically pouring their pineapple Spindrift down the drain in a match of rage.
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