Getting In Touch With Your Feelings Beneath

In every intimate relationship there are situations that come up with partners where we feel hurt, frustrated, unheard or unseen. Sometimes when this happens, you may feel comfortable bringing up your feelings with your partner, talking your feelings through and finding your way through the difficulty together. But other times, you may not feel as comfortable talking in an open way with your partner about what hurts or feels frustrating. This can be the case for many reasons. It may feel too vulnerable to talk in this way. Or the issue at hand, and the feelings it brings up, may feel too strong, or raw, or unprocessed, to be able to say. You may not fully trust that your partner will be able to hear you. Maybe you’re afraid that they will get angry and turn away, leaving you alone and feeling worse than before. Maybe you have had experiences in the past that make talking about your feelings in this way difficult. Or you may not even know why you find yourself keeping silent, experiencing the hurt or anger inside but not opening up about it, pushing your feelings away, moving on to other things.

Sometimes in relationships this can become a pattern—having experiences with your partner that leave you feeling hurt or anxious or angry, but not feeling able to express these feelings. And so you put them aside. But when feelings build up, they tend to come out in other ways. Perhaps you find yourself getting annoyed at your partner for small things that otherwise wouldn’t bother you. Or perhaps you begin to feel emotionally closed off from your partner and find yourself having a hard time getting into a space together of loving camaraderie, ease, and joy. All sorts of difficult and confusing patterns can develop between the two of you, where distance and conflict arise from things that would otherwise seem petty and small. You can start to lose track of why exactly you feel distant from each other. You love each other, you know that, but it can feel like there are so many impediments to feeling and expressing that love.

When people think about working on their relationships in therapy, they often think of being in couples therapy together with their partner—and that is often useful and important. But individual therapy can also support you and your relationship in deep and lasting ways. When my patients and I work on issues like these, we often first focus on really understanding their feelings. Sometimes it’s not clear on the surface the full extent of what you are experiencing with your partner. For instance, your partner may say something careless, and even though you see that they don’t intend to hurt you, what they say cuts deeply nonetheless. And you yourself may not fully understand yet why it hurts so deeply. Often it’s true that the pain is rooted in what’s going on with your partner, at the moment you feel hurt and also more broadly in your relationship together. Maybe you feel unseen; maybe you feel like their careless remarks come from a deeper lack of care. At the same time there may be feelings from past experiences, from past relationships or from other parts of life, that contribute to your current feelings.

It’s helpful, and healing, for us in your therapy to empathize and dwell together with how you feel, with what comes up for you with your partner, and also to begin to better understand why you feel this way. As the therapy process moves along, you may also be able to feel safer and more comfortable talking about these things with your partner when they emerge between you. The part of you that has pushed the feelings away may begin to relax.

This process provides benefits across your life experience. You can come to understand yourself better and become comfortable feeling a wider range of emotions without needing to shut down and push them away. And importantly, it can support you in your relationship with your partner. As you feel comfortable with your emotions and have an easier time articulating to yourself what they are, you may feel more centered when these feelings come up and be able to talk about them with your partner. In this process with your partner, it’s wonderful when you talk with your partner and you feel understood and held. But therapy can also support you navigating difficult moments with your partner. For instance, there may be moments when you speak to your partner from the heart, but you don’t feel heard; or where you say things that are difficult for your partner to hear; or where you need to establish boundaries for yourself in the relationship that are ultimately healthy but that require work to establish. In all, our work together aims to support you in experiencing a new kind of emotional expansiveness, peace, and clarity. And also to support your relationship to become more open, vital, and alive. I invite you to call me at (510) 500-9722 so that we can talk about how Relationship Counseling can help.