At this time of uncertainty and isolation due to the Coronavirus, families and individuals alike are facing tremendous new challenges in their personal relationships.
Most will likely have a degree of heightened anxiety about the uncertainty of the near future which may mean there is huge potential for miscommunication and conflict. In normal life families are only thrust together for short periods such as or Christmas, holidays and maybe illness. So how can we cope with the demands of homeworking, children and partners under foot, enforced isolation or loneliness which may last some time?
Three COSRT therapists give their views and tips on how to survive this unchartered territory. The College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists (COSRT), is the UK’s professional body for psychotherapists and counsellors specialising in sexual and relationship issues. COSRT has an unrivalled wealth of experience of improving standards and sharing knowledge – all to enable sexual and relationship therapists to provide the most effective therapeutic treatments to the public.
Cate Campbell, Psychosexual Therapist
Initially, spending all day every day with your partner and/or family may seem like quite a lark, but it’s normal to quickly get on each other’s nerves and feel stifled. The biggest threat to your relationship could then be a belief that you ought to be getting along just fine and that everyone else is.
The reality of enforced closeness, however, is that people feel trapped and claustrophobic. Accepting this and realising that you need to find ways to manage such feelings, goes a long way to doing so.
Consequently, it’s really helpful to plan how to be together and how to get some space, rather than just believing you should be able to muddle along. A bath, shower or walk alone may become a daily treat to anticipate.
Where possible, try to occupy separate rooms if you’re both working from home. If this isn’t viable, you may need to timetable work so that you can take turns to use the kitchen table or desk, with one of you working while the other deals with childcare, for instance. In fact, timetabling and planning help to avoid resentment, as you can jointly prioritise what’s essential and what can be overlooked. This is also an opportunity to change some of your habits, such as having proper family mealtimes, exercising and taking responsibility for ensuring your environment is pleasant to be in. This is much simpler when everyone has an agreed role and time to do their jobs.
If you do become irritated with each other, think before you speak. If the world was about to end, and this was the last thing your partner/child/flatmate would hear, would you still say what you’re about to blurt out? If not, hold your tongue. It’s more helpful to note what seems to be working and what isn’t and save it for a daily review where you discuss stressful and helpful situations, rather than one another’s behaviour, taking joint responsibility for changes. Avoid accusations and blame the stress of the situation rather than one another. Try to think of at least one thing that’s working well or that you’ve enjoyed about being with your partner each day – and tell them.
Unless you’re having to self-isolate completely on your own, continue physical contact and love making but don’t pester or just reject out of opportunism or habit. Try to make time for intimacy, even if this just involves having a bath together or snuggling up to watch a movie. If you’re feeling anxious or cooped up, talk about this rather than bottling up your feelings and bickering. Chances are, you both feel the same. If you’re worried about your relationship or sex, this might be the opportunity to seek help, as sex and relationship therapists are continuing to work online.
Silva Neves, Psychosexual Therapist
If you are already struggling with frequent conflicts with your partner, this current ‘stay at home’ time can feel daunting and even distressing.
Try the following tips:
• Timing is important when you’re angry at each other: In moments of high anxiety, it is not the right time to try to resolve old issues in the couple relationship that have not been previously resolved. Try to stick to the here-and-now.
• When you communicate with your partner, avoid criticism: make ‘I’-statements, rather than ‘you’ ones as they can sound like you’re blaming your partner.
• Avoid defensiveness. Take your responsibility for your part of the miscommunication. It takes two to communicate well. Ask for clarification rather than assume what your partner feels or thinks about you.
• Avoid the build-up of resentment. In these difficult times, it may be a good time to think about how precious life is, and why you are with your partner. Perhaps you tend to focus on the negative things in the relationship. Sometimes it is important to remind ourselves that there are good reasons why we’re still with our partner. Radical acceptance is accepting all the things that are irritating to keep the positive things that being with our partner brings.
• Avoid stonewalling. Although it is a common coping strategy for many when they feel big emotions, it can also look like you’re ignoring your partner. Instead, when you feel big feelings, try to name one: ‘I feel angry’ or ‘I feel anxious’ and breathe deeply. It will help you process your feelings and it will help your partner hearing your current emotions.
• All of us need to re-adjust to a new, smaller lifestyle, spending more time with our partner and children. It can be a tough challenge, where there are less choices. Be a team and use this to your advantage.
• Rediscover things that had been deemed old-fashioned. With less commute and more home working, it means that you will have more time and an overload of screen time. How about using that time with playing an old-fashioned board game with your partner? Or read an actual book? You can even decide to do yoga or meditation together with the help of an app.
• Make sure you laugh! This is a great anxiety and stress buster. Learn to be comfortable with silliness.
• You can decide to do more things together, like cooking together, or sorting out things around the house that are always left unattended because of a lack of time. It can be a household project.
• Remember that if you have no symptoms in your household, you can still go out. A walk in the park together or alone, breathing fresh air and connecting to nature goes a long way for good mental health.
• Limit your exposure to social media and news the constant repeating messages can heighten anxiety.
• Listen with empathy. Anxiety can sometimes be irrational, but it doesn’t matter. Try to listen and accept that your partner may have some irrational thinking. It is easy these days to entertain the worst-case scenario. Don’t tell your partner what to do, or how to think: simply sit with them, listen to them and hold their hand.
• What about sex?
Make a habit to touch each other with a hug as you wake up and when you go to bed. These small moments of intimacy deepen the feelings of connection with your partner in uncertain times. Your sex life is likely to change. For some people, feeling anxious is an anti-erotic. For others, it is an erotic enhancer. Listen to your sexual urges and don’t judge them. It is not shameful, bad or wrong to feel sexual in times of anxiety. If your partner is up for it, it is a great opportunity to have more sex with each other. Sex can deepen your connection.
Jo Coker, Professional Standards Manager COSRT and Psychosexual Therapist
There are three groups especially at risk during this time.
For many of us working from home and being cooped up with our families will be no more than a passing irritation that we have to negotiate without driving each other mad, life at some stage will return to normality. However, for some social groups the enforced isolation may be much harder to bear and will affect their relationships negatively.
Many young people are used to online dating, it is how they meet, a way of life. Coronavirus isolation does not affect this they can happily Tinder away and maintain isolation. However, converting the date to a face-to-face meeting carries risk, as meeting poses social distancing issues and potential virus transmission if they get close. For many this has meant moving to platforms such as Facetime to “meet” dates and this has derailed normal dating behaviour such as meeting in bars and clubs. For others who do not use online dating normally, this has now become the only safe way to “meet’ new partners. As one client said “I used to worry about STDs now it is Coronavirus”. For many they feel that dating as they knew it is on hold and this increases the sense of isolation and hopelessness feelings around finding a relationship.
The elderly are particularly vulnerable, often lonely and isolated at the best of times, they now have the anxiety and fear or the Coronavirus to contend with, plus increased isolation. This is doubly hard as many are not perhaps very computer literate and so cannot keep in touch with families using technology.
Additionally, some will be carers and as the social isolation increases and they cannot access their usual social clubs so tensions may rise. Be aware of older neighbours and get together with others to provide a network so that these folk have someone to call on if they need medication, food or just a chat on the phone. A wave through glass can do a huge amount to cheer and make a person feel more connected to society. A card through a letter box can make a day. Just think a bit more about these relationships and how you can help at this time especially.
https://www.thesilverline.org.uk/ is a telephone help line where older isolate people can speak to someone and this will be increasingly important in the coming days.
For some, ‘home’ is not a place of safety or happiness. Being thrown together at such a time of stress may lead to heightened domestic abuse as the abuser’s behaviour may be aggravated by the social and work constrictions imposed. The home becomes a pressure cooker for emotions which can overspill with terrible consequences. Alongside this, the provision for those suffering from abuse may become more restricted as we lock down. Anyone suffering from domestic abuse should seek help from one of the many advice help lines such as Freephone National Domestic Abuse Helpline which operates 24/7 08082000247 or via their website
https://www.nationaldahelpline.org.uk/
If the danger is immediate then call the emergency services on 999 and ask for the police.
In these confined domestic circumstances, with school closures imminent and restricted professional services, if parents are struggling with their children, they may need to get help from the social services before the domestic situation deteriorates and becomes risky. As professionals, friends, neighbours and communities we also have a duty to keep our eyes open and notice struggling families, child abuse is everyone’s problem.
We all need to support each other and try to nurture good positive relationships at this difficult time.
In crisis times, relationships and sex can be difficult areas of life to navigate. Many therapists will be offering online sessions at this time of crisis. Please check the COSRT register to find a suitable psychosexual and relationship therapist www.cosrt.org.uk