Everybody must know somebody who is in the wrong relationship. So how come we never know it are us? It’s as though our powers of insight suddenly dessert us and we find ourselves seriously asking the girl who does the photocopying “do you think I’m in the right relationship?” Here’s a quick guidelines of tell tale signs that things are not as they should be.

Relationship or Partnership

Firstly let’s remind ourselves that a healthy intimate relationship is a partnership. Now, partnerships come in all shapes and sizes but whether you are the other side of the world, or living in each others pockets there should be a definite sense of “we’re both in this together”, rather than a tense feeling of not knowing what the other is doing… or why? If you are prone to instantly finding things like your husband actually does have a previous wife, talks fluent Cantonese or has secret gambling debts, then you might well be in the wrong relationship.

Recently a woman asked me whether she thought it was normal for her husband to buy a house without her knowing… well, do you. Exactly. But, this woman was no fool. In fact she was and still is, a bright and intelligent business lawyer. It’s just that, as we all know, when it comes to our own relationship the girl in photocopying has a better idea than us, no matter who we are.

Silence Is Far From Golden

Have you stopped talking to each other? My old supervisor who had the unenviable job of making sure I was counseling effectively once told me “if they are still talking there’s hope, even if they’re yelling at each other there’s hope, but if they sit in silence glaring at you, charge them double and cancel the next session”. Certainly he was a bit old school, but basically he was right.

Interaction, especially when things go wrong is a basic need of making a relationship work. Even if it’s screaming and shouting, at least there is some energy, some passion. The tell tale sign of relationship death is the heavy and unique silence of defeat.

Acceptance or The Hangover Syndrome

Hands up who is regularly getting told off by their partner. I don’t mean the periodic nag to do the hoovering but a feeling that whatever, anything you do is just plain wrong. Have you seen that bit in the film The Hangover where Stu the dentist is planning to leave for his trip? His wife is plain horrible. Everything he does is wrong, and she places endless specifications upon him, “do this, do that, ring me then”. There is little, if any, sense of approval or pain between them. If you fall into this category, if you identify with poor old Stud, if there is no healthy give and take, then you may well be in the wrong relationship.

You would be surprised at how many couples come to us for relationship support and couples therapy that either clearly hates each other, or one clearly hates the other. Again it might seem obvious to an onlooker but when we’re in that situation ourselves its like trying to see through custard. It just doesn’t happen.

If you are not sure whether you fall into this classification, count how many times each day you get told off, or elicit a adverse response. If it’s more than 3 or 4 you have got problems.

There are of course many other things that lead to the malfunction of a partnership, but these are all strong indicators for identifying whether you are just having a few problems or just in plain, good old fashioned denial of the fact that you are in the wrong relationship that will never work. And if you instantly discover your partner in a late night casino discussing proficient Cantonese to a dodgy looking Chinaman about an ex-wife you never knew he had, take my advice and run for the hills.