How Does Anxiety
Affect Your Marriage?

Anxiety can drive a wedge into the healthiest of marriages. It is a difficulty commonly encountered by couples, being an emotional condition with the highest prevalence in the country at 40 million adults, says the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. How can anxiety affect a marriage? In a setting where there are unrelenting stresses coming from the various aspects of running a household, worrying a lot is commonplace. There are other issues – financial concerns, relationship matters, job difficulties, social commitments, etc. – that may complicate your lives, and which you must think and care about as well.

When people commit to marriage and say their ‘I do’s.’ they have the best intentions and hopes – to stay together all their lives. Such enduring love, nonetheless, is not as easy to achieve. In real life, most couples go through all sorts of challenges, so that their love and union are put to the test. Whether you are newlyweds, or you are experienced players in the game, one burden that may challenge your marriage is anxiety.

Spouses are the most influential persons in the lives of their wives or husbands. If one is struggling with anxiety, the other half also is affected in many ways. Thus, marital concern can affect your well-being and the overall quality of your relationship and life. Without the knowledge and skills to address the different issues, anxiety can be the ‘third wheel’ that may put your union in so much pain.

The Triggers of Anxiety in Marriage

As exhilarating as a marital union can be, it can be a breeder of anxiety within the context of raising a family and supporting a household. Having fun and celebrating the love you feel for each other can be a tall order when you or your spouse are emotionally challenged, or feeling apprehensive, worried and/or afraid. It is seemingly unbelievable, but anxiety can ruin the most loving marriages, leaving you feeling ‘unlucky in love’, despite once professing great love for one another.

There are many possible reasons why anxiety can disrupt a once harmonious marriage. For one, the pressures tend to build as the union expands to include the growing number of children and the increasing domestic demands. In addition, there can be workplace challenges, chronic disorders in the family, maybe even substance abuse, and the novel difficulties of the digital age. Ignored, taken lightly or swept ‘under the rug,’ it may find its way into the marriage. Though the emotional difficulties can be a personal challenge, anxiety can grip a marriage, so that it is a burden for both of you.

How Anxiety Ruins a Marriage

Even when only half the couple is gripped by anxiety, both of you are likely to feel its impact in the various aspects of your lives, individually and as a couple. Primarily, anxiety can impact a marriage by overwhelming you, affecting your physical, emotional and behavioral health. Here are a few ways by which anxiety can harm your union:

• Anxiety results in you being emotionally estranged. Worries, apprehension and fears can damage your connection and trust. Numbed or dazed by the symptoms, you will eventually be emotionally unavailable to your loved one. With anxiety coming in between you and your spouse, like a ‘third wheel,’ it would hardly be possible to stay connected and attuned to the needs and feelings of your partner. In the heat of the overwhelming symptoms of the condition the actual needs of the other become unrecognized. This affects not only your day to day connection. It can also impact your intimacy.

• Anxiety can result in you being you defensive. Overwhelmed with the anxiety symptoms, you will most likely guard your emotions tightly, holding back your real emotions. It can incapacitate your ability to show your true feelings. Thus, recognizing and admitting your real feelings may not be that easy. This can cause you to feel, not only emotionally distant, but physically fearful of any intimacy or physical closeness.

• Anxiety compels you to overly focus on your personal issues. The fears can lead to self-awareness of your weaknesses and needs. These can result in your being defensive too for the purpose of protecting yourself. These can place an unnecessary burden on your shoulder and in your relationship, so that anger and reciprocal selfishness builds up within you or your spouse.

• Anxiety can result in you being you insecure and skeptical. Weighed down by fears, you will most likely doubt your ability to decide and to pass judgment. These can work against your interest, preventing you from effecting a change in your relationship, family or household. Stuck in the moment, you may feel hopeless and helpless. These may increase your vulnerability to other forms of anxiety, overwhelm and depression.

• Anxiety robs you of happiness. Overwhelmed with negative emotions and thoughts, you will most probably feel scared all the time. Gripped with anxiety, it would certainly be difficult to enjoy the bond that the union is blessed with. Unable to be emotionally present, it would be impossible to feel the joys of being one with your beloved in marriage or exult in the prospect of an enduring life together.

• Anxiety brings about despondency and jealousy. Feeling anxious, there is a desperate need for affection and/or attention from your partner. When your other half does not respond with warmth and care, the feelings of insecurity can grab and shake you. This happens because anxiety can intensify or magnify fears, giving you unrealistic interpretations of the things that your spouse may do or say. All these negative emotions can work together to breed another scary condition – depression.

• Anxiety disables your functioning. With the condition impacting your ability to do everyday tasks/chores, you may have difficulty complying with your responsibilities. This may mean displacement and shifting of duties. If you are the breadwinner, this means that your other half must step up and find a way to act as the main provider for the family. If you are running the household, everyone must take turns or pitch in for the household to run seamlessly.

• Anxiety is emotionally demanding for couples. Anxiety doesn’t spare anyone. Both you and your spouse would be lugging around an emotional baggage. The affected spouse may often experience edginess, jittery, stress, panic, etc., even when there is no justifiable reason to feel that way. In effect, the non-anxious partner may become overwhelmed with all the displaced responsibilities and stresses day in and day out.

Online Counseling: Finally, Freedom from Gripping Anxiety

Anxiety can be tragic, especially for the spouse who must stay by your side through the ‘rocky waters.’ It is tragic, especially when you don’t do anything about it. If you want to live happily with your beloved, you must end the anxiety symptoms in your marriage. It will take more than determination and will power to do that. To improve the outcome of anxiety and to alleviate its symptoms, you must allow a professional to come in. You can find that professional intervention at Carolina Counseling Services – Fuquay-Varina, NC.

Marriage can complete you and your spouse. Being intact in marriage can also mean utter completeness and happiness for your children/family. While anxiety can disrupt the home front and your union, know that its impact can only be as deep as you will let it. You have the power for things to be better for both of you. All you need to do is to take that first step. Let a licensed counselor/therapist independently contracted with Carolina Counseling Services – Fuquay-Varina, NC. help strengthen your marriage. Call now to schedule an online counseling appointment!

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