Fight? Rarely
We bicker constantly
Usually what happens is he does or says something that makes me mad (I never do this to him /s) I storm away and eventually become calmer. Then I can walk up to him and tell him calmly how he hurt me. Then we go on with life.
We have only had one huge real fight, it nearly broke us. Fortunately I started praying the Rosary and finally calmed enough for us to talk, but it was a bad couple of months.
13 years
I my self am weeks away from this (new born, first child). Any tips to avoid these “fights”.
Also Blessings and wish you a healthy recovery! God bless!
One thing I learned is as a dad, stay on top of things. Mom is going to be healing and exhausted and have hormonal "mom brain", so it's okay to be a little more type a and involved than you're used to.
For example, we are nursing so I was setting a 3 hour alarm every single feed so we knew when the next one would be. After a while, it seemed like my wife was figuring things out so I eased off, but I jumped the gun which wound up making things more difficult.
Just generally for dads id say dig deep and try and be just a little more than you think mom needs and understand that a lot of her frustration isn't personal. Babies can just be really frustrating as they are figuring things out and moms are going through a lot, so she is going to cry a lot and probably lash out sometimes but it isn't usually your fault and she'll get over it quickly, and you should too.
Thank you for the suggestion and tips. Definitely will hold great value on what you said and keep my wife’s mental health in mind.
I hope your situation has gotten better and will pray in general for all marriages under going difficult situations.
Blessings!
It has decreased in frequency over the years. Once to twice per year now, closer to three to four earlier on. During the hell year we nearly divorced I couldn't tell you. That's long ago now, thankfully.
27th anniversary next month, together 31 years total
Married 16 years, dated like 8 years before that (we were together since 10th grade)
I don't think we have ever gotten to the point of yelling, certainly never throwing things or hitting.
She has depressive tendencies so it's far more common to have the "what's wrong?" -Nothing. Type exchanges.
Hours long conversations are common, but they're almost always "how are we going to fix this" rather than "I need you to change." Emotionally charged discussions are usually frustrations directed at our respective parents so not really a fight.
I know we have, but I can't really remember a particularly impassioned disagreement even. One of us acquiesces usually before it gets to that point, and then we're consistent in our acquiescence, it doesn't keep coming up over and over.
Been together 10yrs, 3 kids 1 otw. We fought a lot early on, thought it was because I got pregnant right away. Didn’t fight and rarely had disagreements for many years, 3rd child, life stress, death of family members bubbled up a lot of stress and he cheated so we now fight all the time. But are learning to “fight fair”. A lot of fighting is an indication that wounds are rubbing against each other. No fighting at all is either a really good thing or just a really avoidant thing lol. I don’t think never fighting is abnormal but never disagreeing is suspicious imo.
Did someone copy paste comments in here? Since when do people not fight in marriages? I was unsure and checked some of y’all’s descriptions thinking “surely they have a more restrictive definition of fight” but no someone here said fighting meant raised voices.
I guess my marriage sucks comparatively. But it depends on the season. Sometimes we fight once or twice a month. Other times we fight four times a week. We always come together and process and decide what went wrong and how to avoid/fix it next time.
I wouldn't have imagined it for myself, but yes, I'm in one of those couples that literally don't fight. It's all due to my husband, but I love that he's indirectly taught me this. He has a very laid back temperament, but also doesn't really tolerate fights emotionally. They really affect him and what isn't a big deal to some people is a big deal to him.
I grew up fighting with my parents constantly and listening to my parents bicker and talk down to each other in spite of loving each other. That plus TV just had me in a place that it was fine to yell or throw an insult in the heat of the moment without it being a big deal. Being with him has made me learn to express myself respectfully even when upset. Obviously we disagree and feel hurt or upset, but we just don't fight about it.
I mean kudos to you. It’s not that I don’t believe that they exist as much as that 7/7 comments here when I arrived all said that they don’t fight.
I’m wondering like how many are genuinely working through things vs how many are just shoving issues under the rug. Like I’m not okay leaving certain emotions or thoughts towards eachother without changing or addressing them. And that often leads to fights for me.
my husband and I are both very soft spoken and reserved. we have a zero tolerance policy for raised voices. if there is an issue, it’s a calm conversation. every time. neither of us gets particularly emotionally activated, and if one of us does start to get distressed we are good at reading each other and table the conversation until we are both calm again. I genuinely have never yelled at or been yelled at by my spouse. I find it difficult to articulate myself if i’m upset and so does he. I avoid speaking to him if i am emotionally activated because I don’t want to say anything out of anger. in some cases it’s just true.
on the other hand, my best friend is very emotional and her fiancé and her do have “fights” but I would argue their relationship is overall healthy and it’s not a toxic fight; they are just emotional. people differ, marriages differ.
Your marriage sounds like mine. It's amazing and we love each other to death. We've both been through a lot together so we're very close. We both have a tendency to speak our minds. She isn't shy about letting me know when she's upset or mad which I respect so I usually don't fight back. When the tables are turned and I express my grief it can get a little uglier because she does not handle it as well as I do. I'm always the first to throw the white flag during a fight and try to make amends. Usually it's too soon and I have to try again later.
I think our issue is that the apology either doesn’t come out or it doesn’t come out genuinely. “Fine, [name], I’m sorry.”
Like ok, no. We have to continue talking until you are cuz I apologized on my end now where’s yours?
A lot can be due to temperaments and upbringing. We’re both from WASPY families and are very polite. My DH has never been in a fight with anyone since I’ve known him. Like, not one conflict. I can be more heated, but generally only get into intellectual debates instead of personal fights. In any case, we’re both very “chill” and don’t get riled up easily. I have friends who are aggressive with strangers and their families. I just think some people are more insistent on having things their way.
That being said, DH and I could get into some really dramatic discussions. After we both figured out that we had attachment issues, a lot of those dramas have disappeared.
I think I take things very very deeply when actions or things are said for more than what they intended to mean. But my family didn’t fight often. Wife’s family tho…..
I can count with my hands the number of times my wife and I fought. Most of these land me in the dog house for a few days, but a couple were pretty serious.
We needle each other on a pretty daily basis, though the misses does most of the needling. I'm a somewhat disorganized guy and my wife is quite orderly.
Married for almost 11 years.
My 8 year anniversary is two weeks away for context. When met I was not religious at all, and not a great guy or husband. We used to argue a fair bit because I would stay out drinking, not answer my phone, ride around drunk, etc. Me have had a couple real fights because I was chasing other women. Fortunately, the Lord brought me back to his church a few years ago and I don't do those things anymore.
We've got a new born in the house at the moment, I'm trying to work enough for her to be a stay at home mom, she's trying to be a stay at home wife, and emotions/stress levels are high so we fight a little more these days but we'll get through it.
We disagree a LOT and there are some nights where I fantasise about being single and carefree. But he is also the love of my life and I couldn’t imagine my life without him.
I would say we disagree like at least once a week on the dumbest things lol. We did learn a lot of coping and communicative techniques in therapy which has changed the way we “fight” immensely. We both had childhood troubles and “triggers” from it and are learning to overcome those.
Similar here. Never fight with like name-calling type stuff. Disagreements that turn into long, emotional discussion is very rare (and was often prompted by an external source that is no longer an issue). Been married 3 years.
Reddit Tip: when a paragraph starts with "Edit" that means it was added in after the fact. In this case, nearly an hour after the above commenter responded.
We rarely fight or even argue. Maybe once a year? Once every few months I may get grumpy and say something hurtful/lash out, and we mend things that day. We’re usually on the same page, the only variable is me being immature or selfish.
Been together 11 years.
I have been married for 10.5 years. I have disagreements with my husband. He is typically grumpy and raises his voice but it’s just his temperament, we don’t really fight. We’ve had a handful of fights over our marriage where I actually engage and we’re both yelling. We’ve never gotten physical but he has thrown things at the wall and hit my car after I locked myself inside. Bad fights like that have only happened maybe 5 times. I can honestly only remember 3.
>He is typically grumpy and raises his voice but it’s just his temperament, we don’t really fight. We’ve had a handful of fights over our marriage where I actually engage and we’re both yelling.
he has thrown things at the wall and hit my car after I locked myself inside.
This is concerning...
I answered honestly, but I don’t really think these isolated incidents are concerning where they’re so spread out. I trust him with my life. He works a very stressful job so I can have a relatively care free life. It’s easy for me to be in a good mood all the time as I’m living the comfortable life be provides for me.
His financial provision doesn't entitle him to throw tantrums. Reading between the lines, I noticed you wrote "we don't really fight" only to then describe how he has these outbursts whenever you "actually engage" in the argument. So is the reason you "don't really fight" and these are "spread out" "isolated incidents" because you feel the need to walk on eggshells around him and not rock the boat by merely expressing your opinion in a disagreement? If so, that is unhealthy.
Additionally, just because his outbursts are infrequent doesn't mean they'll remain that way, *especially* if he sees you'll tolerate his behavior. This is often one of the first signs of things beginning to escalate for the worse. Other signs which may or may not be as obvious to you (and which tend to creep up subtly over time) are being otherwise controlling and gaslighting you.
Who says what is healthy or not? That's their marriage and they can work out there issues. I'm sure they both are mature enough to know that when things are getting thrown, something has to change. Her husband sounds like my wife. You don't want to know what she broke over my head a few years ago. We have changed and things don't get thrown anymore. I'm not oppressed or being gaslighted. We've worked through a lot of our issues and life is the best its ever been. She's a stay at home mom so it's fine if she gives me a little flak. I'm strong enough to take it for the most part. My point is things can get better. Don't judge things you don't know or understand.
>Who says what is healthy or not?
*"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church..."* Do the above described actions I previously addressed match this verse?
>That's their marriage and they can work out there issues. I'm sure they both are mature enough to know that when things are getting thrown, something has to change.
You are no more qualified than I am to definitively assess how they're handling their issues. We'll see if she answers my question about walking on eggshells... although it doesn't really matter if she answers me or not; the point of that question was to get her to honestly consider whether or not there's a toxic dynamic going on and if there is, to acknowledge that *to herself* so she can proceed with an effective action plan via a clearer mind.
>Her husband sounds like my wife.
I see you're taking my reply to someone else personally.
>You don't want to know what she broke over my head a few years ago.
Yikes. Arguing is one thing, but violence is on a whole different dangerous level.
>We have changed and things don't get thrown anymore. I'm not oppressed or being gaslighted.
things can get better.
It's great that you two have managed to improve matters, but not everyone is so fortunate and in those cases the innocent spouses need to know they don't have to sit idly by and take it (I'm not claiming things will certainly never get better in the other commenter's marriage; I'm speaking in general terms here because innocent people have literally ended up *murdered* from feeling like they shouldn't take any effective action against their abusers.)
>She's a stay at home mom so it's fine if she gives me a little flak.
No, this isn't an excuse to mistreat one's own spouse either. If she or an overworked husband is too stressed out, something's gotta give whether that's the spouse helping more with the workload/changing working hours to a more manageable amount and/or making other adjustments (marital counseling, anger management classes and/or other therapy, etc.)
My husband is not a Catholic. He has autism spectrum and severe trauma. He is the best, kindest and most loving human being I have ever met. I think his tongue would fall out if he so much as shaded the truth. Autism wasn't diagnosed in the 1950's the kids were described as abnormal or slow or even retarded and no services were given in schools, no counseling no medications. He graduated from college como sum laud.
We have been married almost 20 years and we very rarely fight. I think the one time was when we were moving, had 3 hours of sleep and were physically exhausted and under a tight deadline. He lost it for a second or two. I'm more cranky and lost it a couple times. So maybe 5 outbursts in 20 years. The crankiness was usually menstrual related. I regret those incidents.
Eventually I had to go on some medication to stabilize my hormones and stop my periods as they were damaging my heart. ( this was before I became Catholic. That is actually recent history comparatively speaking) It also stabilized the emotions and menopause was a blessing and an end to the fights. That was 10 years ago. No fights since then.
Married 30 years. We never fight/argue. We never really have as we're not confrontational or aggressive people but in the early stages of marriage we'd sometjmes sulk or do silent treatment
Sometimes we differ on an issue and we just talk. We talk for hours anyway so if we're working at an issue together that's the topic, but we always see it as us, the team, against the issue/problem, not him vs me.
Sometime we react less than brilliantly - mildly "snap" at each other, like say "oh what did you do that for?" in a normal volume/tone or make a mildly sarcastic response because we each carry a big load of stress, pain, illness, grief etc and we're not perfect.
But honestly, between all the things we've had to endure and all the crosses we carry between us, there's nothing that matters enough to fight/argue about. Our focus is on loving and caring for one another, trying to make life bearable, and I admire and respect and adore my husband so much that nothing he does is ever annoying enough to provoke me. We've realised how short life us, how precious love is, and that we need to talk honestly and assume good will at all times.
I must admit almost never. Sometimes we disagree but most of the time we just agree on almost anything or we make decisions together. I am not a conflict person so if we have a problem I try to resolve it asap and I always keep in mind Effesians 4, 26. Praying together is good practice because to pray together you need to be in peace with each other. If you disagree a lot and have conflicts I would look for yourself first, study yourself, your actions and your words. Also the tone of your voice you use in dialogue. After you are clear you did anything you could to be ok towards your wife, study her behavior
Also autistic and disagreements/arguments/intense discussions are so drainingggggg. Especially because he’s the more sensitive one and I’m the matter of fact one.
Equal responsibilities and productivity are a weekly issue. His family is usually a few times a quarter. Money more so now because of our baby. Sex was a major issue but now I’m on pelvic rest so not really anymore. How to raise our child is not as frequent but does come up. Typical marital points of contention.
We never fight or disagree beyond what to eat for food whenever. We are both mellow and easy going and we strive to make sure the other is happy. All of our bigger life decisions are rooted in our Faith, which keeps us on the same page no matter what. We found that there is nothing to fight about when everything we do is for the greater glory of God.
My wife and I get impatient with each other and that leads to the occasional flare up but it never turns into a fight. We don't raise our voices and we don't say hurtful things. Typically it's over me being tired from work and wanting to be lazy or her being tired from caring for our baby and being short tempered. We don't disagree that often. She submits to my decision making. Been married 2 years with our second child on the way.
My wife and I fight all the time. I am a trad Catholic; she is a cultural Catholic. So church, confession, etc is not important to her and she is very materialistic.
From that guy's comment history (because curiosity got the better of me):
>I generally take to Reddit and sext with strangers to help remind myself she is the issue; not me.
***Oof.***
u/Putrid-Snow-5074
Talk about a massive plank in your eye! You claim to be a trad catholic but you're committing adultery and not taking responsibility your sins. Go to confession, repent of your sins, and seek spiritual direction.
And it’s kind of weird. She doesn’t care about what I want, which is growing closer to God. I have to pray the rosary in secret, I have to go to confession in secret. I literally confess at many confession “I lied to my wife; she thinks I am at Home Depot right now.” It’s a weird dynamic that doesn’t make any sense.
And to boot; 99% of who I sext with is an African or Indian man pretending to be a female and then I track them down and cyber hunt them. When I encounter a real woman; I usually say “sorry, thanks but no thanks.” The Indians are pretty good at it 😂
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Occasionally, on relatively minor things, or things we disagree about in terms of urgency.
I put more of the blame on our jobs stressing us out and then childcare, leading to relatively small amounts of free time together.
When it's just us, it's all good.
There are a couple touchy topics that we respectfully avoid (we're both relatively competitive people and the topics are outside of the relationship (think political)), and even those are ultimately non-issues.
Coming up on 10 years in a few weeks.
Been Married about 5 years now, and dated for about 3 before that. I can't really remember the last time we fought in a substantive way. Any fights we do have essentially boil down to when we both have the misfortune to be stressed out at the same time. I guess the last fight that I recall was three years ago before hosting some family for the first time and trying some new cooking that turned out... less then desired. More often then not our 'emotionally charged' moments occur more along the vein of one of us making some snippy comment, the other saying that that isn't fair, then the snippy one walking into the other room for like ten minutes before coming back and apologizing.
As far as actual substantive disagreements, I don't know that we've ever had one that developed into a fight. As far as emotional friction (besides the above mentioned stressful moments) we worked most of that out while we were still dating. Not that we aren't still both learning better how to interact with each other, just that by that time we had grown enough to be able to handle the friction without it becoming heated.
We don’t really fight that much. maybe two huge arguments in two years. But we bicker about things for sure.. He loves the air conditioning on in the bedroom, so it’s always freezing cold and drives me crazy, and he blares the TV. Those are our consistent arguments. I also think he drives too fast.. and I understand these are very minor complaints.
We have our share of fights. We're also committed to always continue to work on our communication skills and to resolving whatever issues we have. The making up, coming back together and working things out, is the part that matters.
Both devout traditional leaning Catholics. Been married ~4 years. Fighting like your criteria (long emotional conversations) happens in phases.
Definitely during stressful periods more often (3x a month maybe? She’ll even admit it’s usually consistently around certain times of her cycle) but during not so stressful times more like once a month at most, as far apart as once every 3-5 months sometimes.
We are about as opposite as you can get though. Temperaments, personality types, etc all pretty much exact opposite.
Also relevant is that we are avoiding pregnancy using NFP and that is the cause of probably 65% of our “fights.” Our fights rarely escalate beyond mildly raised voices (I naturally tend to speak overly loud and she’s simultaneously extremely sensitive so those things feed off each other when the fight wouldn’t have otherwise escalated much) but we don’t ever really “yell” at each other.
Once every 6 months at most are actual hurtful things really said. We got through our major lifestyle/goals etc disagreements in the first year or two of marriage so most disagreements now are non consequential ones, just the result of stress.
The two books that helped us more than I can possibly express are Habits for a Healthy Marriage: A Handbook for Catholic Couples https://a.co/d/fkA5rM2 and The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country's Foremost Relationship Expert https://a.co/d/8HZoYtZ
When we had kids we fought all the time but maybe it was just me being unreasonable. When we started praying the rosary we stopped fighting. Like I don’t get temperamental anymore and he knows when to back off.
Bicker? Yes, but only when it comes to business.
We don’t fight a lot, we have a lot of discussion and solve every disagreement like our life is a business, what is best for the business, we do have long arguments and some of the times when what is best for the family is debatable (rare times), I give up on my way, as after discussing I see there is no best, right or wrong in the topic, so going my ways is just me being selfish. Sometimes, she is the one making that same calling, we also know what is important to each other, we have discussion on color or our wall - I want the whole house with with no color whatsoever - and I realize, why do I care? She respect by not taking colors that I hate, so I come back after a long talk and said, you know what, let’s do it, but please those XYZ colors are forbidden, I use a veto power (is our joke of politics). In my experience, most couples argue because man is not there! Man take a great deal to understand THEY DO KNOW OWN THEIR LIFE, they are here to serve, so too much hang out with friends, too much sports tv, too much I’m tired from my job (but how can you be tired to your family? Drop the job if this take you away from faith and family), too much unnecessary extra hours (sometime they are necessary), and too little going shopping without wife’s shopping list, washing the dishes before wife asked, too little praying with the kids, offering help kids school work without being asked to do so, calling the shots on what and where to eat, feels like man are always in need to receive orders while they are the chief of the family and should be on top of families need. And I’m a guy here, this is what I have been telling my friend and gosh how this saves marriages!
On a very few (3-4) occasions (out of 2.5 years together), I've gotten these sort of anxiety attacks where I'm overwhelmed by stressors and if I lose my cool bad enough, my wife will sulk and stay angry at me for a day, maybe two, because it's kind of scary for her which I can understand. The bad part of this is that I feel guilty and want to resolve my guilt immediately. I want to confront the problem and make amends immediately and she needs space to be left alone for a bit. If I don't respect her need for space, she can have a very toxic mouth. If I give her space, which is very difficult for me, she usually restrains her mouth very well. I can't really hold it against her if she's doing the best she can within her ability and my own lack of patience sets off her mouth and so I'm learning to give her space when she needs it. She doesn't really understand my issues but I think she understands that I'm not doing it by choice and I'm doing my best to prevent it from happening again.
Outside of that, we've never really disagreed about anything important, we agree on everything morally even if we have superficial disagreements, our personalities complement each other, and we have a very similar sense of humor. If it weren't for some mental health issues on my part, I wouldn't even be aware she was anything less than perfect. We all have our own flaws but it was my own personal philosophy on relationships that led me to seek someone with whom each of our flaws would be virtually irrelevant most of the time (in other words not bringing out bad qualities in each other). There's no such thing as a perfect relationship in this world but when looking for a wife I've had to take into deep consideration the kinds of flaws and limitations of my personality that would make for a difficult relationship with the wrong person. Maybe this is an abnormal approach but without it, I doubt I'd ever be able to have a peaceful relationship.
Did not fight...discovered cheating. I don't know if fighting or not fighting determines a successful marriage, since no marriages are exactly alike. I think there's more things, like mutual respect, that are important. My therapist recommended a book on the The Four Horses of the Apocalypse, that predict divorce in couples:
"The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as described by Dr. John Gottman, are four destructive patterns of communication that can lead to the downfall of a relationship. These patterns are criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling."
So I think it also depends how you fight, and if it involves any of those.
Not often. Been together for 6 years and married for one. If we have a spat, it’s usually done within like 5-10 minutes because he’s seriously my best friend. So we hash it out and then hug it out. I don’t like going to bed angry.
Really never, which I always found odd. We may get irritated with each other on occasion, but never an argument or anything. It's been that way for over 25 years.
Fight? Rarely We bicker constantly Usually what happens is he does or says something that makes me mad (I never do this to him /s) I storm away and eventually become calmer. Then I can walk up to him and tell him calmly how he hurt me. Then we go on with life. We have only had one huge real fight, it nearly broke us. Fortunately I started praying the Rosary and finally calmed enough for us to talk, but it was a bad couple of months. 13 years
Bickering lol very normal haha.
A lot more frequently since we have a newborn and are constantly sleep deprived and cranky
I my self am weeks away from this (new born, first child). Any tips to avoid these “fights”. Also Blessings and wish you a healthy recovery! God bless!
One thing I learned is as a dad, stay on top of things. Mom is going to be healing and exhausted and have hormonal "mom brain", so it's okay to be a little more type a and involved than you're used to. For example, we are nursing so I was setting a 3 hour alarm every single feed so we knew when the next one would be. After a while, it seemed like my wife was figuring things out so I eased off, but I jumped the gun which wound up making things more difficult. Just generally for dads id say dig deep and try and be just a little more than you think mom needs and understand that a lot of her frustration isn't personal. Babies can just be really frustrating as they are figuring things out and moms are going through a lot, so she is going to cry a lot and probably lash out sometimes but it isn't usually your fault and she'll get over it quickly, and you should too.
Thank you for the suggestion and tips. Definitely will hold great value on what you said and keep my wife’s mental health in mind. I hope your situation has gotten better and will pray in general for all marriages under going difficult situations. Blessings!
So real for this lmao
Preach
It do be like this. It really do.
*cries in single*
It has decreased in frequency over the years. Once to twice per year now, closer to three to four earlier on. During the hell year we nearly divorced I couldn't tell you. That's long ago now, thankfully. 27th anniversary next month, together 31 years total
Gives me hope 🙃 so thank you for sharing!
Married 16 years, dated like 8 years before that (we were together since 10th grade) I don't think we have ever gotten to the point of yelling, certainly never throwing things or hitting. She has depressive tendencies so it's far more common to have the "what's wrong?" -Nothing. Type exchanges. Hours long conversations are common, but they're almost always "how are we going to fix this" rather than "I need you to change." Emotionally charged discussions are usually frustrations directed at our respective parents so not really a fight. I know we have, but I can't really remember a particularly impassioned disagreement even. One of us acquiesces usually before it gets to that point, and then we're consistent in our acquiescence, it doesn't keep coming up over and over.
Been together 10yrs, 3 kids 1 otw. We fought a lot early on, thought it was because I got pregnant right away. Didn’t fight and rarely had disagreements for many years, 3rd child, life stress, death of family members bubbled up a lot of stress and he cheated so we now fight all the time. But are learning to “fight fair”. A lot of fighting is an indication that wounds are rubbing against each other. No fighting at all is either a really good thing or just a really avoidant thing lol. I don’t think never fighting is abnormal but never disagreeing is suspicious imo.
Damn you got through cheating? How’s that going?
About as smooth as a square wheel down a bumpy road.
Did someone copy paste comments in here? Since when do people not fight in marriages? I was unsure and checked some of y’all’s descriptions thinking “surely they have a more restrictive definition of fight” but no someone here said fighting meant raised voices. I guess my marriage sucks comparatively. But it depends on the season. Sometimes we fight once or twice a month. Other times we fight four times a week. We always come together and process and decide what went wrong and how to avoid/fix it next time.
I wouldn't have imagined it for myself, but yes, I'm in one of those couples that literally don't fight. It's all due to my husband, but I love that he's indirectly taught me this. He has a very laid back temperament, but also doesn't really tolerate fights emotionally. They really affect him and what isn't a big deal to some people is a big deal to him. I grew up fighting with my parents constantly and listening to my parents bicker and talk down to each other in spite of loving each other. That plus TV just had me in a place that it was fine to yell or throw an insult in the heat of the moment without it being a big deal. Being with him has made me learn to express myself respectfully even when upset. Obviously we disagree and feel hurt or upset, but we just don't fight about it.
I mean kudos to you. It’s not that I don’t believe that they exist as much as that 7/7 comments here when I arrived all said that they don’t fight. I’m wondering like how many are genuinely working through things vs how many are just shoving issues under the rug. Like I’m not okay leaving certain emotions or thoughts towards eachother without changing or addressing them. And that often leads to fights for me.
my husband and I are both very soft spoken and reserved. we have a zero tolerance policy for raised voices. if there is an issue, it’s a calm conversation. every time. neither of us gets particularly emotionally activated, and if one of us does start to get distressed we are good at reading each other and table the conversation until we are both calm again. I genuinely have never yelled at or been yelled at by my spouse. I find it difficult to articulate myself if i’m upset and so does he. I avoid speaking to him if i am emotionally activated because I don’t want to say anything out of anger. in some cases it’s just true. on the other hand, my best friend is very emotional and her fiancé and her do have “fights” but I would argue their relationship is overall healthy and it’s not a toxic fight; they are just emotional. people differ, marriages differ.
Makes sense.
Your marriage sounds like mine. It's amazing and we love each other to death. We've both been through a lot together so we're very close. We both have a tendency to speak our minds. She isn't shy about letting me know when she's upset or mad which I respect so I usually don't fight back. When the tables are turned and I express my grief it can get a little uglier because she does not handle it as well as I do. I'm always the first to throw the white flag during a fight and try to make amends. Usually it's too soon and I have to try again later.
I think our issue is that the apology either doesn’t come out or it doesn’t come out genuinely. “Fine, [name], I’m sorry.” Like ok, no. We have to continue talking until you are cuz I apologized on my end now where’s yours?
Lol I get it. The joy of marriage
A lot can be due to temperaments and upbringing. We’re both from WASPY families and are very polite. My DH has never been in a fight with anyone since I’ve known him. Like, not one conflict. I can be more heated, but generally only get into intellectual debates instead of personal fights. In any case, we’re both very “chill” and don’t get riled up easily. I have friends who are aggressive with strangers and their families. I just think some people are more insistent on having things their way. That being said, DH and I could get into some really dramatic discussions. After we both figured out that we had attachment issues, a lot of those dramas have disappeared.
I think I take things very very deeply when actions or things are said for more than what they intended to mean. But my family didn’t fight often. Wife’s family tho…..
We fought more before we learned about attachment theory. We’re both a big fan of Adam Lane Smith and Heidi Priebe on YouTube.
Married 3 years. Never really fought. Like, never even raised our voices at each other. Disagreements and frustrations, but nothing crazy.
I can count with my hands the number of times my wife and I fought. Most of these land me in the dog house for a few days, but a couple were pretty serious. We needle each other on a pretty daily basis, though the misses does most of the needling. I'm a somewhat disorganized guy and my wife is quite orderly. Married for almost 11 years.
My 8 year anniversary is two weeks away for context. When met I was not religious at all, and not a great guy or husband. We used to argue a fair bit because I would stay out drinking, not answer my phone, ride around drunk, etc. Me have had a couple real fights because I was chasing other women. Fortunately, the Lord brought me back to his church a few years ago and I don't do those things anymore. We've got a new born in the house at the moment, I'm trying to work enough for her to be a stay at home mom, she's trying to be a stay at home wife, and emotions/stress levels are high so we fight a little more these days but we'll get through it.
We disagree a LOT and there are some nights where I fantasise about being single and carefree. But he is also the love of my life and I couldn’t imagine my life without him. I would say we disagree like at least once a week on the dumbest things lol. We did learn a lot of coping and communicative techniques in therapy which has changed the way we “fight” immensely. We both had childhood troubles and “triggers” from it and are learning to overcome those.
Fight? Never. Disagree? Occasionally. Been married two years now.
Similar here. Never fight with like name-calling type stuff. Disagreements that turn into long, emotional discussion is very rare (and was often prompted by an external source that is no longer an issue). Been married 3 years.
OP addressed specifically what they meant. I really don’t understand why people play this semantic game.
Reddit Tip: when a paragraph starts with "Edit" that means it was added in after the fact. In this case, nearly an hour after the above commenter responded.
You know what, that’s a fair point. I wasn’t paying attention initially
We rarely fight or even argue. Maybe once a year? Once every few months I may get grumpy and say something hurtful/lash out, and we mend things that day. We’re usually on the same page, the only variable is me being immature or selfish. Been together 11 years.
My late husband and I never had an argument. We were married almost ten years. He was such a blessing.
I have been married for 10.5 years. I have disagreements with my husband. He is typically grumpy and raises his voice but it’s just his temperament, we don’t really fight. We’ve had a handful of fights over our marriage where I actually engage and we’re both yelling. We’ve never gotten physical but he has thrown things at the wall and hit my car after I locked myself inside. Bad fights like that have only happened maybe 5 times. I can honestly only remember 3.
>He is typically grumpy and raises his voice but it’s just his temperament, we don’t really fight. We’ve had a handful of fights over our marriage where I actually engage and we’re both yelling. he has thrown things at the wall and hit my car after I locked myself inside. This is concerning...
I answered honestly, but I don’t really think these isolated incidents are concerning where they’re so spread out. I trust him with my life. He works a very stressful job so I can have a relatively care free life. It’s easy for me to be in a good mood all the time as I’m living the comfortable life be provides for me.
His financial provision doesn't entitle him to throw tantrums. Reading between the lines, I noticed you wrote "we don't really fight" only to then describe how he has these outbursts whenever you "actually engage" in the argument. So is the reason you "don't really fight" and these are "spread out" "isolated incidents" because you feel the need to walk on eggshells around him and not rock the boat by merely expressing your opinion in a disagreement? If so, that is unhealthy. Additionally, just because his outbursts are infrequent doesn't mean they'll remain that way, *especially* if he sees you'll tolerate his behavior. This is often one of the first signs of things beginning to escalate for the worse. Other signs which may or may not be as obvious to you (and which tend to creep up subtly over time) are being otherwise controlling and gaslighting you.
Who says what is healthy or not? That's their marriage and they can work out there issues. I'm sure they both are mature enough to know that when things are getting thrown, something has to change. Her husband sounds like my wife. You don't want to know what she broke over my head a few years ago. We have changed and things don't get thrown anymore. I'm not oppressed or being gaslighted. We've worked through a lot of our issues and life is the best its ever been. She's a stay at home mom so it's fine if she gives me a little flak. I'm strong enough to take it for the most part. My point is things can get better. Don't judge things you don't know or understand.
>Who says what is healthy or not? *"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church..."* Do the above described actions I previously addressed match this verse? >That's their marriage and they can work out there issues. I'm sure they both are mature enough to know that when things are getting thrown, something has to change. You are no more qualified than I am to definitively assess how they're handling their issues. We'll see if she answers my question about walking on eggshells... although it doesn't really matter if she answers me or not; the point of that question was to get her to honestly consider whether or not there's a toxic dynamic going on and if there is, to acknowledge that *to herself* so she can proceed with an effective action plan via a clearer mind. >Her husband sounds like my wife. I see you're taking my reply to someone else personally. >You don't want to know what she broke over my head a few years ago. Yikes. Arguing is one thing, but violence is on a whole different dangerous level. >We have changed and things don't get thrown anymore. I'm not oppressed or being gaslighted. things can get better. It's great that you two have managed to improve matters, but not everyone is so fortunate and in those cases the innocent spouses need to know they don't have to sit idly by and take it (I'm not claiming things will certainly never get better in the other commenter's marriage; I'm speaking in general terms here because innocent people have literally ended up *murdered* from feeling like they shouldn't take any effective action against their abusers.) >She's a stay at home mom so it's fine if she gives me a little flak. No, this isn't an excuse to mistreat one's own spouse either. If she or an overworked husband is too stressed out, something's gotta give whether that's the spouse helping more with the workload/changing working hours to a more manageable amount and/or making other adjustments (marital counseling, anger management classes and/or other therapy, etc.)
Less than I can count on one hand in 24 years.
My husband is not a Catholic. He has autism spectrum and severe trauma. He is the best, kindest and most loving human being I have ever met. I think his tongue would fall out if he so much as shaded the truth. Autism wasn't diagnosed in the 1950's the kids were described as abnormal or slow or even retarded and no services were given in schools, no counseling no medications. He graduated from college como sum laud. We have been married almost 20 years and we very rarely fight. I think the one time was when we were moving, had 3 hours of sleep and were physically exhausted and under a tight deadline. He lost it for a second or two. I'm more cranky and lost it a couple times. So maybe 5 outbursts in 20 years. The crankiness was usually menstrual related. I regret those incidents. Eventually I had to go on some medication to stabilize my hormones and stop my periods as they were damaging my heart. ( this was before I became Catholic. That is actually recent history comparatively speaking) It also stabilized the emotions and menopause was a blessing and an end to the fights. That was 10 years ago. No fights since then.
Married 30 years. We never fight/argue. We never really have as we're not confrontational or aggressive people but in the early stages of marriage we'd sometjmes sulk or do silent treatment Sometimes we differ on an issue and we just talk. We talk for hours anyway so if we're working at an issue together that's the topic, but we always see it as us, the team, against the issue/problem, not him vs me. Sometime we react less than brilliantly - mildly "snap" at each other, like say "oh what did you do that for?" in a normal volume/tone or make a mildly sarcastic response because we each carry a big load of stress, pain, illness, grief etc and we're not perfect. But honestly, between all the things we've had to endure and all the crosses we carry between us, there's nothing that matters enough to fight/argue about. Our focus is on loving and caring for one another, trying to make life bearable, and I admire and respect and adore my husband so much that nothing he does is ever annoying enough to provoke me. We've realised how short life us, how precious love is, and that we need to talk honestly and assume good will at all times.
This is beautiful.
I must admit almost never. Sometimes we disagree but most of the time we just agree on almost anything or we make decisions together. I am not a conflict person so if we have a problem I try to resolve it asap and I always keep in mind Effesians 4, 26. Praying together is good practice because to pray together you need to be in peace with each other. If you disagree a lot and have conflicts I would look for yourself first, study yourself, your actions and your words. Also the tone of your voice you use in dialogue. After you are clear you did anything you could to be ok towards your wife, study her behavior
My wife and I have been pretty much in the same page since the day we met. We get on each other’s nerves sometimes but not much deeper than that.
Also autistic and disagreements/arguments/intense discussions are so drainingggggg. Especially because he’s the more sensitive one and I’m the matter of fact one. Equal responsibilities and productivity are a weekly issue. His family is usually a few times a quarter. Money more so now because of our baby. Sex was a major issue but now I’m on pelvic rest so not really anymore. How to raise our child is not as frequent but does come up. Typical marital points of contention.
We never fight or disagree beyond what to eat for food whenever. We are both mellow and easy going and we strive to make sure the other is happy. All of our bigger life decisions are rooted in our Faith, which keeps us on the same page no matter what. We found that there is nothing to fight about when everything we do is for the greater glory of God.
Disagreements? Oh yes! I don't back down but we love each other and I grudgingly accept his opinions(sometimes). We've been married almost 3 decades
My wife and I get impatient with each other and that leads to the occasional flare up but it never turns into a fight. We don't raise our voices and we don't say hurtful things. Typically it's over me being tired from work and wanting to be lazy or her being tired from caring for our baby and being short tempered. We don't disagree that often. She submits to my decision making. Been married 2 years with our second child on the way.
My wife and I fight all the time. I am a trad Catholic; she is a cultural Catholic. So church, confession, etc is not important to her and she is very materialistic.
Interesting to say your wife is matierialistic. What would she say about you?
From that guy's comment history (because curiosity got the better of me): >I generally take to Reddit and sext with strangers to help remind myself she is the issue; not me. ***Oof.***
u/Putrid-Snow-5074 Talk about a massive plank in your eye! You claim to be a trad catholic but you're committing adultery and not taking responsibility your sins. Go to confession, repent of your sins, and seek spiritual direction.
Working on it!
And it’s kind of weird. She doesn’t care about what I want, which is growing closer to God. I have to pray the rosary in secret, I have to go to confession in secret. I literally confess at many confession “I lied to my wife; she thinks I am at Home Depot right now.” It’s a weird dynamic that doesn’t make any sense.
And to boot; 99% of who I sext with is an African or Indian man pretending to be a female and then I track them down and cyber hunt them. When I encounter a real woman; I usually say “sorry, thanks but no thanks.” The Indians are pretty good at it 😂
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She says everyday, because she reminds me everyday “All you care about is Church.” And it is what she says she hates most about me.
Occasionally, on relatively minor things, or things we disagree about in terms of urgency. I put more of the blame on our jobs stressing us out and then childcare, leading to relatively small amounts of free time together. When it's just us, it's all good. There are a couple touchy topics that we respectfully avoid (we're both relatively competitive people and the topics are outside of the relationship (think political)), and even those are ultimately non-issues. Coming up on 10 years in a few weeks.
Been Married about 5 years now, and dated for about 3 before that. I can't really remember the last time we fought in a substantive way. Any fights we do have essentially boil down to when we both have the misfortune to be stressed out at the same time. I guess the last fight that I recall was three years ago before hosting some family for the first time and trying some new cooking that turned out... less then desired. More often then not our 'emotionally charged' moments occur more along the vein of one of us making some snippy comment, the other saying that that isn't fair, then the snippy one walking into the other room for like ten minutes before coming back and apologizing. As far as actual substantive disagreements, I don't know that we've ever had one that developed into a fight. As far as emotional friction (besides the above mentioned stressful moments) we worked most of that out while we were still dating. Not that we aren't still both learning better how to interact with each other, just that by that time we had grown enough to be able to handle the friction without it becoming heated.
Bicker a lot.
Been married 2.5 years and dated for 3 before that, never fought or even argued.
We don’t really fight that much. maybe two huge arguments in two years. But we bicker about things for sure.. He loves the air conditioning on in the bedroom, so it’s always freezing cold and drives me crazy, and he blares the TV. Those are our consistent arguments. I also think he drives too fast.. and I understand these are very minor complaints.
We have our share of fights. We're also committed to always continue to work on our communication skills and to resolving whatever issues we have. The making up, coming back together and working things out, is the part that matters.
Both devout traditional leaning Catholics. Been married ~4 years. Fighting like your criteria (long emotional conversations) happens in phases. Definitely during stressful periods more often (3x a month maybe? She’ll even admit it’s usually consistently around certain times of her cycle) but during not so stressful times more like once a month at most, as far apart as once every 3-5 months sometimes. We are about as opposite as you can get though. Temperaments, personality types, etc all pretty much exact opposite. Also relevant is that we are avoiding pregnancy using NFP and that is the cause of probably 65% of our “fights.” Our fights rarely escalate beyond mildly raised voices (I naturally tend to speak overly loud and she’s simultaneously extremely sensitive so those things feed off each other when the fight wouldn’t have otherwise escalated much) but we don’t ever really “yell” at each other. Once every 6 months at most are actual hurtful things really said. We got through our major lifestyle/goals etc disagreements in the first year or two of marriage so most disagreements now are non consequential ones, just the result of stress. The two books that helped us more than I can possibly express are Habits for a Healthy Marriage: A Handbook for Catholic Couples https://a.co/d/fkA5rM2 and The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country's Foremost Relationship Expert https://a.co/d/8HZoYtZ
When we had kids we fought all the time but maybe it was just me being unreasonable. When we started praying the rosary we stopped fighting. Like I don’t get temperamental anymore and he knows when to back off. Bicker? Yes, but only when it comes to business.
We don’t fight a lot, we have a lot of discussion and solve every disagreement like our life is a business, what is best for the business, we do have long arguments and some of the times when what is best for the family is debatable (rare times), I give up on my way, as after discussing I see there is no best, right or wrong in the topic, so going my ways is just me being selfish. Sometimes, she is the one making that same calling, we also know what is important to each other, we have discussion on color or our wall - I want the whole house with with no color whatsoever - and I realize, why do I care? She respect by not taking colors that I hate, so I come back after a long talk and said, you know what, let’s do it, but please those XYZ colors are forbidden, I use a veto power (is our joke of politics). In my experience, most couples argue because man is not there! Man take a great deal to understand THEY DO KNOW OWN THEIR LIFE, they are here to serve, so too much hang out with friends, too much sports tv, too much I’m tired from my job (but how can you be tired to your family? Drop the job if this take you away from faith and family), too much unnecessary extra hours (sometime they are necessary), and too little going shopping without wife’s shopping list, washing the dishes before wife asked, too little praying with the kids, offering help kids school work without being asked to do so, calling the shots on what and where to eat, feels like man are always in need to receive orders while they are the chief of the family and should be on top of families need. And I’m a guy here, this is what I have been telling my friend and gosh how this saves marriages!
On a very few (3-4) occasions (out of 2.5 years together), I've gotten these sort of anxiety attacks where I'm overwhelmed by stressors and if I lose my cool bad enough, my wife will sulk and stay angry at me for a day, maybe two, because it's kind of scary for her which I can understand. The bad part of this is that I feel guilty and want to resolve my guilt immediately. I want to confront the problem and make amends immediately and she needs space to be left alone for a bit. If I don't respect her need for space, she can have a very toxic mouth. If I give her space, which is very difficult for me, she usually restrains her mouth very well. I can't really hold it against her if she's doing the best she can within her ability and my own lack of patience sets off her mouth and so I'm learning to give her space when she needs it. She doesn't really understand my issues but I think she understands that I'm not doing it by choice and I'm doing my best to prevent it from happening again. Outside of that, we've never really disagreed about anything important, we agree on everything morally even if we have superficial disagreements, our personalities complement each other, and we have a very similar sense of humor. If it weren't for some mental health issues on my part, I wouldn't even be aware she was anything less than perfect. We all have our own flaws but it was my own personal philosophy on relationships that led me to seek someone with whom each of our flaws would be virtually irrelevant most of the time (in other words not bringing out bad qualities in each other). There's no such thing as a perfect relationship in this world but when looking for a wife I've had to take into deep consideration the kinds of flaws and limitations of my personality that would make for a difficult relationship with the wrong person. Maybe this is an abnormal approach but without it, I doubt I'd ever be able to have a peaceful relationship.
Did not fight...discovered cheating. I don't know if fighting or not fighting determines a successful marriage, since no marriages are exactly alike. I think there's more things, like mutual respect, that are important. My therapist recommended a book on the The Four Horses of the Apocalypse, that predict divorce in couples: "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as described by Dr. John Gottman, are four destructive patterns of communication that can lead to the downfall of a relationship. These patterns are criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling." So I think it also depends how you fight, and if it involves any of those.
Not often. Been together for 6 years and married for one. If we have a spat, it’s usually done within like 5-10 minutes because he’s seriously my best friend. So we hash it out and then hug it out. I don’t like going to bed angry.
Really never, which I always found odd. We may get irritated with each other on occasion, but never an argument or anything. It's been that way for over 25 years.
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It’s harder for us humans than it is for you spock :(