Embracing Healthy Relationships: Cultivating Loving Connection, Finding Peace
Relationship Coaching in Huntsville, AL and everywhere online.
SPECIALIZING IN NEURODIVERSE INDIVIDUALS AND COUPLES
Are your relationships feeling:
Overwhelming?
Underwhelming?
Exhausting?
Stifling?
Unfulfilling?
Painful?
Sometimes we are frustrated by all of the conflict and emotions we are experiencing in our close relationships: pain, anger, sadness, anxiety. We might feel our relationship is broken, and we want with all of our hearts to find a way to mend it. We might feel betrayed, or wounded in some way. The closer the relationship, the more intense the emotions can be.
If you’re married it could be that you are struggling with communication so often, that you know if something doesn’t change the relationship needs to end.
Or maybe that’s what you feel when thinking of your relationships with your parent, your sibling, your adult kids.
And you’re just tired of the turmoil. You are looking for solutions. Connections that are close but not rocky, and for the drama to shut off so you can get some peace.
Other times we look at the relationships in our lives, and realize there is just something that isn’t working. And we wonder, is it me?
Maybe your friendships always end with a major misunderstanding.
Maybe they just fizzle out.
Maybe you thought the relationship was closer or deeper than it actually was.
Or maybe you feel that once your friend doesn’t ‘need’ you anymore they just leave.
And sometimes you have landed on this page because you suspect your spouse has ADHD or Autism, and you are trying to figure out how to make your marriage work.
No matter what troubles you are having in your relationships, it usually affects you deeply enough that all other areas of your life are affected, for the day, or even the week:
work where you
can’t stop thinking about the fight you just had,
or the idea of going home on a Friday to your empty place.
Parenting, when you feel like snapping at the kids when they get home from school.
Leisure, when trying to do something fun, and all you can think about is the argument you had this morning, or HOW you can get him/her/them to understand.
You CAN have healthier, happier, more fulfilling relationships.
How COACHING works
Finding your way through the seeming never ending miscommunications and misunderstandings IS POSSIBLE.
You can live with peace in the house, with loving communication even when there are disagreements.
You can learn to communicate what you need clearly and firmly, and with the expectation of having those needs met.
You can learn to let go of repeating patterns, and the unhealthy ways that conflict can play out both in your mind, and in the relationship itself.
And if you are struggling to establish relationships, you can learn the skills you need, and develop the courage and insight you need to find fulfilling relationships.
Together we will start by identifying where your struggles are focused, and start processing current situation(s) immediately.
As we do, we will figure out together where the first focus for change needs to be. This initial work can take more than one or even two sessions as we tease apart how things have gone awry, where you may have control in the situation, and where you may not.
In this process we may introduce the term ‘codependence’ to help in understanding whether there are times where you think you have control in the relationship, and you don’t - or where you may think you have no control, and you do. Developing this kind of knowledge is key in developing healthy boundaries, and communication styles - and you will feel empowered as you learn to notice and capitalize on these subtle nuances to navigating relationships.
As our work continues to unfold, we may find that there are patterns across several of your relationships - often with family members - and this can be the most exciting part of what we do, as you find how these influences may be unconsciously affecting you, and how you can find freedom to introduce new relationship skills even with those closest to you that improve and strengthen those relationships.
And if you have landed on this page because you are struggling to find or maintain newer relationships all of the above work may help, but we will also focus on what skills you may need to help with meeting, initiating, and developing those newer relationships you are looking for. Sometimes you need skills to help with your ADHD. Sometimes Autism may be in play. Whatever the origin, there are ways that we can work together to introduce or improve skills, and perhaps shift your perspective on where you want to look for relationships.
Relationship Coaching can help you…
Improve Communication
Resolve Conflicts
Strengthen Emotional Bonds
Change unhealthy patterns of relating (eg: Codependence)
Find and keep healthy relationships
Frequently asked questions about Relationship therapy
FAQs
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The best way to improve communication is to use ‘active listening’ skills. These include the following (with modifications for those with ASD):
Maintain eye contact, even when it’s really hard because you’re mad.
Unless you have ASD, and you and your partner have devised other ways to let each other know that you are paying attention.
Don’t interrupt - even when you’re convinced that the other person is wrong, or doesn’t understand what you meant.
Keep your body turned toward your partner, arms uncrossed. Nod. Show empathy in your expression.
If you are ASD there are other ways you and your partner can work out that will allow you to communicate your empathy - perhaps not during the conversation, but before it.
BEFORE you say anything you THINK, make sure to repeat what you heard and ask if you understood it correctly.
If you think you didn’t understand - ask questions - then try the summary of what you heard again.
Put both your phones in another room on silent.
If you’ve had long standing conflicts that are just not getting resolved these kinds of skills can be especially difficult to implement, and you might need a third party to help keep you on track (a counselor, a pastor, etc.).
And if one or both of you are neurodivergent you may need help from a professional to develop healthier patterns in conflict and resolving conflict.
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Arguing is exhausting, and distressing, especially if you feel that you are having the same arguments over and over again. Learning how to resolve arguments well is part of learning good relationship skills. The reality is that you will always have disagreements - you are both human, and are unique, and will see some things in the world differently. But there are steps that you can take that can make having disagreements feel more civilized, and less disrespectful and/or alarming:
If you are starting to yell, or get really heated, realize that you HAVE to take a break. You need to realize that yelling anger doesn’t work to resolve anything, and only increases angry and hurt feelings. Once you are in that mode, your rational side is taking a seat WAY in the back. And that doesn’t help you find equitable, kind, compromising solutions. So every time you start to get to that level - use a ‘safe word’ that communicates your need to cool off for a certain amount of time, and a COMMITMENT to return to the conversation after that time has passed. You can’t just leave it open ended. The other person will feel dismissed and hurt - which will just make things tougher when the whole argument pops up again.
Make sure you are using the active listening skills listed above.
Use ‘I’ statements - focus on your perspective when communicating - such as ‘When I don’t hear from you when you are late from work *I* get worried and scared, and start to have catastrophic thoughts. I know that these are my thoughts and feelings, but I really struggle with them. Is there a way you can let me know you’re running late?’
If your arguments continue unresolved, and seem to pile up, it might be time to seek help from a counselor or mediator.
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You absolutely can have a healthy relationship. Whatever your neurodivergence, there are always ways to communicate with a partner in a healthy way, and for them to communicate in a healthy way with you.
A healthy relationship starts with neither partner pretending to be someone they are not. So if you are neurodivergent, and you have been masking most of your life, it may take a while for you to trust that you can unmask with your partner. This unmasking will be an important part of developing a healthy relationship.
If you haven’t found a partner and are looking for one, it may take a bit for you to recognize who ‘your people’ are, and feel the confidence that you will be treated well by them, before you will be willing to date one of them.
And if you have a partner it may take a while to develop an understanding and acceptance of each others’ different ways of communicating. You each may need to learn how to translate the other’s ways.
But all of these things are possible.
There can be a lot of trauma around developing relationships when you have a neurodivergent brain - primarily because the ways you were treated by your family and/or your peers may have not been understanding, kind, or filled with acceptance of your differences. You can heal from this trauma.
And you can find people that are understanding, kind, and accept your differences, with whom you are also kind, understanding and accepting of their differences from you. And those are the baseline ingredients of any healthy relationship.
Relationship Coaching for neurodivergent couples can help you with…
Understanding each other’s neurodivergence
Finding ways to improve communication specific to your styles
Finding healthy ways to engage in disagreement
Improving the depth and intimacy of your relationship
You don’t have to keep suffering in your relationships.
Peaceful, loving, fulfilling relationships are REAL.
Let’s work together to find, keep and enjoy yours.