Like A Ship Loves An Anchor?

Today’s article may seem a little bit of a downer to start with, but don’t worry, it picks up again too. Simply put, we’ve written before about many of the good parts of relationships, e.g:

Only One Kind Of Relationship Promotes Longevity This Much!

…but what if that’s not what we have?

Note: if you have a very happy, secure, fulfilling, joyous relationship, then, great! Or if you’re single and happy, then, also great! Hopefully you will still find today’s feature of use if you find yourself advising a friend or family member one day. So without further ado, let’s get to it…

You may be familiar with the “sunk cost fallacy”; if not: it’s what happens when a person or group has already invested into a given thing, such that even though the thing is not going at all the way they hoped, they now want to continue trying to make that thing work, lest their previous investment be lost. But the truth is: if it’s not going to work, then the initial investment is already lost, and pouring out extra won’t help—it’ll just lose more.

That “investment” in a given thing could be money, time, energy, or (often the case) a combination of the above.

In the field of romance, the “sunk cost fallacy” keeps a lot of bad relationships going for longer than perhaps they should, and looking back (perhaps after a short adjustment period), the newly-single person says “why did I let that go on?” and vows to not make the same mistake again.

But that prompts the question: how can we know when it’s right to “keep working on it, because relationships do involve work”, as perfectly reasonable relationship advice often goes, and when it’s right to call it quits?

Should I stay or should I go?

Some questions for you (or perhaps a friend you might find yourself advising) to consider:

• What qualities do you consider the most important for a partner to have—and does your partner have them?
• If you described the worst of your relationship to a close friend, would that friend feel bad for you?
• Do you miss your partner when they’re away, or are you glad of the break? When they return, are they still glad to see you?
• If you weren’t already in this relationship, would you seek to enter it now? (This takes away sunk cost and allows a more neutral assessment)
• Do you feel completely safe with your partner (emotionally as well as physically), or must you tread carefully to avoid conflict?
• If your partner decided tomorrow that they didn’t want to be with you anymore and left, would that be just a heartbreak, or an exciting beginning of a new chapter in your life?
• What things would you generally consider dealbreakers in a relationship—and has your partner done any of them?

The last one can be surprising, by the way. We often see or hear of other people’s adverse relationship situations and think “I would never allow…” yet when we are in a relationship and in love, there’s a good chance that we might indeed allow—or rather, excuse, overlook, and forgive.

And, patience and forgiveness certainly aren’t inherently bad traits to have—it’s just good to deploy them consciously, and not merely be a doormat.

Either way, reflect (or advise your friend/family member to reflect, as applicable) on the “score” from the above questions.

• If the score is good, then maybe it really is just a rough patch, and the tools we link at the top and bottom of this article might help.
• If the score is bad, the relationship is bad, and no amount of historic love or miles clocked up together will change that. Sometimes it’s not even anyone’s fault; sometimes a relationship just ran its course, and now it’s time to accept that and turn to a new chapter.

“At my age…”

As we get older, it’s easy for that sunk cost fallacy to loom large. Inertia is heavy, the mutual entanglement of lives is far-reaching, and we might not feel we have the same energy for dating that we did when we were younger.

And there may sometimes be a statistical argument for “sticking it out” at least for a while, depending on where we are in the relationship, per this study (with 165,039 participants aged 20–76), which found:

❝Results on mean levels indicated that relationship satisfaction decreased from age 20 to 40, reached a low point at age 40, then increased until age 65, and plateaued in late adulthood.

As regards the metric of relationship duration, relationship satisfaction decreased during the first 10 years of the relationship, reached a low point at 10 years, increased until 20 years, and then decreased again.❞

~ Dr. Janina Bühler et al.

Source: Development of Relationship Satisfaction Across the Life Span: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

And yet, when it comes to prospects for a new relationship…

• If our remaining life is growing shorter, then it’s definitely too short to spend in an unhappy relationship
• Maybe we really won’t find romance again… And maybe that’s ok, if w’re comfortable making our peace with that and finding joy in the rest of life _{^{(this widowed writer (hi, it’s me) plans to remain single now by preference, and her life is very full of purpose and beauty and joy and yes, even love—for family, friends, etc, plus the memory of my wonderful late beloved)}}
• Nevertheless, the simple fact is: many people do find what they go on to describe as their best relationship yet, late in life ← this study is with a small sample size, but in this case, even anecdotal evidence seems sufficient to make the claim reasonable; probably you personally know someone who has done so. If they can, so can you, if you so wish.
• Adding on to that last point… Later life relationships can also offer numerous significant advantages unique to such (albeit some different challenges too—but with the right person, those challenges are just a fun thing to tackle together). See for example:

An exploratory investigation into dating among later‐life women

And about those later-life relationships that do work? They look like this:

“We’ve Got This”: Middle-Aged and Older (ages 40–87) Couples’ Satisfying Relationships and We-Talk Promote Better Physiological, Relational, and Emotional Responses to Conflict

this one looks like the title says it all, but it really doesn’t, and it’s very much worth at least reading the abstract, if not the entire paper—because it talks a lot about the characteristics that make for happy or unhappy relationships, and the effect that those things have on people. It really is very good, and quite an easy read.

See again: Healthy Relationship, Healthy Life

Take care!

Jealousy is often thought of as a young people’s affliction, but it can affect us at any age—whether we are the one being jealous, or perhaps a partner.

And, the “green-eyed monster” can really ruin a lot of things; relationships, friendships, general happiness, physical health even (per stress and anxiety and bad sleep), and more.

The thing is, jealousy looks like one thing, but is actually mostly another.

Jealousy is a Scooby-Doo villain

That is to say: we can unmask it and see what much less threatening thing is underneath. Which is usually nothing more nor less than: insecurities

• Insecurity about losing one’s partner
• Insecurity about not being good enough
• Insecurity about looking bad socially

…etc. The latter, by the way, is usually the case when one’s partner is socially considered to be giving cause for jealousy, but the primary concern is not actually relational loss or any kind of infidelity, but rather, looking like one cannot keep one’s partner’s full attention romantically/sexually. This drives a lot of people to act on jealousy for the sake of appearances, in situations where they might otherwise, if they didn’t feel like they’d be adversely judged for it, be considerably more chill.

Thus, while monogamy certainly has its fine merits, there can also be a kind of “toxic monogamy” at hand, where a relationship becomes unhealthy because one partner is just trying to live up to social expectations of keeping the other partner in check.

This, by the way, is something that people in polyamorous and/or open relationships typically handle quite neatly, even if a lot of the following still applies. But today, we’re making the statistically safe assumption of a monogamous relationship, and talking about that!

How to deal with the social aspect

If you sit down with your partner and work out in advance the acceptable parameters of your relationship, you’ll be ahead of most people already. For example…

• What counts as cheating? Is it all and any sex acts with all and any people? If not, where’s the line?
• What about kissing? What about touching other body parts? If there are boundaries that are important to you, talk about them. Nothing is “too obvious” because it’s astonishing how many times it will happen that later someone says (in good faith or not), “but I thought…”
• What about being seen in various states of undress? Or seeing other people in various states of undress?
• Is meaningless flirting between friends ok, and if so, how do we draw the line with regard to what is meaningless? And how are we defining flirting, for that matter? Talk about it and ensure you are both on the same page.
• If a third party is possibly making moves on one of us under the guise of “just being friendly”, where and how do we draw the line between friendliness and romantic/sexual advances? What’s the difference between a lunch date with a friend and a romantic meal out for two, and how can we define the difference in a way that doesn’t rely on subjective “well I didn’t think it was romantic”?

If all this seems like a lot of work, please bear in mind, it’s a lot more fun to cover this cheerfully as a fun couple exercise in advance, than it is to argue about it after the fact!

See also: Boundary-Setting Beyond “No”

How to deal with the more intrinsic insecurities

For example, when jealousy is a sign of a partner fearing not being good enough, not measuring up, or perhaps even losing their partner.

The key here might not shock you: communication

Specifically, reassurance. But critically, the correct reassurance!

A partner who is jealous will often seek the wrong reassurance, for example wanting to read their partner’s messages on their phone, or things like that. And while a natural desire when experiencing jealousy, it’s not actually helpful. Because while incriminating messages could confirm infidelity, it’s impossible to prove a negative, and if nothing incriminating is found, the jealous partner can just go on fearing the worst regardless. After all, their partner could have a burner phone somewhere, or a hidden app for cheating, or something else like that. So, no reassurance can ever be given/gained by such requests (which can also become unpleasantly controlling, which hopefully nobody wants).

A quick note on “if you have nothing to fear, you have nothing to hide”: rhetorically that works, but practically it doesn’t.

Writer’s example: when my late partner and I formalized our relationship, we discussed boundaries, and I expressed “so far as I am concerned, I have no secrets from you, except secrets that are not mine to share. For example, if someone has confided in me and asked that I not share it, I won’t. Aside from that, you have access-all-areas in my life; me being yours has its privileges” and this policy itself would already pre-empt any desire to read my messages.

Now indeed, I had nothing to hide. I am by character devoted to a fault. But my friends may well sometimes have things they don’t want me to share, which made that a necessary boundary to highlight (which my partner, an absolute angel by the way and not prone to unhealthy manifestations of jealousy in any case, understood completely).

So, it is best if the partner of a jealous person can explain the above principles as necessary, and offer the correct reassurance instead. Which could be any number of things, but for example:

• I am yours, and nobody else has a chance
• I fully intend to stay with you for life
• You are the best partner I have ever had
• Being with you makes my life so much better

…etc. Note that none of these are “you don’t have to worry about so-and-so”, or “I am not cheating on you”, etc, because it’s about yours and your partner’s relationship. If they ask for reassurances with regard to other people or activities, by all means state them as appropriate, but try to keep the focus on you two.

And if your partner (or you, if it’s you who’s jealous) can express the insecurity in the format…

“I’m afraid of _____ because _____”

…then the “because” will allow for much more specific reassurance. We all have insecurities, we all have reasons we might fear not being good enough for our partner, or losing their affection, and the best thing we can do is choose to trust our partners at least enough to discuss those fears openly with each other.

See also: Save Time With Better Communication ← this can avoid a lot of time-consuming arguments

What about if the insecurity is based in something demonstrably correct?

By this we mean, something like a prior history of cheating, or other reasons for trust issues. In such a case, the jealous partner may well have a reason for their jealousy that isn’t based on a personal insecurity.

In our previous article about boundaries, we talked about relationships (romantic or otherwise) having a “price of entry”. In this case, you each have a “price of entry”:

• The “price of entry” to being with the person who has previously cheated (or similar), is being able to accept that.
• And for the person who cheated (or similar), very likely their partner will have the “price of entry” of “don’t do that again, and also meanwhile accept in good grace that I might be jittery about it”.

And, if the betrayal of trust was something that happened between the current partners in the current relationship, most likely that was also traumatic for the person whose trust was betrayed. Many people in that situation find that trust can indeed be rebuilt, but slowly, and the pain itself may also need treatment (such as therapy and/or couples therapy specifically).

See also: Relationships: When To Stick It Out & When To Call It Quits ← this covers both sides

And finally, to finish on a happy note:

Only One Kind Of Relationship Promotes Longevity This Much!

Take care!