Hey, fellow members of EF.
Sometimes my foreign friends and I feel a tad isolated in this albeit lovely country. Sometimes relocating here (or anywhere else) puts extra pressure on one's marriage/partnership. One might find he/she needs opinions from outsiders because it can come to a point when one does not know whether one's partner is right, both are right (but stubbornly refuse to acknowledge the other's opinion) or whether one's expectations are unrealistic.

Sometimes I feel a primary relationship is an endless tug of war between your wants and his wants, your needs and his needs, his viewpoint and your viewpoint.

I've made a search for discussions/threads on marital/relationship issues but only found the ones on legalities and 'practicalities'. Is it appropriate to discuss relationship topics here?

Marital and personal counselling is prohibitively expensive. Perhaps we can fall a little bit back on the collective wisdom and experience of the members of this forum who enjoy mature, established and stable relationships/marriages. What say you?

I would love to contribute to this thread, but sadly, I am not mature, established or stable. And the word "relationship" is not really in my vocabulary.

Enjoy though

I think you have a valid point, however, I feel that "members only areas" would have to be designated for this, like a ladies only / men only area.

What I can definitely say is that it is encouraging to see that you are willing to go beyond your own boundaries to try and address whatever issues there may be and commend you on this as often people are completely set in their opinions.

Obviously I am not the best person to give advice in this area, being notoriously commitment-shy and fairly uncompromising but if there is one thing that I find works with any conflict is trying to take the other person's side before I make my mind up or make any defining statement. It is so much harder to actually have a proper discussion once you have taken a standpoint as moving away from it would also mean a loss of pride to some extent.

Of course there are a great deal of psychological theories on how to handle relationships and maybe some can help but I always think that if they really were the answer, all psychologists would be healthy, happy people in stable relationships. When it comes to "how to fight properly" though, there is some pretty useful stuff you can fall back on in that area.

The only advice I can give is that in a relationship, 25% of the time you can be right, 25% of the time he can be right and 50% of the time there must be compromise.

or 20/20/60
or 10/10/80

Compromise is the key.

And actually, it shouldn't even be about being right as no one wins in a relationship where someone has to win.

The best relationship is one where you don't even feel like you are compromising.

Well that's four no-can-dos. Natasha's not stable, chemgoddess considers everything in percentages, Kittster is notoriously commitment-shy, though blond and curvy, and Hugh has no taste in dining-room tables. I guess leaves me as the sole advisor remaining. Fire away...

dave

Thought for the Day with Hugh Abu. And hear him again next week on the Moral Maze discussing covertness in a news-bar setting.

dave

My parents faced very similar challenges when they first got together. They met, got married and then moved to Kenya, all within a matter of weeks. The fact that they where in a new country, just the two of them, with nobody outside that they could turn to, taught them how to communicate and resolve issues between themselves. I believe that the skills that they learnt under these difficult circumstances helped them to work through the many challenges that they faced during their relationship and has kept their love strong throughout their lives.

I quite like the idea that you are getting at here. I can see many ways which expats relationships can be strained here. The idea of having left something behind to be with your better half is something that I personally went through not too long ago and to be honest just browsing and reading other posts in the forum helped in its own way to get me through it. Now I am quite happy here (although can not say that I would stay here forever) and my relationship has improved no end, partly by realizing from this forum that I wasn't the only one who left something behind to be with someone in Switzerland. Logistically I don't know how to best approach a thread like this, but I do think it is a good idea.

I'd like to think my marriage is stable, but it is far from mature...can't be with me in it. I am not the perfect husband, father, nor friend for that matter. But, I have been described as at least sweetly corny.

Compromise is the nature of 'relationship.' Otherwise, we would continue to be only individuals. There is a story in Greek mythology about these deliriously happy 4 legged, 4 armed critters that annoyed Zues (by being to happy). So, he did his lightning drill and broke them all in half and scattered them. These 2 legged, 2 armed remnants roamed the earth...doing OK, sometimes even thriving but it was only when they found their other half that they regained their happiness (NB any historians out there, please forgive my butchery of classical mythology).

I've managed to find my other half. Through times that have been described to us as easy or painfully difficult, we've always been fine as long as we were together. We bring ourselves to our 'us', and it works out fine. Our 'relationship' has been in a myriad of countries, settings and cultures over the last five years of marriage, and with another big change looming on the horizon, we're as solid as we were when we took the plunge. I guess we just don't take ourselves too seriously...but we take US very seriously.

But...once again...I digress.

R

In my defence, I AM selling the bloody thing.

Because your wife told you to.

dave

Argus, great idea! However, could it not be made into a group of people in bi-national relationships? I didn't know Mr. Bartholemew when I moved to Switzerland, but meeting him here is the reason I'm staying.

Well, at least y'all made me smile.


For an example of conflict, we are both sensitive people in different aspects. If I mention that something he said was nasty or hurtful, HE gets angry about it. I don't know how that works. Is he angry because he's disappointed with his own behaviour? But he would deny it was a bad thing to say in the first place, and how could I even think that he'd mean such a bad thing? Am I supposed to just take the nasty statements without putting up even a small defence (and then he says I'm always defensive)?
He thinks I'm always making him out to be the bad guy, while I think he often insinuates I was to blame in any bad situation that arises.

It doesn't help also that when PMS comes around, everything looks a bit bleak to me.

We go through the same issues again and again and again -- even during the non-PMS times -- so much so it feels like knocking my head against an insurmountable brick wall.

I think you just described marriage .

Oh, heavens! All you happy, carefree singles out there, stay as you are!

No, I've been married for quite a few years, I just recognise what you are saying as I am sure many other married people do.

You forget, the grass is always greener on the other side.

Unfortunately, how true, how true!

There was a survey I read about a few years ago that found that married women were the least happy, unmarried men were slightly happier, unmarried women even happier, and married men were the happiest.

(Some married men on this forum might say, "Can't imagine why!")

Funny thing is, world-wide, a lot of women hanker to be married. This nesting instinct doesn't nurse our interests at heart, does it?

I feel that one should be happy & content with being alone before they settle down. I had a lot of 2 & 3 year relationships because I just thought it was the right thing to do. When I became single at 30 and started enjoying life, my friends and dinners at home alone watching tv. Then that person literally walked into my life. We had a 7 year long distance(transatlantic) relationship and it sustained all. Give and take is hard but if the love is strong enough everything can be compromised. I am now living in Basel haven given up a lucratic business and it was all worth it. I still say if this relationship were to end I would be fine and would live alone the rest of my life and have my good friends, and travel when I could. Being alone is not a bad thing our soceity has made it out tobe lonely.