Weekly Marriage Tips

We are under an avalanche of horrible news these days, and this translates for many into a larger emotional than we usually carry.  

You may be tempted to hide your emotions or act out upon them.  I would choose a third option.  We all have every right to our emotions, so while boxing them off because they are hard may seem like a good coping strategy, it actually places further burden on ourselves because it lets those emotions fester inside.  We can't work through them when we box them up.

But the other 'go to' strategy - of just blatting them out all over and with little thought can lead to hurting others you love (including, at one extreme, domestic abuse, which is on the rise).  So that strategy isn't in your best interests, either.

Instead, try creating a time when each person can talk - respectfully - about any emotions that they are feeling that are important to them.  There are two specific ways to do this that I like - pick either or both.

1.) at the end of the day take about 5 minutes to finish the sentence "What you need to know most about me today is..."  You can answer that by talking about an emotion ("...that I'm scared I'm going to get sick") or about something you wish to share that's happened that impacts you emotionally ("...that I am proud I finally got to refinishing the teak chair after putting it off for a year!")

2.) schedule two 30-60 minute meetings a week for talking about emotionally laden issues in a respectful way.  In one meeting one partner leads.  In the other, the other partner leads.  Make sure to talk from your own perspective ("I feel rather lonely right now.") vs. blaming your partner ("You don't pay enough attention to me.")

And, finally, at any time during this crisis, if you need a hug or just plain reassurance, let your partner know (assuming they have been quarantined the proper amount of time for that hug!)  Don't expect your partner to 'read' your emotions.  Share them overtly, gently and in a non-critical fashion and ask for what you need.  And when your partner asks you for some emotional support please try to remain open to provide it.

P.S.  Speaking of emotional support, during the pandemic period I am offering free virtual office hours for quick support as well as adding non-ADHD support groups, starting April 23.

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Free, Virtual Office Hours with Melissa

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session will start Fall 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group. Non ADHD group starts April 23.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

These are upended times, with intense pressure of all sorts on many couples.  For some couples the additional time together is a good thing because they can more consciously connect.  But for many – particularly those impacted by ADHD and/or financial changes – the change in routine is a shock.  If you are feeling stressed, anxious, overwhelmed and as if you can’t seem to get away from the chaos (or your partner!) you are not alone.

To help you I’m offering some additional resources.  Specifically, almost daily information through my blog aimed to provide you with relevant relationship and family support.  I’m adding non-ADHD partner support groups.  In addition, I’m also starting something new - free virtual ‘office hours’ during this difficult time.  You are invited to call me during posted hours with a pressing relationship question you have.  Think of it as free relationship triage.

And, if you wish to read my response to the woman above, go to this blog post.

Please stay healthy and in touch.

Melissa

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session will start in the Fall of 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

I thought this article in the NYTimes was interesting – about how our society places an expectation on couples that suggests that women should do more around the house and men take advantage of this and don’t step up – feeling they shouldn’t really have to.

What I love about this quote is the woman’s “We fell into this easy pattern…”  There’s nothing at all “easy” about this pattern – for either partner.  Who wants resentment and negative feelings bubbling around the relationship all the time?

If you are in a heterosexual relationship, you may have this same pattern in your life – woman does more chores than she wants to and feels resentful.  Husband dislikes the resentment, and blames wife for being angry.  Or, another version in ADHD-impacted relationships.  The non-ADHD partner does more than wanted, and feels resentful, etc etc.

If you do, it’s time to name the elephant in the room and bring these feelings out into the open in a constructive way.

Marriage research suggests that relationships are more likely to be healthy and happy if the woman in the relationship feels that chores are ‘well enough’ distributed.  That does NOT mean equal.  That means ‘well enough.’  Figure out what that looks like to both of you (and particularly to the woman!) and then make it happen.

In my couples seminar I suggest that couples take a baseline of who does what, discuss what each person wants to do (both based upon skill and how easy it is for them) and then set a plan for how to stay in touch around tasks and responsibilities without any parent-child dynamics in the mix.  You can do this, too.  I can teach you how as part of my seminar, or you can do it on your own.  (There are more subtleties to it, but this is the simplified version and a good start.)

If you are struggling with task distribution and completion, please start this process.  There’s nothing easy at all about this dynamic, and even with ADHD in your relationship there are lots of ways to improve how you both feel about when and how things get done…and who does them.

Free VIRTUAL OFFICE HOURS with Melissa to support you during the COVID-19 crisis.  More information is here.

Tuesday, May 26, 7:30-9pm EASTERN time

Friday, May 29 3-5:30pm EASTERN time

Tuesday, June 9 7:30 - 9pm EASTERN time

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session starts Fall, 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

I think of my work as a catalyst for couples as they take their own marital journeys.  My opinion being that what my husband and I went through was completely average for couples impacted by ADHD and by laying our learning bare we can hope to speed up that journey for others in a similar position.

But you still have to go through it, with your own discoveries.  And with your own approaches to solving your own issues.  I can suggest, for example, that putting aside some of my fears and baggage about my sex life (admittedly complicated after some affairs) and just deciding to enjoy myself again worked well for me.  I was able to set aside my fears until they could be healed over time by my more positive experiences.  But not everyone will be able to do that…or want to.

I invite you all to share your own experiences, journeys and questions with me and others at our website forum or through contacting me directly.  This is a journey we have all made and you don’t have to make it alone.

Starting April 6th - My Noon Non-ADHD Partner Support Group has availability. 7 sessions. The next sessions after April will begin in the fall of 2020. 

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The next live session starts Fall 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

I wish my husband and I had known all we know now about ADHD in relationships back when I first got married.  We would still probably have struggled, but our relationship would have been so much stronger.

But, as the proverb notes, the second best time to plant a tree is now.  And that is what my husband and I do.  We take time and effort to enjoy every day.  Better yet, we make sure to connect every day in some way.  Lots of times that biking or hiking together – which not only connects us, but provides a sense of emotional peace (which is the case with all aerobic exercise).  But our living in the now also extends to being open to whatever the other person wants to try.  That could be a surprise dinner out, a new movie, time with friends, a visit to a museum, doing a puzzle, going to…well, just about anything.  It might be something as small as putting stamps on holiday cards (something I asked my husband to do the other day and was grateful he did.)

Trees grow strong with water and sun.  So does your relationship.  Every day.

Free VIRTUAL OFFICE HOURS with Melissa to support you during the COVID-19 crisis.  Learn more

Tuesday, May 19 7:45pm to 9pm EST and Friday, May 29 2-5:30pm EST

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The next live session starts Fall, 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

What would happen if you and your partner identified the one thing that you wished the other would stop, and then each acted to eliminate that thing?  That one thing that hurts your heart more than anything else?

Doing so won’t be easy, because if it were, you would already have stopped.  Few genuinely want to hurt their partner, even if they are frustrated or angry.  So you might need help.

Let me give you a quick example:  In my relationship my ‘stop request’ of my husband was his quick spurts of anger that came out of the blue for me.  He stopped those with the help of medication for his ADHD and anger.  Many years later, when his stress levels were lowered, he stopped the medication and controlled it with mindfulness and (jointly) some effective verbal cues set between us.

His ‘stop request’ for me was to stop telling him what to do.  This took quite a while as I had to learn how to adjust to thinking of him as equal in our relationship in spite of his lack of follow through due to ADHD symptoms. (It helped that he improved his follow through somewhat, as well as got rid of the anger spurts!)  My ‘treatment’ included a lot of reading and self-reflection; some counseling; and learning a lot more about ADHD so I could differentiate between defiance/stubbornness and ADHD symptoms.  I also spent a good deal of time thinking about – and working on- reconnecting.

Most struggling couples have at least one ‘stop in the name of love’ requests in them.  Perhaps a counselor could help you both define yours, and act on it.

During the COVID-19 crisis I will be offering free office hours - for individuals and couples with questions about how to navigate relationship issues during social distancing, stay at home orders and all else that comes with our upended times.  It's a difficult time for many, and it is my hope that I can provide meaningful support for those with relationship questions. Learn more.

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session starts Fall, 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

Do you agree with Brooks’ definition of joy?  I’m not sure I would have done so 20 years ago.  But I just spent a recent long holiday weekend with both of my children, their partners, my husband, my father and his partner.  And my joy is exactly what Brooks describes.  

It is the years of giving to both the others in the family and (importantly) to myself that provides such pleasure – okay, joy – as I sit listening to the laughter and comments of those I love most.  Hear the excitement of some, empathize with the struggles of others, even take a brisk walk.  A knowledge that I have given the best I can give to all concerned to help them (and me) be strong and loving people.  My giving was not always perfect, but that is okay because I am only human.

It is not the specific path I chose (staying with my husband through horrible struggles and more) that results in today’s joy.  It’s the attitude – one in which I chose to be the best me I could be, even when times were hard.

This is not a call to stay with your partner or to leave your partner.  It’s a call to look inside yourself and find your best self.  Be proud of that person.  Live as that person.  Do the loving, caring things that person would do – including for yourself.  On this path I hope that you will find joy as I have.

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session starts Fall, 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

Ned Hallowell talks about the mirror traits of ADHD how something that feels negative sometimes can be positive at others.  Example:  An unfiltered ADHD brain that sees many things at once can be a distraction from a spouse or task that needs doing.  Or it can be the basis of outside-the-box and creative thinking.

More examples:  Hyperactivity may lead to stress.  Or it can be seen as being high energy and lots of fun.  Being in the present moment can be about having difficulty planning for the future…or it can be someone who is amazingly responsive to what is happening right now.

A good bit of living with ADHD is about understanding that ADHD traits can be positive when in the right situation, and that looking for the positive helps offset the problems that ADHD also presents.

Are you looking for ADHD thorns or roses?  And can you live with the idea that a rose is beautiful in part because it has both?

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The next live session starts Fall, 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

We all know how uncomfortable it is to be on the receiving end of yelling.  Either you want to run away or your rage at the injustice of that yelling boils over.  That’s the ‘fight or flight’ instincts setting in.

But there is another part of yelling that we don’t think about as often.  That is the part that Smothers was referring to – where your own yelling interferes with your own understanding.

It has been my experience that yelling is not just a release of anger, but a red flag that says “something needs attending to here!”  We all have a right to our anger – just as we have to all of our feelings – but why are you yelling?  What do you need to hear that you aren’t able to in that moment?

You won’t be able to ask yourself that question right away.  But later, when you have time to reflect, what might you discover?  It is when we are brave – when we ask “what do I need to hear coming from inside myself or from my partner?” – that we learn and grow.

What do you need to hear?

Is there hope?  This video may help you answer that question. 

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The next live session starts Fall 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.

Most people who have ADHD wish they didn’t.  That makes sense, as it definitely complicates your life, even if you learn to live well with it.

But the reality is that you DO have it, and so what now?  Strayed has exactly the right idea.  How do you play the hell out of your cards?

• Learn all you can about your particular version ADHD.
• Seek your strengths and find a job that fits those strengths
• Surround yourself with people who are positive about you and support you
• Be with a partner who gets you and appreciates you, even if the ADHD sometimes is a pain
• Optimize your treatment for ADHD so that YOU are in control – NOT the ADHD

Some good resources to help you with doing this include:

• My free treatment ebook, found on my home page.  Take the concepts, such as target symptoms, to your doctor
• My couples seminar, which can help you and partner do better in your relationship…or, if you don’t have time for that, my books
• May We Have Your Attention, Please? Is a new book by Laura MacNiven that helps you identify your strengths and befriend your ADHD

Adult ADHD can have a huge impact on your relationship. ADHDmarriage.com can literally change your life! Find great resources for couples impacted by ADHD including free: Online treatment overview; Downloadable chapters of my books; A community forum with other couples facing similar issues; A large number of blog posts on various topics; Referrals.

Resources

Is your relationship in trouble? Consider my highly acclaimed couples' course: ADHD Effect In-Depth Couples' Seminar - This 8-session phone seminar has helped many couples thrive in healthier, happier relationships. The live session starts Fall 2020.

Support Tele-groups - Be part of a community exploring similar issues; learn from each other's successes and struggles; and find new, more effective ways to be your best self in your relationship: Non ADHD Partner Support Tele-group and ADHD New Habit Coaching Group.

How to Optimize Treatment for Adult ADHD - go to the home page for a free download about the best ways to manage ADHD.

Question? Contact Melissa.

- Please follow us for tips and resources.