Criticism and Blame Are Hurting Your Relationship - Here’s How to Heal

We’ve all felt that surge of anger towards our partner when our needs go unmet or an issue lingers, unresolved. In these cases, criticism and blame often feel like natural ways to express our frustration or ask for change. However, in close relationships, engaging in these communication styles can be deeply damaging, and have lasting negative effects. 

Criticism goes beyond addressing your partner’s behavior - it often suggests something negative about who they are as a person. Blame, on the other hand, serves as a defense mechanism by zeroing in on their faults and responsibility. Put simply: criticism attacks your partner’s character, while blame shifts responsibility away from you and onto them, preventing you from working together towards a solution.

Are You Criticizing or Blaming? Here’s How to Tell - and What to Do Instead

A common element of both criticism and blame is the use of absolutes such as “always” and “never”. If you hear yourself using these terms in your communication, you are most likely engaging in criticism to some extent. My first tip to anyone looking to improve their chances of actually being heard is to refrain from absolutes. Instead of, “you’re always on your phone, it’s like you never want to spend time with me” try a gentle-start up like, “lately, I’ve been feeling distant from you especially when you’ve been on your phone. I miss you and want us to spend more quality time together. Can we talk about how to make that happen more?”. More on gentle start-ups later!

When addressing an issue you’re having in your relationship with your partner, it’s best to focus on one issue at a time. Far too often, couples start discussing one problem, then that problem reminds them of another issue… and then, “remember when this happened?”... “It’s just like that other time”... before long, the expresser is drowning in anger and resentment, while the listener is walled up behind their fortress of denial and/or counterattacks. In these cases, the urgency to address all these problems feels so intense because you’ve lost trust in your relationship’s ability to solve them. What couples must understand is that slowing down is their greatest tool here, even though it goes against any natural instinct when we’re in distress. This is where a therapist comes in to help provide your relationship with the structure it needs, and equip the couple with the communication skills required to actually hear each other out. 

Another crucial component of improving communication through reducing criticism and blame is to focus on your feelings. Describe the situation as neutrally as possible in one or two sentences. Then share how you felt as a result. A good therapist will help you expand your feelings vocabulary (another blog post on this is underway!). Focusing on “I feel” statements allows you to own your emotions, rather than making someone else responsible for them. 

Healthy communication means explicitly stating your needs and desires. This one sounds obvious, but gaining clarity on your needs and desires requires honest reflection and a willingness to be vulnerable. Many folks in our society pride themselves on being self-reliant. While independence is a valuable quality, I would argue that knowing when to ask for help is even more important. After all, humanity is a social species, and as much as we would like to think “we can do it alone”, living a fulfilling life really does “take a village”. Moreover, a relationship takes two people to make it work. 

All of this boils down to the aforementioned “gentle/soft start-up”. The gentle/soft start-up is crucial for the longevity of your relationship, because it actually allows partners to identify and understand the problems at hand and work together on a solution. Imagine someone sharing with you a legitimate concern or complaint yet they don’t come off as critical or blaming. You probably don’t feel the need to armour up and defend yourself. Instead, you’re more likely to feel curious about their perspective and when you understand the full scope of their experience, you want to be helpful in resolving the problem at hand. You’ve probably engaged in this type of communication at work, or with friends. Why not try it with your partner the next time you want to bring up an issue with them. Before you go, I want to give you some examples of common complaints couples share with each-other, and what a gentle start up can look like:

Instead of…	Try…
“You’re selfish, you don’t care about anyone else!”	“I love you very much, and our relationship is important to me. Lately I’ve been feeling a little neglected, and I worry that there’s not as much time and space for us to connect. Would you be open to talking with me about this more?”
“You always make us late to everything…”	“Last night it was really important to me that we arrived on time to this event. I felt frustrated that we were late even though we previously talked about how to manage time better. Can you see where I’m coming from on this? I’d really like to figure out how we can move forward from this.”
“If it wasn’t for you, then…”	“I’m having a hard time feeling like we’re teammates on this. Do you have a moment for me to share my feelings about this issue? Right now, I’m just looking for emotional support and understanding from you. We can work out a solution later.”