November 20, 2025 • 12 mins
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Is your behavior accidentally destroying your marriage? In this video, Kimberly Beam Holmes reveals one of the top predictors of divorce—second only to affairs—that most people don't even realize they are doing.
Control is a silent relationship killer. You might think you are just trying to "help" your spouse, protect your family, or make sure things are done "the right way." But to your partner, it feels like intrusion, intimidation, and a lack of trust.
At Marriage Helper, we see thousands of couples in crisis, and control is one of the hardest hurdles to overcome—but it IS possible. In this video, Kimberly breaks down the psychology behind why good people become controlling, the 5 distinct ways control manifests in a marriage, and gives you a 5-question self-assessment quiz to see if you are guilty of these behaviors.
In this video, you will learn:
- The Root Causes: Why fear, low self-esteem, and poor emotional regulation lead to controlling behavior.
- The 5 Types of Control: Intrusion, Intimidation, Correction, Disempowerment, and Emotional Coercion.
- The Self-Assessment: 5 honest questions to ask yourself right now.
- The Solution: Practical steps to stop controlling your spouse and start saving your marriage.
If you're struggling in your marriage, don’t wait. Get our FREE resource: The 7 Steps to Rescue Your Marriage 👉 https://marriagehelper.com/free
📞 BOOK A CALL WITH OUR TEAM: https://bit.ly/4fhb9Yz
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
In this video, I am going to reveal to you one of
the number one killers ofmarriages.
And here's the thing.
Once I tell you what it is,you're not going to want to
watch it, but you need to,please, until the very end,
because I guarantee you thatyou're going to learn something
in this video that you didn'trealize that you were doing that
is destroying your marriage.
(00:20):
And that thing is control.
I would venture to say that ofall of the marriages that we see
at Marriage Helper, and let'sface it, we deal with people
that are in some of the mostdire of situations.
They are in the middle of adivorce.
They have papers that have beenserved to them.
They are currently separated.
There are affairs currentlygoing on.
(00:42):
These are the situations we see.
And while affairs are probablythe most common situation that
we see, control is a very closesecond.
Control erodes relationships.
And the thing is, most peopledon't even know that they're
doing it.
I guarantee you that by the endof this video, you're going to
have an aha moment and you'regoing to realize that you have
(01:04):
been doing some things that eventhough you haven't intended for
it to come across ascontrolling, it has.
And you need to stop doing it.
In fact, I'm going to give you aquiz at the end of this video.
Five questions for you to askyourself to determine are you
being controlling withoutrealizing it?
But first, I want to dive intowhy do people control?
(01:27):
It's not because you're a badperson, more than likely.
You're a good person whohonestly is just trying to
protect yourself.
At its core, control is a methodof self-protection.
And so a lot of people controlfor one of three main reasons.
It's control out of fear.
I'm scared that you're going toleave me.
(01:48):
I'm scared that you're going toabandon me.
And so, since I'm scared, I'mgoing to try and control the
situation.
Sometimes people control becauseof low self-esteem.
They have a strong need to beright.
They have a strong need to bevalidated.
And even if we look at theresearch of self-esteem, the
lower self-esteem that someonehas, the more likely they are to
(02:09):
lie, steal, and cheat to protectthe way that they feel about
themselves.
Now that's on a drastic level.
But if we look at just a normalday-to-day life, I mean, think
of people you know who arehighly competitive.
A lot of times they want to winbecause to not win is some kind
of admission to themselves thatthey are flawed or that they are
(02:32):
wrong.
And so many times people withlow self-esteem try to control
in the marriage in order forthem to feel that they are
always right.
And then the third reason thatpeople can control is because
they have a poor internalemotional regulation.
They don't know how to beself-aware.
They don't know how to identifytheir feelings.
And since they aren't in tunewith themselves, they begin to
(02:54):
try and control everythingaround them for them to feel
better.
They're trying to control theirexternal circumstances to feel
better internally, and that'snever gonna work.
True peace is found withinourselves.
So those are the three keyreasons that people tend to
control.
But there are five ways thatcontrol tends to look.
The first one is intrusion.
(03:16):
Intrusion destroys autonomy andsafety.
What do I mean by intrusion?
Intrusion is I don't trust you.
So I'm going to follow you.
I'm going to look in your phone.
I'm going to tell you where youcan go, when you can go, how
long you can be there.
I'm going to give you a certainamount of money and you're not
going to have any more to spend.
All of those things we're goingto call intrusion.
(03:40):
I'm trying to tell you how tolive.
And that destroys someone'ssense of autonomy over time.
That's why it can be absolutelydevastating to relationships.
The second one is intimidation.
Intimidation stops genuineproblem solving because
ultimately intimidation is ifyou don't do what I tell you to
(04:03):
do, I'm going to try and coerceyou into doing it.
It's where the husband is sayingto his wife, if you don't get
your bachelor's degree or if youdon't get your MBA, you're never
going to be hireable in the jobthat you're trying to do.
If you don't do the things thatI am telling you to do, it's a
wife.
We had a situation, a couplethat one of our coaches worked
(04:25):
with where the wife felt thismoral superiority about a belief
that she had.
And she realized that herhusband was going to a barber
that believed the exact oppositeof her.
And so she started trying tocoerce her husband and saying,
if you go and continue to givemoney and pay money to that
barber, then I'm going to do X,Y, and Z.
(04:48):
It's intimidation.
And it doesn't actually allowyou to talk openly, freely, and
vulnerably with each other aboutthe core issues going on.
It builds walls and it stopscommunication.
The third way that we seecontrol happen is through
correction.
When someone is constantlytrying to correct the other
person, tell them that they'rewrong, tell them that they're
(05:10):
stupid, tell them that theyvoted for the wrong person, tell
them this, that, or the other,that is constant correction.
You don't think like me, youneed to change.
And until you do, I'm going tobeat you down with my words
until you finally just getexhausted and give up.
And that's what it does.
Correction erodes self-esteembecause over time, someone can
(05:32):
only hear so much that they'renot good enough before they
begin to lose sense of their ownreality.
It's control.
You're not accepting the personas they are, which is what all
of us so, so deeply want.
The fourth way that we seecontrol happen is through
disempowerment, which createsdependency.
(05:53):
This is where you begin tosimilar to some of the other
ones, you are pulling someoneaway.
You're taking away theirautonomy and their choices
because you begin choosing forthem, because you feel like they
can't make decisions forthemselves.
This is where a husband is maybewanting to do a different career
path.
He's wanting to change jobs, butthe wife is continually saying
(06:15):
to him, you can't do that.
You need to stay where you are.
You need to stay with what youknow.
You're not going to be hiredover there.
You're not good enough.
You need to do what I want youto do.
I'm going to empower you.
I'm going to tell you the rightdecision to make.
Maybe it's even in parentingwhere one parent feels like they
know more about vaccines orabout how a child should be
(06:37):
disciplined or about how totreat ADHD or whatever it might
be.
One parent feels superior.
And so they begin to make theother person feel like they
don't know enough to actually bea vital part of working together
to make a decision about what todo for the future.
And so it creates dependency andonce again erodes relationships.
(06:57):
And then the fifth and finalarea of control we see is
emotional coercion.
Emotional coercion fosters fearand avoidance.
It's where you just don't shutup.
You keep telling your spousewhat you want them to do and how
they're wrong and how they'rejust overthinking things or
overreacting.
And you're manipulating them byguilt, shame, or fear into doing
(07:21):
what you want them to do so thatyou'll be happy, but it
completely fosters a sense ofavoidance in your spouse where
they finally give in, but it'sjust to make you shut up.
They're so tired of hearing youtalk about the same thing over
and over that they just shutdown.
You think that they've finallyseen your point.
(07:42):
We see this a lot in religion,especially faith, like a
Christian faith, where a manstarts using the Bible over and
over.
We had a friend who years ago inhis in his marriage, his wife
was not wanting to have sex withhim because he was very
controlling in every other areaof the marriage.
And so in the bedroom, she alsodidn't want to be vulnerable and
(08:04):
give herself to him.
But instead of him trying tochange himself and seeing what
he was doing, he began to justcite scripture to her.
He began to read out toCorinthians about how a man and
a woman should be one and theyshould X, Y, and Z.
And he just kept on and on andon until maybe she would finally
give in.
Not because she wanted to,although in his mind he was
(08:26):
thinking, I finally got throughto her.
No, you wore her down until shelost all sense of wanting to
stick up for herself.
And she finally just did whatshe wanted because she felt
control.
No one wants to live in arelationship where they feel
like they have to walk oneggshells, change who they are,
(08:48):
and can't be accepted for whothey truly are at their core.
This is a key principle that weteach at Marriage Helper.
Now, here are five questionsthat you can ask yourself to
gauge whether or not you arebeing controlling without
meaning to.
The first one is this Do youfrequently feel the need to
check up on or monitor yourspouse's activities,
(09:08):
communications, or whereaboutswhen they aren't with you?
It's question number one.
Question number two, when adisagreement arises, does the
issue usually end with yougetting your way?
Or does your spouse frequentlychange their mind in order to
avoid an argument?
Question number three, do youcriticize your spouse's
decisions about their own life,like how they dress, who they
(09:29):
spend time with, what job theytake, as if they were mistakes
that you need to correct?
Question number four, how oftendo you avoid helping your spouse
with certain tasks, like doingthe bills, household chores, or
even parenting decisions,because you believe that you are
the only one who can do themcorrectly?
So you are leaving them out ofhelping you with it.
(09:50):
And then question number five,if your spouse were to freely
express an opinion that wassharply different from yours,
would you respond by withdrawingemotion, by refusing to talk, or
using silence to convey yourdisapproval?
If you answered yes to any ofthese questions, then you are
(10:11):
exhibiting control to someextent in at least one area of
your relationship.
And of course, the morequestions of those five that you
answered yes to, the morecontrol is actively hurting your
marriage.
And it needs to stop.
Here's the other truth that Iwill tell you of all the
marriages that we work with atMarriage Helper, control is one
(10:33):
of the hardest issues to help amarriage overcome.
But it doesn't have to be.
Here's what it takes to stopcontrol in your marriage and to
save it and turn it around.
It takes you realizing you'recontrolling and that you need to
change.
See, the marriages that we workwith that control is affecting
(10:53):
them, they could all be saved,every single one of them.
If one or both people in themarriage would take
responsibility and ownership torealizing that they are being
controlling.
That's all it takes.
And then actually changing yourbehaviors, changing the things
that need to be changed in orderto put your relationship back on
(11:14):
track, in order to build trust,in order to make sure that there
is healthy communication, thatthere are healthy ways that you
talk to and show acceptance foreach other.
That's what it takes.
So if you are sitting therethinking, I just realized that
there is an area I haven't evenrealized that I've been
controlling in, but I am.
Here's the good news (11:35):
you are not alone and there's absolutely
help.
We have programs, we have a keyprogram for you to learn how to
be different so that you canattract your spouse back, so
that you can turn your marriagearound and that you can have the
marriage you've always dreamedof.
You can't control your spouse.
(11:55):
The only person that you cancontrol and change is you.
And if you've been a controllingperson, you're in good company,
most of us have to some extent.
But the key is is hey, you'veyou've tried to control someone
else.
Use all that positive energy tocontrol you and to change you to
be the person that you need tobe in order to have a great
(12:16):
marriage.
We can help you do that atMarriage Helper.
You can book a call with someoneon our team that can speak with
you about what you can do now tochange the future and the
trajectory that you're on.
Because the more that youcontinue to just keep being the
way you are and continue tocontrol, the worse your marriage
is going to get.
Take responsibility, begin tochange the things that need to
(12:39):
be changed.
And it starts with you.
We can help.
Would love for you to book acall.
Until next time, remember thereis always hope.
In this video, I am going to reveal to you one of
the number one killers ofmarriages.
And here's the thing.
Once I tell you what it is,you're not going to want to
watch it, but you need to,please, until the very end,
because I guarantee you thatyou're going to learn something
in this video that you didn'trealize that you were doing that
is destroying your marriage.
(00:20):
And that thing is control.
I would venture to say that ofall of the marriages that we see
at Marriage Helper, and let'sface it, we deal with people
that are in some of the mostdire of situations.
They are in the middle of adivorce.
They have papers that have beenserved to them.
They are currently separated.
There are affairs currentlygoing on.
(00:42):
These are the situations we see.
And while affairs are probablythe most common situation that
we see, control is a very closesecond.
Control erodes relationships.
And the thing is, most peopledon't even know that they're
doing it.
I guarantee you that by the endof this video, you're going to
have an aha moment and you'regoing to realize that you have
(01:04):
been doing some things that eventhough you haven't intended for
it to come across ascontrolling, it has.
And you need to stop doing it.
In fact, I'm going to give you aquiz at the end of this video.
Five questions for you to askyourself to determine are you
being controlling withoutrealizing it?
But first, I want to dive intowhy do people control?
(01:27):
It's not because you're a badperson, more than likely.
You're a good person whohonestly is just trying to
protect yourself.
At its core, control is a methodof self-protection.
And so a lot of people controlfor one of three main reasons.
It's control out of fear.
I'm scared that you're going toleave me.
(01:48):
I'm scared that you're going toabandon me.
And so, since I'm scared, I'mgoing to try and control the
situation.
Sometimes people control becauseof low self-esteem.
They have a strong need to beright.
They have a strong need to bevalidated.
And even if we look at theresearch of self-esteem, the
lower self-esteem that someonehas, the more likely they are to
(02:09):
lie, steal, and cheat to protectthe way that they feel about
themselves.
Now that's on a drastic level.
But if we look at just a normalday-to-day life, I mean, think
of people you know who arehighly competitive.
A lot of times they want to winbecause to not win is some kind
of admission to themselves thatthey are flawed or that they are
(02:32):
wrong.
And so many times people withlow self-esteem try to control
in the marriage in order forthem to feel that they are
always right.
And then the third reason thatpeople can control is because
they have a poor internalemotional regulation.
They don't know how to beself-aware.
They don't know how to identifytheir feelings.
And since they aren't in tunewith themselves, they begin to
(02:54):
try and control everythingaround them for them to feel
better.
They're trying to control theirexternal circumstances to feel
better internally, and that'snever gonna work.
True peace is found withinourselves.
So those are the three keyreasons that people tend to
control.
But there are five ways thatcontrol tends to look.
The first one is intrusion.
(03:16):
Intrusion destroys autonomy andsafety.
What do I mean by intrusion?
Intrusion is I don't trust you.
So I'm going to follow you.
I'm going to look in your phone.
I'm going to tell you where youcan go, when you can go, how
long you can be there.
I'm going to give you a certainamount of money and you're not
going to have any more to spend.
All of those things we're goingto call intrusion.
(03:40):
I'm trying to tell you how tolive.
And that destroys someone'ssense of autonomy over time.
That's why it can be absolutelydevastating to relationships.
The second one is intimidation.
Intimidation stops genuineproblem solving because
ultimately intimidation is ifyou don't do what I tell you to
(04:03):
do, I'm going to try and coerceyou into doing it.
It's where the husband is sayingto his wife, if you don't get
your bachelor's degree or if youdon't get your MBA, you're never
going to be hireable in the jobthat you're trying to do.
If you don't do the things thatI am telling you to do, it's a
wife.
We had a situation, a couplethat one of our coaches worked
(04:25):
with where the wife felt thismoral superiority about a belief
that she had.
And she realized that herhusband was going to a barber
that believed the exact oppositeof her.
And so she started trying tocoerce her husband and saying,
if you go and continue to givemoney and pay money to that
barber, then I'm going to do X,Y, and Z.
(04:48):
It's intimidation.
And it doesn't actually allowyou to talk openly, freely, and
vulnerably with each other aboutthe core issues going on.
It builds walls and it stopscommunication.
The third way that we seecontrol happen is through
correction.
When someone is constantlytrying to correct the other
person, tell them that they'rewrong, tell them that they're
(05:10):
stupid, tell them that theyvoted for the wrong person, tell
them this, that, or the other,that is constant correction.
You don't think like me, youneed to change.
And until you do, I'm going tobeat you down with my words
until you finally just getexhausted and give up.
And that's what it does.
Correction erodes self-esteembecause over time, someone can
(05:32):
only hear so much that they'renot good enough before they
begin to lose sense of their ownreality.
It's control.
You're not accepting the personas they are, which is what all
of us so, so deeply want.
The fourth way that we seecontrol happen is through
disempowerment, which createsdependency.
(05:53):
This is where you begin tosimilar to some of the other
ones, you are pulling someoneaway.
You're taking away theirautonomy and their choices
because you begin choosing forthem, because you feel like they
can't make decisions forthemselves.
This is where a husband is maybewanting to do a different career
path.
He's wanting to change jobs, butthe wife is continually saying
(06:15):
to him, you can't do that.
You need to stay where you are.
You need to stay with what youknow.
You're not going to be hiredover there.
You're not good enough.
You need to do what I want youto do.
I'm going to empower you.
I'm going to tell you the rightdecision to make.
Maybe it's even in parentingwhere one parent feels like they
know more about vaccines orabout how a child should be
(06:37):
disciplined or about how totreat ADHD or whatever it might
be.
One parent feels superior.
And so they begin to make theother person feel like they
don't know enough to actually bea vital part of working together
to make a decision about what todo for the future.
And so it creates dependency andonce again erodes relationships.
(06:57):
And then the fifth and finalarea of control we see is
emotional coercion.
Emotional coercion fosters fearand avoidance.
It's where you just don't shutup.
You keep telling your spousewhat you want them to do and how
they're wrong and how they'rejust overthinking things or
overreacting.
And you're manipulating them byguilt, shame, or fear into doing
(07:21):
what you want them to do so thatyou'll be happy, but it
completely fosters a sense ofavoidance in your spouse where
they finally give in, but it'sjust to make you shut up.
They're so tired of hearing youtalk about the same thing over
and over that they just shutdown.
You think that they've finallyseen your point.
(07:42):
We see this a lot in religion,especially faith, like a
Christian faith, where a manstarts using the Bible over and
over.
We had a friend who years ago inhis in his marriage, his wife
was not wanting to have sex withhim because he was very
controlling in every other areaof the marriage.
And so in the bedroom, she alsodidn't want to be vulnerable and
(08:04):
give herself to him.
But instead of him trying tochange himself and seeing what
he was doing, he began to justcite scripture to her.
He began to read out toCorinthians about how a man and
a woman should be one and theyshould X, Y, and Z.
And he just kept on and on andon until maybe she would finally
give in.
Not because she wanted to,although in his mind he was
(08:26):
thinking, I finally got throughto her.
No, you wore her down until shelost all sense of wanting to
stick up for herself.
And she finally just did whatshe wanted because she felt
control.
No one wants to live in arelationship where they feel
like they have to walk oneggshells, change who they are,
(08:48):
and can't be accepted for whothey truly are at their core.
This is a key principle that weteach at Marriage Helper.
Now, here are five questionsthat you can ask yourself to
gauge whether or not you arebeing controlling without
meaning to.
The first one is this Do youfrequently feel the need to
check up on or monitor yourspouse's activities,
(09:08):
communications, or whereaboutswhen they aren't with you?
It's question number one.
Question number two, when adisagreement arises, does the
issue usually end with yougetting your way?
Or does your spouse frequentlychange their mind in order to
avoid an argument?
Question number three, do youcriticize your spouse's
decisions about their own life,like how they dress, who they
(09:29):
spend time with, what job theytake, as if they were mistakes
that you need to correct?
Question number four, how oftendo you avoid helping your spouse
with certain tasks, like doingthe bills, household chores, or
even parenting decisions,because you believe that you are
the only one who can do themcorrectly?
So you are leaving them out ofhelping you with it.
(09:50):
And then question number five,if your spouse were to freely
express an opinion that wassharply different from yours,
would you respond by withdrawingemotion, by refusing to talk, or
using silence to convey yourdisapproval?
If you answered yes to any ofthese questions, then you are
(10:11):
exhibiting control to someextent in at least one area of
your relationship.
And of course, the morequestions of those five that you
answered yes to, the morecontrol is actively hurting your
marriage.
And it needs to stop.
Here's the other truth that Iwill tell you of all the
marriages that we work with atMarriage Helper, control is one
(10:33):
of the hardest issues to help amarriage overcome.
But it doesn't have to be.
Here's what it takes to stopcontrol in your marriage and to
save it and turn it around.
It takes you realizing you'recontrolling and that you need to
change.
See, the marriages that we workwith that control is affecting
(10:53):
them, they could all be saved,every single one of them.
If one or both people in themarriage would take
responsibility and ownership torealizing that they are being
controlling.
That's all it takes.
And then actually changing yourbehaviors, changing the things
that need to be changed in orderto put your relationship back on
(11:14):
track, in order to build trust,in order to make sure that there
is healthy communication, thatthere are healthy ways that you
talk to and show acceptance foreach other.
That's what it takes.
So if you are sitting therethinking, I just realized that
there is an area I haven't evenrealized that I've been
controlling in, but I am.
Here's the good news (11:35):
you are not alone and there's absolutely
help.
We have programs, we have a keyprogram for you to learn how to
be different so that you canattract your spouse back, so
that you can turn your marriagearound and that you can have the
marriage you've always dreamedof.
You can't control your spouse.
(11:55):
The only person that you cancontrol and change is you.
And if you've been a controllingperson, you're in good company,
most of us have to some extent.
But the key is is hey, you'veyou've tried to control someone
else.
Use all that positive energy tocontrol you and to change you to
be the person that you need tobe in order to have a great
(12:16):
marriage.
We can help you do that atMarriage Helper.
You can book a call with someoneon our team that can speak with
you about what you can do now tochange the future and the
trajectory that you're on.
Because the more that youcontinue to just keep being the
way you are and continue tocontrol, the worse your marriage
is going to get.
Take responsibility, begin tochange the things that need to
(12:39):
be changed.
And it starts with you.
We can help.
Would love for you to book acall.
Until next time, remember thereis always hope.
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