5 good practices
to stop arguing
with your partner
Sometimes, small things take on vital importance and risk ruining a relationship forever. Maria Claudia Biscione, psychotherapist and sexologist, suggested 5 good practices to defuse tensions and regain serenity.
1 Habits, intolerance, and arguments
When living together, many small habits of the partner that are intolerable often come to light, sparking arguments and even fights.
“When the way of relating to each other often takes on a critical and devaluing tone, it is easy to lose the thread of complicity and understanding,” explains Maria Claudia Biscione, psychotherapist and sexologist. “If you don't take action, finding more welcoming and tolerant ways, you risk breaking the relationship.” We discussed this with the expert, who suggested 5 good practices to defuse this type of discussion.
2 At the beginning of the relationship, no one notices the "quirks" of the other, but then they become unbearable. Why does this happen?
At the beginning of a relationship, one tends to show the best of oneself, highlighting the aspects of attention, care, and needs of the partner. Additionally, one is more tolerant because the goal is to confirm and consolidate the relationship. The paradox lies in the fact that instead of carefully evaluating the compatibility of habits and personal characteristics at the beginning, it is minimized because the need to create the couple sabotages the initial signals.
3 What are the habits that most annoy women?
The expert states that the male habits women usually cannot stand follow three lines: disorder, the "couch" man, and the "where is it?" The first concerns the total male inability to understand order as a reassuring and controlling concept.
The second concerns the presence/absence of the partner: you are next to me, but you are not really present because if I talk to you, you don't listen, you don't hear. The third concerns the usual question after a thousand directions: "but where there??".
4 What annoys men?
Women are certainly no less in their bad habits: leaving hair everywhere in the bathroom, the symbiotic relationship with friends, compulsive cleaning, obsession with the body and shopping, the bossiness in wanting to manage things, meddling in his things even when it's his relaxation space, asking for help only to promptly criticize.
5 How and in what way do these bad habits become fuses that ignite discussions?
When you settle into a relationship, you relax and risk losing sight of the other with their needs, habits, and desires. You become easily intolerant, and the more fights are triggered, the more you distance yourself (even sexually) from the partner to avoid complaints and disapproval.
Different reactions: women
Behind these easy discussions, the common point is often the same: "but why don't you do it like me?". For women, sometimes, it is a personal affront, representing a "you don't love me," "you don't see me," even if in reality it is often not so. There is a risk of entering the dangerous mechanism of feeling excluded, of "you don't care enough" or "we have no common ground."
Different reactions: men
For men, the nagging of criticisms refers to an annoying and controlling maternal script: often it is precisely the constant talking about things or sharing that becomes the annoying female "habit" to defend against and escape from. Moreover, feeling criticized for small things is detrimental.
6 Over time, how do they negatively impact the harmony of the couple? Can they also lead to the end of the relationship?
“Harmony is based on mutual reinforcement, on smiling at one's own and others' flaws, on accommodation and compromise.” When all this is buried by a single communicative pattern, the relationship becomes heavy and can bring out personal relational models that each carries from their own origin stories.
When this happens, it becomes difficult to distinguish what belongs to the past from the present because it is precisely the present of the couple that has stopped replacing the old ghosts.
7 The problem is that often you start arguing about the same things and never stop: how do you get out of this vicious circle?
“Doing the same actions always produces the same results, so it is necessary to create new ways of interacting. To do this, it is necessary to start from the motivation to regain mutual trust and activate a new virtuous circle.
8 5 good practices to stop arguing over the partner's annoying habits
1- Learn the art of tolerance: train acceptance of the other, remembering that their flaws are exactly the same as ours. Also, try to practice kindness more when asking and smiling when communicating.
2- Never forget respect: it is fundamental in every relationship, meaning knowing how to look at the other, welcome them, listen to them without judgment and domination.
3- Bad habit or just their passion? If you can't stand the partner's passion, maybe it's because you see a special world to which you don't have access. Try to enter it on tiptoe or alternatively, learn from the other that giving oneself time is a precious gift that we can learn to give ourselves.
4- One for you, one for me. Sit down at the table and make a top ten of the flaws you can't tolerate in each other and then choose one that you feel you can eliminate. Committing to change a bad habit is an act that means I can meet you halfway.
5- I can't stand you anymore. If the level of frustration for the partner's behaviors exceeds a certain threshold, ask yourself if you still have the ability to look at the other as at the beginning of the story. Try to remember what united you and how much of that emotion still lives inside you. It will be the starting question that can show you the way to follow.
