What is Passive Aggression Doing to Your Heart?

February 24, 2012 By Leave a Comment

We all know by now that passive aggression can damage everything it touches: the passive aggressive man, his partner and family, and their relationship. It is psychological warfare conducted both on himself and everyone around him, an incomplete coping mechanism that tries to make up for the life lessons never learned.

However, what if it wasn’t just the heart of your relationship that was damaged by your passive aggression? Passive aggressive husbands, listen up: your behavior might just be putting your own life at risk.

According to a new article published on Medical News Today by Catharine Paddock, PhD, men who resort to passive aggression because of a feeling of superiority, self-importance or an unwillingness to see the other person’s point of view (narcissism) may actually suffer physically for it, putting themselves at risk for heart problems.

In a study published in PLoS ONE, many men with these personality traits (explotativeness, entitlement, arrogance) have higher than average levels of cortisol in their systems – which puts them at a higher risk for heart problems. According to Sara Konrath, quoted in the article, these men “may be paying a high price in terms of their physical health, in addition to the psychological cost to their relationships.” What is interesting about this new study is that men with these personality traits have high levels of cortisol even when they are not under stress.

Cortisol is the hormone that is released when your body goes into “fight or flight” mode. As a passive aggressive man, you may have high levels of cortisol/a “fight or flight” hormone in your system – does that sound about right? In your daily life, is your brain telling you “I can’t deal with this, let’s run”? Perhaps it’s saying “How dare my wife say that, I’m going to get her back”? When you feel threatened, it’s definitely telling you those things, isn’t it?

Why does your body release cortisol, even when you’re not in a stressful situation? One of the study’s authors, also quoted in the article, stated that this was perhaps due to the fact that ”[e]ven though narcissists have grandiose self-perceptions, they also have fragile views of themselves, and often resort to defensive strategies like aggression when their sense of superiority is threatened.”

This creates, in a sense, a feeling that the body is constantly under stress – it doesn’t matter if it is real or imagined, because the consequences are the same on the body. They lead to higher blood pressure and greater heart problems – we all know this!

Read the entire article at Medical News Today

Neil Warner

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to suffer alone in an unhealthy relationship for one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.You can begin with our passive aggressive system created just for men, at  Stop Your Passive Aggression, with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!

 

Filed Under: healthy happy relationship, impact of passive aggression, passive aggressive behavior, passive aggressive definition, Passive Aggressive Husband, passive aggressive personality, toxic relationship Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Dealing with emotional abuse? here is help!

February 21, 2012 By Leave a Comment 
In their very useful cooperative way of writing articles,
several authors at Wikihow have summarized ways for dealing
with emotional abuse. Here are some of the suggestions:

  1. “Realize that you cannot change your partner, only your reaction to him or her. You can attempt to show your partner how damaging these behaviors are and how they are affecting you, and hope your partner will agree that you are being badly damaged. You can hope your partner will then make the decision to change, but ultimately you cannot force change. Your partner must recognize it and decide to end the behavior on his or her own.”

  2. “Set new, reasonable terms for the relationship with clear and consistently implemented consequences. Decide (ideally together, but if that isn’t possible, decide for yourself) that you’re going to learn a new way of being in this relationship. Abuse most often exists because the spiritual/emotional weakness of the abuser demands the exercise of control over others (you) to give him or her a feeling of emotional security. Read that again, because it’s important: Abuse really starts because of insecurity or trust issues with the abuser. It is most often enabled by (1) the victim’s inability or failure to recognize the abusive behavior or (2) powerlessness of the victim, as in the case of a child enduring the emotional abuse of a parent. In adult relationships, ultimately, neither partner understands a healthy way to diffuse abuse and to respect each other or themselves. Establish that, effective immediately, all interactions will be honorable, and will specifically and especially exclude: name calling, character attacks/judgments, raised voices, spitting, throwing objects, etc. and that if either partner breaks the agreement, then separation will immediately be imposed until mutual respect is restored. Be prepared to accept that this may never happen, especially in advanced stages of abuse, and that your commitment to a healthy, respectful relationship may result in the termination of this abusive one.”

  3. “Set boundaries. Abuse, in general, is an issue of disrespect that usually involves trespass upon individual equality and freedom due to unclear or poorly-defined boundaries. If you are on the receiving end of abuse, it’s up to you to set up clear, reasonable boundaries for an honorable relationship and to consistently stick to them. Let your partner know that you now recognize your responsibility in allowing the disrespect in the past, but that this era has now come to an end. Recognize the damage incurred by the previous era and establish a commitment to obtaining the support needed to forgive and restore the peace and strength necessary for mutual respect in all of your future relationships.”

  4. “Develop emotional intelligence. In cases of abuse, both partners are often unknowingly suppressing important emotions. Receivers of abuse are often uncomfortable expressing authentic, respectful anger, which is necessary to establish boundaries. Abusers are often expressing fear, not anger, when abusing. It is the “Fight” fear response that is coming through (as in “Fight or Flight”), and in order to end abuse, both partners must be willing to learn new ways of feeling and expressing their true emotions to end the pattern of blaming, shaming, and punishing. Express your deepest and strongest feelings only in forums where they will receive the fullest respect and support, such as a diary, a blog, a group of very close friends or trusted family members, a professional and respectful psychologist (best by referral only), etc.”

    This advice is really on target…if you want more, (or wish to share your own suggestion) you would like to visit this site:

    http://www.wikihow.com/Deal-with-Emotional-Abuse, and explore more ideas there.

    Neil Warner

    Neil Warner

    I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.We can begin by you having a complimentary consultation with Conflict Coach, with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!

     

Filed Under: healthy happy relationship, Passive Aggressive Husband, Relationship Repair, toxic relationship Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

The Three C’s of Passive Aggression

July 15, 2011 By

When doing research about what attachment theory tells us about the quality of relationships, as well as its potential for emotional needs satisfaction, what we usually find is that childhood experiences have a very important role in our lives.

Sometimes we hear about the challenges that passive aggression and other defensive behaviors have on marriages, but we fail to connect these present, adult behavior failures with the past conditioning produced in us by the family we grew up with.

So now we have a wife who is totally confused and blindsided by the spouse’s behavior, and that frustrated wife erroneously connects her husband’s unhappiness and their current problem to something she either did or didn’t do.

In short, the present spouse makes herself responsible for her husband’s behavior, and in taking this weight on, she tries to find the reason of the communication failure, so she can “heal it.”

Nobody enters into a relationship with a disclaimer, or an instruction letter that would make it easier for the wife to know the territory she is entering. If such a letter did exist, the instructions on how to deal with a passive aggressive husband would begin with capital letters:

“THIS IS A CONDITION YOU DID NOT CAUSE~

YOU CAN’T NEITHER CURE OR CONTROL IT,”

NOW, can you  stop blaming yourself!”

Wouldn’t that kind of disclaimer be a god-sent message? It would save so much pain, grief and time… which of course translates into lost happiness. Together in this blindness is the passive aggressive spouse, who will support to his death the conviction that his behavior is normal and everybody else is “too demanding” or “needy” or whatever way he uses to describe a wife with emotional needs going unsolved.

Let me recap: if you are in a passive aggressive relationship, take a step back and frame everything under this mantra: I did not cause his condition, I can’t cure him and the best I can do is not to take personally anything of the hurtful behaviors he is doing now.

When it gets hard, remind yourself:

Whatever he is doing now,

  • it is his only way of responding; he doesn’t know better;
  • it is the response he learned with his primary care-taker or mother;
  • your best way of protecting yourself is letting the behavior go away without engaging on it. Just ignore it.

Now that you have this vital piece of information, what are you going to do?

Certainly not try to change him yourself. That role lies with him whose behavior it is! To encourage him to take his own behavior into his own hands, we encourage passive aggressive husbands to take our Passive Aggressive Test. He will be guided to see for himself that these are his own behaviors (not yours or your responsibility). And YES, WE can help him change himself with the “6 Steps System to Stop Passive Aggression and Save your Marriage!”

 

Neil Warner
Neil Warner
I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today. 

We can begin by you having a complimentary conflict coaching session (by clicking here), with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!

Filed Under: assertiveness, passive aggressive behavior, Passive Aggressive Husband, passive aggressive marriage, passive aggressive personality Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Relationship repair: The anger you hear is her pain

June 22, 2011 By

When disputes are frequent and people don’t bother even listening to the other side, the gap widens and relationships get sour. Hatred and contempt fill the gap with negative emotions difficult to dilute. You can be tempted to fight fire with fire and answer perceived aggressions with more aggression.

We need to remember that each dispute is a request for understanding; each confrontation a hidden search for recognition from the other side. When the other side is yelling at you, don’t follow your first impulse to escape or shout back. Listen and own every word that comes out of her mouth. Validate what she says; repeat what she says back to her, and ask if you got the whole version or if there is something that escaped your understanding.

Then go into apology mode, by saying things like, “I’ve been such a selfish person. Please, forgive me; I don’t want to be that person anymore, because I don’t want to hurt you anymore.” And mean it.


If the other person i’s repeating the same rant over and over again, it means that you haven’t responded to her complaint in a way that makes her feel you HAVE heard her.

You’re probably responding in a defensive way, explaining again to her whatever she already knows that can improve your situation. This is not what she needs. She doesn’t care at all about your excuses, real or imaginary. Can’t you see the pain below the surface?

She needs you to hear exactly what she’s saying to you,  and to grieve, as she is grieving, the insensitive, selfish, out of control human being you have been with her for as long as you have. And she is grieving for the lost opportunities for love, for understanding and mutual support that are all in front of you two now.

If you want to do real relationship repair, begin for taking care of her needs. Accept her anger, as a fact of your life; hear her words of pain, validate her feelings as true and legitimate, and never forget that this marital strife is originated in the years and years of insensitivity towards her.

But, if you want to be really married to her, as a grown up and not as a child, you need to understand that this is what a woman wants in a relationship with a significant other. She needs and deserves your honesty. This means that you have to take a good look at yourself and discover, accept and heal those parts of you that are not matching her reality; those aspects of your life that don’t reflect adult commitment yet.

 

Neil Warner
Neil Warner
I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.We can begin by you having a complimentary consultation (by clicking here), with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!

Filed Under: impact of passive aggression, passive aggressive behavior, passive aggressive definition, Passive Aggressive Husband, passive aggressive marriage, passive aggressive personality Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Defending yourself from love with passive aggression?

May 25, 2011 By

In this dance of connection and isolation named marriage, it is possible to see that the two people have different models to get together…basically how near can you get to people without fearing to be swallowed by the relationship?

The national assumption about us being independent individuals crashes with the task of forming a new “WE” entity when we marry or establish a permanent relationship; both are antithetical.
And so, we find several degrees of permission to be near, and or permission to create distance from the other and be by yourself, depending of course on the attachment style we developed when children. If you have a secure attachment, you can go back and forth between your own needs for individuation and the merging with your loved one: neither will scare you either with abandonment or with engulfment. In the case of persons with insecure or anxious attachment who could express the following feelings:

  • I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others;
  • I am nervous when anyone gets too close;
  • I often worry about someone getting too close to me;
  • I am not comfortable having other depend on me;

we can perceive that there is some insecurity there, either trying to get close or to accept the inevitable dependence  on each other generated by a “WE.”

Where is this conversation going? Easy, the best way to keep a fixed distance with an intimate partner is using some of the techniques of passive aggression!

Let me explain: when you do the icy silence called “the cold shoulder” what you are really doing is regulating the distance….telling the other person:

“I’m not leaving you, but I’m in my cave, don’t get near me so I don’t get too scared of intimacy…, and the “WE” project goes into the fridge up until the moment I can reattach again”

When you do the nasty comments, and the put downs, and the inconsiderate critiques what you are doing is controlling the possibility of the other person getting dangerously near, by doing hurtful behaviors that will force her to withdraw in order to protect herself.

Having an insecure attachment marks a person for life, because he can’t ever trust completely the other person when she gets too near: what if she finally leaves him? what is he feels too dependent of her and so has to be too worried about his own survival without her?   Better to detach constantly from the other with passive aggression, so nobody can be so near him as to make him feel dangerously intimate!

Now we understand better this dance: when he withdraws, she chases him with her love and so forces him to withdraw more….escalating the passive aggression attitudes so finally get her to reject him.

And all this in the name of love, would you say? Probably, yes. This is the relationship that lots of people call love…not knowing something better as how to generate a more secure attachment.

 

Neil Warner

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today. 

We can begin by you having a complimentary consultation (by clicking here), with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!

Filed Under: assertiveness, impact of passive aggression, passive aggressive behavior, Passive Aggressive Husband, passive aggressive marriage Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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