Relationships and a partner's annoying habits: how to act to avoid arguments

Sometimes small things take on enormous importance and risk ruining a relationship forever. Psychotherapist and sexologist Maria Claudia Biscione suggested 5 good practices to defuse tension and restore peace.

1 Habits, intolerance and arguments

When you live together, many small habits of your partner emerge over time that you cannot tolerate, often triggering disagreements and even arguments.

'When the way you relate to each other often becomes critical and belittling, it is easy to lose your sense of closeness and understanding,' explains Maria Claudia Biscione, psychotherapist and sexologist. 'Unless you take action and find more accepting and tolerant ways to communicate, you risk destroying the relationship.' We spoke to the expert, who suggested 5 good practices for defusing this type of argument.

2 At the beginning of a relationship, nobody notices the other person's "quirks", but later they become unbearable. Why does this happen?

At the beginning of a relationship, people tend to show their best selves, emphasising attentiveness, care and their partner's needs. They are also more tolerant because the aim is to affirm and strengthen the relationship. The paradox is that, instead of carefully assessing compatibility in habits and personal characteristics at the outset, people downplay it because the desire to become a couple undermines the early warning signs.

3 Which habits annoy women the most?

The expert says that male habits women cannot stand usually fall into three categories: messiness, the “couch man,” and the “where is it?” man. The first concerns men's complete inability to understand tidiness as a reassuring concept that provides a sense of control. 

The second, by contrast, concerns the partner's presence or absence: you are beside me, but you are not really present, because when I speak you do not listen or hear me. The third concerns the usual question after countless directions: "But where exactly??"

4 What annoys men?

Women certainly have their share of bad habits too: leaving hair all over the bathroom, symbiotic relationships with friends, compulsive cleaning, obsession with their bodies and shopping, insistence on controlling things, interfering in his affairs even during his downtime, and asking for help only to criticise it every time.

5. How, and to what extent, do these bad habits become sparks that ignite arguments?

As a relationship settles, we relax and risk losing sight of our partner and their needs, habits and wishes. It is easy to become intolerant, and the more arguments arise, the further we withdraw from our partner, sexually too, to avoid complaints and disapproval.

Different reactions: women

Behind these easily triggered arguments, the common thread is often the same: 'Why don't you do things the way I do?' For women, this can sometimes feel like a personal affront, meaning 'You don't love me' or 'You don't see me', although often that is not really the case. There is a risk of entering the dangerous cycle of feeling excluded: 'You aren't interested enough in me' or 'We have nothing in common.'

Different reactions: men

For men, persistent criticism recalls an intrusive, irritating and controlling maternal pattern: often the constant desire to discuss or share things becomes the annoying female "habit" they seek to defend themselves against and escape. Feeling criticised over small things is also damaging.

6 How do they negatively affect a couple's harmony over time? Can they also lead to the end of the relationship?

"Harmony rests on mutual encouragement, smiling at your own and one another's flaws, accommodation and compromise." When all of this is buried beneath a single pattern of communication, the relationship becomes strained and can bring personal relationship patterns back to the surface—patterns each person carries from their earlier life.

When this happens, it becomes difficult to distinguish the past from the present, because the couple's present has stopped replacing the old ghosts.

7 The problem is that we often start arguing over the same things and never stop: how do we escape this vicious circle?

"Doing the same things always produces the same results, so new ways of interacting must be created. This starts with the motivation to restore mutual trust and set a new virtuous cycle in motion.

8 5 good practices to stop arguing about your partner's annoying habits

1- Learn the art of tolerance: practise accepting one another, remembering that their flaws are just like your own. Also try being kinder when making requests and smiling more when you communicate.

2- Never forget respect: it is essential in every relationship. It means knowing how to see, accept and listen to the other person without judgement or domination.

3 – A bad habit, or simply a passion? If you cannot stand your partner's passion, perhaps it is because you glimpse a special world that you cannot access. Try entering it gently or, alternatively, learn from your partner that making time for yourself is a precious gift you can learn to give yourself.

4- One for you, one for me. Sit down together and make a top-ten list of each other's faults that you cannot tolerate, then each choose one you feel you can eliminate. Committing to changing a bad habit is a way of saying that I can meet you halfway.

5- I can't stand you anymore. If frustration with your partner's behaviour passes a certain threshold, ask yourselves whether you can still look at one another as you did at the start of the relationship. Try to remember what brought you together and how much of that feeling still lives within you. This is the starting question that may show you the way forward.