{"id":8232,"date":"2016-06-20T06:00:28","date_gmt":"2016-06-20T10:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/?p=8232"},"modified":"2016-06-11T06:59:07","modified_gmt":"2016-06-11T10:59:07","slug":"turning-a-negative-relationship-positive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html","title":{"rendered":"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"David sat in my office confused. \u201cI know we\u2019ve had lots of family problems. My wife is mad at me for all kinds of reasons and some of them are legitimate. But I am trying to do nice things for my wife, but it doesn't seem to matter. She doesn't even notice. I don't get it.&quot; David fails to see that the overall negativity of his relationship sort of cancels out the good when it happens. I know that doesn't sound fair, but an on-going negative relationship depletes the positives over time. For example, in an overall positive relationship, if a husband comes home and forgets to bring the bread for dinner, the wife would probably think,&quot;Oh, he must have had a lot on his mind and just forgot. No worries. We can do without bread.&quot; But if that same relationship is already very negative and the same thing happened, the wife would think, &quot;See, he only thinks of himself. I can't depend on him.&quot; In fact, research tells us that 50% of positive gestures go unrecognized in couples characterized by negativity. The reason--there is too much negativity in the bank. Even neutral actions are seen as negative. So what can you do? Go back to the basics. Work on the marital friendship, show admiration and respect for your partner, and most of all, be there when he or she tries to connect with you. The challenge is to deposit positives into that emotional bank account. Over time, you can turn it around. But you have to be intentional. Pray for a change of heart and for your spouse to be responsive to your continued efforts. Keep down the criticism, defensiveness and disrespect towards one another. Don't turn away when frustrated. Stay present, calm yourself and talk. Point out the positives about each other. Remember why you got together in the first place and try to recapture some of that good feeling! Be patient and eventually things will turn around, but you may need help restoring that friendship and expressing fondness. Afterall, it was probably the erosion of the positives that created the negativity you now experience.\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-8231\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/258\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"ID-10070272\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" \/><\/a>David\u00a0sat in my office confused. \u201cI know we\u2019ve had lots of family problems. My wife is mad at me for all kinds of reasons and some of them are legitimate. But I am trying to do nice things for my wife. Honestly, it\u00a0doesn&#8217;t seem to matter. She doesn&#8217;t even notice. I don&#8217;t get it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>David\u00a0fails to see that the overall negativity of his relationship cancels out the good when it happens. I know that doesn&#8217;t sound fair, but an on-going negative relationship depletes the positives over time.<\/p>\n<p>For example, in an overall positive relationship, if a husband comes home and forgets to bring the bread for dinner, the wife would probably think,&#8221;Oh, he must have had a lot on his mind and just forgot. No worries. We can do without bread.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But if that same relationship is already very negative and the same thing happened, the wife would think, &#8220;See, he only thinks of himself. I can&#8217;t depend on him.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In fact, research tells us that 50% of positive gestures go unrecognized in couples characterized by negativity. The reason&#8211;there is too much negativity in the bank. Even neutral actions are seen as negative.<\/p>\n<p>So what can you do?<\/p>\n<p>Go back to the basics. Work on the marital friendship, show admiration and respect for your partner, and most of all, be there when he or she tries to connect with you.<\/p>\n<p>The challenge is to deposit positives into that emotional bank account. Over time, you can turn it around. But you have to be intentional. Pray for a change of heart and for your spouse to be responsive to your continued efforts.<\/p>\n<p>Keep down the criticism, defensiveness and disrespect towards one another. Don&#8217;t turn away when frustrated. Stay present, calm yourself and talk.<\/p>\n<p>Point out the positives about each other. Remember why you got together in the first place and try to recapture some of that good feeling! Be patient and eventually things will turn around, but you may need help restoring that friendship and expressing fondness. Afterall, it was probably the erosion of the positives that created the negativity you now experience.<\/p>\n<p>For more help, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/We-Need-Talk-Successfully-Navigate\/dp\/0801016762\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1465642597&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=we+need+to+talk\">We Need to Talk<\/a> by Dr. Linda Mintle<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>David\u00a0sat in my office confused. \u201cI know we\u2019ve had lots of family problems. My wife is mad at me for all kinds of reasons and some of them are legitimate. But I am trying to do nice things for my wife. Honestly, it\u00a0doesn&#8217;t seem to matter. She doesn&#8217;t even notice. I don&#8217;t get it.&#8221; David\u00a0fails&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":419,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[913],"tags":[920,128,1544,3529],"class_list":["post-8232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-couple-relationships","tag-couple-relationships-2","tag-couples","tag-marital-problems","tag-unhappy-couple"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Turning a Negative Relationship Positive<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"David\u00a0sat in my office confused. \u201cI know we\u2019ve had lots of family problems. My wife is mad at me for all kinds of reasons and some of them are legitimate. But I am trying to do nice things for my wife. Honestly, it\u00a0doesn&#8217;t seem to matter. She doesn&#8217;t even notice. I don&#8217;t get it.&#8221; David\u00a0fails&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Doing Life Together\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/drlindamintle\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-06-20T10:00:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-06-11T10:59:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Linda Mintle\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@drlindamintle\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive","og_description":"David\u00a0sat in my office confused. \u201cI know we\u2019ve had lots of family problems. 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I don&#8217;t get it.&#8221; David\u00a0fails&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html","og_site_name":"Doing Life Together","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/drlindamintle\/","article_published_time":"2016-06-20T10:00:28+00:00","article_modified_time":"2016-06-11T10:59:07+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg"}],"author":"Linda Mintle","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@drlindamintle","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html","name":"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg","datePublished":"2016-06-20T10:00:28+00:00","dateModified":"2016-06-11T10:59:07+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/#\/schema\/person\/1e16a9c7332cfcc5b5d89e4ba3a36142"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2016\/05\/ID-10070272-300x200.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2016\/06\/turning-a-negative-relationship-positive.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Turning a Negative Relationship Positive"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/","name":"Doing Life Together","description":"Relationship Doctor, Mental Health, Emotional Wellness, Relationship Advice &amp; Entertainment","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/#\/schema\/person\/1e16a9c7332cfcc5b5d89e4ba3a36142","name":"Linda Mintle","description":"It is rare that a trained academic who speaks passionately to the heart of people providing real answers to real life problems is so relatable. Dr. Linda\u2019s fun personality and expertise comes through whether she\u2019s helping her audience stress less or make peace with their thighs! Dr. Linda has her Ph.D. in Urban Health and Clinical Psychology and is a national expert on mental health. She has specialized in the treatment of eating disorders, anxiety, depression and pain management. With 30 years of clinical experience working with couples, families and individuals, she brings her common-sense approach to people who want to live in positive mental health. Dr. Linda is also a bestselling author with 21 book titles to her credit, a radio host of the Dr. Linda Mintle show, professor, national speaker, winner of the Mom\u2019s Choice Award, a national news consultant, featured writer for Beliefnet and hosts her own website. Her academic appointments keep her abreast of current research in her areas of expertise. Her media experience includes seven years as the resident expert for ABC Family\u2019s Living the Life television show and regular appearances on network television and radio. It is often said that being with Dr. Linda is like having coffee with a friend. She makes the complicated issues of relationships and mental health easy to understand and applicable to everyday living. The ease she has with people, coupled with her clinical training and experience makes her a sought-after speaker on college campuses, conferences and special events. Whether she is doing a TV skit with Tim Conway or discussing teen violence with Queen Latifa, Dr. Linda will entertain, educate and integrate faith and mental health in everyday living. 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