After reading the article “Can We Talk? Researcher talks about the Role of Communication on Happy Marriages” I decided to take a long look at my current relationship with my husband as well as my past relationships. After some thought I believe that self-disclosure in your intimate relationships is a crucial factor in having a successful and happy marriage/relationship.
When I was younger I usually chose to keep everything in and hated disclosing anything personal to my partner. I was young and engaged and our relationship failed before even making it to the alter. We had been together since I was 16 and broke up in our early 20’s. We fought a lot because we both chose to live separate lives and never really disclosed any personal information to each other. I liked to keep a wall up as some may say. We usually fought because of miscommunication because we never disclosed anything in each other, this would lead to a lot of misunderstanding and both are minds wandering thinking the worse when the situation could of easily been resolved if we just sat down and talked things out in the first place. After meeting my husband our relationship is completely different from any of my past relationships. We have a wonderfully happy marriage and I do think a lot of it is due to the hard work we put into our communication and self-disclosure between each other. He tells me everything and I tell him everything. Now I do believe when it comes to genders things are a little different.