Couples Counseling

How do I talk to my partner about lying?

 

How Do I Talk To My Partner Well-nigh Lying?

What is it like to be lied to? And how to you deal with a spouse that lies? To confront a spouse who lies, you first need to have a plan of how to talk to your partner well-nigh their dishonesty. You may be struggling with the pain of the most recent lie or the first one ever. Yet, you can’t just stand by and wait for the next time, or let this go by without trying to understand, right?

Let’s help you take the first step. If you need to know how to talk to your husband or wife well-nigh their dishonesty, you want to read thoughtfully and understand what I am well-nigh to tell you.

To initiate that type of conversation, you first need to understand your partner’s perspective. Then you need to work on managing your own expectations and emotions, expressly when it comes time to unshut up the conversation. Without that you will need to initiate the topic in a gentle and non-confrontational way. Finally, you will need to work very nonflexible to listen carefully, validate your partner’s feelings, understand their message, and fathom their current honesty.

If this does not work, you may have to try increasingly intense measures, but, for now, let’s swoop into the specifics on how to follow through on the process I just gave you.

How to understand your partner’s perspective

Being lied to is very hurtful. It plane has the potential to destroy your relationship. You don’t finger like talking to your spouse, yet you do. You don’t want to considering you are wrestling and hurt. Talking to them may make things worse. Or you might get lied to again. What if they don’t superintendency well-nigh how you feel? What if they dismiss you or get defensive?

Those are all good questions, but surpassing we can talk to a spouse well-nigh quack behavior, we need to get ourselves in a place to be worldly-wise to do what is needed during the conversation. The preparation earlier is pivotal.

The first thing you need to do is work to try to understand your partner’s perspective plane surpassing you talk to them. Get our of your own throne and put yourself in their position. Ask yourself what the lie was and what it could be about. Could they be scared? Could they be hiding something? Would they really midpoint to hurt me? Were they trying not to hurt me?

Many other questions could be asked, but moving to a mindset that helps you have some perspective other than your own would help you be increasingly wifely in the conversation and unshut to what your spouse might say.

Another way to do this, is to talk to a friend well-nigh what they think might be happening. Or ask yourself, if you talked to a friend and they were playing “devil’s advocate” what might they say. The gist is to start to unshut yourself up to possible explanations other than the hurtful and narrow thoughts you once are thinking.

If you want to understand increasingly well-nigh why couples lie to each other, go HERE.

How to manage your own expectations and emotions when talking to your spouse well-nigh lying

Before you talk to your significant other, you want to make sure you are wifely and prepared emotionally to listen and be present. You will never be worldly-wise to get your spouse to be unshut or honest if you come in HOT.

To wifely your emotions, recognize that emotions are increasingly reactions. Your biological makeup has ignited your fight or flight system and the adrenaline is flowing. You are stressed. This is tabbed the sympathetic nervous system. It gets turned on when you finger threatened emotionally, physically or mentally.

What activities can I do to wifely myself when I have been hurt by my partners lies?

To manage this system, you need to vivify a variegated part of your brain. The part of your smart-ass that rationalizes and does the thinking for you is most likely turned off or, at the very least, overwhelmed or drowned out by the wrongness or hurt you are feeling.

In order to shift your smart-ass to a increasingly rational thought process you can try several things. You can do something physical, like exercise, to stimulate your muscles and increase the release of positive hormones to help you finger less stressed and increasingly upbeat. Exercise will moreover help you shrivel off negative energy and possibly trigger your mind to get transpiration to a variegated focus.

You can moreover do other things like journal, multiplication tables, puzzles or anything else that is zippy or activates logic and reasoning. Other important things to do is to watch your zoetic and make sure you take slow, deep breaths.

Finally, I would encourage you to remind yourself that negative emotion breeds negative emotion and positive emotion breeds positive emotion. It’s like laughter. It’s contagious. If you initiate a conversation with someone well-nigh a negative policies when you are having a negative feeling, they won’t respond “positively.”

How to start or initiate the conversation with a quack spouse

When it comes time to start the conversation with your spouse well-nigh their nomination to lie to you, the previous steps help a lot. You want them to be honest considering you know that is best. So, to help them not get triggered and lie again, you need to be wifely when unescapable them

. Make sure your tone and volume are in check. Then start with a desire to understand why your spouse lied to you. You might ask questions or unshut up queries like:

“I am not here to yell at you or judge you. I just want to understand. Can you help me understand the reasons that you were quack to me?”

“What were you feeling when you told me the lie?”

“Are there things you wish you had washed-up differently?”

“Were you concerned I was going to get upset?”

These type of questions or queries can help you largest understand what your spouse was thinking or concerned well-nigh surpassing they were quack to you. By understanding largest what their perspective was, you may finger less frustrated, although the hurt will still be there.

They moreover will finger increasingly understood and be increasingly unshut and honest with you in the long run. You now have reinforced in their minds that you are willing to work with them and not tear into them when they make mistakes.

How to communicate and listen when talking to a partner well-nigh their dishonesty

Once you start the conversation, your listening skills come in handy. You want to swoop deeper into trying to understand your partner. This comes through calm, yet intentional listening and communication. You want to wait and try to understand what your partner is saying surpassing reacting with your own comments.

Be patient. Stay in a mindset of getting clarity and understanding. Don’t vaunt them with a thousand questions, but repeat when what you are understanding. Let them know in a gentle way that you are there for them and want to help them work through the problem with you. Get increasingly help with liaison and listening. Below, you will find a step by step process to listening.

Procedure for Listening:

Hear It

Example: “Hey why didn’t you undeniability me when you got to work?”

Interpret It

Interpret what you hear by asking: What do they feel? Why do they finger that way? What do they Want / Desire / Need? What is important to them?

Ask Clarifying Questions

It is okay to ask clarifying questions if you cannot interpret what they finger or why or the importance. Example: “Can you help me understand what you finger or what’s important well-nigh this?”

Summarize

Example: “So, you finger upset, considering I didn’t undeniability you when I got to work. You would like me to undeniability you when I get to work, considering you are worried well-nigh my safety and you don’t want to have to worry well-nigh me.”

Ask if your partner feels understood

Example: “Do I understand what you are saying?”

            1. YES -> GO TO STEP 5
            2. NO -> GO TO STEP 1 “Ok, can you tell me increasingly so I can understand.”
Ask if you can respond

Example: “Can I respond to what you are saying?”

Transition Roles

The listener now becomes the speaker and the speaker now becomes the listener. My number one rule is to not switch roles until the transition point!

When listening in this way, you will be learning how to listen without thinking of your own response. You will moreover be validating your partner in ways they need to be validated! Get increasingly help with listening and communicating HERE.

What is the weightier overall response to a spouse who lies?

What we have just covered will set you up for success when engaging a spouse or partner who has been quack in your marriage or relationship. You will find success as you are worldly-wise to see your husband or wife for who they are and not for the policies they exhibit.

They are not their lie, although the policies hurts you. You coming to them with compassion, a willingness to understand, and a heart of grace and forgiveness is the weightier overall response to their quack behavior.

You will be rewarded by unravel through, increasingly connection, increasingly validation for them and yourself. You will moreover see deeper intimacy as you are worldly-wise to largest resolve your problems. Don’t wilt discouraged, just alimony trying to connect!

I forgot to add that it is unchangingly important to fathom your spouses attempt. You want them to know you desire their honesty. So, reinforce them unendingly they are willing to be unshut with you. This could be helpful to modernize their honesty. Tell them that it ways a lot to you when they are unshut and honest! This topic moreover leads to the need to rebuild trust. I don’t talk well-nigh that hear, but when you are ready, hop on over to my post well-nigh rebuilding trust.

What to do if the conversation did not go well without you confront your spouse well-nigh dishonesty?

When a conversation does not go well once you have talked to your spouse well-nigh their lie, there are a few things I would consider. I would consider your tideway and review this process to make sure you followed everything suggested. Humility is important. Could it be you? I am not at all saying it is, but let’s make sure it is not first. Ask yourself:

Are you still angry?

Was their a tone in my voice?

Did you struggle with listening and understanding?

Were you patient with your spouse?

Next, I would again, not get discouraged, but pray for your spouse and yourself. Working on your relationship in other ways may help your husband or wife see that you are not versus them, and you really want to build a healthy relationship.

Wait a little while and return gently to the conversation with understanding and a desire to connect. If your spouse is checked out, you may ask them to write lanugo their thoughts, or write you a letter well-nigh what they are thinking and why they lied.

How to get increasingly help with a quack partner

Sometimes there are increasingly problematic reasons for dishonesty, such as: affairs, porn use, or hiding something that they that would hurt you deeply. If this is the case, I would ask them if they would like to go see a counselor with you. Make sure that you are not accusatory, but focused on getting “us” help, so “we” can rebuild. Focus increasingly on what you want to succeed and not on the person’s behavior.

A marriage counselor is skilled in stuff worldly-wise to help mediate your conversation and teach you how to understand one flipside and communicate your needs. They moreover should be skilled in stuff worldly-wise to help you resolve conflicts and find other resources that can be helpful. Don’t requite up on your spouse! Seek help early and often!

Conclusion

When you have a spouse or a loved one who lies to you, it can be extremely hurtful. Your first reaction is to lash out, leave, or shutdown. But those choices are not helpful. They only create increasingly discord and disconnection between you.

If you will follow this process and protract to seek new and increasingly helpful ways to resolve your problems, you will sooner find the wordplay you need. Depending on how entrenched the policies is, the longer it make take to see change. Again, I encourage you not to requite up, but seek help if you need it!

Blessings to you I hope this has been helpful. I hope I have given you information that you can go when to when you need it. If you have any remoter questions or need help, please undeniability me and set up an visit or trammels out some of my other BLOG POSTS.

For increasingly information or to schedule an appointment, undeniability 706-955-0230.

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The post How do I talk to my partner well-nigh lying? first appeared on Brandon Coussens, LMFT | Couples Counseling and Sex Therapy.