9 Signs That Your Relationship is Struggling with Communication
How do you define a strong relationship? Many would argue that it’s loyalty, love, honesty, respect, and understanding. Effective communication is a crucial component that is frequently disregarded, though. Poor communication can weaken and hollow out your connection, much like termites do as they silently eat away at wood.
Noisy disputes aren’t the only sign of poor communication. It can occasionally be seen in straightforward inquiries like “Why didn’t you do what I asked?” or the thick hush that comes next. Neglecting a relationship can cause it to slowly fall apart, even while ineffective communication can strengthen it. You are not by yourself if you struggle with communicating in your partnership. Shazia Saleem, a separation and divorce counselor with a master’s degree in psychology, has provided her thoughts into a list of telltale indications of bad communication, which we’ve assembled to help you navigate.
What Causes Poor Communication In Relationships?
Many things might gradually deteriorate communication in a partnership. These problems don’t come out of nowhere; instead, they slowly seep in and rip apart the complex strands holding your relationship together. The damage may already be significant and challenging to fix before you recognize it.
Emotional ignorance is typically the root cause of bad communication. People who have trouble understanding and controlling their emotions find it difficult to communicate effectively, which weakens relationships.
Let’s examine a few subtler, less evident causes of communication breakdowns in partnerships to get a better understanding.
1. Life Gets In The Way.
Gradual drift over time is one of the most common causes of communication failures in relationships. This usually shows when things start to get ordinary in a relationship or when outside influences start to wear on it. Managing demanding work schedules, dealing with work-related stress, or handling difficult relationships with coworkers, superiors, or family members can all negatively affect your relationship with your spouse, both physically and emotionally.
Individuals tend to absorb stress or, worse, to target their loved ones with it. Your spouse can stop being the encouraging ally they should be and start to fade into the background when boundaries between personal and work life grow more hazy.
This problem is especially noticeable in long-distance partnerships. Both couples become mired in their own problems and lives, which reduces meaningful communication and widens the emotional distance even further.
2. Lack Of Trust.
As we’ve already discussed, the foundation of any relationship is trust. There may be fractures in this trust that result in problems with communication. These fissures are frequently caused by a slow deterioration in faith, integrity, and transparency.
A loss of trust can have many causes, such as aggressive or financially deceptive behavior, but continuous dishonesty can also be the cause. When a girlfriend asks her boyfriend about his weekend plans, for example, and he lies to her about going to a family dinner when he’s actually going to watch a football game with buddies, this can erode her trust.
Even a tiny bit of her trust is shaken when she learns the truth. These lies have the potential to totally destroy her trust and pave the way for more issues in the relationship if they continue. These problems have the potential to erode partners’ intimacy and connection over time, which could cause the relationship to seriously worsen.
3. Shock Or Trauma.
Shock or trauma can seriously impair communication in a partnership. One partner’s personality and interactions with their significant other can be profoundly impacted by a horrific experience they have experienced.
Think about how losing a job might affect you; it can cause you to lose confidence and find it difficult to tell your partner how you truly feel because of a damaged sense of pride. Similar to this, you might find it difficult to express your feelings to your spouse after suffering a loss or grief, which could prevent you from being open and honest with them.
9 Signs Of Bad Communication In a Relationship
Consider this: Your wife is excited to have dinner with you when you get home from a long day at work. She inquires about your day and offers some details about hers, but because you’re tired, you snap and turn down the food she’s made. You end up sleeping hungry and with a bad mood. If any of these situations sound familiar to you, there has been a breakdown in communication in your relationship.
It would be wiser to gently convey your need for some time to relax rather than retorting in annoyance. Recall that your partner isn’t psychic. To keep up good communication, it’s essential to express your emotions in a clear and concise manner. In light of the difficulties in life, it may seem insignificant, yet maintaining a healthy relationship depends on excellent communication.
Couples that live far apart frequently struggle with communicating as well. In addition to emotional pressure and a need for intimacy, physical isolation can exacerbate frustration and misunderstandings. In order to address these problems, a productive communication system must be established. Here are some additional signs of inadequate communication in romantic relationships that you may have overlooked:
1. Passive – Aggressive Behavior.
It’s a serious sign of poor communication when your encounters become dominated by passive-aggressive conduct. Be on the lookout for tendencies such as being silent, making crude comments that pass for jokes, reacting condescendingly, placing blame elsewhere, and exaggerating small problems.
Serious communication issues are indicated if your partner consistently answers your sincere questions with passive-aggressive remarks, like dismissing you by saying, “I’m fine,” even though you know they’re not.
Since communication is the main thing keeping long-distance partners linked, these problems are even more common in these situations. When your partner misses a call, utilize your time apart to talk honestly and openly about communication problems rather than reacting with sarcasm or judgment. Express your true feelings to your partner in order to improve communication and fortify your relationship.
2. Lack Of Emotional Intimacy In A Relationship.
The absence of emotional closeness in a relationship is a major factor in communication breakdowns. Your comfort level while sharing your ideas and feelings with your spouse is strongly impacted by the level of intimacy you two have.
It becomes challenging to talk about your feelings when there is a lack of emotional closeness, which may jeopardize the stability of your partnership. When you don’t create a secure space for your spouse to express their emotions, poor communication frequently results. There are situations when staying silent is a protective reaction to being written off, ignored, or made fun of in the past.
For a relationship to succeed, emotional and physical closeness are equally important. A deeper bond between you and your partner is created when you are able to successfully understand and express your feelings.
3. Interrupting In A Conversation.
There’s nothing more annoying than attempting to have a conversation and having it cut off constantly. Both partners should be able to freely express their opinions and feel truly heard in a good partnership. Relentless disruptions are an obvious indicator of inadequate communication and should not be disregarded.
Are you having trouble communicating with your partner effectively? The solution is simple: give listening first priority. Rather of speculating about your partner’s thoughts, concentrate on actually listening to them. In addition to assisting with understanding your partner’s emotions, active listening fosters a welcoming atmosphere that makes them feel important and encourages them to open up more.
4. Silent Treatment.
There are few things more annoying than attempting to talk and having your conversation constantly interrupted. Both partners should be able to voice their opinions and feel truly heard in a healthy partnership. Recurrent disruptions indicate a communication breakdown that requires attention.
Do you find it difficult to communicate well with your partner? The solution is obvious: give careful listening top priority. Pay close attention to what your spouse is saying rather than attempting to infer what they could be thinking. In addition to helping them express their feelings clearly, active listening creates a safe space where they feel appreciated and are more likely to open up.
5. Increased Resentment.
Imagine this: After a demanding workday, you come home to discover that your significant other hasn’t done any household chores or assisted with supper. You express your annoyance, yet nothing happens. Beneath, like a ticking time bomb, there simmers a silent resentment.
In a relationship, poor communication can turn small grievances into deep-seated resentment. Your worries could go unanswered and grow into resentment if your attempts to explain problems are treated with apathy or annoyance.
If you or your partner are unwilling to address each other’s concerns, it’s likely a communication breakdown that’s causing rising dissatisfaction and unpleasant feelings toward one another.
6. Competitiveness.
When couples put being “right” above being happy, it’s common for bad communication to have its roots in these kinds of partnerships. One spouse may focus on what is right or wrong and become extremely critical of the other instead of trying to reach a mutual understanding. Relationships are rarely clear-cut; sometimes it’s better to take a step back and see things from a different angle rather than fixating on who’s at fault.
When every disagreement becomes a contest to see who can be more accurate, there has been a breakdown in communication. This method leaves couples stuck in never-ending arguments because they frequently become fixated on trivial details or small arguments and fail to see the bigger picture. Finding common ground can be subordinated to showing oneself superior in a power struggle that ensues in the relationship.
Long-term relationships frequently experience communication problems, but if you’re having them right now, they probably have been building for a while and are getting worse over time.
7. Being Aggressive.
Creating a safe, caring environment is the aim of a partnership. However, when one or both spouses start acting aggressively, things can soon become poisonous. This is a significant problem that jeopardizes the stability of the relationship, not just a symptom of bad communication. Shouting or raising your voice to get your message through simply serves to worsen the situation and hint to a more serious breakdown in communication. If unchecked, aggressive conduct can develop into more damaging routines, like abuse.
Expert in emotional wellness Shazia claims, “People who lack emotional awareness frequently turn to aggression because they find it difficult to express their feelings in a healthy way.” This conduct indicates emotional brittleness.
This problem is especially prevalent among women who could find it difficult to speak clearly when their partner behaves aggressively. You can tell you’re in a relationship with someone who struggles to communicate and is emotionally unstable if your attempts at conversation are treated with hostility, objects being thrown, or shouting.
8. Inability To Reach Mutual Goals.
Mutual objectives and shared experiences are the lifeblood of relationships. It is almost impossible to unite on shared goals if there is a breakdown in communication. You can want one thing and your partner would want something completely different. These disagreements could cause division if they are not discussed in an adult and open manner.
It’s essential to accept and value each other’s distinctive viewpoints. The process of defining and accomplishing shared objectives becomes easy and doable when both partners accept each other for who they are.
9. Projecting Emotional State On The Partner.
Projecting your own anxieties and insecurities onto your spouse and misinterpreting their behavior as validating those problems is a common practice in partnerships. Our views can be distorted because we frequently see circumstances through the prism of our own emotions. Being able to identify when you or your spouse is projecting and being willing to confront it are crucial skills to have.
Shazia provides this insight: “In this situation, empathy is very important. You can close the distance caused by misunderstanding by making an effort to comprehend your partner’s viewpoint and emotions. People are more likely to project their fears onto other people when they lack empathy.
There are highs and lows in any relationship. Although life is an endless rollercoaster, it can be difficult to enjoy the ride when there is inadequate communication. Take aggressive measures to address and resolve any indications of inefficient communication in your relationship. Recall that your spouse ought to be your confidante and conversation partner, experiencing life’s highs and lows alongside you.
