How to Fight With People You Care About Without Destroying Your Relationship
I had a fight with my girlfriend recently. It was huge, and could potentially have ended things. It didn’t, and I am definitely grateful for that.
But it did teach me an important lesson about fighting with people you care about.
I took my time to articulate what that meant, why it’s important to fight differently with your loved ones than you do with other people and then how to do it.
It’s ready and I hope you find it as useful as I do. Enjoy!
First things first, why fight differently?
The simple answer is love.
The practical answer is: it preserves and strengthens the relationship.
Most people have only a few people they truly care about and who care about them in return. Fortunately for you, you have people like that.
Now when you’re with someone you love — family, spouse, partner or friend — you want your relationship together to last.
But that can’t happen if you fight with them like they’re an enemy you’re out to destroy. Because if you destroy them, you’ve destroyed the relationship. Do that enough times and you’re left perpetually alone, and lonely.
Putting that into perspective, it’s important that we fight differently with the people we love so that our relationships become stronger and last longer.
Let me show you how in the following steps.
Step 1: Remember that you love them
I understand that you’re angry right now, but remind yourself that you love this person.
Maybe that’s why this fight sucks even more, because you still have to be with them and deal with them and see them over and over.
That’s why this is a headache. If it was a random person, you wouldn’t care as much. But you love them, and you don’t want that to change.
Step 2: Know exactly what you’re fighting about
I know it’s hard to stay logical when emotions are high and negative, but the only way to reach a resolution is to remember exactly what you’re fighting about.
Other things may come up during the fight. You might remember something else they did or didn’t do. But don’t forget why this fight got started in the first place.
Step 3: you can call them an asshole BUT don’t lie about it
Fighting is messy I’ll admit.
Telling you to apply restraint and logic when you’re in a place of negative emotions is already a stretch.
You’re angry, you’re not thinking clearly, you want to hurt them for hurting you etc.
But again remember, you’re fighting with someone you love. Your goal with this fight isn’t necessarily to win, but to repair the relationship so that it becomes stronger.
The only way to do that is:
Don’t Lie.
Don’t lie against them or accuse them falsely. This is important.
Sometimes you’re incredibly pissed that your only desire is to make your partner feel your pain, so you say the most hurtful thing you can think of.
Sometimes that hurtful thing is a lie.
For example:
Calling them mediocre when they’re actually skilled at their job.
Accusing them of being uncaring towards you when you know they put in double effort to show that they care and support you.
Generally accusing them of doing something you know they didn’t do, etc.
The point of fighting with love is to reach a resolution that’s okay by both parties. You want a way to be able to repair in a way that makes your relationship stronger.
You do this by holding each other accountable to your wrong doings and communicating the actions that hurt you.
This means that if they’re lying, you call them out on it.
If they’re being irresponsible, you tell them they’re being irresponsible.
And if they’re being an asshole about something, tell them, you’re being an asshole right now.
Call them out on as many things as is necessary, but as I’ve said before: don’t lie.
This way they have the opportunity to own up to it.
Lying or accusing them falsely will slowly crack the relationship and make it difficult to repair after each fight. If it happens long enough, they’ll slowly resent you for it and eventually they’ll leave.
Step 4: Don’t poke at their insecurities
This step piggybacks off the last step.
You can fight without bringing up their weight, height or something from their past they trusted you with.
They’re already angry and hurt in all of this, don’t add more fuel. They could react negatively and poke your insecurities as well, creating a vicious cycle until somebody goes too far.
Or they’ll fold into themselves and never trust you again.
Like I’ve said, fights can be messy.
Regardless of what I’ve said so far, things will get said that you didn’t mean. What’s important is the next step.
Step 5: Apologize genuinely
This part is important.
I’ve been with people who apologize because they want the fight to end.
They say “I’m sorry” too quickly without actual remorse or understanding what they’ve done. And then they go and do it again.
They apologize haphazardly without taking accountability. For example people who say I’m sorry if I hurt you in any way even after you’ve told them specifically how they hurt you.
That doesn’t work.
When you refuse to acknowledge the damage you or your actions do to affect your partner, they still feel hurt… even if they “accept” your apology.
To genuinely apologize, saying “I’m sorry I did X” is a lot better than simply saying “I’m sorry”.
Even when you didn’t intentionally mean to hurt them, saying, “I’m sorry you got hurt when I did X, it wasn’t my intention. What I wanted to do was xxxx…” will make them feel more seen, and feel better.
After which, they’re more likely to let it go.
Also when apologizing don’t give excuses or throw blame.
Don’t say “I’m sorry I did X but I wouldn’t have done it if you didn’t do Y”
It’s annoying.
Including but in your apology makes it feel false. It means you refuse to take accountability for your actions. And it would have been better if you said nothing at all.
Step 6: Finally, discuss a way out
In healthy relationships, big fights about the same thing don’t happen more than once.
Small fights about where to put the dishes or toilet paper, those happen all the time.
But big fights about the same thing? Those are sparse and rarely happen more than once.
And that’s because fighting in relationships is a learning process.
What happens in big fights is that you learn how deeply something affects your partner, and as a consequence, you.
Think about it like this:
If you’ve ever been in a fight with someone you actually love, and there’s a period of silence, you hate it. Even if you’re in the right.
I don’t mean a few minutes of silence. I’m talking long hours, sometimes days.
You’re tense around them.
There are worms in your belly, sometimes kettlebells in your chest. I’ve found that I can’t fully concentrate on work if my girlfriend isn’t talking to me or if I’m not talking to her because of something serious.
I have the same thing with my mother and my sisters.
And I think that happens because your love for this person is tied to the details of your life.
Fighting them in a way that causes silence disrupts your pattern of acting and that of course makes you super uncomfortable.
When you consider how this happens, you work with your partner to ensure it never happens again, on both sides.
When discussing a solution to move forward, it’s always best to do this when you’re both calm.
This means no more name calling, no more passive aggression, no more angry talking.
You’ve both apologized. You both love each other.
Now is your time to say, this is why it hurt, this is why I did it, this is what led to it, this is how I forgive you, let’s work on making sure it never happens again.
Conclusion
Phew, that was a lot about fights wasn’t it?
In relationships you’ll have to forgive your partner a lot more than you do other people.
You’ll also have to accept forgiveness too.
Due to the difference between humans, it’s impossible to expect that things will go well all the time.
Fights will happen, let them.
Then learn from them. Learn how you repair.
Fighting with someone you love and care about develops your emotional intelligence on how to navigate the rest of the world.
It also prepares you for your next relationship if something bad happens to this one.
Everyone in relationship fights. Only healthy people learn how to do it properly.
Thank you for reading.
If you have questions or thoughts, I’d love to hear in the comments. If you think someone you love and care about will benefit from this piece, share it with them.
Stay easy,
Dave.
This is quite insightful. I wish I had come across this sometime last year. Would there be a follow-up on how to repair destroyed relationships?
This was such an eye opening read