Hi there and welcome to day 19. Today we are going to be taking a look at the health of your relationships. It may sound bogus, but there are several ways love and relationships can affect your ability to stay healthy. You crave to love and be loved, so being in a relationship is not an unusual phenomenon.
However, some relationships cause more harm than good and leave you drained emotionally. How do you differentiate between a healthy and abusive relationship? Can love and relationships affect your health? You will get answers to these questions today.
When you’re in a good relationships, it works wonders for your health because it helps you to be emotionally stable. You go through life as a happy individual who finds it easy to rest, to sleep at the appropriate time and to eat as well. People in positive relationships live longer and are more productive with less chance of developing coronary heart disease or high blood pressure. A loving partner can also notice little signs of illness and will insist that you see a doctor to stay on the right track.
Features of a Healthy Relationship
Without a doubt, I’m sure you desire to have a healthy relationship with your partner, friends and family, so, I’ll share some features of a good relationship.
• Both partners can manage differences without threats to end the relationship.
• Both partners consciously make the relationship a priority and not an after-thought.
• Both partners readily give attention to the desires of each other without grudge or ill-feelings.
• Both partners avoid all forms of abuse: Emotional, Verbal or Physical abuse
• Both partners are committed to making the relationship work, by giving all it takes wholeheartedly.
With these in mind, a good relationship fosters trust, love, honesty, mutual respect, with communication and compromise between partners. You can freely express your innermost thoughts and feelings in a healthy relationship without any fear of condemnation.
The Signs of an Abusive Relationship
Just like risk factors such as unhealthy diet, high level of stress and lack of exercise can negatively impact on your health leading to blood pressure, your relationship is another variable that could predispose you to have high blood pressure. The blood pressure gradually rises when your body continues to secrete stress hormones, accompanied with heart palpitations due to being in an unhealthy relationship, which leads to anxiety with symptoms like loss of appetite, sleeplessness, and churning of the stomach. When you always experience anxiety and emotional pain due to a relationship that’s going bad, it affects your internal balance. You could end up with depression and also indulge in unhealthy habits such as eating junk food, or drinking alcohol because you’re emotionally unstable. The pattern could continue and result in high blood pressure, and other chronic diseases like cardiovascular diseases or some forms of cancer.
Unhealthy relationships almost always involve some form of codependency. Codependency refers to someone being dependent on their partner’s acceptance for their personal happiness and self-worth.
Being in a codependent relationship could either mean spending a large amount of time trying to please your partner by making adjustments, or expending time and effort in an attempt to change your partner. You’re neither happy nor satisfied in the relationship, it’s technically unhealthy, but you’re afraid to end the relationship or even to contemplate losing your partner.
Codependency means preferring to stay in an abusive relationship, rather than to be alone and seek a relationship that is fulfilling with the potential of bringing all the love and commitment you deserve. If you’re making too many sacrifices for your relationship to stay on tracks, but not receiving much in return, then you’re stuck in a codependent relationship, and you need to get out to preserve your health and dignity.
Don’t allow your inhibitions to ruin the chance to find the love and joy you truly deserve. Believe in yourself and know that being in a healthy and happy relationship is achievable.
Let’s jump over to today’s exercise in our excercise book and take a good hard look at the relationships in our lives.
