The Whinypaluza Podcast with Rebecca Greene Episode 102 Improving Marital Patterns

No need to whine, it's Whiny Palooza! Have some wine and join us on the Whiny Palooza podcast with Rebecca Green.

Welcome to the Whiny Palooza podcast. I'm your host, Rebecca Green. I'm a wife, mother of 3, and licensed clinical social worker. I also have 3 fur babies at home too. My passion has always been to help children and their families. I always dreamed of being a wife and a mother. Parents are always learning through their struggles, failures, and successes and joys. I am no stranger to this wild ride of parenting, and I know behind every great parent lies a team of supportive friends and family. I want to be part of your support system. I want you to know that you are not alone. We are in this parenting world together. Join me every week for insightful discussions with experts on parenting and marriage, as well as other parents who have found the secret to successes in parenthood. You'll learn tips and tricks to make life with your family better than ever. I hope you will follow along with me while we dive into what it takes to achieve a happy family.

Hello everyone, this is Rebecca Green for the Winey Palooza podcast, and I am so excited to have Dr. Maggie Vaughan with us today. Thank you so much for being here.

Oh, thank you for having me.

Um, she's an impressive lady. Dr. Vaughn offers couples and individual therapy to adults and specializes in relational concerns, anxiety and depressive disorders, and problems pertaining to self-image. Her theoretical approach is an eclectic one deriving from several psychoanalytic schools of thoughts as well as cognitive behavioral theory. The psychoanalytical component of Dr. Vaughn's work helps clients become aware of previously unconscious aspects of themselves, including problematic ones like ineffective decision-making and interpersonal patterns. Cognitive work assists clients in finding adaptive ways of perceiving themselves, others, and circumstances. Behavioral interventions involve the teaching of skills needed for effective coping, communication, self-care, and symptom relief. As outdated behaviors and perceptions are identified and modified, clients report increased well-being and self-efficacy. Free from the internal constraints that formerly hindered them, clients ultimately find themselves living fully and authentically. And isn't that what we all are looking for? To live fully and authentically. And when I can be my authentic self with someone, I know that I have found a gem in my life, right?

Absolutely. Absolutely. That is the key.

Oh, well, I love that introduction. I love learning about you and what you're doing, and I would love to know what inspired you to become a therapist.

Oh my gosh. Um, you know, years of being completely dysfunctional and feeling lost and not living as my authentic self, and then finally getting on the other side of that. I think, you know, it really inspires you to try to give other people the tools that helped you to get out of that situation. Um, You know, I'm also very interested in health, the medical field. I considered med school, but it was just going to be way more than I could ever get through. But this was an alternative to that that would allow me to focus on health and well-being and to work directly with people. And, and I love it. It's, you know, every person brings their unique puzzle to problem solve, so it never gets old. It's constantly interesting and, and, um, just very stimulating for the brain. So I find it to be rewarding in, in a number of ways, both for the personal connection piece and also just the, you know, the, the, again, the mental stimulation piece that it provides me.

Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. It's, it's one of those fields that never gets boring.

No, that's right. That's right.

And I love that you want to give people the tools that you learned for yourself. That is amazing and inspirational.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's, it is very rewarding for me. I am so grateful for the people who come to me and who are willing to trust in me and to, to allow me to, to support them in their journeys.

Well, and I wanna tell you before I jump into more questions that 5 minutes with you and I can already tell how wonderful you are cuz it's so easy to talk to you.

Oh, that's so nice. Thank you.

So I really want to focus in on marriage, and I want to help people with their marriages today. I know from being married that we're all making mistakes every single day. Can you tell us what mistakes people are making in their marriage?

Oh my goodness, so many. Where to begin with that? Um, okay. Well, here's one. I think after a certain amount of time in a relationship, we really forget to see our partners. And one of the things that, you know, we all— that, that's important to all of us in our relationships, in, in life, is just being seen, having other people take us in and see us in the ways that we see ourselves. And what happens in marriage is that, you know, well, in any relationship, after the first, you know, maybe year, year and a half, you just get caught up in life and suddenly you're doing life. And that there's this other person there who you chose to be your life partner, and yet you cease to, to see them and to reflect back to them that, hey, I see you, I see this part of you that is so wonderful and so unique to you, and I see the contribution you're making to our home and our, our family. And so we wind up feeling very alone in our relationships. So I, you know, just— this is just one piece of the answer to what you asked, which is that we, we forget to see the other person and acknowledge all that is, is great about them.

You're making me think about this morning because I know you'll understand this. I have 3 children to get out the door, and my husband comes down the stairs, and I'm rushing around like a lunatic, and I don't even stop to say good morning, hello, and smile at him. And it's amazing when I pause from my busyness just to smile at him, how happy that makes him. Just that pause.

Yes, yes. Just take one moment to connect, make eye contact. I mean, I do the same thing too, and I think all the time, oh my goodness, if my clients saw what a horrible partner I am, oh God, they would never come back to me. But I know what I'm doing, I'm aware of it. And yet, you know, just times you get caught up in life and you're going and going, you're like, oh, these kids, I can't get them out the door. And yes, and you just ignore your partner. And yeah, so just remembering to connect, even if it's over text message, just saying, hey, how's it going? Oh, I remember you had this important meeting today. How, how did it go? You know, taking those moments to connect, really important.

Well, and it means so, it means so much more than we think it means. And I keep forgetting that all these little things that I think are little add up to making them feel so much more important.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Making one point of connection a day goes a very long way. Honestly, having a happy marriage takes no more than 5 minutes a day. That's what it takes, 5 minutes a day. Hey, I appreciate you. You know, showing gratitude would be another, another, um, piece of the answer to what you asked. Just take, take one minute and say, hey, I I so appreciate that you did this, even if it's minor. Yes, even if it has to get done. I mean, this is— couples get caught up on this idea that, well, someone's got to do the dishes, why should I say thank you? Well, yeah, but it's a pain in the ass to do the dishes.

Yeah.

No, and when you do it, wouldn't it be nice for someone to say thank you to you? So just say, hey, thanks. I said, you know, I really appreciate that you did that, and I see you.

Yes, I feel like we need those two reminders every day. I feel like I need to write those two reminders down to look at every single day. And I'm gonna move into communication because I know when I'm communicating well with him, and I know when I'm going down a really not so good place. So can we talk about communication patterns? And something positive that we can do to help our marriage?

Okay, um, well, this is, this is a tough one, but if you can learn this, you will master marriage. So here's what happens: couples get in the same argument every single day, and they don't realize it's the same argument. One day it's about socks that have been left on the floor, the other day, it's about how, you know, so-and-so, how your partner spoke to the kids. Usually what's happening is that couples are arguing about themes and they don't realize it. They're picking on the nitty-gritty and they're going back and forth. No, I didn't leave one sock, I left two socks. I didn't put them in the corner, I put them over here. It wasn't Tuesday, it was— well, okay, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. What matters is— and you can, so you can save yourself a lot of time if you learn this too, because you can stop talking about content and get into these themes, which is, I feel taken for granted when, or I, um, uh, feel disregarded when. And, and if you can identify the themes that you're arguing about, then you can talk about that, because that's what really matters. It's, you know what, I don't think you, you consider me when you do X, when you leave the socks on the floor. It's not about the socks, okay? The socks are all over the house, it's annoying, but it's not really about that. It's that you're taking it for granted that I'm gonna go around and clean up the socks. And you know, we do all these things like we test— well, I wonder if I leave the socks there, how long will they stay there? Well, they stay there for 3 weeks, and then you have proof that your partner doesn't care about you, you know?

Oh.

What you need to do is just say, hey, I don't, you know, every day I'm picking up these socks and I feel really taken for granted that they're left all over the house. It would mean a lot for me if you could split sock duty with me. So when couples can learn to take a step back from these little minor irritations that they argue about over and over again and identify What's the meaning they're attaching to this situation, and can they talk about that? Then they're really getting to something. And if they can talk about that, then their partner can say, oh my gosh, no, of course, I don't mean to take you— you know, I, I don't want you to feel taken for granted. Then you can move on, and you don't have to talk about whether this happened on Monday or Tuesday, or you just— oh gosh, no, if this makes you feel taken for granted, let me pick up the socks, it's no big deal. Or If the socks are there, I'm really sorry. They certainly are not, you know, a symbol of how I feel about you. And then the air is clear.

Well, and it's, it's mind games that I see even with myself, where it's, how long is it going to take him to take out the garbage? How long is this going to take? How long is this going to stay overfull like this? And I don't even say 'Can you please take out the garbage?' Why am I just waiting for him to notice? I laugh. I laugh at myself sometimes, and I'm like, 'It'll take you 2 seconds to ask him to take out the garbage.' Right, right.

But then you just, you just get so stirred up and you want to be angry. Yeah, I, I don't know. It's weird. It's funny. We have to step back and analyze ourselves and what— yes, and if it's really worth it.

And yes.

Yes, but we all do it. We all do it.

We all do this. We are, we all are doing similar things, which is funny. It's, it's, we're not alone.

No, no.

I, you know, I have heard people dealing with depressed partners, you know, and it's so hard to live with. It's so hard to manage. It's hard for the depressed person. It's hard for the partner. I mean, trying to get them to go do something. I mean, the stuff that I have heard from people just makes me so sad. And I'm just wondering if you have advice to the person dealing with the depressed spouse and how, how to help.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. It's such a hard one because, um, you know, on the one hand, a partner who has a depressed spouse feels— has so much empathy for them on the one hand, and on the other hand is so frustrated and feels so stuck themselves because it's so— it's very difficult to motivate the depressed partner to do the very things that would make them feel better. And we, we have mirror neurons, so we do feel to a certain extent what our partners feel. So even if we ourselves are not depressed, we're going to be brought down to a certain extent by that, that low mood. And I think there's a lot of resentment around that, that I can't be happy if you're not happy. I can try, I can go out and do things for myself, but I'm still coming back to someone who's in this very low, heavy place. So I think it's great to seek out support if you can find it. Find, find a support group of other individuals with depressed partners. Certainly try to find resources for your partner because that, that's going to be the absolute best thing. And then think about things like walking, getting outside that you can do together that would make both of you feel better. I mean, the key is just to, to at least get your partner to do something to keep moving. Because a moving body is not a depressed body. So if you can at least do that one piece, that, that tends to go a long way.

That's, that's such good advice. I, I, yeah, I wish that I could have connected you to these two couples ages ago because, you know, you know what can happen unfortunately is it can lead to divorce, but Oh yeah, I know that this is a common problem.

Oh, it really is very common. Well, depression is just so common, and it's on a spectrum, you know. It, it affects people to varying degrees, but it's, it's very, very common. More common than we even realize. I think more common than the statistics even.

I agree with you because people don't always talk about it and don't always report it. And if they're not depressed, they're usually anxious.

Oh, right. Well, my clients say, so what do you, what do you specialize in? It's like anxiety, depression, relationship concerns. So basically if you wake up in the morning, you could probably benefit from working with me.

Oh my gosh. I love that. I believe your line is that everyone benefits from therapy. Is that the right? Because it's so true. Every single one of us would benefit from seeing a therapist. Yeah, there's no doubt. You talk about unconscious aspects of ourselves, and I don't think that people know what that means and how it's impacting us, um, our lives, our marriage. Can you give people an example of this?

Sure. So for example, early in life we learn what makes us feel loved. And, you know, one of the things that we want more than anything as, as children is to feel loved and approved of and adored by our parents. And we figure out which buttons to push in order to get the feedback that indicates that that is the case. And we also learn what to do in order to avoid disapproval. Moving forward throughout life, we tend to continue to do these things without even realizing it. It's not even on a conscious level, but we tend to continue to engage in those same behaviors that made us feel loved and that helped us to avoid feeling unloved as kids. So it's important to bring those unconscious drives to the surface later in life so that you can decide whether or not they're still serving you, because sometimes they're not. Yes, not every, not every family is a functional one, and sometimes we learn somewhat dysfunctional ways of behaving in order to keep our parents okay with us. And then we seek out the same types of individuals or, or certain things that are similar to the ways our parents were, and we engage with them, these people, in, in similar ways in order to make sure that we feel loved. It's not always a healthy thing. Sometimes it's fine, but not always.

And I think that a lot of times we don't realize that we don't need to be doing them anymore. It was right, it served us when we were 10, but not maybe when we were 45.

Absolutely, absolutely.

I've even heard my husband say like, um, you know, I'm not like nothing like your father.

Right, right. You know, I'm not your dad, right?

Oh my God. Where did, why did he just say that? Anyways, that's a whole—

Always good to be reminded though.

I know it is a good reminder. I would say that if he was sitting here, he would say that sometimes he gets so annoyed just wanting me to make a decision. And you talk about being a better decision maker. And that's something that I consciously work on. So can you help us? Because it, it can really drive ourselves and our spouse crazy.

Yes. Well, usually when someone has a hard time making a decision, it doesn't matter what you choose at that point. It doesn't matter. So you can pick something and trust that even if you didn't make the very, very best decision, you can recover from it and it will be just fine. So if you're at that point, that, that's a good thing to, to remember that it's going to be just fine. Pick something, go with it. You can always make a change at that point when you're, when you're debating between two things or you're looking at the menu with 8,000 items, just, you know, pick a section, narrow it down to five things and, and pick something. You're going to be fine.

Yeah, I would say we're probably a very stereotypical couple where like he makes a decision like boom, and he's like, just make a decision. Like all you have to do is make a decision. He makes me laugh, but it's true. It's true. What is— there's—

what, what do you think makes it hard for you to make a decision? What are you afraid of?

Um, you know what, there are so many big decisions. You know, like for example, are we going to remodel our house or are we going to move? You know, like stuff like that comes up and I am like, what's your opinion? And he'll say, I don't care, whatever you want. Right.

That's correct. That was the correct answer.

It was the correct answer. And it's also a lot of pressure.

Right.

Your answer. And what do you want to do?

Right, right. And back to the question.

So it's, you know, it's just, it's big decisions. There's not a right decision. There's not a right decision. If we, if we move, we'll be fine. If we remodel our house, we'll be fine. But it's stuff like that, where I, I think that I'm not alone, and then I can get stuck and not make a decision, which gets rid of all the momentum, which really bugs me.

It— that is a really hard one because it feels like such a commitment, you know. I would still say if you're deciding between the two, you can pick either way. This is an upgrade, right? I assume.

Yes.

Moving to the slums, and it's, it's gonna be fine, you know. It's going to be an upgrade. And still, if you, if you get to the other side of that decision and you decide you've made the wrong one, you can correct it.

I, I love that. I'm going to hold on to that. And I laugh at myself with problems like this, and I say, this is a very good problem to have. Yes, yes, I'll take it over a lot of other stuff that we could be, you know, upset about. So coping skills, self-care, Let's move to that because I think that we— I will tell you that when our kids were little, my husband would literally kick me out the door to go take care of myself and say, leave and go take care of yourself. How can we as spouses help our partner with improving their coping skills and taking care of themselves? What can we do?

You know, in every relationship, I think it's very important that each person have a very strong sense of, of an individual life. So I think if the both of you focus on your lives— and I always like to break down our lives into 4 categories because it makes this a little more simple. You know, look at the, the sources of social support that can, that can also derive from, from family. Social support, health, fun, and career or sense of accomplishment. Doesn't actually have to be career, can be anything that gives you a sense of accomplishment. If we each break down our lives into those 4 areas and give ourselves a rating, let's say on a scale of 1 to 10, how well are we doing in each of these 4 areas? Which area am I a little weaker in? And if you say, well, you know, my social life is a little like, eh, right now, okay, well then make a point of getting out with friends or work colleagues. They don't have to be best friends. Once a week, if that's realistic, or just on a regular basis. So if you can strengthen these various areas of your life, you'll be coming into the relationship with a very solid foundation as an individual, a very solid sense of self, and just a sense of well-roundedness that I think really serves in the area of coping skills. When you're well-rounded, you're better equipped to deal with life stressors, whatever comes at you. You know, you've got the social support to rely on. You've got this fun escape that you engage in every now and then. You're taking good care of your health, so you feel more capable. You have more self-esteem. When you're moving around. So I think that that's a really good place to start.

That is really, really good advice because as I'm listening to you, I'm thinking about the hours and hours and hours that my husband works. So when you're saying the 4 things, I mean, I'm going to spell it out to him because it's totally, totally off balance. And as his wife, I will say to him, you know, you worked 13 hours yesterday and 12 hours the day before, and I'm concerned. So can, can we scale down on your hours so you can take care of yourself?

Yeah. And it's hard. You know, a lot of people feel as though they can't, but this is when people begin to feel more anxious or more depressed when life's lopsided like that.

Yes.

You can step back, take, take a weekend, evaluate your life. Do some problem solving. Think about how you can find more balance. It will make a huge difference if you can try to implement, implement that.

Awesome advice. I'm taking that. Um, can you tell us about a couple that maybe stands out to you that you were able to help that you want to tell us about?

Oh my goodness.

There's probably a ton of them.

There are so many now. Um, let me think of who, who stands out. You know, to me, couples are so similar to one another.

I know, maybe none of them stand out.

Like, distinguishes them, maybe their lifestyles or, um, what they do for a living. You know, some people just have incredibly unique lives, but the couple stuff is so similar. It's, um, again, it's hard to think of who stands out. Um, well, you know, let me just think of— there's a couple that I worked with a while ago that they, they came into me on the, on the brink of divorce and really just wanted to come in, pretty, pretty much assumed they would go ahead and get divorced, but wanted to make sure that they had explored the options and had done what they could. And, um, you know, what was happening in their relationship is that they weren't taking the time at the beginning of each week to have a very simple discussion about what the week would look like and what the expectations and needs were of each partner. And so what would happen is they'd go through their week one person would be home before the other, felt alone and abandoned, and like, well, I guess we spend no quality time together anymore. This is just what we do. And, um, the other felt unsupported in their career. And she, you know, there were certain things that she wanted to, to pursue and didn't feel supported in those things. And he had no idea that she was trying to take this time to do that after all of the, the, you know, kids had gotten out of the home and she was trying to carve out this time and really needed that alone time. Both essentially were feeling neglected and uncared about. And once we acknowledge that and we put into place this just once monthly— I mean, once weekly check-in on Sunday evenings, okay, when can our together time be? What time do you need to focus on your work? What time do you need to um, get your exercise in. So they would carve out the, the alone time for each of them, or the individual me time for each of them, and then they would carve out the couple time. And that was it. That was all that it took for these two to begin living a really happy life together. It's just a matter of clarity and a simple conversation, conversation at the beginning of each week. And there we were. But they just felt— they came in and they were like, you know, it's just not working. We're not happy. We don't care about each other. We live separate lives now. So we're probably done because we've been doing this for years, but we'll go ahead and do, you know, a little couples work and see.

It's amazing to me time and time again that I think something is so tiny and simple, but if we change it for a couple, ourselves, our child. It's like a little tweak and amazing outcomes. Yeah.

Yeah.

That's fabulous. That is an awesome story. I, I love hearing success stories. What do you like best about what you do?

I love, I love working with couples because because the sessions are so active and there's a certain degree of politics involved in it, staying neutral and also, and brain flexibility. Couples work is so quick and so intense. You have to be able to jump from one person's perspective to the other's perspective and really get it. And then figure out, okay, how are we going to get from this place and, you know, this person's position and this person's position and find a place where they can mutually connect and, and find mutual satisfaction? And it's, you know, every couple is, is, as I said in the beginning of our conversation, every couple brings a different, uh, composition, a different puzzle to be solved. And the sessions are just incredibly interesting and incredibly fast and You know, nonstop stimulation and entertainment for me. And I adore my couples. I just find it so fun that these two very different people, you know, starting at opposite ends of the world when they come in, can get back on the same page. It's really fun to see that and rewarding.

So they're keeping your life very interesting.

Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah, I, I didn't know when I became a therapist that I was gonna be like a private eye, like a detective. Like I didn't know that that was part of our title. Right, right, right. Uh, what else do you want to share that I didn't think to ask you?

Oh gosh. You know, I think you, you, you got to probably the most important piece of, of the couple's relationship when you asked about communication. I, I think it's just important for couples to realize that usually they're not arguing about the things they think they're arguing about. They're arguing about the meaning they're attaching to the things they argue about. And if they can try to, to identify what that meaning is— what do I think it means that I didn't get a call from my spouse today? What do— what is the meaning? It's not that they didn't call, it's Oh, I think they don't care about me. I think they forgot my meeting. They, they forgot that I had that special presentation because they don't care. If you can say, hey, I really felt uncared about, then you can talk about what really matters, as opposed to you didn't call today, and then they'll, then they'll provide you with some justification for not having called, which is totally beside the point. So I, I think You know, you touched upon something really important there when you asked about the communication piece.

And yes, well, and, and you summed it up, I think, when you said we want to feel appreciated, we want to feel seen. I mean, the little things that make us so happy in our marriage.

Yeah, yeah, yes, yes, the little things.

Tell everyone where they can find you.

You can find me on my, my individual website, which is everyoneneedstherapy.com, or on my group psychotherapy practice website, which is happyapplenyc.com.

Well, I can't thank you enough for taking time out of your busy day to meet with me. I had so much fun with you.

Oh, me too. Thank you so much.

This is Rebecca Green reminding everyone to spend every day laughing, learning, and loving.

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