Sometimes one of you, acting alone, can make all the difference in creating a successful relationship.

Conflicts and periods of doubt can arise in even the strongest of relationships. Two people who attempt to create a relationship always bring their own issues, backgrounds, expectations, personalities, and inner difficulties into the interplay that occurs between them. It is not at all unusual that the two people might find themselves, at times, in a deadlock. They see no way to break the impasse and to recapture the spirit of good will that they once had and would like to have again. Each party’s personal conflicts come into play and stifle the communication, sharing and love that seems necessary to harmonious interaction. Rather than confronting our own part in the problem, we may resort to blaming our partner—”If only she (or he) would change, then we could be happy.”

While it is ideal for the two partners to agree mutually that there is a problem that needs to be confronted and to show an equal amount of motivation in solving the problem in relationship therapy, this goal is not always achievable. The reality of the situation is that one of the partners may not be ready to work on the problem—and the reason for this may be perfectly valid. For example, one partner may fear that working on the relationship could bring up other problems. Or one of the partners may feel inadequate in talking about relationship issues and may have fears of being attacked if he or she were to try relationship therapy (although this is, in reality, a highly unlikely event). Or perhaps the partner feels unable to make the changes, which have been called for in the past. Commonly, one of the partners just doesn’t see that there is a problem, and therefore fails to see his Whatever the reason, there are times when one partner is simply not ready to work mutually on the relationship. This is a fact which must be accepted. But it does not mean that the relationship is doomed. Rather than condemning our partner for his or her inability to work on the relationship, it is far more productive to show respect for our partner’s view and to take matters for bettering the relationship into our own hands. There is a great deal that one partner, acting alone, can do to create a relationship which is happier and more fulfilling for both parties.

Working alone on a relationship problem can mean that we have to take a look at our own issues and our contribution to the difficulties with our partner. While this challenge is not always easy, the payoff in terms of our own emotional wellness can be enormous, both for our own future personal happiness and for the success of our relationship. Working solo on a relationship may mean coming to terms with the anger we have fostered (perhaps for years), taking responsibility for our own happiness, breaking out of our old ways of seeing the world, changing our expectations about how we should live everyday, and accepting the good in our relationship as being good enough. It may mean letting go of some of our most entrenched behaviors. We may even find that letting go can bring us tremendous rewards that we never expected.

Think of a relationship as a system with two parts, which strives to achieve balance. It can be compared to a seesaw. When one of the partners makes a shift, the other partner has to make a comparable shift to maintain the balance. This often works negatively. For example, if Chris reminds Michael to take out the trash, Michael, feeling controlled, might back off and stop communicating. In turn, Chris then criticizes Michael even further for breaking off communication—and Michael retreats even further. A balance is achieved in this case with a pattern of blame and withdrawal. How can the balance shift in a more positive direction? Or her contribution to the difficulties.

Chris might decide to stop reminding Michael to take out the trash. In fact, Chris starts taking out the trash. Michael does not feel controlled in this case and has no need to break off communication. Showing appreciation to Chris for doing this chore, Michael starts taking out the trash. Both parties win in this case, and a positive balance is achieved in the relationship. (Of course, this could backfire on Chris, who may end up taking out the trash all the time. But at least the old pattern is broken, communication now has a chance to succeed, and Chris can assess whether it is more important to maintain the relationship with new ground rules, even though it is flawed and far from ideal, or to continue the old pattern of blame and withdrawal.)

Here are some ways that one party, working alone, can improve a relationship:

Take Care of Your Own Needs

We often look to our partner to provide for our needs, and this can be a big mistake. People, whether they are in a relationship or not, need to function in a whole and complete manner. The best relationships are generally those in which two healthy and fully functioning adults come together and enhance each other with love, support, trust and nurturance. They appreciate the gestures of love that they receive from their partner, but they would be able to live full and complete lives even if they were not in a relationship.

We sometimes think that the two people should give equally to the relationship in order to achieve a balance—but it may be more productive to see the balance in a different way. Think instead about achieving a balance within yourself, so that the question becomes one of deciding how much to give to the relationship and how much to give to yourself. There are some things that you may want and which you can provide for yourself. You see these things as non-negotiable.

For example, if your partner is always late for social events and you find this unacceptable, try going once alone—and the next time your partner will probably be ready on time. If your partner feels threatened by this, gets angry and starts an argument, try showing some empathy and decisiveness. Don’t participate in the argument. Simply say that you understand your partner’s feelings, but that this is something which is very important to you and you have decided to do it. It does not mean that you are rejecting or abandoning your partner, but it does mean that you are asserting yourself in a healthy way and taking care of your own needs. A simple act of assertiveness can often break a destructive pattern of mutual neediness.

Do the Exact Opposite of What You Have Been Doing

Each partner in a relationship plays a role. It is important to identify the role that each of you plays and then try to make a change. One way of accomplishing this is to identify your role and then do the exact opposite.

This takes courage, because of fear that abandoning our previous role will only make the problem worse. In truth, however, changing this role will compel your partner to make a change as well, a change, which may enhance the relationship. For example, Joan complains that Jeff plays golf all the time and doesn’t have time for her. Joan plays the role of the one who nags and Jeff plays the role of the one who rebels by playing golf.

If Joan were to change her role from nagging to supporting, Jeff might make a change from rebelling to cooperating. Joan could learn to play golf herself, ask Jeff about his day on the course, and buy him some golf-related gifts. She could also cultivate her own interests. Jeff, in turn, realizing that Joan is now doing the exact opposite of what she had been doing, will no longer feel that he has to rebel against her. Because she shows support for his interests, he will then reciprocate by showing more concern for her needs. People respond much more readily to support than to criticism. The old destructive pattern has now been broken and each partner is now free both to pursue their own needs and to give to the other.

Relax Your Definitions of Power Struggle

When we are involved in a relationship conflict we often resort to all-or-nothing thinking, and it is difficult to think outside of this box—”I am right and my partner is wrong.” The more you insist on your point of view, the more your partner defends his or her position. The two opposing ways of thinking become entrenched. It is helpful to defuse the situation by trying to develop empathy for your partner’s point of view and by relaxing the sense of urgency you have about your own views. The following thoughts can help to increase the flexibility of your thinking: “My partner is just being herself. She means no harm. She’s trying to do her best. I need to appreciate her just the way she is. I need to stop trying to change her or to convince her that I am right.” When you try to get your partner to see things the way you do, you are actually searching for love and closeness.

You want complete support, a partner who can affirm your way of thinking. Understand, though, that this is exactly what your partner is searching for too.

Try to empathize with your partner’s view, and this can open the door to the closeness you want. You may feel an urgency or anxiety about asserting your own view. You don’t have to abandon your views, but you can work on the anxiety you feel about affirming your views. It helps to take a live-and-let-live approach to your struggle. Relax—and trust that things will work out well. And they often do.

Ask Your Partner to Help You Solve Your Problem

Rather than blaming your partner and creating an air of defensiveness, try reframing the problem. Make it clear that you are the one having the difficulty, and ask for your partner’s help in solving your problem. For example, instead of blaming your partner for spending too much money, it might be more helpful to find a good time to have a talk about how you feel very vulnerable financially—and then enlist your partner’s support in finding ways for you to feel more financially secure. You will find that taking ownership of the problem yourself can bring you much more support and closeness within the relationship. You can help create the conditions where your partner has an opportunity to rise to the occasion rather than feel blamed because your needs are not being met.

Working alone on your relationship means working on yourself. By making a shift in how you define your own sense of self, thoughts and feelings, you can help create the conditions which bring your relationship into a state of mutual harmony, support and love. A trained professional therapist can help you identify and modify patterns in the way you approach your relationship. The rewards can be immeasurable—for both you and your partner.

Is it Fair that I Have to do All the Work and the Relationship?

No, it is not fair—but that’s all right. Consider the alternatives. You can stay in a deadlocked relationship if you choose, but then each partner loses the potential benefits that can come from a healthier and more supportive commitment. Or you can let the relationship dissolve completely. This may be a viable option if the situation is intolerable, abusive, or completely mismatched. However, if there is a chance that the relationship can work, it is worth trying different approaches, which have not been considered in the past. After all, ending a relationship before considering alternatives may represent an absence of fairness and a potential source of regret in the future.

When considering the idea of fairness, remember that many things in life are not fair. Illness, financial setbacks, and grievous losses come to the best of people. Even if there were complete equality between you and your partner, there is no assurance that the problems in your relationship would be solved. Part of the human condition is to persist even when circumstances are not ideal.

Your partner may lack the ability to provide equal input into solving the problems of your relationship. This is something worthy of acceptance. It is not ideal, but it is reality. Sometimes the strength and courage of one person is needed to compensate for the shortcomings of another.

The real test of fairness is to question whether you are creating the best life you can. In any relationship, we need to provide a balance, not necessarily between the two partners, but on the dimension of balancing your own needs against the needs of the relationship. The source of your happiness lies within and is derived from your physical, emotional, mental and spiritual strengths. Working on these factors within yourself puts you into a firm position to attend to the demands of your relationship.

A relationship requires flexibility, effective communication, some hard work, and a lot of good will. When we feel complete within, we are in a strong position to create the conditions, which can lead to a healthy and thriving relationship. Perhaps there is some truth in the old saying that it is only when we love ourselves that we can truly love another.

Adoption agencies used to refuse to place children with families who already had their own birth children, but that stipulation has been lifted in recent years. Both birth and adopted children can become part of a loving and warm blended family.

If you are thinking about adoption and already have a birth child, the first consideration is whether you will be able to bond with an adopted child as well as with your birth child. A feeling of closeness does not necessarily develop overnight. You will need to work at it, particularly if you adopt an older child who challenges you with difficult behavior, or who turns out to be quite different from you and other members of your family. Even with a baby, bonding can take a while. Your biological child will watch your behavior and listen to your words. You will need to model acceptance, love, and inclusiveness if you want your biological child to begin accepting a new sibling.

It is imperative that you analyze your reasons for pursuing adoption. If you hope to create the warm relationships your own large family had, recognize that facilitating those relationships may be a full-time job, which in the end may be unfulfilled. If you want to create a family basketball team, recognize that you cannot control the athletic abilities of your children. If that is your dream, you may need to hold back and reconsider. It is not fair to stack expectations upon a child who may have totally different abilities, either because of genetics, prenatal environment, initial life experiences, or a combination of these.

Another consideration needs to be how you will deal with relatives and friends who question why you want to adopt. Think about whether your extended family will be able to bond with an adopted child as well as with your birth child. Will they favor your birth child with more expensive presents or more of their time?

If you are unsure how your child feels about having a new sibling, it is wise to start discussing the issue. The process of adoption is a difficult one to keep from your child. After all, a social worker comes to your home, paperwork must be completed, and there may possibly be a trip to a foreign country in the planning stages. Your child may hear a discussion of people called birthparents. There is often a period of not knowing whether a new child will or will not be coming to the family. Your birth child will quickly sense that something is happening. The social worker doing your home study will want to know what you are doing to set the stage for welcoming the new child, and if you have thought about the sibling conflicts that could result. The more your child is involved, the more likely his or her responses will be knowledgeable.

If you are wondering how children raised in families–with children through birth and adoption–are able to adjust, the research studies, while small in number, are encouraging. The results indicate that adoptive placement of a child in a blended family does not affect overall adjustment of the biological child and may, in fact, have positive effects on the adopted child. It appears as though family structure, while complicating the dynamics of adoptive family life, plays a minor role in adoption adjustment. It doesn’t take a research study to know that children of certain ages and in particular developmental stages act in certain ways and feel certain things. Children develop sibling relationships long before they recognize the difference between a biological and an adopted child.

However, it is obvious that you need to acknowledge the differences between your children by birth and adoption. They know they are different, and if you pretend that they are not, the message will not ring true. You must emphatically let the children know that although they joined the family in different ways, each way is a good, valid way, and you treasure and love them all. You need to address the adoption issues with your adopted children when developmentally appropriate but not at the expense of your children by birth. Undoubtedly children in a blended family will use what is available to get what they unconsciously or consciously need at a given time. If adoption is known to get a rise out of a sibling or parent, it could be used to tease the adopted child or cause guilt in the parent. Let’s look at the situations from two common perspectives: either the adopted child feels displaced and that the biological child is preferred, or the biological child feels displaced and that the adopted child is preferred. Perhaps the biological child thinks that in his parents’ efforts to make the adopted child feel welcome and part of the family, they have totally ignored his genetic connections. He looks just like Daddy and everybody used to talk about that all the time; and now, because the new brother doesn’t look like either parent, no one ever talks about the similarities to avoid hurting the new brother’s feelings. The birth child experiences the loss of all those warm fuzzies that looking like Daddy provided. In another family, the adopted child feels left out because she knows she was the only child in the family who did not grow inside of Mommy. She has two other parents out in the world and maybe even other siblings. The brothers and sisters that she lives with are more successful at school, possibly because they dont have concerns about being adopted. Their grades are better, and Mommy and Daddy like that. It’s not fair.

Faber and Mazlish’s book Siblings Without Rivalry is an excellent resource. The ideas in this section all come directly from Faber and Mazlish’s book, which believes that parents can create an atmosphere that fosters cooperation, mutual respect, and caring between siblings. Parents’ reactions can reduce competition and allow hostile feelings to be vented safely. Parents’ attitudes and words do have power, and they can lead the adversaries toward peace and perhaps to one day seeing one another as a source of pleasure and support. Your children may not ever be the best of friends, even if that is what you are secretly hoping for. But at least you can do your best to help them become adults who will listen to another person, respect the person’s point of view, respect the differences between them, and resolve the differences peacefully, even if the only solution is to agree to disagree.

Adoption educator Patricia Irwin Johnston, in her article “Sibling Attachment,” suggests a number of ways to promote a feeling of closeness among siblings of any kind. One of these is to “do all that you can to nurture a sense of shared family culture.” Two other adoption educators, Lois Melina and Holly Van Gulden, also speak about this concept. When there are natural opportunities, find ways to emphasize and comment on things that the family enjoys together, such as silly songs, rituals, funny stories, or favorite places. Remark on similarities among family members. For example, when you go out for pizza to the family’s favorite pizza restaurant, say “Boy, we sure all love pizza!” When everyone bundles up and you assign the various jobs involved in stringing up the Christmas lights on the house, and the neighbors pass by and say how nice they are, say, “Yep, that’s the Jones family tradition…we always string the lights on December 15th.” Celebrate religious observances, holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, and other special days in your family’s particular way that will create lasting memories for your children.

One couple with a daughter by birth who subsequently adopted a daughter established a day they call “Sisters Day.” They celebrate the day the two girls became sisters with a cake after dinner and the exchange of homemade gifts the girls make for one another. This celebration is held instead of an “Adoption Day” celebration that calls attention only to the child by adoption and is in addition to each girl’s birthday celebration.

No matter how a child becomes part of the family, each one must be loved and valued for whoever he or she is. Loving each child exactly the same is not often possible. Children have different talents, abilities, and characteristics. Parents are bound to feel differently even about their birth children. Parents can never eliminate sibling rivalry, but they can minimize it. They can try to create an atmosphere in which each child’s contribution to the family is valued and nurtured, each child’s needs are met, and each child is encouraged to reach his or her full potential. Parents can work to create a shared family culture that encompasses all family members and surrounds them with love, respect, and security. All parents can do is their best and trust that positive, satisfying sibling relationships will result.

Taking the First Step

Once you decide that you want to believe in yourself, you’ve taken the first step. Awareness is the first step to achieving harmony and acceptance. Consider the following statements and note your strengths and weaknesses:

• I believe that I am a good person.
• I am able to express my feelings.
• I appreciate my body and take proper care of it.
• I see challenges as chances for growth.
• I am creating circumstances that support my personal worth.
• I create and enjoy intimate relationships.
• I believe that life offers abundance to me.
• I know my needs and how to meet them.
• I am establishing the life I want.
• I have faith in my own abilities and resources.
• I participate in meaningful activities.

Awareness is the first step to achieving harmony and acceptance. Continue the process of discovery by deciding if you can accept yourself as you are now or if there are things that you need to work on.

Make a List

You are unique and special. Make a list of what you like about yourself, all your positive qualities, the things you do well. Spend time every day reviewing your list. Focus on the positive. Tell yourself that you can live up to your potential. By discovering yourself, who you are and your positive qualities, you will learn to love yourself. Discovery is the beginning to the creation of a fulfilling life.