The Wellness Connection with Fiona Kane

How to Be a Better Partner in a Long-Term Relationship | Ep. 126

• Fiona Kane • Season 1 • Episode 126

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How to be a better partner in a long-term relationship isn’t about perfection, it’s about growth, awareness, and real connection. 

In this episode of The Wellness Connection, Fiona Kane shares honest lessons from over 35 years of marriage, including how to manage emotions, avoid emotional landmines, and communicate with love instead of defensiveness.

Whether you're in a committed relationship or preparing for one, this conversation offers practical tips and deep reflections on what truly helps love last.

Learn more about booking a nutrition consultation with Fiona: https://informedhealth.com.au/

Learn more about Fiona's speaking and media services: https://fionakane.com.au/

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Credit for the music used in this podcast:

The Beat of Nature

Music by Olexy from Pixabay



Fiona Kane:

Hello and welcome to the Wellness Connection Podcast. I'm your host, Fiona Kane. Today I'm going to talk a little bit about relationships. Now, I'm not a relationship expert by any means, and so this is really just general things I've learned along the way for myself and, in general, just working with my clients. So it's just sort of some tips and some ideas and things that I have learned that help with your, with romantic relationships, with them, with basically making a marriage work, uh so, but also anything to do with relationships obviously expands out to other relationships, because just learning how to have a healthy relationship, uh yeah, obviously that works in lots of different ways.

Fiona Kane:

So one of the things I've learned, that one of the most important things I've learned, is that we can't change what other people do. We can't force people to be different. We can't force people to do different things. We can't force or change another person. What we can do is we can make changes ourselves.

Fiona Kane:

So my starting point is always well, what can you do that's different within you? Because sometimes I find that you know I was guilty of this myself kind of saying, oh, why doesn't he do this, or why does he do that, or I wish he would do this other thing. And then I kind of I turned it around and thought, well, what would elicit that behavior in him? And it's not going to be nagging or saying you should do this or you should do that. I said, well, what behavior in him. And it's not going to be nagging or saying you should do this or you should do that. I said, well, what, what behavior in me? What's something I could do different that would change the way that he responds and I noticed that that did make quite a difference. So just taking ownership for how I was being now, what that looks like in your relationship it might be lots of different things.

Fiona Kane:

So it might mean making an effort to to you know it's like depends on that person's love language, right. So it might mean making the effort to do something that helps them out, or organizing a romantic dinner or a romantic time, or cooking a dinner, their favorite dinner, or just being kinder, even if you're feeling angry and even if you're feeling hurt, just trying to approach the situation and trying to approach the person with love, because often when we're feeling hurt and resentful, what we do is we punish our partner. So we either punish them with we're kind of mean, or we get cold and distant or all the different kinds of ways that we respond when we're feeling hurt and we're feeling angry or we're feeling like we're missing out. But of course, when we start behaving that way, we get the opposite of what we're looking for, because usually they kind of start to withdraw or they get angry or they get frustrated, and then you've got two people either withdrawn from each other or frustrated with each other or whatever, and you know, obviously it kind of just keeps snowballing and gets worse and worse. So really a big part of this in my experience is owning your own behavior, owning your own feelings and learning how to process your own feelings and change your own behaviors.

Fiona Kane:

Now there will be situations where, look, in some situations you're with a narcissistic partner who you know. If you're in a situation where you can't do anything right, no matter what you do, it's always wrong, there's never going to be enough. It's a whole different situation. Go and get help for that, because no matter how much you're changing yourself, that's not going to help anything. But I'm just talking for, you know, the average couple where you know we're just miscommunicating or things a bit flat, things not going so well. These strategies definitely work in those situations. So it's really. And the other thing too is that if you work on yourself so whether it be working on how well you manage your emotions and rather than acting out straight away, that you, you know, be calmer, if you work on things like your health and your mental health and all of those things, that will bode well for you anyway, will bode well for you in life, will bode well for you in life, it will bode well for you in your career or all aspects of your life, and if this relationship doesn't work out, it will also bode well for you in your relationship. So there's kind of no, you can't lose by working on yourself. You know, still a benefit, no matter what.

Fiona Kane:

But the other thing, too is just going back to what I was just talking about there before your owning your behaviors, your responses and things. This is a really big one for me, because when I was younger I was a bit of a hothead. Look, I still do. I get angry sometimes. We all know the different emotions that we experience and how well we manage them, that sort of stuff. I mean. Now, it's human. Of course I get angry sometimes, but when I was younger, I really didn't cope with it very well, or I didn't know how to manage my emotions or comfort myself or regulate my emotions.

Fiona Kane:

And what I used to do when I was much younger I've been with my husband for 35 years now what I used to do is I used to do when I was much younger I've been with my husband for 35 years now. What I used to do is I used to kind of what I would call throw landmines into the room, and a landmine would be a cutting remark, a snarky remark, a joke, but the joke wasn't a funny joke, the joke was on, it was cruel, right. So essentially, what I did is I used my wit or my words or my intellect or whatever I used those things to basically to to harm my partner, to harm my husband and I. So I'll just throw these landmines in, and you know I would feel better because, well, I got that off my system, right. But it didn't help anything because what I literally had done is thrown, you know, an emotional landmine into the room, and when you do that it harms everybody in the room, right? So it harms you, harms your partner, and you know if you've got children or other people. You know, obviously it just harms everyone, and it took me a while to realize that that's what I was doing.

Fiona Kane:

And then it wasn't. You know, there was no win-win, there was no win at all. And of course you'd sort of feel like, oh, like, oh good, I got that off my system. But then straight away you'd feel like, yeah, and then what? Did I win anything? And the answer was no, I didn't win anything and I just damaged my relationship. And you keep doing that for long enough. And then you wonder why you don't have a healthy relationship. There's a clue, and it's funny because I didn't see that I was doing it.

Fiona Kane:

One day my husband pointed it out to me. I won't go into details because I don't want to. He's not on this podcast, he doesn't want to. But yeah, one day he just pretty much held up a mirror to me and said look, I'm not, don't talk to me like that, that's not okay, whatever. And it's the first time I actually saw what I was doing and I really I was quite shocked that I saw what I was doing. I saw this behavior because I didn't think I was that kind of person. I thought I was a kind, nice, lovely person, all these things, all these ideas I had about who I was, and he basically held up a mirror. And what that allowed me to do, though, is because I could have just been angry at him for holding up the mirror and said no, no, I'm fine, it's just all you.

Fiona Kane:

But I must have just had, you know, had that aha moment, had that insight, and what I did is I started to notice, I started to. It's almost like I just started to observe. I started to observe my behavior, and I started to notice that I used to sort of use my words as weapons, and when I started to notice that, at first I was just observing it, but then, over time, when you start to observe it at first I was just observing it, but then, over time, when you start to observe it, you start to be able to stop it, because what happens is you see yourself formulating the words and getting ready to you know, throw this landmine. And then I was able to get to a point where I'd say to myself is that worth it? Is it worth throwing that? Do you really think it's a good idea? And so I was able to kind of start to change that behavior, but so that was actually really helpful, that I was able to listen that time and reflect and observe and see what I was doing and, at a certain point, pull back and start to recognize that that's what I was doing. And so now I'm much more likely to notice it and I've probably diffused at least 90%, if not more, of that kind of behavior Probably more, actually, I'm doing pretty well, but I've diffused so much of it because I was willing to look at it, I was willing to take ownership of it and I was willing to change it right.

Fiona Kane:

And that has made a huge difference, because we need to feel safe in relationships. And so if you're not feeling safe or your partner's not feeling safe, have a think about what that might be and, like I said, we can only change our bit. We can certainly communicate to our partner if they're willing to listen, like my husband communicated to me. So we can communicate and say no, I'm not feeling safe because, like, whatever the thing is. However, like I said, a lot of what you can do is something that you can do yourself. That's about making changes for you, learning how to regulate your own emotions and learning how to.

Fiona Kane:

So you know, know what happens is because we get, like I was talking about before, we're feeling so hurt and hard, done by and all the rest of it. You know, we go to our respective corners and we don't want to. No one wants to be the first one to, you know, to give in or to give up or whatever it is. But you know, the truth is that it doesn't get better until someone is actually willing to to um, you know, basically put the hand out. You know, so when, if you really love that person and or if you did once really love that person and you feel like you know you really want this to work, you want to make this happen, then you really need to find that spot in your heart of that love that you have for that person, or at least that affection, or even if you have respect or whatever level of whatever it is that you feel for that person. We need to be willing to actually kind of come from that place and just tap into that and go no, actually I really do love this person. Right now I'm feeling very hurt and angry, but I really do love this person. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to approach the situation love. I'm going to approach the person with love, because when you approach a person with love, you're more likely to have that person respond back in kind, as opposed to if you approach them with anger and bitterness, and you should do this, obviously. If you approach someone in that way, you're not going to get the response you like, no matter how justified you are. You could be the most justified and you could be right and all the rest of it, but good luck with that right.

Fiona Kane:

And it's that old adage. I think it was Dr Phil, yeah, dr Phil used to say this all the time do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? And that's actually a really, really good question to ask yourself, because this is a big thing in relationships Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? And so many people choose being right because they want to be right about whatever it is. And even now you know people are breaking up over politics and things like that. Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?

Fiona Kane:

Now, you know I'm not saying that that means you never, ever. I'm not saying that means you can't have any boundaries or you can't have any standards and you can't demand a certain type of relationship or behavior. Of course this isn't me saying let someone walk all over you and treat you like crap and it's only ever your fault and you should just put up with it and you should put up with anything. I'm not saying that at all. All right. So obviously, within relationships we still have, you know, healthy boundaries of whatever that, whatever that looks like for you and, and you know we, we have a, you know we get treated in a way that we expect to be treated right. So you know respect and all of those things. So obviously you that kind of for me that's a given, that that's there. So I'm not sort of saying, oh, don't have any expectations. Of course you have expectations, so you have those things there.

Fiona Kane:

But just remember, you know, do you want to be right, do you want to be happy? Some people they like me in my cutting remarks or whatever they want to win in the moment and the win in the moment might feel good, but that win in the moment is that, is it really a win? And so I would ask you if you feel like being right is really important to you when you really stop and reflect on it. Is that really a win? And maybe sometimes in situations it is, but I just you know and reassess that for yourself. Is that really a win, the fact that I'm right about this and I'm taking the moral high ground and I'm proving that I'm smart and they're stupid, or whatever the situation is Is that working for you? Is that helping the relationship? Is that just another version of a landmine or, you know, is that just healthy negotiation about a relationship? I don't know, but it's worth asking yourself that question, because do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? Well, I want to be happy most of the time, but I do have a need to be right as well. I'm a bit of a smarty pants. I think I know it all sometimes and so I balance that because I just know that's my personality and sometimes I just have to ask so, fiona, do you really want to be right about this? Is it that important to be right? Because sometimes it's just not that important.

Fiona Kane:

There are situations where being right and getting your own way is really important, and there are situations where it just doesn't matter, and it's knowing the difference. It's knowing that really doesn't matter and that's the other thing in relationships as well. Like, what we do sometimes is we, we go on about every little thing, about, you know, the dishwasher and this and that and whatever. And look again, I'm not saying this from some moral high ground where I've never been this person Honestly, I'm saying it because I am this person sometimes, you know. So don't, it's not a judgment, but we go on about so many of the little things that really don't matter and and and really save kind of these big conversations for the things that really do matter, for the big things. Because if you just barb at your partner over and over again oh you didn't do this in a dishwasher, if that's all I hear from you, obviously that doesn't bode well for a relationship because you're just going to feel attacked and judged and they're going to feel like it's never enough and never good enough, and I know I'm absolutely guilty of that at times. So, like I said, no judgment, but ultimately, if you want a healthy relationship, less of that would be really, really useful.

Fiona Kane:

So the other thing that I just wanted to bring up as well look, obviously, relationships. There's a lot in it and there's a lot you could talk about and I'm not going to cover it all here today. I'm just giving you some of the tips that have worked for me. And ultimately, it's about learning how to regulate your own emotions, learning how to know when you're throwing you know, basically landmines into a situation. Are you helping it? Are you all about being right and not being happy? Is that working for you? Are you coming at it with love? You know those sorts of things.

Fiona Kane:

Then there's one last thing I would mention to you is you know, it's not healthy to have big elephants in the room that we don't talk about. Sometimes it's just sometimes you're actually going to do the hard stuff and talk about things that are hard, and we think that avoiding them, you know, is helpful. But avoiding stuff is usually not helpful. It just gets bigger and harder and all the rest of it, and one of those is actually finances. Now, finances, I think, is one of the biggest issues in relationships, where people have the you know, the biggest stress and breakups and all of the rest of it.

Fiona Kane:

I would encourage you, no matter how hard it is and I know that my hubby and I we've had some tough financial times is you've got to talk about it and you've got to get help and sometimes that means you've got to get a financial advisor. Maybe you need to get a counselor as well, whatever you need, but we've certainly worked with financial advisors over our time and had advice and had help and just been really honest. Because, no matter how hard it is to be honest about finances and to come clean and to try, you know it's really hard. It's a real point of vulnerability and sometimes it's hard if there's an imbalance, if one person's earning more than the other and one person's spending too much or whatever. All those things are really really tricky and we do try and avoid them because it's hard. But avoiding them only makes it worse and you're more likely to end up with your relationship falling apart.

Fiona Kane:

So my advice to you is come clean about those things, because if you work with someone like a financial advisor or something like that, you can work together. If you're working as a team to resolve a problem, that works a whole lot better than if you're kind of like, not elephant in the room, we're not going to talk about it, we're not going to say anything, we're going to pretend it's not happening, that things just get worse when we do that. So that's in general in life, right Things don't get better if we avoid them, if we pretend they're not there. Generally speaking, a lot of problems get worse when we don't address them. So my encouragement is if there's big elephants in the room, that they've you know, you've got to talk about them, you've got to have this communication and um, and one of those things is finances. It's a really, really big one that we avoid talking about and we do that to our detriment.

Fiona Kane:

So, anyway, it's a bit of a shorter episode today, but I just wanted to give you just a few tips, a few things that I have learned about healthy relationships and things that we can do to maintain healthy relationships. Ultimately, we need to feel safe, we need to feel heard, but we also need to be aware of, well, what are we doing to help our partner feel safe and heard? Sometimes it's all about the list of the things we want, but we don't think about well and even just like, if you're not with a partner yet and you're looking for someone again, it's not just like, because a lot of women these days have this big list, have this big list of what they want their partner to be. You know, six foot tall, six pack, you know, six figures, all the rest of it. He must do this and he must have this and he must have that. Great. But how about? What do you offer? What do you bring to the party, right?

Fiona Kane:

So I think we have to remember we've got to think about what we bring to a relationship. Are we looking after ourselves? Are we eating well? Are we managing our emotions? Are we looking after our mental health? Are we looking after our financial health? Are we sensible with money, all the things? But what are we doing to make us a better person all around? What are you doing to make yourself a better person all around, whether it be spiritual, whatever it is? Are you working on you? Are you making sure that you're doing well? And if we are, then that's attracting that other person. But sometimes we've got this big long list and you know, if you're sitting on the lounge eating your Doritos and your trackies and you've got this big long list for the other person, maybe think about, think about. Well, you know what's in it for them as well, because a relationship is a relationship. It's going to be something in it for both people. So, yeah, anyway, just, you know, what we can do is we can control our own behavior, and what we can do is we can reflect on whether or not we are behaving in a way that is helping or hindering the situation. So that's what I would encourage you to think about for yourself.

Fiona Kane:

So please like, subscribe, share, rate and review the podcast. I'd really appreciate that. Share this episode with a friend if you think that they would benefit from it, and I'm always happy for people to comment or reply or whichever way, whether you're getting it on YouTube or whether you're getting it through your audio. But I'm happy to hear what you think as well, what your thoughts are. So what I like to do here is have real conversations about things that matter, and relationships matter. So I just thought I'd give you a little bit of the wisdom that I have, a little bit of what I've learned, and hopefully that helps you. I hope you have a great week and I'll see you all again next week. Thank you, bye.

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