Do You Have Healthy Romantic Boundaries?
Create relationship boundaries that enhance your lives.
Think about what is important to you and have a discussion about these things before they become an issue. Click To Tweet
Finances.
Financial issues can strain any relationship. It’s important to discuss your preferences.
Would you loan money to your neighbor? Friend? Sister?
Who pays for dates?
Do you prefer separate bank accounts? How much can one of you spend without consulting the other?
Financial issues are a regular cause of relationship issues. Create acceptable financial boundaries and hold each other to them. Prevent any financial disagreements before they happen.
The past.
You’ve both dated others.
Are the details of those past relationships off-limits, or do you both want to examine the other’s past?
What do you consider worthy of conversation, and what do you think should be left in the past? Each couple has a different opinion on this matter.
Privacy.
Does your partner have a right to know where you were Saturday night?
Should one partner have open access to the other partner’s journal? calendar? phone?
How much privacy is acceptable?
Some people want to know every detail, while others prefer more privacy.
Anything else that matters to either of you.
Think about the healthy romantic boundaries that you need in your relationship to feel comfortable.
What can you tolerate? What are you unwilling to tolerate?
Your relationship is unique.
Think about what you need and why.
Be clear about your expectations.
Be careful not to weaken your boundaries with these behaviors:
A lack of willingness to state your preferences. You’re undermining the whole purpose of having boundaries when you refuse to let your opinions be known. Ask yourself why you’re unwilling to let your partner know what you want.
Accepting poor treatment or behavior from your partner. When you’re willing to accept poor behavior, your partner will assume that any boundaries you agreed upon are optional.
Guilt. There are times your partner may be frustrated by the boundaries. That’s not a cause for guilt feelings. Perhaps the boundaries can be revisited, but avoid feeling guilty for something you both agreed upon.
There’s no point in setting boundaries, only to turn around and sabotage them. Belittling your boundaries like this is likely to cause resentment.
What healthy boundaries do you want in your relationship? What do you need? Click To Tweet
Sit down with your partner and talk about what you both expect from your relationship. Cover what you are willing and unwilling to tolerate.
Set boundaries that will strengthen your relationship and stick to them.
These agreed upon guidelines can prevent a lot of relationship stress and make room for more joy.
Now it is your turn, please offer a favored piece of relationship advice in the comments below.
38 thoughts on “Do You Have Healthy Romantic Boundaries?”
I feel like a lack of communication, especially in relation to boundary setting, comes from extreme fear. I pray over all of us that we find love and worth within ourselves so we can speak out truth and peace without fearing someone else will disrespect or leave us if not!
Finding love within ourselves can go a long way to helping us to find strength to speak our own truth.
“The past” has always been a problem. Thank you for pointing this out.
Thank you. I am just doing my part.
An excellent post. Even though I am not in a relationship at the moment, these tips can help me to work on my future relationships.
Entering into a relationship when already having a strong sense of self can be quite helpful to know your exact boundaries.
Thanks for sharing sometimes we are too busy in our life and forget to maintain our relationship proper way which is most important!
Life can definitely get very busy. With that, it can be easier to let things go that we would not normally.
Those are some great points to keep in mind and having a proper and healthy relationship is never easy. Communication with each other is definitely important as well as setting boundaries.
Having a proper and healthy relationship can have its challenges but it is definitely worth it.
These are fantastic tips to sit with your partner and ask each other! I believe it’s so important to have open communication and learn about each other’s expectations for the relationship. This is great, thanks for sharing these tips and questions to ask!
Tracy, you are very welcome. Open communication is definitely one of the keys to a healthy relationship.
Personal Boundaries are important because they set the basic guidelines of how you want to be treated. Boundaries are basic guidelines that people create to establish how others are able to behave around them. … Setting boundaries can ensure that relationships can be mutually respectful, appropriate, and caring.
Boundaries help in all areas of life. Creating boundaries is not about keeping people out. It is about guidelines to how you want to let them in. Thanks for your thoughtful comment.
I have a story regarding dining with an ex or a friend. I am not comfortable if my girlfriend would go dine with her ex but I would never forbid her from doing it. Once she asks me if it was ok to go dine with one of her friends because he wanted to bring her out to eat fondu at the restaurant. I say sure honey but inside I was kinda uneasy about the whole ordeal. So the next day I told her about my feeling and projected the situation on her in a non-threatening way. I say, Honey, “I think it’s ok that you go and dine with your friend, but I feel a bit weird about it. I would like you to imagine me asking you if it was ok that a girl I haven’t seen in a while that you don’t know wants to bring me to a chick fondue restaurant downtown so she will pick me up tomorrow and we will go out for dinner.” After thinking about it she automatically said that she would also be uneasy about it. Then she decided not to go because she understood me. So in short I think that without being controlling you can still affirm yourself solve problems without any friction.
Steven, thank you for sharing your story with us. This type of open sharing helps us all to learn. You felt uneasy and instead of bullying the situation into what you desired or just stewing in your feelings, you found a way to talk about it.
You bring up a lot of good questions, that I think are important to talk about in a relationship – new or old, just to make sure that you are on the same page 🙂
It is never a bad idea to reassess regardless of how new the relationship is or isn’t 🙂
Communication is the key. Although you can’t quite lay it all out at once but certainly as topics come up both parties should talk about their expectations and what makes each other comfortable.
Finding the best way to communicate with your partner (or potential partner) is very important. If a relationship cannot handle real talk then it is not a healthy relationship.
I think all of us can stand to evaluate our romantic boundaries. It’s so easy to lose ourselves or lower our standards when we’re in love, but the only does a disservice to us.
You bring up a good point about boundaries. When we are in love we can lose ourselves in the other person, our happy hormone is kicking and judgment can be clouded. Taking a step back offers a gift to all members of the relationship.
This is such an important question for us to ask ourselves. It’s easy to fall into unhealthy boundary issues in relationshipe.
Spending some time with the question and evaluating what it means to you is a brilliant idea.
What you wrote really made me think a lot, it’s a difficult question that I have to answer!
Thank you for giving it the thought and consideration.
Great tips. Even though I have not be in a romantic relationship for years, these tips are definitely helpful. Great post.
Thank you. It will be fun to see what they do for you.
Hi Elise,
I agree with your tips especially the tip about communication. That’s one of the reasons I married my husband. Communication keeps us strong.
Janice
If communication breaks down it all breaks down. I love that your comment helps to reinforce this.
Hi Elise,
Romance is the need of almost every single person. It is the food of a young soul. Setting healthy romantic boundaries are necessary for the growth of your romance and ultimate relationship.
What a great response…. in and of itself it is also romantic.
I have not dated in years. Maybe some day I will. This post has great information to consider and I know I would use it. Setting up a foundation is key in any relationship. AKA Boundaries
Honestly, most, if not all, of these tips could be used in just about any relationship.
I think it’s important to have a conversation about the past and decide what is off limits and what to discuss. Great points!
Thank you. Discussing what to review together is super helpful to the relationship as a whole.
Super important points you made here! Thank you for sharing!
Thank you. I am glad you found it useful.