Transcripts

Don Rosenthal:
I think the ingredient that causes couples to start going downhill is resentment and when you resent your partner, they feel it and they start resenting you for the way you express your resentment.

Don Rosenthal, co-author of the book, Learning to Love says often that resentment happens because back in the beginning of the relationship, just being together with your partner made you feel so great.

Here's someone who loves me and wishes me well and so now I give you the job to make me happy by loving me non-stop. And of course that's totally impossible- you can't give someone else the job to make you happy. And so when we bang up against others' imperfections and humanness, I start resenting you for not fulfilling the function I gave you.

Don says when you stop resenting and blaming your partner for how you feel, things can get better…

I learned this when I became a father. Here's this little kid who's in a bad mood, I offer him love-he pushes me away, sometimes he says, "No, Mama." And yet I still love him and what I realized was that it's possible to have someone I love not loving me and still feel love and still feel good. And I think that when two people begin to suspect that the other isn't doing it to them, than that's the beginning of wisdom.

Tomorrow, more ways to improve your relationship- I'm Mike Carruthers and that's Something You Should Know.