Couples Counseling and Adverse Childhood Experiences
When partners come from different backgrounds it has an influence on the relationship. Couples therapy helps untangle the differences in perspectives that can cause tension by exploring how growing up in different families and environments affects the relationship dynamics.
Consider the common scenario in which one member grew up in a relatively healthy family system and the other partner did not. Perhaps the other partner had less support, more adversity or an outright abusive childhood experience. The partner from the more stable and secure situation may take safety in relationships for granted and lack insight into what it is like to grow up without that.
The lack of adversarial experiences in childhood can both provide an opportunity for something more nourishing for the partner that grew up without and can lead to misunderstandings.
The member with a more stable/ secure background cannot always understand the nuances of how the other has been affected by their past; they have not been through it themselves. They may judge the other for being overly emotional or acting illogically. There may be an assumption that the the less fortunate member of the couple is damaged, needs fixing or is somehow less than. And this may be communicated in explicit and implicit ways that influence the relationship. For example one member may become the savior while the other gets put into a role of being the one who needs to be saved. These roles can limited the relationship as a whole as well limiting individual growth.
Those who grow up with adverse childhood experiences may have more complicated perspectives on how people interact with one another due to their lived experiences. Childhood security and stability are not a given and can limit one’s perspective to the struggles that those that grew up with less than deal with.
Viewed from another angle, those who grow up with more adversity can often have a more expanded view of the world, an awareness that things do not always work out for everyone and that circumstances can result in behaviors that might not have happened with more security, stability or nourishment. People with adverse childhood experiences may be more resilient in a crisis and more perceptive of their surroundings, including inter-personal interactions. Sometimes in more privileged situations there can be an idea that if something bad happens to someone there must of been something that they did to contribute to it. Bad things happen to bad people. If you are good you will be rewarded. This can add a layer of shame onto adversity. Shame can keep us from acknowledging the more compromising parts of relationships. To admit something awkward happened can be equated with being a difficult person or rocking the boat. Sometimes maintaining “good” feelings towards one another comes with a price. Those with adverse backgrounds tend to be more aware of the price.
The point is whether you grew up in a secure environment or an environment with adversity, both experiences can contribute to difficulties in the relationship as well as the strengths.
In some couples both partners come from backgrounds that were adverse, traumatic and/ or abusive. In these relationships there may a bond based on those experiences, a shared knowing what it’s like to go through it, to survive. This common ground can be both a resource and a source of conflict. This can be true particularly if neither partner has had a good role model for secure attachment. Untangling the ways in which those experiences interact helps couples get along better, work towards common goals and helps both partners co-regulate during tough emotional moments.
There are many ways that all this can play out in a relationship. The key is that by growing awareness together, a couple can become closer. Couples counseling offers a place to explore how each person is affected both by what happened to them and how that influences the way they show up in relationship. No matter who you are, how you see the world is a result of what you grew up in. It is valuable for couples to understand how past relationships and experiences are entering into present relationships.
In a couple it is important for each partner to have an opportunity to express their past experiences through their own lens in their own words.
The inter-personal patterns and experiences that we were exposed to as children influence and shape how we relate to others now. This is true of everyone. The good and the bad. We all use our past to understand our present. It is how we are neurologically wired. Sometimes that is helpful and other times it can cause issues. Sometimes the past helps us understand a new situation and other times our past experiences keep us from seeing whats happening right in front of us. While someone can certainly address these issues in individual counseling, when it is addressed as a couple, the process of exploring together how it effects the dynamics between the two of you can bring you closer together and make your bond more resilient when differences emerge.