Realtionship Difficulties

An absence of healthy boundaries in adulthood can put us at risk of settling for unhealthy relationships that can lead to resentment, manipulation, and abuse. Without prioritising self-care and establishing boundaries, we risk sacrificing our own wellbeing and happiness for the demands and expectations of others.

It’s important to remember that setting boundaries is not selfish, but rather a necessary step towards maintaining a healthy and fulfilling life. We need to learn to accept that there is some discomfort in setting healthy boundaries and be prepared to experience this.

Signs of healthy boundaries:

You don’t feel guilty saying ‘no’
You don’t let others abuse you or exploit you
You can hold your ground when pressured
You’re not offended by others’ boundaries
You don’t feel responsible for other adults
You don’t take others criticism personally
You take responsibility for your own triggers
You respect others’ boundaries
You value your rights and feelings
You don’t need others to agree with you

Abuse

For people in abusive situations, it’s important for them to know they can come to a place where they can talk, where they can feel safe and where they are not judged.

Domestic abuse includes physical, emotional and sexual abuse in a couple relationship or between family members. This could include siblings, parent on child or child on parent. It can happen against anyone and anybody can be an abuser.

Emotional abuse involves a pattern of behaviour over a period that makes you feel bad about yourself. It can also be called mental abuse or psychological abuse. Emotional abuse could involve actions that deliberately isolate, humiliate or scare a person.Behaviour that could be classed as emotional abuse includes intimidation and threats, criticism and undermining actions.

Financial abuse is a way of limiting or controlling your ability to make, use or maintain your own money and financial resources. It includes having your money or other property stolen, being defrauded and having your money misused. The abuser could be the breadwinner and withhold or hide their money. They could be taking big risks with shared money without talking about it or they could be putting debt into your name.

Sexual abuse is sexual activity you don’t want, don’t agree to or don’t understand. Perpetrators often use force, make threats or take advantage of victims not able to give consent. The abuser could be a partner, family member, someone you know or a stranger.

Physical abuse is when someone deliberately hurts or injures you or another person. It could involve a wide range of physical violence such as hitting or kicking you, spitting or throwing things at you, biting, scratching or hair pulling, scalding or burning you.

Bullying

Bullying is when other people have the power to cause you pain and distress through abuse, threats and intimidation. It can include emotional, physical, verbal and cyber bullying and can happen at all ages – in families, education and at work. Therapy can be helpful for both the victim and the bully or those supporting someone who is being bullied.

The Anti-Bullying Alliance defines bullying as the repetitive, intentional hurting of one person or group by another, where the relationship involves an imbalance of power.

Bullying takes many forms and can include:

Physical Assault – such as hitting, kicking and pushing
Verbal Attacks – such as threats, name calling and belittling someone
Social Bullying – deliberately excluding someone by ignoring them or not including them in plans
Cyberbullying – targeting someone online with hurtful messages or sending sexually explicit images or videos

We often associate bullying with young people and school, but anyone can be a victim and it can happen in any setting and within existing relationships such as partnerships, work colleagues and family. Often individuals are bullied for being different – perhaps because of race, gender, sexuality or disability.

Whether you’re being bullied now or have been in the past, a counsellor can give you a safe space to explore what’s happened and its impact on you. Therapy can help people to understand that, where someone is being nasty to someone else, the problem does not lie with the victim’s personality, it lies with that of the bully.

Loneliness

Loneliness is when you don’t have the relationships and social connections you’d like. You don’t have to be alone – even people with lots of friends and family can be lonely. Loneliness can lead to anxiety and depression, and is associated with issues like low self-esteem, low self-confidence, stress and social anxiety. Counselling can help you to explore and understand how you’re feeling and give you coping skills to deal with your loneliness.

People with lots of friends and family and active social lives can still feel lonely if they don’t have strong connections with the people around them. Other causes of loneliness can include grieving a loved one, dealing with a relationship break-up, retirement, changing jobs, moving to a new area or starting university. In all these situations, you’ve lost a relationship or connection with people who make a difference in your life.

Remote working has played a big part for some people. They’ve missed the experience of being in the office and being with colleagues, and that’s left them feeling lonely.

Loneliness can lead to anxiety and depression. It can also be connected to issues such as low self-esteem, low self-confidence, stress and social anxiety. If you’re feeling lonely, you’re often left alone with your own thoughts. Over-thinking can be an issue.

Relationships

Relationship counselling can help improve the way you relate to those around you and allow you to break free from old patterns of behaviour. This can cover all relationships, including couples and families.

But a relationship doesn’t have to be in crisis before you pursue counselling – for some people, therapy is a means by which they can prevent relationship issues from growing.

When we’re triggered the past comes back to bite us and we often start believing the other person has characteristics they don’t actually possess. We relive previous difficult and unresolved situations, but this usually goes on outside our conscious awareness.

Effective communication is needed to manage triggers. In all our relationships, verbal, physical or written skills are needed to connect, to understand different points of view and to offer support.

“To love someone long term is to attend a thousand funerals of the people they used to be. The people they’re too exhausted to be any longer. The people they don’t recognise inside themselves anymore. The people they grew out of, the people they never ended up growing into. It is not our job to hold anyone accountable to the people they used to be. It is our job to travel with them between each version and to honour what emerges on the way.”

Heidi Priebe

Sex related issues

Sexual difficulties can occur at any time, especially during times of stress and change. If sex used to be exciting but no longer seems so, therapy can help you look at why the change happened. In a good relationship, getting help should give you an opportunity to find some answers.

Sexual abuse

Sexual abuse is when you are pressured to do something sexual against your will. It can include unwanted touching, photographs or rape. Some people blame themselves and do not report the abuse. Or they may have been influenced to trust the abuser or feel they will be punished for reporting it. Childhood abuse is not always addressed until sexual problems emerge in adulthood. Talking to a therapist can help.

Perpetrators often use force, make threats or take advantage of victims not able to give consent. The abuser could be a partner, family member, someone you know or a stranger. Survivors may seek coping strategies to manage their pain, which can be physical, psychological and emotional. Some of these can be unhealthy.

Survivors of sexual abuse can find it difficult to talk about their experiences. They may be scared about speaking up, nervous about whether they will be heard, or worried they’ll be judged. Sexual abuse might also lead to dissociation, where survivors don’t connect with the trauma so they don’t have to deal with it.

Often, abuse is silent, the victim does not have a voice. In therapy, the survivor can use their voice in any way they wish. It can help them heal by validating every feeling they may experience, even the difficult ones such as love for their abuser.

Some survivors may never speak of the abuse but work on coping strategies. Therapy can help them learn how to manage the panic attacks and deal with the nightmares or flashbacks. It’s where a survivor can rebuild their self and explore their identity to become more than a victim.