How Does a Bad Temper Hurt the Marriage?
A bad temper can be toxic to many relationships, especially a marriage. It can cause a variety of problems for both partners. A bad temper can be a bad habit and without appropriate anger management skills, it can lead to a marriage dissolving.
People who have a bad temper often “explode.” They may yell, scream, call their partner names, throw things or make threats. They often say mean things and act very irrational when they are angry.
People with a bad temper often report having a “short fuse.” They haven’t learned skills to recognize when they are becoming angry and they usually feel like their temper is out of their control. They may blame others for causing them to feel angry and not take any responsibility for managing their own emotions.
One big problem with a bad temper is that sometimes it works for people in the short term. Others may give in and try to appease the angry person. However, this attempt to make peace isn’t out of a genuine like for the person, it’s out of an attempt to make them stop their inappropriate behaviors. In fact, angry outbursts often lead to others strongly disliking the person in the long term.
If you have a bad temper, it is important that you learn how to manage your anger. The damage you do to your relationship is not reversible. You can’t take back the mean things you say and do.
A person married to someone with a bad temper often has to feel like they walk around on eggshells. They may feel like they can’t disagree with their partner and may try hard to make things as peaceful as possible. It is a stressful way to live if you feel like you can’t express your true feelings to your partner.
Learning how to manage your anger may be one of the most important things you can do for your marriage. If you don’t know how to express yourself without getting angry, consider therapy. Counseling can help you learn how to manage your temper. If your partner has an anger problem and refuses to get help, consider getting therapy for yourself. You can’t change your partner but you can change how you behave.
I have been doing couples counseling for a long time. I’ve noticed that, often, when one person has an anger problem, it comes from a pattern of painful experiences in childhood, dysfunctional childhood family patterns, or some kind of trauma in the person’s past–for instance, physical abuse or sexual abuse. In one couple I saw, one partner had had a serious head injury as a child. The explosive behavior turned out to be a combination of all of the above PLUS developing a habit of automatically yelling, etc., instead of learning new ways to express frustration. I use EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) to work with the traumas individually and other methods to work with the habits that the couple get into.