The first couple I interviewed is Misty and Lyndon Tharp. They have been married for 5 years and have two daughters age 6 and 3. Their house is pretty chaotic most days. Lyndon works for the railroad and is gone about 70 hours a week. Misty is a very hands on mom seems to do most of the communicating. She is very outgoing and talks about a mile a minute. Lyndon is much more reserved initially. When you talk to Misty and Lyndon as a couple, she is very dominating in conversation. Lyndon can barely get a word in edge wise. If Lyndon does speak up, Misty almost always interrupts him. Their style of communication seems passive aggressive. Their ease of communication is not really present. Both Lyndon and Misty agree that their communication isn’t very effective. Misty admitted to cutting Lyndon off a lot when he speaks and she admitted to belittling him in conversation which is apparent even to me. Lyndon views his communication style as being passive. He would rather Misty get her point across rather than have a big fight or discussion. Misty views her communication as dominating and aggressive and wishes Lyndon would speak up more. Both Misty and Lyndon agreed that their communication changed significantly after their kids were born. They can’t remember the last time they had an adult conversation that did not involve the children or the children being present. My evaluation coincides with their
