Family conflict is one of the common factors that cause psychological instability as well as easily lead to stress for parents and children. Therefore, regardless of the cause of the quarrel, it should be resolved early to avoid causing long-term effects.
What is family conflict?
Conflict in the family is simply understood as quarrels, conflicts, disagreements that occur within the family. It can be a dispute between husband and wife, parents and children, or between children in the same family. In fact, family conflict is one of the inevitable situations and it comes from many different causes that are related to the interests, values, and needs of each person.
In most families, there have been conflicts, big and small, between members. While this is not an uncommon condition, if left untreated it can have a wide range of consequences that affect all members, especially young children.
Sometimes conflicts that arise in the family cannot be resolved in the same way as outside social relationships. If there is no patience, tolerance and thoroughness in behavior, it will make the argument even more stressful, even leaving many lasting consequences over time.
Causes of family conflict
Conflict in the family can happen for many different reasons. In reality, every family will have unique problems, disagreements, conflicting opinions and desires. Sometimes, due to the inability to understand and sympathize with each other, conflicts and arguments arise.
Here are some family conflicts that can lead to stress:
1. Disagreement
This is considered one of the most common reasons that can lead to conflicts between family members. Also because each individual will have separate views, thoughts, and desires, sometimes there will be conflicting opinions. Not only for couples, but also generation gap is one of the factors that cause conflicts.
In fact, at each social stage, there will be different standards and lifestyles. If parents and children do not know how to respect each other's views, it will easily lead to quarrels and conflicts. Some families often have the notion that children must always obey their parents, not disobey adults. However, sometimes rigid and too strict upbringing becomes a big barrier to the relationship between two generations.
2. Due to lack of fairness
Children in a family should be treated fairly with each other. However, many families are not like that, they often give more love to their youngest child, son or children with good academic achievements and outstanding advantages. The bias of adults towards children will easily cause children to give birth to envy and jealousy with their siblings, thereby easily giving rise to conflicts and disputes.
In some cases, parents, because they love their children too much, are afraid that their siblings will hurt their children, so they sometimes spend harsh words criticizing and shouting at their children. This causes great trauma in the minds of children, many young children become shy and timid. Others have a violent attitude of protest and opposition because of the abusive and discriminatory behavior of their parents, thereby creating a big gap between family members.
3. Adultery
Whether it's mental infidelity or physical infidelity, this is also one of the big reasons why many families often have conflicts. When one of the two begins to have thoughts and desires for another person, it shows that they have gradually lost interest, care and concern for their partner.
The coldness and indifference in the marriage relationship will cause both of them to often have conflicts and quarrels. In particular, conflicts caused by adultery show up at a violent level, seriously affecting psychology and family life.
4. Lack of responsibility
A happy, strong family needs to be built on the sense of responsibility of family members. If a person is not responsible, always leaving everything to others, sooner or later there will be conflicts and conflicts in the family.
Especially in our country, many families still have the concept of "respecting men and women", all housework is the responsibility and duty of women. However, nowadays women still step out into society and still own the economy, so they are no longer limited by the narrowness of the kitchen.
Therefore, after working and returning to their home, they were also somewhat tired and did not have much energy left. If at this time family members do not share the housework but put that responsibility on the shoulders of women, it will also lead to conflicts in the long run. When their tolerance has reached the limit, they will begin to act against, protest, even lead to divorce.
5. A few other reasons
Besides the reasons mentioned above, family conflicts can also arise due to a few reasons as follows:
- Due to blind jealousy
- Due to lack of mutual respect
- Not knowing how to listen and understand
- Due to parental control, excessive control of children
- Due to the high expectations of family members
- The way to educate children is not appropriate
Signs that you are stressed because of family conflicts
Conflict in the family is also one of the common causes of stress. When constant quarrels occur, family members will be greatly affected psychologically and daily life activities, especially children.
Depending on the cause and extent of the conflict, the manifestation of stress will be different. In addition, the psychological effects also depend on the personality and life experience of each different subject. Some people only experience stress at the time of conflict, while others feel anxiety and insecurity continuously over a prolonged period of time.
Some signs indicate that you are stressed because of family conflicts such as:
- Low mood, sadness, depression, anxiety.
- Heavy, negative mood for a long time.
- Unable to control their own emotions, it is easy to get angry, irritable, agitated before problems and unusual events.
- Not wanting to talk to family members, even showing a cold, indifferent attitude.
- Loss of concentration, work and study efficiency decrease significantly.
- Sometimes due to excessive stress, it will easily lead to the use of offensive words, behaviors, and gestures, smearing, and criticizing other family members.
- Some young children will develop a hostile mentality, become stubborn, irritable, and violently rebel against their parents.
- Many cases isolate themselves, do not want to meet and interact with anyone.
If this situation persists and does not have an appropriate solution, it will cause family members to gradually separate from each other, even causing more dangerous mental health problems. In many cases, due to not being able to solve problems and instability in psychology, many people perform negative behaviors, causing unpredictable consequences.
Tips to help you overcome stress because of family conflicts
Conflict in the family, if it continues for a long time, will affect the mood and daily life of family members. Stress due to family conflicts can only be overcome when conflicts and arguments are well resolved.
In fact, conflict is inevitable when members of multiple generations live together. However, if you know how to reconcile and behave properly, the conflicts will soon be resolved, family members will sometimes understand each other better.
Here are some helpful tips to help you quickly overcome the stress of family conflict:
1. Straight talk
Perhaps when there is a conflict, it is difficult to stay calm to solve the problem together. However, if you choose to keep quiet, the problems will not be resolved, in the long run, when encountering similar situations, both will still quarrel, even leading to serious consequences. than.
Therefore, after the argument, when you realize that you are calm and mentally stable, both of you should sit down and have a frank discussion with each other. Let's tell each other about our thoughts, views and desires so that we can understand each other better.
You should understand that conflicts and quarrels in the family often come from both sides. So don't be too rigid to hold your opinion but let's "forward - backward" together at the right time. Let the other person know your wishes, point out the mistakes that you are not satisfied with, and vice versa so that you can try and correct them together.
A frank, constructive conversation will help both of you quickly resolve the conflict, thereby minimizing the stress and tension caused by family conflicts. For children, parents should also use a gentle, soft attitude to analyze for their children to understand and perceive more properly, so that they will know how to adjust more properly.
2. Change your mind
Sometimes you can't change and adjust other people's thoughts to your liking. Therefore, in order to keep peace and have a good relationship with your family members, you should also learn to change your own thoughts and views.
With close family members, sometimes you don't need to be too clear, specifically distinguishing right from wrong. After arguments and conflicts occur, you should first look at yourself and adjust your thoughts in a more positive and optimistic direction.
You should understand that no one is perfect, no matter how much love they give you, they will not be able to spoil you in all situations. Therefore, learn how to change yourself, every day try to perfect yourself so that your family life is always full of laughter and happiness.
At the same time, if you can adjust your thoughts in a more optimistic and positive direction, you will avoid the risk of stress because of conflicts occurring in the family. However, not every situation requires you to yield and endure.
If your spouse is an irresponsible person, cheats many times, no longer wants to cultivate family happiness, then you should strongly end this relationship to reduce pain for yourself and your children. mine. Sometimes ending an unhappy marriage is a good choice for you to enjoy life comfortably.
3. Learn to listen and understand
The reason why family members often quarrel and conflict is the lack of empathy, understanding and sharing. If you do not know how to listen to the other party, conflicts are inevitable. Therefore, train yourself to listen and understand, before you have a dissatisfied attitude with someone, try to put yourself in their position and feel.
Each person will have a different way of seeing and evaluating the problem. Therefore, do not rush to judge without fully understanding their thoughts. When disagreements arise in the family relationship, the best way is to bring together thoughts and share your views.
When you understand what other members feel, you will also gradually empathize and understand them better. Thereby reducing unnecessary conflicts, the state of stress will also be greatly reduced.
Psychologists have also said that if family members share, listen and understand each other, all conflicts can be resolved quickly. Therefore, the best way for you to overcome the feeling of stress, fatigue, stress because of family conflict is to stop criticizing and listen and share more with each other.
4. Control your emotions
To overcome the stress period because of constant conflicts in the family, you need to know how to control your own emotions well. When conflicts arise, if you do not know how to regulate your emotions, your words can easily hurt the other person. When you are overwhelmed by emotions, you will not be able to control your actions, your language, and sometimes you will behave inappropriately.
Usually, the feeling of stress after quarrels and conflicts in the family often appear in people with high self-esteem, sensitive or in puberty children, adolescents. To be able to release all negative emotions well, the best way is to learn to control your own psychological state.
As soon as you notice signs of stress, find yourself activities to relax and relieve effectively. Stress will gradually be reduced if you listen to music, watch movies, read books, take care of bonsai, exercise, go for a walk, soak your feet in warm water, practice yoga, cook, etc. If negativity reigns for too long, it will seriously affect mental health.
5. Get the help of a psychologist
If you can't get out of stress because of family conflict, the best way is to seek the help of a psychologist. Being able to talk and consult with experts will help you relieve stress, anxiety, and insecurity in your heart. At the same time, they will also give some useful tips so that you can quickly resolve conflicts that are occurring.
When you consult with a psychologist, you will learn how to better regulate and control your emotions. Experts will also help you see your shortcomings and change your perspective in a more correct direction.
Experts recommend that you participate in psychological counseling with family members so that all can understand and share with each other more. At the same time, experts will also help you improve communication skills, solve situations, relax, reduce stress to avoid troubles in daily life.
Stress due to family conflict is not a new problem, but many people do not know how to relieve it, making mental health worse. Hopefully, through the information of this article, readers will know how to overcome conflicts in the family and connect and tighten the relationship between members.