Analysis of Relational Communication PDF

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Christyna J Mota Grand Canyon University Course Number: COMM – 100 Lori Cipriani June 25, 2021

2 Every relationship that individuals establish is different from one another, and they go through stages as the relationship progresses. One relationship that everyone forms are friendships. When you first meet someone, you do not know everything about them, and it takes time to learn more information. Some friendships are short-lived, some last longer than others, while some last a lifetime. Throughout my life I have experienced various kinds of friendships and each one of them went through stages, specifically the Mark Knapp Relational Stages. The Mark Knapp Relational Stages is a breakdown of the coming together and the coming apart of a relationship. The relationship that I will be focusing on is the one that I have with my daughter’s father. It was a relationship that was once romantic that fell apart but grew into a friendship that is beneficial for our daughter. Coming together stages The coming together stages include initiating, experimentation, intensifying, integrating and lastly bonding (Farmer, 2016). The model that Knapp came up with shows that increase of communication aids in the progression of the relationship (Farmer, 2016). “Movement through the stages is systematic and sequential because progression through the stages is dependent on the groundwork prepared in the previous stage (Farmer, 2016).” Unfortunately, Phil and I skipped several stages in our relationship which created an unsteady foundation that ultimately led to our separation. The beginning of our relationship was a quick start and we quickly when through the first stages up to the intensify stage, which is the stage where intimacy increase physically and emotionally (Farmer, 2016). In 2014, we were blessed with the birth of our daughter, and it caused our relationship to rapidly go through the integrating stage which was mainly one sided. He was in the military and away from his family, while I lived very close to mine. I introduced to

3 my family and friends, and he was very standoffish. At the time I thought it was just because he was an introverted person, whereas I was a very extroverted person. When we moved out of California to North Carolina, I quickly realized that it was because I was more involved and attached to the relationship than he was. Once we moved to North Carolina, we spent three months together then he had to deploy for nine months. During this time, we started entering the beginning stages of coming apart. Just like the coming together stages, there are five in the coming apart stages. They consist of differentiating, circumscribing, stagnating, avoiding, and terminating (Farmer, 2016). We began to not see eye to eye, almost every conversation turned into an argument, and the relationship started to deteriorate on our shaky foundation, we found ourselves in the circumscribing stage. While I became so obsessed with trying to communicate our problems and finding ways to fix what I thought was broken with us, I was pushing him further and further away until he got into the avoiding stage and just so happen to deploy.

Coming Apart Stages

In the avoiding stage, “the partners in a relationship are making themselves unavailable and trying not to be around each other physically or emotionally. When couples experience this stage, they start to avoid emotional intimacy by not being around their partner or by simply failing to disclose personal information (Farmer, 2016).” While it was not his fault that he was physically away, there were times where we could have communicated when he emailed, skyped, or called, but he would choose not to.

4 In 2017, we decided to separate which terminated our romantic relationship. When most relationships end, usually both parties do not speak with one another. However, we had a daughter together and I thought it was extremely important for her to have both parents in her life. I did not want to fight him for custody because I did not want to take my anger out in court and potentially hurt my daughter. Even though he was not the right partner for me, he was and still is a magnificent father to my daughter. He puts her needs first, he is on the same page with me when it comes to her well-being, and he always communicates with me when something happens with her.

Forgiveness

The Waldron and Kelley forgiveness Model suggests that it is composed of seven communication tasks the first being confront the transgression (Kelley, 2016). We both had our fair share of transgressions in our relationship, and it was important for us to address those. The second step towards forgiveness was to manage our emotions. I can be a very emotional person, so it was crucial for me to not erupt in anger as we relived those transgressions. The third step was to engage in sense making, which meant we had to process our understanding of our new relationship and where we stood. The next steps were to seek forgiveness, grant forgiveness, renegotiate the relationship, and manage the transition (Kelley, 2016). As time went on, we were able to put aside our differences and have an open conversation without arguing and discuss what we planned for our futures. In many relationships where couples forgive, it is important to note that you can forgive the other person and not

5 reconcile, and you can reconcile without forgiveness (Kelley, 2016). We were able to effectively communicate by listening to what the other was saying and not take what was being said personally. Due to this, I was able to forgive him and myself for the relationship falling apart and we were able to focus on properly building a better foundation for a friendship.

6 References Farmer, Jessi. (2016). Chapter 7: Interpersonal Relationships. In Grand Canyon University (Ed.) Human communication. Retrieved from https://lc.gcumedia.com/com100/humancommunication/v1.1/#/chapter/7 Kelley, Douglas (2016). Chapter 8: Maintaining Interpersonal Relationships. In Grand Canyon University (Ed.) Human Communication. Retrieved from https://lc.gcumedia.com/com100/human-communication/v1.1/#/chapter/8...