Table of Contents
Types of family stress
The types of family stress are divided into two categories: one type being from external factors, such as poverty or violence, and another type coming from within the family structure itself. Family stresses that come from outside forces include financial hardship and unemployment. Family stresses that come from within the family structure include divorce, mental illness, drug abuse and death of a spouse.
Marital Stress
Marital stress is the most common form of stress in families and describes any type of discord in a marriage. It can describe anything from mild disagreements to severe conflicts. One source refers explicitly to marital stress as “a state occasioned by persistent tension.” This perception reflects the notion that marital and other disputes are sources of most conflict for families.
Many stressors can cause marital distress. These include economic, social and cultural factors. For example, a recent study found that people who feel they’re missing important events in their children’s lives due to work commitments are twice as likely to have an affair than those with more flexible schedules.
Physical separation from a spouse or partner can also lead to poor marital quality. This is because it may reveal previously unknown problems in the relationship and lead to abandonment, insecurity, isolation and loneliness. These negative emotions are strong predictors of divorce rates between couples separated by geographical distance. Therefore, couples must be aware of the difficulty they may encounter when separated for long periods due to work or other reasons.
Inadequate family communication
The inability or reluctance to talk about feelings and concerns with others in the household can be stressful. Also, any problem that arises from poor communication between family members, such as hurt feelings or people feeling left out, can lead to psychological distress.
Communication overload, especially if you have it with more than one person, can be a problem. In addition, communication overload is often fueled by technology (e.g., e-mails, Facebook messages), where social life may be conducted outside of face-to-face dialogue.
Financial difficulties
Money is a big part of our lives, and it can get in the way of our family life. Financial difficulties can create severe stress that negatively impacts others. Consider it from the point of view of your spouse just barely getting by economically or not making enough to cover expenses, for example. Imagine them feeling bad about themselves all the time because they’re working hard financially, yet things are still going downhill fast.
Maybe you work too, so you both aren’t taking care of yourselves as you should be and now find that one partner feels neglected and unloved while the other partner feels uncared for, perhaps even physically sick with worry and fear every day? In short, an economic difficulty presents as an emotional problem within any family, often disrupting everyday family life.
Financial difficulties cause a strain on the family and have been shown to lead to conflict among family members.
Below is an outline of scenarios of family problems that are linked to financial difficulties:
- Nearly 2/3 of households with young children report financial stress
- Poor parents usually spend less time with their kids as they are preoccupied with finding ways to provide for them.
- Parents have more trouble making decisions and live in a constant state of fear of what will happen tomorrow—increased feelings of regret and guilt due to not keeping up.
- Attempts at coping often result in increased substance abuse or violence, forcing more distance between parent and child.
This cycle continues until it’s so destructive that one party decides they can’t take it anymore. Households facing difficulty turn into fractured ones hastening the process of detachment.
Work pressures
Job role dissatisfaction: The turnover rate in the professional world is not something we see every day. It’s become a regular occurrence, especially since the covid 19 pandemic, and for a good reason.
Job role dissatisfaction happens when people are no longer satisfied with their job role or work environment. This dissatisfaction can lead to burnout – physical exhaustion coupled with emotional detachment from one’s job – and, if left unchecked, will affect family life and mental health. In addition, unhappy workers are likely to become unhappy family members.
Occupational stress and family life: People are likely to be working more hours than ever before, juggling family and work demands, leading to father or mother being away from the kids for long periods. This situation causes more significant child-parent conflict and distance within the family unit. In some cultures, this situation is exacerbated because mothers – not fathers– are primarily responsible for childcare.
This issue also increases marital stress because spouses may have different expectations about who should care for the younger children and what that should look like. Just handling all these things while balancing a career puts pressure on an individual both professionally and personally, which leads to them thinking, ‘I want out’ (of their job). As a result, some people choose to leave one job to find another to provide more overall satisfaction.
One income family stress: Workplace or employer downsizing, retirement, and a changing job market impose new pressures on the family. Many spouses of older workers who retire seek to keep working because they can’t afford to live on their smaller incomes.
The increased financial pressure on families is one reason that the divorce rates are going up among older adults, and it’s also why there has been an increase in people over age 50 living with extended family members.
In addition, children who have to care for aging parents also may experience increased levels of stress and anxiety and an inability to focus on their own needs, a situation describing spillover effects. No matter the cause or type of family stress, it is vital that people find ways to take care of themselves emotionally to maintain their mental health.
Family and work stress: (How does work stress affect family life?) Many parents have trouble balancing their work lives with raising a family. Such parents include those who work in high-powered, demanding positions that require them to be away from home often. They also include parents in the military (military family stress) or those who work shift jobs that require them to be at work when their young children are asleep or at school.
Responsibilities of parenting
Parenting means to care for and nurture someone, but also to take on significant responsibility. Parents must provide for the needs of their children and other family members and ensure their children have a healthy upbringing by providing stability, guidance and instruction. However, when conflicts and stress hamper those tasks, parenting responsibilities can become one reason a parent feels overwhelmed by life.
Furthermore, there is a concept called “parental guilt”, which can be broadly thought of as the feeling of inadequacy when we take on specific family roles or tasks. It’s so common because many parents feel like they have to do everything with their children themselves, but this leads to exhaustion and frustration. For example, if the parent wants a child to learn something new, they often want to teach them how themselves, even though it might be more efficient for an older child who has already learned that subject matter to help teach the younger sibling. Ultimately, parental guilt creates resentment from both the parent and children towards one another.
Family health problems (e.g., chronic illness)
Family health problems can be very stressful. If the illness is chronic or recurring, it can cause issues with finances, work-life balance, and mental health that may need to be addressed. Having a chronic illness in the family can lead to higher levels of stress in families, and difficult discussions around the quality of life and goals for the future. It’s important to talk openly about these topics and find ways for every household member to make decisions that will help their situation while preserving everyone’s needs.
A significant source of stress for some people is the lack of control in their life. If a person has a chronic illness, there’s little one can do but wait it out, leading to feelings of helplessness or even anger with themselves or others around them. It’s not only the chronically ill person that feels this way. Many of their family members, friends and caregivers may feel helpless or angry as well.
It is widespread for people with chronic illness to lose some level of independence over time. This new circumstance can be challenging both emotionally and physically.
Family members, friends and caregivers who do not have the time, ability or desire to be with a chronically ill family member may feel helpless, angry, frustrated or guilty about their independence.
Emotional distress caused by a death in the family
Death in the family can cause a significant amount of anxiety. An event or significant life change such as death is an example of a family stressor, and people deal with this stressor in different ways.
When faced with this type of stressor, some family members might be more likely to notice that some relationships within the family are stronger while others seem less so over time. Each member will have their coping mechanisms that govern how they respond to this stressor, leading them to feel more cautious and on guard than usual.
Families most often note feeling like they are just “going through the motions” during this period of loss, as it’s difficult for anyone involved to think about anything other than what has happened. Reports of increased marital instability usually occur among couples coping with grief.
There are several ways mourning and death in the family stress can impact those left behind, including feelings of guilt; feeling that life will never be satisfying or enjoyable again; an out-of-control sense of anger and irritation with everything and everyone, and suicidal thoughts.
Divorce or separation of parents
Divorce is a huge source of stress on children because they miss out on the most important person in their life.
Parental divorce can lead to family stress. In the divorce, children may feel anger and resentment towards one parent or both parents, especially if they feel responsible for the break-up. Parental divorce can also result in guilt and self-blame among adult children for the failure of their parents’ marriage.
Additionally, some children may be prone to long-term behavioral problems due to a lack of continuous parental monitoring and poor parental responses because their parents’ time is spent at work or focused on other relationships post-divorce.
Parental divorce can also create feelings of guilt and abandonment in those that feel they bear more responsibility in the marriage than their partner. Custody arrangement and living arrangements can yet be another significant source of stress.
Many adults raised by divorced parents cite the instability they experienced as children due to frequent moves or changes in school districts, lack of financial security, constantly changing living arrangements, and the lack of consistency in parenting, harsh discipline, etc. The experiences may then impact their parental practices as adults.
Other examples of family stress
Listed below are just a few examples of family stress:
- Arguing and fighting with the spouse or partner.
- Arguing and fighting with parents.
- Fences between brothers, sisters, extended family members, or “in-laws.”
- Family valuables being broken (e.g., dishes).
- Picky eating habits of kids in the household.
- Cooking meals for the family.
- Taking care of children that were not yours from a previous relationship or marriage but you became their guardian somehow and are now tasked with disciplining them when they disobey you
- Unequal distribution of housework among spouses/parents or having a job out of the home
- Competition with other activities, such as hobbies or friends, especially when these activities are more important than family time.
- Communication problems in the household – too many secrets shared by one spouse to another or not feeling able to be honest about what is wrong and how it may affect the other parent
- Financial struggles because couples want different things
- Feeling unhappy with the way your life turned out relative to hopes and expectations you had when you were younger, married, and had kids. For example, you might be tired of being a parent or partner despite spending most of your life thinking this was what you always wanted.
- Feeling like your kids are a burden (even if you care about them and love them)
- Feeling like you’re doing the best you can, but it isn’t good enough
- Feeling like you constantly have to apologize to your kids for everything you do and that they don’t appreciate it
- Feeling like you aren’t getting the respect or love that you deserve from your kids
- Feeling like the only way you can get respect or love is to punish and criticize them
- Feeling like your house is a constant battleground, where being right means more than being loving
- Feeling like you can never get your kids to behave or listen, no matter how hard you try.
If you are struggling with family stress, please contact your doctor or a mental health professional for help and support.