Making Room for ME in Relationships: Why It’s ESSENTIAL to Tell Your Partner What You Need + FREE My Personal Compass Worksheet

Even if you love your partner and believe you have a strong bond with them, it can be hard to tell them what you need.

Why?

Because you don’t want to come across as bossy, needy, or demanding.

So instead of telling your partner that you need to go to bed by 9 p.m., eat a vegan diet, or talk to them at some point every day, you decide to stay quiet.

Maybe you tell yourself that you’ll communicate your needs to your partner later on in your relationship—when things “feel more secure” or you’ve been together longer.

Or maybe you even try to convince yourself that your needs aren’t all that important or that you should leave them behind now that you’re no longer single.

This may seem like the best way to avoid “rocking the boat” and make your relationship last.

But in reality, if you want to feel happy and satisfied—both in your own life and in your relationship—it isn’t just helpful to tell your partner what you need. It’s essential.

Why?

I’m glad you asked! Because that’s exactly what I’ll be diving into in this blog post.

Keep reading below to find out WHY it’s mission critical for your relationship to tell your partner exactly what you need.

Why Should You Bother with Communicating Your Needs?

Even if you generally feel at ease with your partner, you might feel awkward or uncomfortable with the idea of telling your partner what you need. Why is it worth it to push through these uncomfortable feelings and communicate your needs to your partner?

Because when you tell your partner what you need, it…

Sets the Stage for Personal Happiness

Why? Because YOU MATTER!

No matter who you are and what your story is, you have needs.

Maybe you need to start off your day with yoga, see your friends in person every week, or have “me” time to decompress at the end of the day.

If you feel uncomfortable about telling your partner what you need, you might try to ignore your needs or devalue them.

But the reality is that the needs you have—whether they’re physical, emotional, spiritual, or sexual needs—are no different from the need to eat or sleep. Just like you can’t make your need to eat or sleep go away no matter how much you try to ignore it, you can’t make your need to have alone time or connect with your friends go away.

Some of the needs you have might be ones that you can fulfill without your partner’s help or involvement. For example, if you need to have time to recharge by going to a yoga class every day and you’re able to go to a lunchtime class near your workplace, you can meet this need without your partner having to do anything.

However, you’re bound to have needs that require your partner’s cooperation or support to fulfill. For instance, if you live with your partner and want to maintain a vegan diet, you’ll need to work with your partner to figure out how the meals you prepare and eat together will meet your dietary needs. And of course, if you have relationship or sexual needs—like needing to talk to your partner every day or make time for intimacy every few days—you’ll need to get your partner involved to fulfill them.

If you need your partner’s help to fulfill your needs and you don’t communicate these needs to your partner, you’re setting yourself up for a situation where your needs don’t get met. And because having your needs met is essential to feeling happy and satisfied—both in life and in your relationship—not communicating your needs paves the way for unhappiness, dissatisfaction, anger, and resentment.

At a minimum, you might feel that you’re not as happy as you could be because something that’s important to you is missing from your life. But as many of my clients have experienced, not having a key need met can also lead you to feel angry and resentful toward your partner.

In comparison, when you do tell your partner what you need (and articulate these needs clearly), you make it much more likely that your needs will get fulfilled. You make it more likely, for example, that you’ll be able to go to bed at 9 p.m. the way you need to or spend the first 30 minutes of each day doing stretches or sun salutations. When your deepest needs are satisfied, you’ll set yourself up to feel happy and fulfilled. And when you feel happy and fulfilled, you’re more likely to be in the right headspace to be a supportive partner and build a loving relationship with them.

Helps Your Partner Succeed in the Relationship

When my clients feel that their needs aren’t being met in a relationship, something I often hear them say is, “Why doesn’t my partner just know what I need? Isn’t it obvious???”

No matter who it is who asks me this question, I have the same answer every time: “no.”

The reality is that no matter how close you are with your partner or how long you’ve been together, your partner can’t read your mind. And they might have very different needs or ways of navigating life and relationships.

For instance, you might need to talk to your partner every day in order to feel connected to them. However, for your partner, daily communication might not be something that they need or that they’re used to doing in a relationship. So if you don’t tell your partner that you need to hear from them every day and why this is important to you, they might have no clue that you need to talk to them in person or on the phone at some point every day. (Just on another note, if this sounds like you, ask yourself why it is important to you to talk to your partner every day. Is it necessary? Is it a trust issue?)

However, when you clearly communicate your needs to your partner, you take the guesswork out of the equation. This way, your partner understands what you need from them and what they need to do to help your needs get met.

If your partner truly loves you and wants you to be happy, they’ll be open to hearing what your needs are and motivated to fulfill them. You can make their job easier by telling your partner what these needs are and helping them figure out how they might be able to fulfill them (or support you in fulfilling them).

And of course, by being vulnerable and assertive doesn’t mean that every need that we have will be fulfilled. Some of our needs truly come from our lower ego versus our higher self. But when you assert yourself authentically, you are more likely to find solutions with your partner that can lead to fulfillment of both your and your partner’s needs.

Shows That You Care About the Relationship

You might worry that if you tell your partner what you need, you’ll jeopardize or harm the relationship. But the reality is that when you clearly communicate your needs to your partner, you show that you truly care about the relationship.

Why?

Because opening up about what matters to you and helping your partner understand this takes courage. And doing it regularly requires commitment. If you didn’t care about the relationship, there would be no reason to put in this kind of effort.

So when you do put in the work to tell your partner what you need and, therefore, help them succeed as your partner, you show that you love them and want to make the relationship work. This can help your partner feel secure about your relationship, your love for them, and your intention to work through challenges for the sake of long-term, enduring love.

Allows You to Assess Fit Sooner Rather Than Later

In a relationship, compatibility isn’t about having the same needs as your partner does. You can have a strong, loving relationship with someone even if you like to start every day by going for a 30-minute jog whereas they like to sit in bed, drink coffee, and read the news.

Instead, compatibility is about having a partner who’s able and willing to meet your needs (and doing the same for them). For example, if it’s really important to you to go for a jog every morning, your partner doesn’t have to enthusiastically lace up their running shoes and go with you at the crack of dawn every morning. But they do need to be okay with the idea that you might get out of bed before they do and the two of you might start your day by doing different activities. If they’re not okay with this—if they believe that the two of you should get out of bed at the same time every morning and sit down together for breakfast until you have to leave for work, for instance—your partner might not be right for you.

Of course, there are some cases where both you and your partner need to have the same needs in order for the two of you to be compatible. If you really want to have kids at some point, for example, it’s important that your partner shares this desire. Similarly, if it’s really important to you to get married eventually, you’ll want to be with a partner who wants to get married eventually too.

In either case, communicating your needs to your partner will help you determine whether the two of you are truly compatible with each other. It allows you to find out whether your partner is willing and able to meet your needs (even if they don’t share your needs).

If, through this process, you verify that your partner is able to fulfill (or help you fulfill) your needs, great! If not, it might be tough to realize that you and your partner aren’t on the same page. But at least you’ve discovered this now rather than later. And you can make a conscious decision about whether to stay in the relationship or move on.

Strengthens Your Relationship

Telling your partner what you need involves opening up, talking about what really matters to you, and being vulnerable. These behaviors don’t just allow your partner to truly get to know you. They also allow the two of you to connect emotionally on a deeper level—which is essential to developing a strong, loving bond.

In addition, when you communicate your needs to your partner (and give them the chance to do the same), you create the opportunity for the two of you to work together to meet each other’s needs. As you work collaboratively to support one another and fulfill each other’s needs, you’ll deepen the trust and sense of security between the two of you. This will create a foundation that sets your relationship up for long-term success and allows you and your partner to feel safe, valued, satisfied, and loved.

Don’t Hesitate to Communicate Your Needs

When you’re in a relationship, you might hesitate to tell your partner what you need because you don’t want to seem demanding or needy.

But the reality is that clearly communicating your needs to your partner is essential for long-term love. It allows you to achieve personal happiness and satisfaction, help your partner succeed in the relationship, and build a strong emotional bond with them.

Of course, before you can communicate your needs to your partner, you need to clearly understand what your needs actually are. Understanding your needs is easier said than done. In fact, like a lot of the clients I work with, most people aren’t consciously aware of what their deepest needs and desires are. Years ago, I didn’t really know this and so many of my needs were neglected and in truth were quite superficial. But I’m glad that I am not that person anymore. I learned the hard way, but I am happy I did.

That’s why I’ve created a FREE worksheet for you called My Personal Compass.

It’ll help you gain clarity on who you are and what really matters to you so that you can communicate this to your partner and use it as a basis for building a strong, loving bond.

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.

See you again soon!

Vera

P.S. Even once you know what your needs are, it can still feel hard or awkward to communicate them to your partner. If you need some help with telling your partner what you need, check out the video I made on this very topic right here.

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