How to reduce relationship stress and increase harmony now

In a study, a group of couples revealed their top 5 stressors. Married couples reported higher levels of stress levels than dating or engaged couples. If you were to guess what they rated as their top stressor, what do you think it would be?

#5 stressor: Too much to do around the home

#4 stressor: Inadequate income

#3 stressor: Feeling emotionally upset

#2 stressor: Your job

#1 stressor: Your spouse 

The #1 stressor cited by both men and women was their spouse. These couples genuinely believe that their problems would be solved if their partner would only change. But this makes them feel disempowered because they cannot change their partner. The only one they have control over is themselves. So what would do you do if you were in a similar situation?

1. Decide this is NOT how it should be

It may seem like with marriage the number of demands and responsibilities compound 10x. This is how I felt as soon as my husband and I got back from our honeymoon. It was as if we went from a tropical forest in Costa Rica to being in a constant pressure cooker once we got home from our honeymoon. With housework, running a business, taking care of clients, paying bills, and all the little things I was now taking care of as a new wife, I very quickly felt the burden, stress, and overwhelm. Yes, it was real. I was feeling more stressed now that I was married and had a house and husband to care for, but something inside me kept telling me this wasn’t how it should be. 

While you may have more responsibilities, commitments, and demands as a married couple, you’ve also doubled your team. Now you are no longer facing life by yourself. You now have a LIFE partner. if you’ve been feeling taxed, overworked, exhausted, and stressed, it’s time to reel your partner back in and see how you can mesh your lives better, how you can work together as a team, lean on each other, and distribute the load more fairly. 

In the words of George Eliot, “What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other?”

Your partner is not in your life to be your top stressor. They’re not in your life to make things more difficult or challenging. 

When you decide that you’re not going to accept this as the normal, as “this is just how it’s supposed to be,” then you open yourself up to look for new ways to reduce relationship stress and see how you can make life easier for each other.  

2. Make a list of your stressors within the relationship 

Grab a piece of paper and pen and write down the concrete things causing relationship stress. The more specific you can be the better. 

For example, one of the things that was causing me stress was that I was carrying a mental load about the neverending tasks I was taking care of. I felt like the meal planning, groceries, the bills, our daughter’s pediatric appointment, and vet appointments were all falling all on my shoulders.

I was feeling stressed because I was legitimately carrying too much.

3. Bring in your partner

 One day I sat my husband down with a giant Post-It note and wrote down everything that I was bogged down with. He was genuinely surprised at everything I was juggling. I was surprised that he was surprised - wasn’t he supposed to know? 

I assumed that he had to know the cause of all my stress because he lived with me, we slept together. Wasn’t he seeing all I was doing? 

Nope. You’ll find that this is often the case. It’s almost like we all have a movie playing in our heads at all times. Don’t expect your partner to pay attention to your movie when they have their own movie playing in their head. We all have our own thoughts, goals for the day, and pending items to take care of. 

I often hear from wives, “why should I have to tell him? He should know.” This thinking will never help you.

4. Look for the easy way. 

Once you have a list of things that create relationship stress, ask yourself “how could this be easier?”

You may be doing things in a way that’s making it harder and unnecessarily stressful. 

My husband and I used to fight about the trash. He would forget to put a new bag back in so then I would be in the middle of cooking and when I would open the trash can, there was no bag. This would frustrate me. My blood would start boiling, until I asked myself, “how could this be easier on him?” This had me thinking, there had to be a better way.

See, I stopped seeing my husband as the problem. Instead of thinking it was a “husband problem” I decided to see it as a “system problem.” Now there’s always a clean trash bag on the bottom of the trash can so that when he pulls out the trash bag, he sees the new bag inside and just puts it in. And, tada! Fights about trash, gone! 

5. Optimize your systems weekly. 

Take some time every week to audit what’s creating stress in your home life and relationship. So often we experience this stress because we continue to do things how we’ve always done them without pausing, paying attention to exactly what’s creating the friction, and brainstorming solutions.

It’s not going to get easy by default. A peaceful, harmonious, and joyful home is not by design, especially in the modern world we’re living in where both partners work, we raise children with limited childcare, and have more distractions and commitments than ever. 

This is a life by design that you and your partner get to create every week when you take time to observe, analyze without judgment and without blaming, and see how you can make it easier on each other. 

Remember, you are a team. The best and most powerful team. You can reduce relationship stress and increase the harmony in your home.

I hope these tips help you reduce relationship stress so that you can have free space, time, and energy to enjoy your relationship, and have more joy and fun together. 

I’d love to hear from you. What “Aha” moment did you have while reading this blog?

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