When we grow up we experience a range of responses to our hurts, joys and concerns. These become deeply formative messages about how to deal with our own emotions and those of others in the future.
“Many of us heard statements like, “it’s not that bad!”, “bless your heart, it’ll pass”, “get over it”, or “come on now, big boys don’t cry”. These statements miss the essence of a child’s communication and leave them to deal with the pain of the situation and the suspicion that they were foolish for showing how they were affected.”
Detriment of Invalidating Responses
When we have invalidating responses to our emotional experience like the above, it becomes difficult to feel like you are allowed to express emotions at all. The risk and frustration doesn’t seem worth it.
Once this pattern of relating to your own emotion sets in, it is even harder to know what to do with others who are expressing their emotions. Often people commit to not showing emotions, being tough, pulling themselves up, or distracting from their emotions.
This is so important in relation to a porn addiction because spouses are often deeply hurt by the other’s addiction. Big emotional responses are common and often seem to come from nowhere. However, they don’t come from nowhere, they are based on the spouses experience and need to be taken seriously if that person is going to heal and move forward.
Learning About Your Emotions
If you are struggling to stay with a spouse’s emotional reactions and expression you should start by considering what you learnt about your emotions. Think through the following questions:
- What messages did your family communicate to you about emotions?
- Did they often use cliche phrases such “big boys don’t cry” or “you are just so emotional”.
- What was your emotional “role” at home?
- What was expected of you emotionally in the home?
- Were you ever asked to care for others or hear their pains?
- What ways did you start dealing with your emotions as a result of your experiences?
You will likely find you are putting what you learnt about emotions onto your spouse—it feels like a set of emotional rules that they may be breaking.
Your spouse needs you to attend to their painful emotions, to experience you remaining with them and to feel as though you understand them—that they are safe. This can be hard, yet it is the foundation of validation that we all long for.
Understanding the Validation Process
So what is validation? It contains three core aspects, the first of which is listening for what seems to you as the kernel of truth in the other person’s experience.
This aspect is crucial to lead us into our second point: the other person’s words and felt experience will be understandable to you if you can appreciate just the smallest sense that this does “make sense”—there is an understandable cause for this emotional experience. And thirdly, we have to remember we aren’t necessarily agreeing with the other person, rather we are appreciating their perspective.
Why would you do this hard work? Because, relationships cannot thrive (and seldom survive) without validation! When we validate, our partner has the experience of us listening and caring about them, and removes us from the “right – wrong” dance that many couples find themselves in.
Further, once we understand one another, problem solving and support become possible. At its core the work of validation reduces emotional pain in both members of the couple and a new direction for communication emerges.
What should I validate? We use words of validation in response to another person’s experience, emotions, thoughts, beliefs and opinions—remember it isn’t agreeing, but showing you understand why they might experience something the way they do. We certainly validate facts and the difficulty those facts cause for someone.
Validating is a skill that we can practice. And as I mentioned above, it may not come naturally to those who didn’t receive it for themselves. If that is your situation I recommend committing to careful practice.
There are a number of practical steps that validate. They are outlined below:
- Pay attention: Don’t multitask, but listen well, make eye contact and respond with your own facial expressions (this is registered at a deep unconscious level by the speaker).
- Reflect back: Say back what you have heard without judgmental language (or parroting) to make sure you really “get” what the other person is telling you.
- Respond to the whole person: Watch their body language and facial expressions, these will increase the information they are giving to you about any situation.
- Understand: Given what the other person expresses, complete the sentence, “It makes sense that you…. Because ….”
- Acknowledge the valid: Act as if the behavior or emotions are valid or important to you, and that they represent reality. This is the opposite of dismissing someone.
- Show equality: Don’t put the other person down, or elevate yourself above them. Be equals and treat them as competent, not fragile.
About the author: Paul Loosemore, MA PLPC, author of “21 Movements Towards Life” – The step-by-step guide to recovering from sexual addiction or pornography. Paul works as a mental health counselor, and consults with those who wish to recover from Sexual Addiction—both individuals and couples. He is the founder of www.stopsexualaddiction.com where you can find his guide, or contact him.
References:
[1]: Loosemore (2016) 21 Movements towards life.
[2]: Adapted from, Linehan (2014) DBT skills training manual.
The opinions and views of our guest contributors are shared to provide a broad perspective of addictions. These are not necessarily the views of Addiction Hope, but an effort to offer discussion of various issues by different concerned individuals.
We at Addiction Hope understand that addictions result from a combination of environmental and genetic factors. If you or a loved one are suffering from an addiction, please know that there is hope for you, and seek immediate professional help.
Reviewed By: Jacquelyn Ekern, MS, LPC on April 7, 2017.
Published on AddictionHope.com