EFFECTS OF ADDICTION ON MARRIAGE

EFFECTS OF ADDICTION ON MARRIAGE

Addiction is a disease that can affect your relationship life. A lot of crashed marriages and broken homes exist as a result of the effect of addiction on one or both of the partners. It is always a difficult situation to discover your spouse is going through a crisis and there is little or nothing you can do about it.

Addiction can make a partner that is so loving and affectionate to become so emotionally withdrawn and start exhibiting negative characters such as becoming abusive and obnoxious.

It becomes a worse situation for married couples who have kids that they cater for. They would be unable to explain their ordeal to the kids and there is a high tendency they get affected by the predicament faced by their parents particularly in school.

A child’s development and growth is usually linked to the connection they have with his or her parents. An excellent connection gives the child a sense of security and safety. However, a state where one of the parents is an addict, this can hamper the child’s progress to maturity.

It is important to note that addiction can easily destroy a marriage as any other marriage defects would such as issues of infidelity, abuse, trust issues and so on. Whereas marriage requires a partner to be selfless and always looking out for the good of the partner, addiction is entirely a selfish deed. Addicts think of themselves alone. As a result of this, marriage and addiction are two opposite experiences and cannot work together.

Unfortunately, addiction is always difficult to eliminate and if a partner refuses to do anything about it, the situation becomes aggravated. A lot of times, addicts in a marriage do not even consider their spouse and see the need to get help because of the self-satisfaction effect they get from addiction. They are blinded to how hurt their partners are and how their marriages are gradually declining.

Addiction often creates an unhealthy atmosphere in marriages. Addicts are always of the view that their predicament only affects them but that is not the case. It affects their partners as much as it does to them.

Addicts abandon their relationship, goals, interest and other responsibilities that comes with marriage and this makes their spouse feel less important than their addiction. Seeing a partner direct his or her attention on how to satisfy an addiction and contribute nothing to the marriage will discourage you and will gradually lose interest in the relationship.