The 4 Rules of Fair Fighting: How to Work Things Out
By Matt W. Sandford, LMHC
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Do all couples fight? Over the years I’ve
certainly seen plenty that do, and I’ve also have seen a fair share who claim
they don’t or that they never saw their parents fight. It’s my proposition that
pretty much all couples fight. I would wager that those who claim they don’t
fight either are using a style called withdraw or alimentation as their form of fighting, or they don’t have
enough of a relationship to even bother
to fight. You see, fighting in marriage may be really bad stuff and may
represent a road to the end – divorce is on its way. But, fighting in marriage may also represent two people who are
really different, living in a fallen world, trying to get their needs met,
express themselves and make their marriage work, all while under stress.
What if a lot of fighting in marriage isn’t really
bad, it’s just badly managed?
What if often we aren’t really trying to be a jerk
or bitch and we don’t hate the other person, but instead we are reacting to
something our spouse did that hurt us and we are protecting ourselves? Or what
if, sometimes, when things get intense, we don’t even understand why we react
the way we do? There’s plenty there I could work with as a counselor, but for
now I want to provide some help in terms of how to fight more fairly. Fighting
fair can really help us to hold back on some of the bad stuff we’ll regret and
that really matters. And fair fighting can help us to address some of our bad
patterns, so that we can stop sabotaging the process and get to places where we
can feel more heard and more understood by our spouse.
Fair fighting is about coming up with some rules
for fighting; rules that you will both agree upon trying to uphold and will be
willing to acknowledge when you break them. Each couple is different and you’ll
need to come up with rules that fit your values. But I’m going to give you some
that I believe need to be in there.
1. Learn to utilize time outs.
For kids a time out
is often viewed or used as a punishment, but for adults, time outs are valuable
opportunities to cool down, to reflect, and get some distance from a situation
that can bring clarity. Discuss together respectful ways to request a time out
for yourself (time outs are not
something you impose on your spouse – that would be using it like it is often
used on a child). Discuss ahead of time an agreed upon usual time apart. You
could even come up with a simple signal that you could use to indicate a
request for a timeout, to prevent long discussions about the time out itself. And
then – don’t forego coming back together to try again. This is not to be misused as a technique for
avoidance of issues! So, when you feel the intensity going up and you might
lose it or get mean, take that time out.
2. Stay on the Issue
Couples tend to store
up resentments, don’t they? Oh, maybe we didn’t intend to store it up at the
time. Maybe we intended to just let it pass, or maybe we really were trying to
be kind. But then a fight comes along and out comes that old issue I go back to
or the one I had not brought up before. Bringing up past issues or adding to
the issue just clouds up the current process.
3. Replacing “You”s with “I”s
You never attack with “you”
statements, do you? Because of course you know that stating things in
accusatory and blaming ways will draw someone into a defensive stance – which
isn’t very constructive for working through differences. “You” statements are
the ones in which you say things “You can never let me finish, can you?” or “Why do you always have to…” What is going on is that we are trying to say
something about ourselves, how we are feeling, what we are bothered about, and
ask the other person about the way they have bothered us, but we skip over the
part about how we feel about it. And yet, that is the important part. Let me
help you out here. You are not going to get your spouse to change what they do
without you expressing how it effects you, or what it means to you. There is
not motivation to change without that. This kind of approach just doesn’t get
you what you want. It increases the chance of hurt feelings and a cycle of
attacking and defending.
4. Agreeing to Disagree
If you’ve been
married awhile, you know how there are some things that you just go round and
round on and nothing ever changes. You probably feel like your spouse just
doesn’t seem to care enough to change on this one, no matter how often and no
matter how well you express your position on it. Good healthy couples have some
of these. It is just because we are fundamentally different people with
different genders, different backgrounds and different world views. It doesn’t
mean they don’t love if they don’t see it your way on this, just as much as
you’re not changing on the one they are stumped on. You can die fighting on
these kinds of hills and it’s not worth it. Instead, acknowledge that it’s a
personality difference and learn to laugh about it. Focus on the many things
you think similarly on and rejoice that you are different and can learn and
grow from having each other, even if you don’t change on this area.
Fighting fair matters. But it takes time and
practice to learn it. So, don’t forget to be patient with yourself and one
another and remember to own your stuff and make apologies when you blow it.
Now go for it!
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