Is fighting and arguing normal in a marriage?

One question that I am often asked by couples in couple therapy, “Is fighting and arguing normal?”

In fact, fighting in marriage is as natural as anything else that couples do together. After all, unless you’re married to a clone of yourself, two individuals are bound to have loads of issues that divide them.

Fights may be caused by little things such as leaving the dirty dishes in the sink, or bigger issues such as whether to have another child, or whether to move to a different town or city. 

Did you ever notice that mood shifts could cause strife between you and your spouse? Often, people are not aware that they are in a bad mood. Perhaps they had a tough day at work, or an argument with a store owner. They come home to their spouse and they start to unload their tension on their marital partner. The original source of the tension often remains out of one’s awareness, leading one to use one’s spouse as a target for a bad mood.

Couples tend to forget that the person they are married to is a separate person. Spouses often take the other person’s individuality for granted. Arguments may flare up around different standards of behavior, values, political beliefs, sexual desires, money, and child-rearing philosophies.

Some spouses get angry at their partner’s limitations. I have seen marital conflicts where one partner complains that the other person doesn’t organize and clean the home, and upon closer examination, it is the other person’s learning disability at fault, not the individual.

Sometimes couples fight when one party wants to change his/her role in the marriage, such as going back to school to pursue a new career. What one expects in a marriage can and often will change over time. If these changes are not dealt with openly, it can fuel a serious breakdown in the marriage and lead to fighting.

Believe it or not, research has shown that couples that stay married fight as much as couples that get divorced. However, the key difference is that couples that stay married seem to be good at focusing their disagreement on the issue that is in conflict, not the person. Couples that divorce seem to lose sight of the actual issue or problem that needs to be dealt with and instead quickly prepare for a noxious battle.

In dysfunctional marriages, a spouse may perceive his or her partner’s different point of view as a personal attack rather than a difference in perception or preference. It would be better if an angry spouse could think: Let’s try to understand the problem and figure out what to do about it – a more rational approach to a fight.

Instead, spouses who resort to dysfunctional fighting will often call each other insulting names; assassinate the character of their partner, or worse; devalue the other person’s right to have a different view; or shout very loudly during the fight, using derogatory expletives.

Sometimes interpretations are made like, “You’re angry at me because your father always treated you like dirt!” or “You’re just stupid.” These “hitting under the belt” verbal attacks just don’t work, but instead trigger more anger and counterattacks. I call these types of behaviors “dirty fighting.” Each side loses.

So, my advice to couples is that when a fight is inevitable, remember to focus on saving your marriage, not necessarily winning the argument.

If the anger gets out of hand, and most people have had times when this has occurred, try some cooling down exercises. Deep breathing through your nose and exhaling slowly through your mouth can calm you down, or take a time-out from your argument and take a walk. When you’re calm, you will be more in control and deal with your conflict more rationally.

Remember, even when you feel you are absolutely right, don’t put down your partner’s point of view. Validate what your partner is feeling, even if you disagree. Work as a team and aim to figure out what the problem is, so that you and your partner can come up with some solutions that you both can live with, rather than solutions that pull you apart. Marriage, after all, is a partnership, and therefore compromise and flexibility are critical.

While fighting in marriage is scary for some, marital fights challenge couples to use their creative and intellectual resources to figure things out.

In fact, studies show that many couples feel an enhanced passion toward each other after having a fight, providing they can resolve and work out the matter that they are fighting about.

Marital fights can help couples to communicate better and drive home an important lesson in maintaining a healthy relationship.

Don’t keep your feelings locked inside of you. After the dust settles, and you calm down, try to get to the source of the problem and figure out a solution that works for both of you.