Purim is considered a happy holiday, where everyone gathers together for a meal, a feast and joint parties.
This is a holiday that emphasizes togetherness and the individual within the whole, but there are those for whom the situation is very different.
There are many couples who experience loneliness during the holiday, and also throughout the year.
They live with a permanent mask in the relationship, they fake and fail to express the feelings, thoughts and things they would like to experience in the relationship.
Other couples find creative ways to solve problems in a simulated way that resembles a band-aid for difficulties, without going deeper and solving sediments and bitter feelings that accumulate over the years.
In the Latin language, the word mask means a face covering, in Hebrew it is a face covering or a costume.
The meaning is that we disguise ourselves as someone else, an idea, another person, etc.
Don't Let Your Differences Divide (Illustration), Photo: GettyImages
Masks in a relationship
Galit (pseudonym) came for treatment and shared the difficulties with her husband.
"I am 32 years old, married for 10 years and the mother of four small children. My husband, Asaf (pseudonym) is 33 years old and we fight a lot. There is a feeling of distance between us, as if we are putting masks on the relationship, there is a lot of bitterness and hard feelings."
She goes on to say: "Even when we have serious fights, Assaf wants us to have intimate relationships. Of course not by force, but that's the last thing I want to do. The situation bothers me because I have the feeling that the relationship is not real and honest, the fights never end and I want to resolve them."
I asked Galit to come to therapy with her partner, and I listened to their pain, their sense of falsification and their experience of loneliness, and together we tried to take off the masks and understand if it is possible to resolve quarrels through sex.
Many passions in a relationship (illustration), photo: Getty Images
During the treatment, we tried to define the phase that the couple is going through.
This is a "productive period", which is characterized by career development, family, relationship and raising children.
This is a difficult and complex period, when part of the routine causes distance and sometimes also a decrease in the frequency of intercourse.
During the treatment, we tried to understand together what the masks mean, is the relationship characterized by concealment, secrets or lies?
What characterizes the quarrels?
And is it right to solve difficulties through intimate relationships?
I explained to the couple that sex is not a means of solving crises.
They are indeed an important tool, but not to solve crises, the couple must first create closeness and intimacy between them.
The relationship is damaged (illustration), photo: Getty Images
so what are we doing?
It is important to talk
regularly with courage, honesty and in a real way about the relationship and the fake feelings.
Another step that can help is to be careful about a conversation that is characterized by a good word and encouragement on a daily basis.
In addition, it is recommended to go out as a couple at least once a week.
Regarding solving the problems through intimacy, it should start from the basics - words of affection, closeness, and only then progress to passion and sexuality.
It is important and can help happiness, but when there is precipitation it will solve the problem in a superficial way and give a wrong and fake feeling.
After you create friendship and intimacy, you can move on to the next level.
Successfully!
Dr. Ronit Sharon is a lecturer at the Hebrew University. She directs a relationship institute for couple and individual therapy with branches nationwide.
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