Is love enough to keep two people together in a long term relationship?

19 Aug Is love enough to keep two people together in a long term relationship?

People think love conquers all but many times love is not enough in a long-term relationship.

We know many couples file for divorce on the grounds of “irreconcilable differences” which might mean that the couples grew apart or went through difficulties hard to overcome but not necessarily fell out of love.

The opposite happens too. Many couples stay together although having fallen out of love, because they are a good team, they are fearful of starting all over again or “losing” their children or family among many other reasons.

Therefore, love and marriage do not go together like a horse and carriage as Frank Sinatra’s song goes. (Sorry Franky!) Relationships are intricate and complex.

When couples notice that arguments become a commonality or the dynamic of a relationship changes for the worse, it is important to go beyond love and to pinpoint the problem or roots of the conflict. Most people usually think of in love/not in love as the only variables at stake in a relationship but there are many others involved. Probably, love is the engine that makes couples try their best to move forward.

It is always worth paying attention to the following factors when couples struggle:

✓Did something change in the relationship?
✓Did the couple go through some kind of stressor or unwanted experience?
✓ Are childhood issues or past experiences causing problems?
✓Is the family of origin provoking frictions in the relationship?
✓Is a particular position in the family of origin creating personal issues that impact the relationship?
✓Are financial problems a huge concern?
✓Are parenting style differences leading to arguments and resentments?
✓Is intimacy and sex not satisfactory?

All the above are just possible sources of conflicts in couples and there are many more. These issues are always mixed up and tend to overlap each other.

Find out here how couples therapy can help you.

Sometimes, although it is easy to identify the causes of struggle, it is difficult to deal with all the problems and side effects that they have provoked. Other times, the couple’s dynamic changes and it’s not clear why or how to rebuild or recreate the relationship. Many couples come to sessions without understanding why their relationships are so worn down. In these cases, couple therapy helps to discover hidden or unknown issues in couples.

Yes, love is not enough to keep couples together but it is more than enough to make partners work for a better relationship.

This might interest you: Couple Therapy: How does it work