How Routine Saves a Marriage

“I will not let our love wallow in gray everyday life!” – this is what inveterate bachelors say, defending themselves from marriage ties. “I’m tired of the routine”, “I’m so tired of the monotony”, “Every day is like hundreds of others” – psychotherapists have to hear such phrases every day.

But men and women, today desperately suffering from everyday life, once aspired to it with all their hearts. At the beginning of their romance, they dreamed of sharing even the most insignificant everyday affairs with their loved one. They rejoiced, buying groceries together in the store, then cooking dinner with four hands, trying to quickly wash the dishes in order to finally sit side by side on the sofa in front of the TV and feel completely happy.

What happened? Why does all this seem to them today a caricature of family life, the beginning of its end?

Let’s agree that the couple’s everyday life is unlike the passionate relationship of lovers – perhaps that is why many feel nostalgia for those blessed moments when the common life was still new, and household chores were done with pleasure.

“The feeling of monotony arises at the moment when there is too much compatibility in the relationship, excessive merging with each other,” says family therapist Inna Khamitova. “When one of the partners lacks air in relationships, meetings with friends, there is no time left for hobbies or being alone, he begins to see a routine in life together.”

So it’s not everyday life that kills love, but too strong connection with another person, focus on him, dependence on him, which turns relationships into fetters.

The first lesson that everyday life teaches us reminds us: it’s time to get rid of the dream of a merger. Love does not fuse two into one person living in blissful solitude. But there is a routine in love itself.

Considering a gradual decrease in interest in a partner as something inevitable, we get a side benefit: we free ourselves from responsibility, quickly forgetting that the quality of our everyday life together depends on ourselves. The recommendations of experts will help you take a fresh look at the uniformity of everyday life and, perhaps, teach you how to enjoy it.

Weekdays bring together

Women’s magazines advise couples to give her a decisive battle at the first sign of boredom: urgently arrange a weekend in Sochi or at least book a table in a restaurant for a romantic candlelit dinner. You might think that we are able to restore spiritual intimacy only by breaking out of the familiar environment. Such a strategy is undoubtedly attractive, except for one “but”: you won’t spend your whole life on vacations and restaurants …

“My husband often goes on business trips,” says 45-year-old Olga, “and I feel that in order to develop relations, we need to be together more. We’ve been married for 12 years, and our closeness is fueled by family traditions: going to the market on Sunday mornings, having breakfast together, reading in the evenings – we love to sit next to each other, and we don’t even have to talk. When my husband is away, I feel lost and yearn for our rituals.”

“A well-established life, family traditions unite a couple, give a sense of stability,” explains Inna Khamitova. – Partners share household chores and get used to this state of affairs. When one of them leaves somewhere, the one who remains has to take on his duties for this time … Often it is at such moments that a keen realization of how attached he is to his partner comes.

Psychotherapist Christoph Fauré, who has worked extensively with widows and widowers, confirms: “After experiencing loss, each of them yearns above all for the simple little things of living together. No one remembers, say, the one and only holiday spent in Greece. The loss of a loved one makes you wonder how precious these seemingly mundane trifles were.”

“There is no need to strive to fill every day with exceptional events,” says psychologist Lyudmila Shaigerova. “It’s not about the actions, but about the attitude towards them. Many couples see cleaning the house together or going shopping together not as burdensome duties, but as an excuse to spend time together. Conversely, in the theater or in a restaurant, we can get bored if our only goal was to escape from ordinary life.

You can choose weekdays

Ordinariness is also oppressive because it subtly reminds us of the boredom that we encountered in childhood. “Some situations inexplicably start to overwhelm us,” says Christophe Fauré. “Everyone has their own “quagmire” of despondency, so it is important to determine what exactly causes melancholy, discuss it with a partner, and even make a “map” of dangerous swamps so that you do not get bogged down in them in the future.”

So, for 34-year-old Alexei, a Sunday trip with children to the park has always been torment. “It was the same every week,” he recalls. – I returned home twitchy, irritated, we quarreled with my wife, who could not understand why vacation with children put me in such a state. In fact, these walks reminded me of endless car trips with my parents to the village, when I was only allowed to get out of the car for five minutes to stretch my legs.

When Aleksey realized what memories Sunday trips evoke in him, instead of the park, he began to take the children to the pool, and peace and tranquility finally returned to the family.

Everyday life inspires

When we share daily life with someone, over time we begin to pay less and less attention to our partner, confident that we know this person by heart. It is not so difficult to change such an attitude – it is enough to see the beloved as he is today. Recognize that he, like ourselves, never ceases to change.

“Perhaps you are not attracted by the idea of ​​a kayaking trip with friends proposed by your partner,” explains Lyudmila Shaigerova. “You don’t have to agree and then plod along dejectedly, cursing everything in the world. It is better to let him go alone, and then listen with pleasure to stories about the experiences he has experienced.

Let us remember how curious this person was to us at the beginning of our acquaintance, and dare to ask directly: “What are you dreaming about right now?” The answer will probably not be the same as before.

Everyday life motivates

There is a special, calming charm in the routine days of living together: they make it possible to move from energy that can move mountains to doing nothing and peace, and thus create a feeling of reliability and security. Because of this, we can (fearlessly) be ourselves, try new things, go beyond our limits, take risks that we might not have taken alone.

“Where there are boundaries and each partner treats the other as an independent and therefore interesting person, both perceive their home as a haven, a haven to which they want to return,” says Inna Khamitova. “But, trying to support another, to give him pleasure, it is important to be able to defend yourself, your interests in disputes, even if you have to go into conflict for this.”

“Remember the danger of starting to live an exciting life outside the home, and with a partner to share only boring, obligatory things,” adds Christophe Fauré. “In our time, a man and a woman are at risk of falling into one of the extremes: endowing relationships with excessive meaning and giving up their own lives for them, or putting too much effort into their lives outside the couple. We must try to balance between these two options.

In a pair, but … apart

In order to prolong love, some couples decide to forego their life together for occasional joyful encounters: a night entirely dedicated to passion, an idyllic weekend alone…

Initially, relationships are maintained through sex, but (with few exceptions) this lifestyle is almost incompatible with long-term plans and with genuine involvement in each other’s lives – it implies mutual obligations.

“Those who find it difficult to maintain their individuality, being in the same apartment with a partner, prefer to live separately,” adds Inna Khamitova. “Fearing a merger with another person, they choose a “guest” marriage and maintain a separate household.”

Among those who refuse to live together, there are many who have survived divorce and are raising children from a previous marriage. They seek to avoid conflicts and prefer to raise children themselves, protecting the relationship in a couple from disagreements.

“I often see,” says Christophe Faure, “how unsuccessful attempts to build relationships with difficult teenagers literally destroy relationships in a couple. In this case, it is wiser for adults to wait until the children leave the parental nest, and only then settle together. Such couples, avoiding the routine, save the relationship from breaking up.