If you think type A behavior is bad for you, just imagine what it's
doing to your relationship. Chances are your mate is feeling its impact
too. Here's how to get yourself -- and your love life -- back on track
and keep your romance alive.
In marriage, as in every human endeavor, there are some people who
manage to get it right, despite facing the same circumstances that defeat
others.
Of course, negotiating the potholes that fill the path of most
modern relationships leaves these couples stressed. Still, they find ways
to cope with the pressures that accompany their hectic lives.
You might think marriages like these are in the minority. But a
large percentage of the couples we've counseled -- collectively, we've
spent over 60,000 hours observing thousands of marriages -- are able to
keep their romances alive. They do so in a manner that's graceful,
flexible, and obviously effective, maintaining high levels of passion and
emotional closeness 15, 20, and even 30 years after their walk down the
aisle. From the way they whisper to each other, still hold hands, and
flirt, it's clear they care deeply. They're living testaments to the
benefits of an intimate relationship. And they remind us of an important
lesson: Stress is inevitable, struggling is optional.
Stop and analyze these high-passion marriages and you see they go
through the same phases all long-term relationships go through: high
levels of emotional closeness the first couple of years; an abrupt drop
off in intimacy, at least partly due to increased responsibilities, like
babies and mortgages, around year five to seven; and finally, a leveling
off of tenderness and affection, where people begin to collide with the
stresses of everyday life. In this last phase, couples may stay together,
but their relationships get stale. They're often less kind to each other.
They forget little things, like saying please and thank you, laughing at
each other's jokes, making love.
Why is it so many relationships become stagnant, with partners
settling into a lifetime of strife, while other couples create alliances
that are highly caring, loving, and warm? One reason is our ignorance of
the developmental process of intimate relationships. The marital journey
begins in a wonderful place we call "bliss city." This is where we see
what we need to see and be how we need to be in order to create harmony
with this new person we believe to be the fulfillment of all our dreams.
Needless to say, there's a lot of selective perception going on here;
that's what makes it safe for us to fall in love.
What most of us see in a partner is our unfulfilled potential,
characteristics we lack or feel awkward about: I'm shy and you're
outgoing; I work too hard, you're nurturing. Two individuals share the
hope that they will join together and make one whole person, the bliss
will continue, and the relationship will provide an island of refuge
lasting a lifetime.
At the core of this early stage of connection is a kind of
relationship contracting. As a result of what we perceive and communicate
to each other, consciously and unconsciously, we assign to our mate and
assume for ourselves a set of roles that create our particular
relationship dance. Of course, as time goes on and relationships
progress, couples discover that many of the traits they've attributed to
partners simply aren't there, and the pas de deux turns into a solo
shuffle.
Complicating things further is that we're living during a true
stress epidemic. Our lives have exploded into "big" lives with increased
pressures and many roles to fill. More than any prior generation of
couples, moreover, we need and expect to feel content, spiritually
aligned, entertained, etc. So we're constantly seeking to balance four
areas: commitment to intimate relationships, commitment to familial
relationships, commitment to work, and commitment to ourselves. How's a
couple supposed to keep their marriage going when, as individuals,
they're also scrambling to keep these commitments under control, all
within the constraints of seven 24-hour days?
Type A: The High-Powered Survival Skill
The effect of trying to fit everything we deem important into the
time we have is that invariably people begin to exhibit some form of type
A behavior. Type A behavior pattern (TYABP) is a unique form of stress
adjustment that reflects "hurry sickness," feeling compelled to do more
and more in the same brief amount of time. If we didn't devise some sort
of high-powered survival skill, we'd collapse when even the least bit
strained. Stress-hardy people don't collapse -- that's the key to TYABP
-- they go numb and keep on going. The problem is, a type A's tendencies
aren't very attractive.
Type As selectively perceive interactions and many people --
particularly other type As -- as challenges, even when they may not be.
So they become hard-driving, competitive, time urgent, controlling, and,
in some instances, hot-tempered. Because they've got much to do and feel
it's important to get everything done, high-powered people easily become
frustrated, irritable, and sometimes hostile and cynical. When things
don't go type As' ways, they flare up. But when they're upset, they act
more type A; it's their ace-in-the-hole coping skill.
Stereotypical high-powered men and women hold down pressure-cooker
jobs filled with endless responsibilities. But no matter what your
occupation, if you endure and acclimate to ever-increasing levels of
stress, you're high-powered.
When Type A Hits a Relationship
Tags:
babies,
emotional closeness,
everyday life,
hectic lives,
human endeavor,
intimate relationship,
long term relationships,
love life,
marriage,
potholes,
romances,
stress,
stresses,
type A behavior,
type B,
walk down the aisle,
whisper,
work
