Stress: Is Stress Good or Bad in Marriage?

My husband and I have been married for 2 1/2 years. Through these years, we have started a family, moved away from our home town, and we will both be graduated from college by July. There have been a lot of stress and times of trial in our lives. The ultimate being financial strain. We realized this when we had our first child, as well as paying for rent, school, food, and the just basic necessities of life, we were struggling with money. We finally got some money back that we had been promised. I decided that I was going to get ahead on rent and pay two months. I got a money order, and by the time I got home, I had completely misplaced it. This really brought stress into my life, because we had been struggling with money, and now two months of rent was gone. I cried when I told my husband because I just felt horrible that I had not been more careful. We had to go back to the bank and explain what happened. They said that they could not refund us for three months! We needed that money for rent right then! We had to dive into our savings (which was not very much) which we had been savings for emergencies and pay rent. That was just four months ago, and now, even though it was recent, we have received the money back, we got our tax return, we moved to a place that has cheaper rent, and my husband got a job working full-time with good pay. We look back and wonder how we did it, but feel accomplished that we were able to make it through that stressful time and get back on top of our financial lives. That stress helped us to work together and help one another through. For us, that stressful situation may have helped out marriage become stronger.

My cousin and his wife had been married for around 10-12 years. They had 6 children very close together. He was going to school, extensively, to get his doctorate degree. This takes time, money, and a lot of stress on the family and marriage. In the end, the stress was too much for both partners, and the marriage ended.

The above stories show a positive aspect of marriage, as well as a negative aspect. So the question is, is stress a good or bad thing in marriage? Benjamin Karney states, “The problem with stressful events is that they demand a response” (Karney, p. 1). He goes onto explain that if a stressful situation occurs, such as having a flat tire and taking it to get fixed or taking a sick child to the doctor’s office, “Our responses to these events, whether they are adaptive or maladaptive, take time and energy” (Karney, p. 1) But, what else takes time and energy? Relationships. So while we may be fitting our time around coping with stressful events, we may being giving more time to those and less time to our marriages.

More stress = Less time spent on the relationship

(Karney, 2014)

In this video clip, we see that the stressful things in life can use all your time and energy, which concludes, very little or no time spent on your relationships. What happens when this is your marriage? If your time and energy is spent on all the stresses you experience each day, then your marriage relationship could dwindle.

According to the model above, stress just seems like an overall bad thing! But, “Stress is likely to be bad for couples who lack the resources to cope with stress effectively." And the implied inverse may also be true: "Stress may not be so bad for couples with adequate resources.’" I think that this statement is one to remember, because just as I mentioned above, every couple is in different situations and depending on their situation could reflect on if the stress is a bad thing or a good thing. A wealthy couple that has a flat tire may have no problem taking it to the repair stop to pay and get it fixed. But a couple who may live on a strict budget and does not have any extra money for car repairs may be faced with a very stressful situation.

So the questions still stands, is stress a good thing, or a bad thing in marriage? And the answer completely depends on you and your spouse’s situation.

Activity:

Are there little stresses in your life that you could do without in order to spend more time with your spouse?

1. Together, think of at least one thing that is stressful you could adjust in your marriage.
2. During that time, strive to spend it together on building your relationship.
3. Come up with a fun and non-stressful activity that you both enjoy in order to relieve other stresses.

Simple things such as taking a walk, reading a book together, or just soaking in the sun may be ways that you could get some unneeded stress in your life to distinguish a bit.

Keep following to learn more about Stress in Marriage:

What Causes Stress in Marriage?

References:

Karney, Benjamin. (2014). Stress is Bad for Couples, Right? Retrieved from:http://www.ncfr.org/ncfr-report/focus/couples/stress-bad-couples-right

Hill, R. (1949). Families under stress. New York: Harper & Row.