Two different people lived and lived on planet Earth. We walked along different streets, talked with different friends, had breakfast in different kitchens and knew nothing about each other. But one day they met. We started going to parties together, watching movies together, eating yogurt with one spoon. And one day the idea occurred to them that just going on dates was no longer enough, but they wanted to live together. In the plot of fairy tales, usually a lavish wedding is played next, and that’s where the story ends. With us, everything is just beginning, and in modern times, not necessarily after the wedding, you can do without it for now. ABOUT THE DISCOVERY OF EXPECTATIONS When I met Anya, she and Denis had been living together for more than a year. He worked as a taxi driver for a company and often took late orders because they paid better. Anya asked Denis to call her in the evening if he was delayed. Since there were no calls, and Denis still didn’t show up at home early, Anya called herself. Denis didn’t like this, and he began to turn off the phone. Anya did not dare to start a conversation about the reasons for such inattention to her request. She was afraid to “run into” irritation and confirm her fears that his feelings for her had begun to fade. I advised her not to talk about her accusations to her partner, but about her concern for him and for their relationship. It turned out that the situation with calls was also difficult for Denis. He really doesn’t like to call and, as he says, “report”, since his mother always controlled him tightly. He decided that Anya also wants to control him. One of the reasons for the “discord” in the relationship is the confidence that each partner necessarily understands the feelings and desires of the other. Our heroes had different expectations in this situation. Anna thought that Denis knew about her anxiety. And she regarded the reluctance to call as inattention and neglect. And it seemed to Denis that his friend did not trust him and was trying to check where he was and what he was doing. “IDEAL” CHANGES TO REAL - WHICH CAN BE ACCOMPANIED BY DISAPPOINTMENT My friend Ira has already been married once. With this experience in mind, she made a list of qualities that her future husband should have and looked for a man who possessed all these qualities. Since her first husband was a big spender, Ira wanted to find a man who knew how to spend money wisely. She met Misha. It seemed that he was the embodiment of her dream in reality. Misha worked as a lawyer, knew accounting and was caring and charming. In the summer they went on vacation together. Ira even liked that Misha didn’t buy various trinkets, but said that if they have plans for living together, then they need to think about a new bigger apartment, a more prestigious car, and in general, the budget needs to be planned in advance. Having returned, they began to live together, but Ira became more and more withdrawn. She didn’t invite anyone over and stopped visiting her friends. When we met by chance, she complained that Misha didn’t like it when guests came, since it was an extra expense, and it was better not to go out herself, because then it would be rude not to invite her back. It’s also not worth spending money on the theaters that Ira loves so much - it’s better to save it for an apartment! And so on. Needless to say, Irina’s idea of ​​Misha as an ideal partner for her, and how Misha turned out to be in real life, are “two big differences.” It seems that before deciding to live together, partners already know a lot about each other. They know some of each other's habits, tastes, and interests. But, as couples who come to counseling say, “it was as if the partner had been replaced / he or she was completely different!” One of the reasons is that you involuntarily look at a loved one completely differently than at others. We project our own desires onto him and think that he will feel and act the way we would like him to. The closer you are to a person, the more you know about him. Paradoxically, this does not help objective understandinga different and corresponding attitude towards him, but rather the opposite. We begin, often unconsciously, to set our own accents. At the beginning of a relationship, attention is focused on features that correspond to our subjective image of a partner as an ideal one. And after people have lived together, and their idealized perception begins to be “corrected” by reality, then suddenly, as if through a magnifying glass, the partner’s shortcomings appear. And his image, in both cases, turns out to be somewhat one-sided. Until our ideas about a person have found their confirmation or refutation, they serve the illusions of our polar perception, and can become a source of misunderstanding and errors. Since we are completely confident in the correctness of our vision, it often doesn’t occur to us to ask again and check, “Is that what you really think?” or “Do you want that too?” And two people live with each other, but it turns out that they interact not with their real partner, but with his fictitious image. This is what happened in the story of Mikhail and Irina. She appreciated Mikhail's economical attitude towards money, but thought that friends and going to the theater would be as important to him as she was. Only after consulting a psychologist, whom they came to together, did Ira and Misha begin to really get to know each other. YOU CAN'T RESIST YOURSELF IN each of the cases described, the partners did not talk to each other about what each of them wanted. Each acted according to their own scenario, not coordinated with the other. And, as a result, everyone felt misunderstood and unheard. This causes resentment and anger. But it may not be realized. For example, if a person in his family had a ban on showing aggressive feelings. And then the aggression shifts and is expressed in an indirect way. For example, one of my neighbors, a quiet young lady of retirement age, never argued with her husband. But when he came home drunk, the next day she could go to the store and spend a fair share of the money she had saved for a large purchase. She herself could not explain why she squandered such a sum. In the psyche, no feeling disappears “just like that.” Even if the sweet young lady did not realize her anger at her drunken husband, by spending money, she indirectly demonstrated her dissatisfaction to him. Mutual unconscious and/or unspoken complaints can also lead to a cooling and impoverishment of relationships, including sexual ones. A woman is “silent with her body,” often without realizing the true reason. This means that women's resentment can manifest itself in a loss of sexual interest in their man. Or in a psychosomatic disease, such as thrush. It’s as if the body is saying that “I’m offended, and I won’t have sex with the offender.” But when relationships are established, such manifestations (if they have not acquired a complicated form) disappear. Even when aggressive feelings are recognized and the reasons for dissatisfaction are clear, it can be difficult to somehow constructively convey your complaints to your partner. Here are Olya and Maxim, who came to us for a consultation, they could rather impulsively sort things out. They started living together a few months ago, and before that they dated for a year. Olya works as a lawyer for a large company and leaves for work early every day and returns in the evening. She misses Maxim and wants to spend the evening with him. And Maxim works as a programmer and doesn’t need to come to work early. He is a classic night owl. Even before moving to him, Olya knew about Maxim’s work schedule, but they always found time to meet. And now it began to seem to Olya that Maxim was paying little attention to her, and she began to create scandal after scandal. Maxim, in turn, is used to seeing Olya tender and cheerful. He never expected that when they lived together, she would turn into a screaming fury. And Maxim was angry because her claims were incomprehensible to him. SO HOW DO YOU NOT FIGHT, BUT AGREE? 1. It is necessary to abandon the usual stereotypes of response (at least fortime), for an objective assessment of yourself and your partner. If you are used to screaming, remember that screaming is regarded by your partner as an attack. This in no way gives rise to warm feelings in response, but, on the contrary, encourages aggressive defense, and the “battle” does not contribute to a confidential conversation. Walking away and then silently swallowing the insult is also not an option. As you know from the above, the psyche will find a way to take revenge on the offender. In this case, some time-out (temporary) will not hurt.2. Give yourself time to observe your own feelings and understand in what situations and what specifically irritates you. When resentment accumulates, it may seem that the partner is wrong all around. Then it is much more difficult to distinguish between your own feelings. And behind the anger you may not see that you were offended by the lack of attention, or that you were very bored. It is important to remember that anger is always a defensive reaction, and behind it are completely different feelings and needs, and it is these that are most important, in the end, to convey to the partner. In the case of Olya and Maxim, both stopped screaming, and started special notebooks where they wrote down situations in which they were unhappy. Then it became possible to start talking to each other. There are couples for whom it is generally useful to communicate precisely in the “epistolary genre”, when they have time to think about what is said in writing, but in direct communication they are too impulsive for this. 3. Use descriptive language, not accusations. The response to an accusation is a defense. And no dialogue will work. And if you describe your experiences and talk about your desires, your partner has more opportunities to show support (he at least knows what to support). So, Olya told Maxim that he stopped telling her that she was beautiful and loved. And she asked me to tell her this more often. And Maxim wanted his friend to pay attention to the fact that he regularly purchased groceries. Her simple “thank you” was important to him.4. There is no need to persistently find out the “objective truth” Given the subjectivity of human perception, there cannot be objective truth in relationships. Therefore, endless clarifications about who is right and who is wrong, what happened “in reality,” usually lead to a dead end. It must be remembered that no one has canceled the difference in perception, and it is important to take this difference into account when trying to come to an agreement. If a person is able to see the problem not in the partner, but in the difficulties of communication, difference in expectations, different internal world order, then the couple only benefits from this. After all, then the partners do not attribute malicious intent to each other and can work together on the subject of their disagreements, and not list endless accusations and claims, trying to prove that they are right instead of reaching an agreement. ABOUT CLARIFYING EXPECTATIONS AS A PREVENTION OF DISAPPOINTMENTS Each of the partners grew up in their own individual family and has their own ideas about this very family life. Some people want to repeat the style of family life of their parents in their couple, while others, on the contrary, want to live completely differently. Very rarely these scenarios coincide. And in order to avoid unnecessary conflicts, it is useful to talk and agree on how you see your joint “boat” of family life while still “on the shore.” For example, Dmitry and Alisa have been dating for two years, and over the past few months, Dmitry has been increasingly raising the question of a joint accommodation. Alice is in favor, but has a few more concerns about this, and the process of making the final decision to move in together took a little longer. It is very important to realistically agree on mutual expectations about living together, but often couples do not know how or do not try to clarify controversial questions, believing that the most important thing is “love”, which often, in the end, breaks down on the reefs of mutual misunderstanding, understatement and disappointment. At our general meeting, we tried to reach agreements between the partners regarding some essential aspects of coexistence. For example, Alice’s main concerns were related to the degree of her freedom and the workload of everyday life in a joint.