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Hi, thank you for joining today’s podcast episode. Today’s episode is 201, “How to Handle Your Partner Going Against Your Wishes.” Before we get started, I want to take a moment and just join with you, if you will, in setting the intention for the Empowered Relationship podcast, and this is the larger intention. Now, each episode we go into a little more depth about a particular topic, but the overall intention is for you to feel supported, more prepared in navigating the landscape of long-term intimacy.

In my experience, we often don’t learn these skills in school or in our families, or even in our friendships or communities. Relationships tend to be such an intimate, private thing, and unless we’re self-studying, it can be difficult to come across these teachings, principles, exercises, strategies that help you develop lasting love, but also in a really healthy, authentic way. I would add media to this. Oftentimes we see certain examples of relationships in movies and TV and tend to emphasize certain aspects, but don’t really give us the full picture of cultivating really healthy, conscious partnership.

So that’s the intention, is for you to feel better equipped, more prepared in negotiating some of these aspects of relationship that could challenge us at times, threaten us at times, or even ask us to develop more capacity for joy, love, and intimacy, that might reach out of our comfort zones; that might be a good thing, but also challenge us in a positive way. So really, the invitation here is for you to lean in to whatever is emerging in you, or your relationship, and using it as a form of a curriculum for your development, for the development of your relationship; all in service of cultivating this healthy, long-lasting, fulfilling relationship. If you would like access to today’s show notes, you can visit drjessicahiggins.com Find the Podcast tab and click on that. You’ll find all the episodes listed there. Again, the most recent episodes are at the top. Today’s episode is 201, “How to Handle Your Partner Going Against Your Wishes.”

In today’s episode, I’m going to be responding to a listener’s question. Now, this question was submitted several months ago and had intended for the response to be addressed in Tobin Zivon’s episode, “How to Alchemize Your Triggers Into Insight, an Interview With Tobin Zivon.” Now, Tobin and I had really wanted to talk about power struggles and conflict in relationship, and I might have mentioned this listener’s situation… But as I was looking through some listeners’ questions, I realized I could go into a little more depth, so I’m going to do that today.

What I want you to pay attention to, if this situation doesn’t resonate with things that you experience in your relationship, I want to invite you to pay attention to the deeper patterns. Because most of the time, the deeper layer has really little to do with the surface conflict.

You’ve probably heard the phrase of, “It’s not about the dishes, or it’s not about the trash, or it’s really not about the volume of the music in the car, or what your partner said, or what your partner did.” Now, these are triggers. But what gets activated in us is what I really want to invite you to pay attention to. So again, this situation might not be close to home for you, but if you can listen for the process of working with the deeper layers and how to negotiate that in relationship, you might find this very useful.

On a side note, I have listeners periodically pose questions for me to address on this show. Oftentimes, I do my best to weave the question into a topic that is upcoming. Sometimes these questions get more deeply addressed, and sometimes they get referenced… So if you have a question that you would like to submit or have submitted, just please keep that in mind, that I do my best to address questions and really provide good, valuable content that is supportive for people in negotiating relationships. Sometimes, again, I’m going to go in more depth than others. Again, if you are interested in getting more support, you can also schedule a free strategy session to explore the option of getting support in your relationship. That could be individual coaching, or it could be getting support in your couplehood. So that’s couples coaching. That will really help you unpack, identify the disconnect patterns, what’s informing that, helping you begin to build a pattern for connection, and getting the support in implementing that. So again, you can find that on my website, which is drjessicahiggins.com. Click on Schedule and you’ll find more information there.

Let’s get started in today’s episode. Again, this is a listener, and I’m not entirely sure if she wants to remain anonymous, so I’m going to omit her name. She writes, “I am in a lesbian relationship. I had been with my partner for two and a half years. She is a yoga teacher, does not believe in using chemicals/medication, and is very spiritual. I am a financial planner. I am a person who used chemicals when needed, mostly for cleaning, and I took medications if I was sick.” Now she goes on to write a lot about her situation. It’s about two pages, so I’m not going to read it all here, but I am going to reference excerpts.

Basically, what she’s posing is a conflict where she has been clear with her partner about her distaste for full sleeve tattoos. Now, I guess this listener has a few tattoos of her own, which she has in very discrete parts of her body, so it’s not as visible and not as dramatic and full as covering the arm. She’s been very vocal about this, and they’ve had lots of conversations, and it seems as though the way this listener is describing her partner’s perspective is that this is something she really likes, and this is something that she wants to do… So they’ve been having a conflict around this.

More specifically, she goes on to describe that her partner had a birthday, and her request was to receive a voucher for the tattoo shop. Over several conversations, they discussed their different preferences, and a lot sounds like was shared. However, this listener was feeling as though she was pretty clear about not wanting the full sleeve tattoo and that she found that really unattractive. So what ended up happening was it was unclear, and then her partner ended up getting the beginnings of the full sleeve; and that it was very dark and very full, and would be filled in at some point… And felt very perhaps disrespected, disregarded and really questioning, “Did she even hear me? Does she care about my perspective and consider my feelings about this?”

The listener is essentially asking, “I really love this person, and yet I am struggling with how to reconcile this. It seems as though we are really at odds.” She described that as she was feeling upset with her partner, her partner was almost upset with her for being upset.

So I’m going to go into this, because this is a common pattern that I feel occurs in relationships in all different forms. So again, I want to remind you, if you don’t resonate with the tattoo conflict, then see if you can replace tattoo with something that you have experienced a conflict with in your relationship. Perhaps more specifically, something they had done against your wishes.

Recently, I was working with one of my clients, and he was talking about a pretty new relationship and that she was really requesting that he trim and shave in his private part area. And it was funny, he was telling me he had actually gone on the internet to search the functionality of that. He is very practical and looks at the real validity of things. This is kind of how his mind works. This is something he hasn’t ever done before, so he’s considering it as an option. When he went on the internet, he actually found all these reasons why it’s actually not that healthy for the skin or all these different aspects around why it could be problematic. So he was pondering whether or not he wanted to do this. It took him a couple of months. And when he finally did, he was hoping that she would be happy, because it’s something that she had mentioned a few times and really expressed a lot of desire for and how much it meant to her.

When he finally did, she made a comment around, “Oh, wow. Well, if it were me, I would have done it the second you asked me.” She started to express some feelings around her doubt or worry of his care for her. Does it indicate how much he likes her, wants to be with her, how interested he is and how much he really cares? So, as you can see in a very small example, these are preferences that represent our likes and dislikes, but oftentimes, it’s much deeper in what it represents.

I want to give you some support and how to break down some of these interactions so that you can have a little more awareness and understanding of some of the variables that might be at play. For context, I want to hold that it’s quite possible that this couple has been negotiating the second stage in relationship – the power struggle stage. This is where we typically start to see our differences a little more clearly. The neurochemicals and the high of the first stage, of the romance phase, has worn off. Not that that isn’t still a part of our experience, but we’re usually seeing things a little more clearly and also are contending with our differences and how to work together.

So again, so much of what I talk about on this show is using what feels difficult and threatening at times as curriculum. If we’re looking at the power struggle stage, this is curriculum to help us grow into how to work together more effectively. Oftentimes we don’t have a lot of support or felt experience around how to do this well. Conflict typically can be scary, whether or not we’ve seen anger or destructive ways of dealing with conflict and power over, and one-upping. That can feel like nobody wins. There’s no real positive outcome, and hence, why would we really want to engage in that? Yet if we’re going to develop our relationship, this is part of the process. We have to learn how to share space and share life together that is a win-win. We don’t do that from ignoring or power-struggling. Because if one person wins, it’s not a win for the relationship.

I actually have a relationship map that I developed, and it’s a free download. It does require an email opt-in, but it gives you a concise understanding of each stage, what we’re often confronted with in the challenge, and the goal of each stage. So if you’re interested in checking that out, I want to encourage you to visit today’s show notes. I’ll make sure that’s easily accessible for you. I also have an article series, I believe. I also have an eBook, and I have a couple podcasts on that topic.

The second thing I want to note is oftentimes there are such a dance and a balance between intimacy and autonomy and relationship. This is ever fluxing, because we are two individuals that are living a life, and that again, purpose and development and growth of each individual. Then we also have the relationship that in of itself is almost its own entity, if you will. It has its own life, its own qualities and is also emerging and developing and growing. So there’s a lot of things to be aware of in this.

When we enter into relationships, so often we have the attempt to give over, and be highly attentive to how to please, how to give, how to show up in consideration for our significant other. And while this is very beautiful, it can also start to tip the scale where we lose ourselves, or perhaps we lose touch with what’s authentic and real and important for our individual self. Sometimes this is easier said than done. It can evoke fear. If I stand in what’s true, and I perhaps am expressing something that’s not popular or not favorable to you, will you still love me, will you accept me? Or perhaps there’s other fears of the conflict, or rocking the boat. I’m not going to go into great detail about that today, but I do want to note that I have a couple podcasts on this topic. I do believe it’s important to keep in mind what we’re negotiating around the value of being close and together in that intimacy, and the value of autonomy and separateness and individuality, and that they’re both equally important. It’s difficult to navigate, it’s difficult to dance in between these two conflicting needs.

There’s actually research that shows anytime we’re moving from autonomy into intimacy, basically saying, “I need you” or “I want you” or “I want to be close”, or when we’re initiating autonomy, separateness, “I need alone time. I want to go do this by myself” or “I want to pursue this thing individually”, those points of initiating closeness and initiating separateness are oftentimes highly conflictual, that there’s a lot of conflict that happen in those two junctures. So I do think that this is really important to consider.

Now, this particular listener in what she wrote, she did say, “I don’t feel like my views are important in our relationship.” She also talked about how she has really taken in her partner’s views and really considered them. So changing from using chemical cleaning products to more natural ones, and perhaps not turning to a medication when she has a headache and considering more natural remedies and methods to address whatever ailment she might be experiencing. So she’s made some adjustments to consider her partner’s values and preferences.

Now, I don’t know the actual ins and outs of this, but as you can hear, there is a consideration. Now how far that goes on that spectrum around losing self or not finding a place to advocate for her needs, that I don’t know. It reminds me of another podcast that I published a while ago. I was talking about the importance of balanced assertiveness. I had a short little graph that shows what I’m talking about, and really described the importance of being both attentive to our own needs, as well as those of others, and if we go too far on either end of that spectrum, it can be problematic. Again, with this second note of intimacy and autonomy, sometimes there can be fears that inform this. So if I change or consider you, I’m hoping that you will consider me, or perhaps that you will be attentive to what I want. So it’s this give in the hopes of return.

So it can be helpful to look at the intention of being considerate, and see if you can access what’s the deeper need there. If I give to you, what will that allow me to feel? Or if I give you what you want, or I defer to your preferences, what is it that I’m hoping to experience? You might get some information there. Again, all in the theme of being conscious. No blame, no shame, no judgment, but just the recognition that we all develop tendencies and strategies for negotiating relationships… And again, we want to be aware so we can choose more mindfully and intentionally around what we’re creating and how we’re doing that.

The third aspect I want to bring attention to is the importance of going deeper. Now if you’ve listened to this podcast for any length of time, you’ve probably heard me mentioned the importance of accessing the deeper layers; the underbelly, the deeper core, fear or need… And oftentimes, most of the time, we’re aware of the initial surface issue. Again, “I don’t find tattoos attractive, and if you really loved me, you would consider that.” Again, I don’t think anybody would disagree with that. However, if you pay attention to the surface issue, it’s “I don’t find full sleeve tattoos attractive.” That’s one layer. But very quickly, it was tied to, “If you loved me, you would consider this.” This gets into conflict because it’s possible that her significant other has a deeper need of feeling expressed, feeling free, feeling authentic. There’s something in that that is so important. So on the surface level for her, it would mean, “I want to get full sleeve tattoos.” But the deeper layer is, “I want to feel expressed. I want to feel my authentic freedom to be who I am.”

Now, if we take those two deeper needs – I want to feel loved and considered, and I want to feel expressed and free – those don’t inherently have to be in conflict. But what happens is, our human tendency is to focus. Our mind gets attached to a way in which that need can get met, and then we focus on that and feel, almost at times, that this is the only avenue. So I need to get full sleeve tattoos to be fully expressed. Or I need you to not get full sleeve tattoos for me to feel loved and cared about.

So having said this, I want to invite a deeper understanding. Oftentimes, when we feel this opposition, we feel this conflict in relationships– and the emotions are there very, very quickly, and we feel the heightened intensity, and that’s why I really also want to encourage, if you haven’t already listened to the last two podcast episodes on emotional intelligence, that will give you more support in considering this type of dynamic that I’m describing. So if we can regulate, calm, identify… In episode 199 I was talking about if we could freeze-frame that initial reaction, we would be able to perhaps, look at the deeper layer that is the first emotion. Because again, I want to remind you, the secondary emotions, push people away; the more reactive ones. But the primary emotions bring people close.

So in this example, if she’s saying, “Oh my goodness, you got a tattoo” or “You got a full sleeve tattoo… I’m really scared that you don’t care about my feelings.” Or, “I’m really afraid that what I need doesn’t matter.” I mean, my heart breaks when I say that. Rather than– I don’t know what the exchange was here, but so often, it’s like, “What? What are you talking about? How could you do that? I told you…!” It can feel very reactive or even attacking or blaming or critical. So later on in her description, she also described how her significant other is essentially not turning towards her pain, not responding, and it seems as though she’s being defensive and even mad at her for being mad at her. So as you can see, this just creates a lot of disconnects and push-away.

Okay, so how do we work with the deeper layers? I just want to note that, in fact, we do have differences in personality, in preferences, And all of this is important… But oftentimes where we get stuck and where we have these conflictual, contextual interactions is when there’s a deeper charge. Okay, so she did start off her question with recognizing “We are very different”, and oftentimes differences bring attraction in the initial stages. The polarization of, “Ooh, that’s different. I like that.” But then when we get into forming a life together, it’s like, “Ugh, you’re different. I don’t like that.” It’s quite the opposite. So as I said in the first point, the power struggle – it’s our real curriculum and learning how to work with those differences that serve both people, that we can both feel good about.

So yeah, the way she’s describing “I don’t like, or I don’t find the full sleeve attractive”, okay, so that’s a preference. And fair enough. When they first started dating, she had onel and she was willing to go with that. So it wasn’t her first choice. But she felt like, “I really like this person enough, so I can overlook this.” Okay, so that in and of itself, she overcame that.

Now, the way she’s describing her own tattoos is she has them in more discrete areas of her body. So I don’t know, but it’s possible that she might have some layer of being conscious of her public appearance. The image that you portray, the identity that you subscribe to, and what that represents. We all express ourselves, and we stereotype often, and we judge people, and that’s just part of how we operate. Hopefully, most of us have an open mind that we don’t want to judge a book by its cover, but sometimes, some of us have a little more attachment to what that looks like and what that represents and what it means.

So coming back to the question of, “How do we get at these deeper layers?” I love the question “What would my partner not having full sleeve tattoos allow me to feel?” Or perhaps whatever you’re holding in your mind as an example that you’re replacing with the tattoo… Just “What would my partner XYZ allow me to feel?” Whether or not it’s something they do or something they say, what would it allow me to experience? That can be very revealing, because oftentimes we’re focused on our significant other and attached to the way in which we’re trying to get a need met, but we don’t always have the awareness around what that need is. So sometimes it could be, in this example, “I want to feel respected in the community.” So there are some ideas around what tattoos mean. So that can even be helpful.

Sometimes we have associations with telling jokes, or a tattoo or how we represent ourselves. We have certain meaning-making around that. So discussing that can be really helpful. Now, again, it’s probably not going to resolve the difference. Oftentimes, these differences– we can overlook or feel like small battles or small things that we’re not going to consider a deal-breaker. And the way that this listener was describing, it’s not yet a deal-breaker, but what it’s hooking for her is bringing up a lot of doubts and questions. Even so that she said, “Every time I look at her, all I see is the fact that she does not value my feelings.” That statement right there, for me, could indeed that the tattoo represents feeling loved and feeling cared about.

So that would be my invitation, is to focus on the insecurity or the fear around not being loved and cared about. I know that’s extremely vulnerable to reveal, and at the same time, this is what needs attention. This is what needs reassurance This is what needs support. This conversation about tattoos can be very different when these deeper layers are talked about. Again, I’m making this up, but in this example, my significant other has the desire to feel self-expressed and free and I have a desire to feel loved and cared about. Now I do believe there’s a way that can be a win-win.

The other thing is, as I mentioned a moment ago, about the meaning-making – what we associate with the thing we’re having trouble with – in this case, the tattoos, this listener described, feeling some level of association with covering her body with tattoos as something that was a part of her life with her ex-husband, I guess, who is completely covered in tattoos. So there could be some feeling here of threat or fear, as what does that mean for her partner. Is that an indication that she’s still wanting to be connected to her ex-husband, or some feeling that she has towards her ex-husband? That is an important thing to focus on. Again, that would be more connected to the deeper layer. It’s not so much about the tattoo, it’s more about “Are you still in love, or do you still have feelings, or what’s your connection or your sentiment towards your ex-husband?”

Having some real understanding around that could help develop more security and solidarity in the bond. Because ultimately, I would want this listener to feel reassured of her partner’s love, commitment, care, and how that can be demonstrated. This listener has her own ideas around how she wants to feel cared about, but perhaps it’s important to have this deeper understanding that her partner can understand the deeper layers… So she wants to help, like “Of course, I want you to feel cared about. I want you to feel loved. How can I help? How can I support that?” But sometimes it does mean revealing these deeper fears and deeper vulnerabilities because that’s what we feel inspired to respond to. Again, those primary emotions bring us close.

I don’t want to oversimplify this. This does require a process, and it can be a tricky ground, because we get triggered and we react and then we’re often in a disconnect pattern. So sometimes getting support for this can be really helpful. I also really highly recommend Hold Me Tight by Susan Johnson, Love Sense, Stan Tatkin’s Wired For Love… There’s a lot of really great books that support people in these types of conversations. Because particularly those people I just named have an awareness around our working models as it relates to the attachment. That often is our imprint on our needs getting met and feeling secure in relationship. So I do believe it’s a core thing to pay attention to.

Couples are confronted with conflicts all the time and oftentimes are out of the loop of the deeper layer. I have this couple who I’ve been working with for a short while, and learning about their history… For the husband, he grew up in a family of his parents having pretty traditional gender norms, and his mother was very caring of the domestic responsibilities – cleaning, cooking. That was one of the ways that he felt really loved. It wasn’t through words or really physical affection, it was through the actions. So that is something that is very much a love language of his. Whereas his wife is very independent and is professional and is skilled in so many areas, and doesn’t necessarily put a lot of value on her skill of domestic duties. She’s more of a modern woman. And this has been a conflict. For her, she has been framing it as like, “We’ll get a cleaner. It’s not a big deal. This is just a task. ” Where for him, it’s been a way to feel loved. When she wasn’t aware of that, and it meant that much to him, he’s feeling hurt about the lack of love. So on a surface level, it looks like chores and keeping a home clean, and the deeper layer is feeling loved.

A couple more notes. The fourth topic I want to bring up is around boundaries and agreements. I could say a lot about this, and I do have podcasts and articles about agreements and boundaries. I mention this because sometimes we end up not having clear boundaries around something we don’t want to participate in, and then we end up participating in the very thing we don’t want to experience, because we’re not clear. Or in this case, she said “I actually gave my girlfriend money to get a tattoo.” I think in her mind, she was thinking it would be a little bit more of a discrete tattoo, so I think she was trying to compromise and be considerate of her girlfriend’s desire for a tattoo, but ended up participating in something that she really had not wanted to experience.

So that lends to also being explicit about agreements. So I’m giving you this money, and let’s be really clear what this is and isn’t. I know that that does not seem sexy, it does not seem warm and fuzzy, and it does set it up for more clarity and more accountability… Because then if the agreement is not followed, which in this case the  listener is like, “I thought we were clear, and you just went against.” It just feels like a breach of trust. Or “You lied. You misled. You just did the opposite. You totally disregarded our agreement and wasn’t accountable. That’s hard to trust if we can’t rely on each other.” So then it starts to turn that corner. But if we look back at the agreement, perhaps it wasn’t as crystal clear.

When things are gray, and there are mixed messages, oftentimes it’s hard to sift through. Then people end up conveniently– and I don’t think this is malicious, but we’re human, and we want what we want, and we’re in our own self-focused, so we tend to pursue and see things through a lens that serves us. Now, again, that sounds very selfish, the way that I’m describing it, but it is our human tendency. Again, we build in the awareness and the consciousness of others, and the consideration and the balanced negotiation there, but sometimes the impulse or when things are gray, we tend to lean towards what we would want, and I get it. So in this case, again, I question, “How clear and explicit was their agreement?” Now, if you’re interested in learning more about this again, I want to invite you to perhaps listen to a couple podcasts on this topic of agreements and boundaries to just assist in this understanding of how to engage in setting boundaries and establishing agreements that can be serving both people.

The last point I want to make is perhaps a little bit a conjecture on my part, but I’m going to speak to it anyway because I do you see how common the criticism and defensiveness shows up in relationship,  and that’s one of the things that people often are looking for support around. So as this listener was describing that her partner was upset with her and feeling guarded and defensive in response to her hurt does indicate to me that perhaps the way in which this listener was addressing the issue could have sounded like criticism to her partner.

Now that could be the way it was expressed, and it could also be the way that it was heard. Sometimes people are more sensitive to criticism and do react more quickly. Other times, people who struggle with communicating their needs in more vulnerable ways, sometimes use criticism as a tendency. Oftentimes, there are so many things that inform this strategy of criticizing. That’s why I developed the Shifting Criticism Into Connected Communication, as it really unpacks “Why do I criticize? Why is it so hard to change? How do I change? What can I do differently?” Now I have a course for this, but I also have a free guide that you can download that, walks you through recognizing some of these critical tendencies and also some examples and language around what more connected communication looks like in the exact same scenario. Again, you can access the link for that download on today’s show notes. Again, today’s episode is 201, “How to Handle Your Partner Going Against Your Wishes.”

Just a quick summary, we talked about the power struggle stage, we talked about intimacy and autonomy, we talked about cultivating deeper understanding between two different people in relationship, and perhaps those core fears and needs and really having more of that vulnerable conversation.

We also addressed the importance of boundaries and explicit agreements, as well as the criticism defensive pattern. Again, you can find today’s show notes on my website, drjessicahiggins.com. Click on Podcast and you can find all the episodes listed there. Again, today’s episode is 201. Thank you for listening. I appreciate your tuning in and investing in the quality of your relationship, as well as growing yourself and your connection. Until next time. I hope you take great care.

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