By Debbie Harrower

Your relationship is and always will be a work in progress. Are you making any of these mistakes in your relationship?

Withholding affection / intimacy for silly reasons

There is no excuse for anyone to have an affair. We all know that. But, a sad reality of life is that people have affairs – all the time.

There is no guarantee that your partner won’t be tempted to cheat on you. But, the chances of someone cheating go up considerably when they are unhappy or feel unfulfilled in their relationship.

So many women withhold affection and intimacy from their partner if they feel he is not ‘behaving’ the way they want him to.

I get so annoyed when I hear friends say things like ‘If Ray doesn’t do x-y-z for me, he doesn’t get any s-e-x from me’.

OMG! Really woman?  Your man is not a dog. AND, you are not the only woman he can ‘get some’ from. What you can do, someone can probably do better.

If you do this type of thing to your man – stop it. It’s pathetic. You are practically begging him to cheat on you.

Stop being a control freak

How did you react when you were younger and your parents put a tight leash on you? Did it anger you, make you want to rebel?

The same thing happens when you try to control your partner. You cannot police his every move. You are not his boss and you do not own him.

Everyone needs to have interests and activities outside their relationship. Time alone with your friends occasionally is normal and healthy.

You need to create a space in which your relationship grows, not suffocates to death.

Give your man some space.

Don’t get personal during arguments

Belittling your partner during a fight is NEVER a good idea. Making nasty remarks about their appearance / their manhood, is just spiteful.

Once you have spat out those venomous words, there is no taking them back. No matter how nice you are to him once you have made up, even if you say 10 000 times how sorry you are and that you did not mean what you said, you have tattooed those thoughts into his brain.

He will always have those comments floating around the back of his mind.

If you would not want him to say mean things about your stretchmarks, saggy boobs and whatever else – don’t do that to him.

Arguments are going to happen, learning how to maintain respect for your loved one during those times is so important.

Argue don’t attack!