Don’t think that all those couples that don’t argue simply ‘roll over’ when people bully them. It’s not like that at all. And we stand up for each other at all times. It just so happens that my wife and I don’t bully each other. And we don’t let other people bully us either. We’re adults, we can both get what we want with out hurting other people or each other.
I really don’t understand why anyone would stay in a relationship where that was common. Don’t understand it at all. I’d be gone in a flash.
Yup. I bet lots of couples do without screaming matches, but they still disagree (strongly but amicably) with each other on occasion. And while I’ve never had - in any relationship - the kind of arguments that required multiple exclamation marks, I have sometimes had discussions like this:
Which my ex categorised as an argument and would get upset and leave the room.
She was a wonderful person to have a relationship with, but it would have been better if we could have ever disagreed about something without it being extremely emotionally painful for her. (Obviously my own behaviour caused problems too; she is not the bad guy or anything like that).
So some couples never argue even in the ‘discussing different points of view’ sense because one of the two finds disagreement difficult, but that doesn’t mean there’s never any silent disagreement.
OTOH, I know a couple of couples that don’t have arguments or conflicts of any notable kind - they’re just very, very similar to each other.
There appear to be a lot more level heads here than mine. My husband and I sit down and work out the big things and let each other know when we disagree on the big stuff and work to a compromise. Usually, when making small decisions the deciding vote goes to the person who cares the most (for example, I don’t care what colour my car is and he doesn’t care what soap we use). Decision making we have down.
It’s the small day-to-day annoyances that cause our arguments. He often forgets to do something and it escalates (this is usually on the third or fourth nag). I just can’t envision a relationship where the other person does nothing to annoy you. And I am not the sort that can bottle it up for long.
Nailed it. My wife is on my side, she generally likes me and doesn’t want to do things to purposely upset me. Keeping that in mind, it is easy to resolve issues, she is either unaware that she has upset me or is having a bad day. If she is unaware, then I inform her, if she is having a bad day, everyone has bad days, I let it slide.
What I like about marriage is that I have someone who has my back, no matter what. It’s a great feeling.
My wife and I never argue. We sometimes have discussions about serious things. She even cries sometimes during serious discussions. But as far as I can recall, we have never yelled at each other or really “fought.”
My examples were in the extremes; I think its possible to get along without fighting yet still having an opinion.
But…I see a lot of people who pat themselves on the back for being such great communicators when in reality theyre so desperate to be with someone they simply avoid anything that might make their partner angry, regardless how they feel inside.
When my friends wife met him, he was living with his ex who was mooching off them. I figured something would change since neither of them were happy about it. Instead, nothing happened. His new girlfriend hated it, hated his ex, hated that he was letting his ex mooch off him. But she was afraid if she confronted him, he would side with his ex (“just friends”) at the time. She didn’t want to make waves and later bragged about how well they get along, but I think its because they never broached a topic they feared would cause them to face unplesant issues.
I sometimes worry one of them will reach some breaking point and have a nasty fight they dont recover from.
I’m really regretting my first post. After this one I’m shutting the hell up.
Thirty-five years later, I still agree with her observation, however crudely she tossed it off (in a casual conversation between friends about people she didn’t know). At the very least, she was in fact correct regarding the couple being discussed.
Be that as it may, I can’t argue with your comment, because a few years later it gradually dawned on my wife and I that she probably wasn’t a very good therapist. I’m sure she did a lot of good; I’m not at all sure she did no harm. We weren’t surprised to learn that she left her profession after only ten years of practice. Permanently, as it turned out.
I am sure that I didn’t contribute much to this thread, and I’m outta here.
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I think this is where the baggage people bring in to the relationship gets in the way. I agree with you; most normal people don’t wake up in the morning and try to figure out ways to mess up their spouse’s life.
That would be…difficult to work with. As disagreements go, that seemed awfully mild to me. Is it time to buy a couch or not? Let’s figure this out. No need for anyone getting upset.
I think it’s fairly certain that this is exactly what will happen. I think a lot of couples reach a point where they decide to leave unresolved issues alone and just live with them*, but that’s usually after they’ve wrangled with them over and over and over, not just ignored them and swept them under the carpet.
*I read a theory that this is actually healthy and realistic; not everything can and should be solved, and sometimes you just leave it alone and get on with your lives.
I think by ignoring some problems its only making things worse. Boundaries are very important- allowing someone to cross them simply because you dont want to argue is a recipe for disaster.
My fiancee is adamantly anti-gun. She will not tolerate living in a home with a gun in it. My opinions on guns are mixed. She brought it up long before the prospect of living together even though she knew a heated discussion might ensue. It was one of her boundaries, and too important to ignore.
Had she avoided bringing up the topic, moved in with me and possibly a firearm, shed be a lot more unhappy. Me, i’ve learned to discuss the topics I’m the most emotionally invested in (i.e. Argumentative) early on so we can meet in the middle rather than avoid it. But then, with my fiancee and I when we do have an argument neither of us stay mad long, and there are TONS of things we agreed on because we had the guts to bring it up.
Personally, I think it’s weird. Typically, it seems that many of the couples who claim not to argue have one really strong personality and one who is much more submissive, and the submissive one consistently knuckles under.
My wife was raised in a house where her parents didn’t argue, through a combination of not communicating, and her dad (probably) letting her mom have her way to avoid conflict. She’s definitely assertive and stubborn, and would probably not have stayed married to a man as assertive or stubborn as her.
I grew up in a house where my parents weren’t afraid of conflict, but didn’t have big screaming fits either, and are/were never hateful toward each other. It was ok for them to disagree and argue about things, but in the context of working out a compromise they could both live with.
When my wife and I had our first real argument, she thought that somehow I didn’t love her, or was going to break up with her, or something crazy like that.
I had to explain that me disagreeing strongly was just the opening salvo in a process that would end up with some kind of compromise.
LSLGuy has the right idea- that’s what my parents did, and what my wife and I are doing.
The latter. I have an incredibly long fuse, and I can really put the emotion aside in order to have a rational conversation about something. In addition, I’m almost never “seething inside”; it’s so rare that she does anything that really makes me angry. I can think of only one time in the last four years, and in that instance I mentioned it, she apologized for upsetting me, and we worked out ways (for both of us, not just her) to solve the issue.
We mostly agree. However, I enjoy elaborate political discussions a lot more than she does, including playing devil’s advocate in order to really decide what I think about a situation. She does not enjoy this in the same way. Therefore, I more frequently have those conversations with my friends than my girlfriend.
I think one thing that makes it easier is that she and I both pointed spend time alone and with other friends, out of each other’s presence. We’re both quite independent in that way, and I think that it helps greatly to keep perspective. It’s too easy to make mountains from molehills if you’re constantly in the same argument. Spending time with my friends makes me realize that bitching to them about how she loads the dishwasher wrong would make me look picky and whiny, which is a good indication that I am actually being picky and whiny.