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Home / Marriage Enrichment / Articles to Enrich / How to Stress Proof Your Marriage
How to Stress Proof Your Marriage
Do you feel that you do not have enough time in a day or time for yourself or your spouse? Do feelings of irritability, frustration, or tension cloud interactions with your spouse? Do you find yourself wondering why simple discussions turn into major arguments or how emotions get so out of control? Are you feeling more reactive, envious, or defensive? Or are you experiencing:
- Dual career marriage
- Facing downsizing or job loss
- Parents of young children
- Finances are tight
- In-law problems
- Difficulty concentrating, forgetful
- Feeling overwhelmed and discouraged
- Waning energy and motivation
- Sense of wanting to escape daily hassles
- Difficulty getting out of bed in the morning
These are some of the common causes and symptoms of personal and relationship stress that can negatively impact your marriage. A big part of the solution to managing stress in marriage is first recognizing it and then not allowing the stress to be the cause of conflict. How can couples stress proof their marriage?
Positive and Negative Reaction to Stress
We all experience stress as part and parcel of being rational and complex living organisms with a free will. Stress is a normal physical response to actual or anticipated events that make you feel threatened or upset your balance in some way. The stress reaction is an automatic way that the body protects itself. Stress impacts spouses across the whole of their persons and vocation of marriage: mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually and socially. Our stress response can either enhance our ability to meet the challenges that come our way, or beyond a certain point it can diminish and harm our coping ability.
- Eustress is the positive and adaptive form of stress.
- Distress is stress that is exerting a negative and draining effect. [1]
- Stress tolerance is the power to endure stress, which may vary with circumstances and timing.
Just as individuals experience the subjective impact of stress, so do our primary relationships experience the impact of stress, which can be in a positive (eustress) or negative (distress) manner. Chronic low level stress, or periods of prolonged acute stress, is the frequent cause of distress and can lead to unhealthy patterns of individual or relationship coping. Studies have shown that the male cardiovascular system remains more reactive than the female and slower to recover from stress. [2]
The challenge is to recognize when the net impact of stress is on the deficit side, and how to get and keep ourselves and our marriage relationship on the asset side in our response to stressors. Marriages become symptomatic when one or both spouses or the marriage relationship itself is experiencing stress overload.
Sources of Stress
Stress can derive from either external factors or is self-generated through internal factors. Personality, temperament, gender, internal frame of reference, spiritual values and beliefs, previous life experiences, current life circumstances, all combine and contribute to how stress is subjectively perceived (friend or foe) and responded to (welcomed, accepted, flight or fight).
Examples of external stress factors for couples in their earlier years of marriage are: adjustment to a shared married life, birth of first child, caring for younger children, managing demands of dual career, finances, the couple sexual relationship, spirituality, interfamily relationships and commitments. Examples of internal stress factors are: balancing need for intimacy versus autonomy, unrealistic expectations, perfectionism, lack of assertiveness, negative out look, difficulty accepting uncertainty and change.
The point being, that there are internal, external and interpersonal factors in the mix and dynamic of whether marriage stress tends toward eustress or distress.
Symptoms of Stress Overload
Cognitive Symptoms:
- Memory problems
- Inability to concentrate
- Lapses in judgment
- Excessive worry
- Negative thinking
Emotional Symptoms:
- Emotional over reactions
- Irritability and moodiness
- Depression and apathy
- Feeling overwhelmed
- Feeling lonely or isolated
Physical Symptoms:
- Aches and pains
- Diarrhea or constipation
- Nausea, dizziness
- Chest pain, heart palpitations
- Decrease sex drive and impotency
Behavioral Symptoms:
- Over or under eating
- Over or under sleeping
- Social withdrawal
- Neglecting home or work duties
- Increase use of alcohol or drugs
Spiritual Symptoms:
- Pessimism and negative outlook
- Underlying disquiet and restlessness
- Feeling God is distant and uninvolved
- Lapse in former spiritual practices
- Loss of interest in spiritual matters
Relationship Symptoms:
- Increased arguments and sarcasm
- Feeling unappreciated and alone
- Flight into distraction or passive activities
- Emotional distancing, viewing pornography
- Decrease in affection and sexual intimacy
Stress Solutions for Marriage
Keeping stress from negatively impacting your marriage is a two-fold process of 1) being able to identify your individual and marriage stress symptoms, and 2) learning to better monitor and manage your individual and marriage stress levels.
Here are some key strategies for better managing the effects of stress on your marriage:
- Understand your own stress reactions and stress tolerance. Make an inventory of your stress coping strengths and vulnerabilities as an individual and together as a couple. Commit to learning ways to increase your capacity and resiliency to manage stress from within and without. Reevaluate your goals and priorities. Acknowledge your losses and limitations. Realize increasing stress tolerance and coping is a lifelong project that enfolds our mental, emotional, physical, spiritual and social realms of functioning.
- Develop a strong support network. This is the greatest protection against negative stress impact. Your spouse is your primary ally and companion in the shared journey of marriage. Life's pressures and problems do not seem as overwhelming when you and your spouse have each other and trusted family and friends that you can count on for emotional and practical supports.
- Recognize stress over flow into your marriage. Realize that at the end of a long, stressful day one or both partners' cup may be over flowing capacity with stress build up. Learn to identify when it is your stress speaking. Take the necessary measures to de-stress from your work day and not allow stress over flow to run havoc in your marriage. [3]
- Make your home a safe haven and sanctuary from the external factors of stress. Take your partner's side against opposition (even if seems unreasonable at the time), express a "we against them" alignment with your spouse, validate emotions, communicate understanding, express affection [4], preserve couple and family time, create a calm and uncluttered environment, pamper your partner.
- Pray together daily as a couple. Let God know your needs. He cares and wants to be invited in to support your marriage. Recite together with Jesus his prayer, "Father, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread; and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive every one who is indebted to us; and lead us not into temptation" and entrust your marriage needs to His promise "And I tell you, Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened." [5]
Stress Coping for Christians
I find it extremely credible and compelling that God in the person of Jesus Christ did not exempt or make Himself immune from the distressing effects of acute stress. In the gospel account of the agony in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus experienced in the fullness of His humanity the debilitating effects of extreme acute stress – mental agony, emotional and physical distress, soulful sorrow, and companions who fell short in supporting His human need. [6]
I can recall the numerous times that I read the following scripture passage and wondered aloud to God how this could possibly translate into my life - "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." [7]
What I found over the years is God's faithfulness. The more I join my burdens with His yoke, and let Him transform my mind and priorities more in conformity with His, somehow things sort out and take their proper place. I am better able to keep a balanced perspective during stressful periods. I have more of an abiding sense of God's loving care as our heavenly Father for my marriage.
For those times that I try going it alone and end up coming up short, St. Paul in his New Testament letter redirects me to God's human empathy and divine help - "For we have not a high priest [Jesus] who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, …Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." [8]
God does not leave us alone to work out the details of our marriage vows.
Serenity Prayer for Stress Management
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
forever in the next.
Amen.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr
David Grobbel, L.M.S.W.
Marriage Preparation Coordinator
The Retreat Center at St. John's
- Seyle, Hans (1936). "A syndrome produced by diverse nocuous agents". Nature 138: 32. Selye, Hans (1975). Confusion and controversy in the stress field. 1. pp. 37–44.
- Gottman, John M. PhD and Silver, Nan, The Seven Principles For Making Marriage Work, pp. 37-38 (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1999).
- The Seven Principles For Making Marriage Work, pp. 188-189.
- The Seven Principles For Making Marriage Work, pp. 87-89.
- Luke, Chapter 11: 2-4, 9-11 (RSV)
- Matthew, Chapter 26: 36-46 (RSV)
- Matthew, Chapter 11: 28-30 (RSV)
- Hebrews, Chapter 4: 15-16 (RSV)
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