Money biggest cause of marital distress

FINANCIAL pressures mounting on couples are causing sleep deprivation, anxiety and alcohol abuse, and are increasingly a factor in troubled relationships.

According to the Catholic counselling service Accord, two-thirds of almost 4,000 couples who sought help in the first six months of this year had financial concerns.

A further 39% of clients said finance was a “serious issue” for them. In some areas, this rose to more than 40%, while in Galway, 54% of clients said finance was a “serious issue”.

Furthermore, 83% of clients stated they were stressed, while 52% said that they were feeling depressed.

Jane Ferguson, co-director of counselling with Accord, said the service had seen a 10% increase in clients last year and an 11% rise so far this year.

Ms Ferguson said that 80% of clients this year said criticism and insults were a part of their relationship, while one in three spoke of emotional abusive elements in the relationship.

“When an external difficulty such as losing a job or living under the threat of redundancy is added to the equation, people experience a whole range of emotions which might include anger, resentment, disillusionment, frustration, stress, anxiety,” she said.

“Some feel a sense of failure at not being able to provide a level of income sufficient to maintain the lifestyle that had been planned and some resent the fact that they are now financially dependent on the state or on their partner,” Ms Ferguson added.

“When people are under this kind of stress their whole lives are adversely affected,” she said.

“The inability to calmly discuss the issue, and to work out ways of dealing with the financial difficulties, can affect their health, disrupt their sleeping and eating habits, and people can turn to alcohol as a means of gaining temporary relief. Unfortunately, the distress, frustration and anger at the situation might also be misdirected and aimed at family members,” added Ms Ferguson.

Meanwhile, almost 7,000 new clients of the Money Advice and Budgeting Service in the first six months of this year were couples or individuals with children.

According to MABS, people who are under the stress of constant debt and dealing sometimes with more than 10 different creditors, will have to be rehabilitated in some way.

“MABS has considerable experience of the corrosive psychosocial effects of indebtedness on individuals and families. We hope that the many people currently experiencing this will return to employment or otherwise increase their incomes as the economy recovers,” MABS said.

“However, with so many people adversely affected, we believe that there are individual, economic and societal imperatives to put in place measures to rehabilitate over-indebted consumers.”