avatarColleen Sheehy Orme

Summary

The article discusses the importance of conducting emotional wellness checks in relationships, similar to how we maintain other areas of our lives, to prevent prolonged unhappiness and encourage timely action for personal emotional health.

Abstract

The author reflects on the lack of emotional wellness checks in our lives while walking their dog, contrasting the regular maintenance of practical aspects like dental appointments and car insurance with the absence of similar metrics for relationship health. The article suggests that if we tracked our emotional well-being with the same rigor, we might leave unhappy relationships sooner, having recognized and addressed prolonged periods of unhappiness. The author shares personal experience about being stuck in a failing marriage for years, emphasizing the importance of self-responsibility in relationships and the need for a "happiness wellness check" to avoid justifying a partner's bad behavior and to protect oneself and one's family from the effects of a broken relationship. The article advocates for setting time frames for addressing marital issues, such as six months for initial discussions and a year for taking decisive action, to prevent unhappiness from becoming a permanent state.

Opinions

  • The author believes that adults are responsible for tracking their emotional health and should not rely solely on their partners to fix marital problems.
  • There is an opinion that relationships should be subject to regular checks, similar to other responsibilities in life, to gauge happiness and take appropriate action.
  • The author expresses that staying in an unhappy relationship for an extended period can lead to self-destruction and negatively impact the family, especially children.
  • The article suggests that people often justify their partner's negative behavior and delay making difficult decisions, which can result in years of unhappiness.
  • The author emphasizes that adults should hold themselves accountable for their happiness and not acquiesce to long-term misery.
  • It is conveyed that taking action, such as attending counseling or even considering separation, is a responsible approach to addressing persistent

The Happiness Wellness Check Question We Never Get Asked

If answered we might leave unhappy relationships earlier.

Photo by Oleksandr Pidvalnyi: On Pexels

I’m walking my yellow lab, Phyllis. My thoughts wander as Philly pulls me through the streets. I’ve got to make a few appointments and I’m calculating the time between visits. Adults are responsible that way.

The areas of life we are well-versed in.

It’s time to make a dentist appointment. It’s time to renew the car insurance. It’s time for an oil change. We track these areas of our lives.

But we don’t have emotional wellness checks.

We don’t have relationship checks.

There is no metric we adhere to.

I remember one of my friends saying, “It seems like you have been unhappy for a long time. No one has tried harder than you to save your marriage. It’s okay to give up.”

She was right.

She was asking me an important question.

“How long have you been unhappy and what have you done about it?”

But at that point, I had been destroying and exhausting myself for several years. I always say, I beat the horse, turned it over, beat it again, and then repeated. I wouldn’t give up on my husband.

But what if we treated relationships as we do other aspects of our lives?

What if we tracked this area of our lives?

It’s been six months since our marital problems began. It’s been a year since I’ve been unhappy. I’ve got to do something. I’ve got to be a responsible adult. I’ve got to track this metric.

If not, time will continue to lapse.

My emotional health will deteriorate.

My being, my children, and my family need me to be strong and healthy.

But we don’t do that. We get caught in the day-to-day marital misery that soon envelops us. Or maybe it’s a job we hate but can’t bring ourselves to leave.

We either ignore, deny, fight, or try to fix our feelings and/or situation.

But we can’t fix a situation that involves more than one person. It takes two people to make a marriage a happy refuge. It takes two or more to make a job one we don’t dread going to.

Somehow in relationships, we lose a sense of self-responsibility.

Because we are tethered to another individual.

We look to them to fix our marital problems.

There’s a variety of reasons for this. A relationship involves two people so we can’t solve issues alone. We made a vow so we aren’t likely to easily abandon a marriage when our spouse refuses to work at it or damages it with lying, cheating, neglect…

Or the other things that take down love.

But if we did happiness wellness checks we would be able to gauge time.

Not waste it on someone who isn’t willing to work towards joint joy.

If this had been a common concept, I don’t believe I would have expended five years attempting to resuscitate my relationship. I’m an adult. I’m a responsible being.

I am accountable in all aspects of my life.

I think I would have held myself to a healthy time assessment.

Instead of making justifications for our problems. He’s a good person in a bad place. This is uncharacteristically bad behavior. I can’t give up on my marriage we are a family.

But I did give up on my family by exposing my kids to a broken relationship.

For far too long.

I wouldn’t do it again.

I wouldn’t lie to myself.

I wouldn’t tell myself my children would be better off if their parents stayed together. I wouldn’t tell myself a man was a good person in a bad place when he repeatedly hurt his wife and children the same way again and again.

I wouldn’t beg a man to care.

I wouldn’t beg a man to continue to go to marriage counseling.

A man is an adult and adults should be self-responsible.

Adults should hold themselves to a happiness wellness check. They shouldn’t place this responsibility in the hands of anyone other than themselves.

It’s been six months since our marital problems began. It’s been a year since I’ve been unhappy. I’ve got to do something. I’ve got to be a responsible adult. I’ve got to track this metric.

Six months is a warning sign.

It means a discussion needs to take place with your spouse or your boss. A dialogue needs to begin to understand where the unhappiness is being derived from.

Identify the problem, investigate it, and attempt to correct it.

A year means some type of action needs to be taken.

A decision to attend couples counseling or make the marriage a bigger priority. A job may require a few resumes to be sent out. But whatever or wherever the unhappiness is coming from needs an immediate action plan.

I always say, “We must entertain unhappiness. If not, it becomes a houseguest that never leaves.”

Year two of unhappiness is a “Danger, Will Robinson” moment.

Things aren’t working for whatever reason.

Unwanted decisions may need to be made.

People shouldn’t acquiesce to misery for extended periods of time.

It doesn’t end well. Not for us, or the people around us. Unhappiness finds a way out. It begins with words. A little complaining or venting. And then it escapes to other areas like food or wine.

It demands to be entertained.

It should be treated as any other houseguest.

Attended to…then politely sent on its way.

And definitely not allowed to permanently move in with us.

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Self
Self Improvement
Relationships
Love
Life
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