Healthy RELATIONSHIPS: How Do I Know If My Relationship Is Healthy? + FREE Relationship Health Checklist

As human beings, we’re wired to form relationships with other people, especially romantic partners.

That’s why romantic relationships don’t just give us someone to curl up with on the couch or have sex with. They also boost our physical and mental health. In fact, when you’re in a healthy relationship, you’re more likely to be healthy, engage in healthy behaviors, and have a lower risk of dying.

Because relationships are such an important part of life, you might wonder just how healthy your relationship is. After all, it’s easy to find quizzes, cheat sheets, and checklists that spell out the signs of a bad relationship. But what about healthy relationships? What exactly do they look like? And how do you transform a relationship that’s rocky or even just okay into a better one?

If those are the questions that are running through your head right now, you’re in the right place. Because below, I’m launching a new blog post series on how to size up the health of your relationship.

In this series, I’ll help you assess how healthy your relationship is and give you some tips on how to turn a mediocre bond into a deeper, more loving connection.

Are you ready to get started? (I know I am!)

Let’s kick off this brand new series by talking about how to tell if your relationship with your partner is a healthy one.

In particular, let’s chat about the 6 characteristics every healthy relationship has.

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1. You and Your Partner Trust Each Other

I’m sure that I don’t have to tell you that trust is HUGE in relationships. When you put your heart on the line and share the deepest parts of yourself with someone, you want to know that your partner has your back.

Of course, in romantic relationships, trust means more than believing that you and your partner won’t cheat on each other. When you and your partner trust each other, you don’t keep secrets or hide information from one another. Even more importantly, though, you feel safe with each other and know that you won’t hurt each other.

You build trust with a partner when each of you shares things about yourself and accepts one another for who you are. Trust also forms when you have a chance to realize that your partner is dependable and will be there for you.

For example, Anna and Ben are in a relationship together. As a young adult, Anna struggled for years with an eating disorder. It’s something that she doesn’t share with many people out of embarrassment. But because Anna trusts Ben, she’s able to share her story and her past with him. When Ben responds by being there for Anna and keeping her story to himself, it only solidifies the trust that Anna has in him.

2. You’re Honest with One Another

When you’re in a healthy relationship, you and your partner aren’t afraid or hesitant to be honest with one another. That is, you aren’t afraid to share who you are, what you’re passionate about, what matters to you, and what you want out of life. In other words, you aren’t afraid to be the real you.

Of course, it’s natural to hold back a bit early on in a relationship. So if you just started dating your partner or are only a few months into your relationship, don’t panic if you haven’t divulged every deep dark secret to your partner. Openness and honesty develop with time. So as long as you’re continuously sharing who you are with your partner, it’s okay to let the openness and honesty between the two of you develop in its own time.

It’s also important to keep in mind that honesty in a relationship doesn’t mean that you have to tell your partner every single thing. For instance, in a healthy relationship, you don’t need to tell your partner everything you talk about with your mom or let them review all of the text messages on your phone. And you shouldn’t need to give your partner a play-by-play of what you’re doing when you go out alone with friends.

Being open and honest with your partner is also important for cultivating trust in your relationship. Remember the story of Anna and Ben from the previous section? When Anna opened up to Ben about her eating disorder, it created an opportunity for trust to deepen between them. It showed Ben that Anna trusted him enough to confide in him. And it gave Anna an opportunity to realize that Ben is trustworthy.

3. You Respect Each Other

It might seem obvious. But it’s important to note that healthy relationships are also characterized by mutual respect.  

Respect can take may different forms in a romantic relationship. For example, you and your partner might show respect for one another in the following ways:

• really listening when the other person has something to share
• forgiving each other for mistakes
• creating space for the other person in your life
• making an effort to get to know people and interests that matter to the other person
• allowing the other person to retain their individuality
• encouraging each other to pursue your goals and dreams
• validating the other person even when you don’t agree with them

For example, let’s say that Ruby and Megan have different opinions about the amount of screen time that’s appropriate for their 3-year-old son. Ruby believes that allowing their son to have a limited amount of screen time each week is okay whereas Megan thinks that he’s too young to have any screen time. Ruby and Megan might not agree with one another on this topic. But because they’re willing to acknowledge the validity of their partner’s opinions and understand the reasoning behind it, they respect each other.

4. You Both Actively Support Each Other

You probably know that healthy relationships are characterized by reciprocity. In other words, you do things for your partner, and your partner does things for you.

But in a healthy relationship, no one is keeping score. And neither you nor your partner are indebted to the other person. Instead, you each do things for one another because you genuinely want to. Although you know that your partner loves and cares about you, you don’t expect anything in particular in return when you help or support them.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that you can’t speak up in the relationship if you feel that your partner isn’t pulling their weight. For instance, if you and your partner agreed to take turns driving your teen to 6 a.m. swim practice but you’ve played chauffeur every time for weeks now, it’s reasonable to have a conversation with your partner about how to achieve better balance.

You also don’t have to always support each other 100% equally. For example, let’s say that you break your leg and can’t do many of the household chores you usually take on. While you’re recovering, your partner might take on the extra responsibilities and tend to your needs. In a healthy relationship, your partner does this without expecting that you will do something to return the favor (although it would be normal for them to assume that you’d do the same for them if the tables were turned).

A relationship can still be healthy even if one partner routinely provides more support to the other. What matters is that both partners are okay with the support they provide in the relationship and the support they receive.

5. You Care About One Another

Deep levels of trust, honesty, and respect are key traits of healthy relationships. But when you’re in a romantic relationship, you don’t just want to know that your partner is a good person who is dependable and respectful. You also want to know that they care about you. That’s why care and affection are important in romantic relationships.

Now, when I talk about affection, I’m not referring to passionate love. Passionate love is the kind of love that’s high in intensity and characterized by strong emotions and a desire to be physically close to your partner as much as possible. It’s common at the beginning of many relationships. But over time, it transforms into compassionate love. Compassionate love is love that involves intimacy, commitment, affection, and trust.  

Keep in mind that there’s no “perfect” or “ideal” level of affection a relationship needs to have to be healthy. Some healthy couples might be very affectionate—always holding hands and exchanging kisses in public—whereas others might show affection through more subtle actions, such as making coffee for one another or volunteering to take on extra chores when the other person has had a rough or stressful day. All that matters is that both members of the couple are satisfied with the amount of affection they give and receive in the relationship.

6. You Communicate Effectively with Each Other

Finally, if you and your partner have a healthy relationship, you communicate effectively with one another.

Communication is important in every type of relationship—both personal and professional ones. But it’s especially critical to have good communication in romantic relationships because you and your partner spend lots of time together and your lives are highly intertwined.

Being able to communicate effectively with your partner is important in a relationship because it helps you tell your partner what you need from them to ensure your needs are met in the relationship. This makes it more likely that both you and your partner will be happy in the relationship and committed to building a lasting connection with one another.

However, communication is also essential for navigating conflict effectively in your relationship. You see, when you spend as much time as you do with a romantic partner, it’s only inevitable that conflict will arise sooner or later. This is the case no matter how strong your bond is and no matter how long you’ve been together. You and your partner are different people with different opinions, preferences, and goals. So it’s only natural that you’ll have conflicting needs or disagree with each other from time to time.

When you and your partner communicate effectively with one another, you’re able to resolve differences in opinion or other types of conflict that arise successfully. Instead of exploding, calling each other names, walking out on one another, or even avoiding difficult conversations with one another, you’re able to honestly share your thoughts and feelings and respond compassionately. This makes it more likely that both of you will share information that the other person needs to know and be motivated to work through and resolve challenging situations.

For example, let’s say that Jade has been finding that when she comes home from work late at night, the sink is full of dirty dishes—dishes that her husband, Mike, used. Jade likes to have a clean home and also doesn’t want to spend the little free time she has when she gets home washing Mike’s dishes.

Because Jade and Mike communicate well, she’s able to start a conversation with him about the dishes, compassionately explain why they bother her, and state what she needs from him (to wash them!). She doesn’t stay quiet about it until she’s ready to explode or lash out at him for “not caring about her” or “being lazy.” As a result, Jade and Mike are able to resolve conflict effectively when it arises and prevent it from negatively affecting them or their relationship.

How Does Your Relationship Stack Up?

It’s easy to believe that a “good” or “successful” relationship is characterized by big romantic gestures, public displays of affection, or lots of sex.

But the truth is that it’s the characteristics that I laid out above that more commonly define healthy relationships. After all, although it’s nice to have someone to hold hands with while taking a walk or lie next to in bed, it’s things like trust, mutual respect, honesty, and effective communication that create solid foundations for relationships.

These characteristics of healthy relationships are important not just for defining healthy relationships but also for understanding how you can improve your connection with your partner.

Often, it’s easy to believe that if there are no glaring issues with a relationship (like cheating or lying), there’s nothing that you and your partner need to work on.

But from working as a therapist for years, I’ve learned that most relationships aren’t failing to be strong and satisfying because couples are unfaithful to each other or lying to each other. Instead, it’s because they don’t have as strong of a foundation as they could in one of these 6 key characteristics that define healthy relationships.

When I dig into the foundation of a relationship and assess its health, I often find that couples (even ones that seem pretty solid on the surface) can deepen their connection by simply strengthening their communication or supporting each other more.

And you know what? I want to give you this same kind of insight.

That’s why I developed my FREE Relationship Health Checklist.

It’ll help you assess the health of your relationship and gain clarity on the specific areas that you and your partner can focus on to build a deeper, more loving connection.

Also, I want to let you in on a secret: I’m about to unveil something extra special. It’s a project that’ll help you take the bickering, resentment, and stress out of your relationship and build a deeper, more loving bond with your partner. Keep an eye out for more details here very soon!

And if you haven’t done so already, follow me on my Facebook page Vera Velini – The Assertive Happiness Coach. That way, you’ll be among the first to hear about new blog posts, resources, and master classes.  

Until next time!

Vera

P.S. What’s the difference between the relationships that go the distance and the ones that don’t? Check out the video I made on the #1 thing that successful couples do every day.

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