When you keep having the same argument

The arguing is not the problem

The couple who never argue are not the happier couple. Usually they have stopped wanting anything from each other. An argument is an attempt to achieve something: to be heard, to be taken seriously, to create closeness. It is a sign of involvement.

It becomes a problem when the argument always takes the same course and never reaches an end. Then it burns energy without resolving anything. And because it resolves nothing, it comes back.

Why the triggers are interchangeable

Housework, money, in-laws, phone use, who looks after the children and how: ask couples what they argue about and the usual subjects come up. Look more closely and it almost always turns out that these subjects are interchangeable. Remove one, and another moves up to take its place.

The argument does not follow the subject; it follows a sequence. The sequence is stable – the subject is merely the occasion for setting it off.

A sequence often looks like this: One person raises something. The other hears an accusation and justifies themselves. The first feels unheard and becomes more emphatic. The second feels attacked and withdraws or strikes back. Each confirms for the other exactly what they feared.

What makes this sequence so stubborn is that every step makes complete sense from the perspective of the person taking it. No one is being unreasonable. Both are responding appropriately – to a situation that does not exist in that form.

The role of old patterns

This is where the schema therapy perspective becomes practical. People bring particular sensitivities with them from their history. Someone who learned as a child that criticism was dangerous responds to every piece of feedback with alarm. Someone who learned that they only counted when they performed responds to withdrawal with panic.

These imprints are neither diagnoses nor weaknesses. They are adaptations that once made sense. In a relationship, two such systems meet – and sometimes they interlock in such a way that every reaction from one keeps fuelling the system of the other.

The classic case looks like this: under strain, one person needs closeness and clarification. Under strain, the other needs distance. The harder the first pushes, the further the second withdraws. The further they evade, the more urgent the first becomes. Both are right, and both are making it worse.

What happens in couples therapy

We map the sequence. Not as theory, but using a concrete argument from the past fortnight. Who said which sentence, what it set off in the other, what followed. For many couples this is the first moment they see the argument as a movement rather than a question of blame.

We look for the point before the point. Every argument has a place where it was still reversible. Almost always, that place lies earlier than both of you think – often in the very first sentence, or even before it, in the tension of the day.

We practise a different move. Neither silence nor giving in. A third thing: putting into words what is happening right now. "I notice I'm shutting down" is a sentence that interrupts the sequence, because it is not part of the sequence.

We clarify what an ending is. Many couples do not know how an argument ends. They stop when both are exhausted. An ending needs a form: an understanding of what has been understood, and what remains open.

What changes – and what does not

Shorter arguments, less frequent escalation, and when things do escalate, both of you find your way back more quickly: that is what couples typically report after a few months. The subjects remain. Between two people, the differences do not disappear.

What changes is your relationship to the arguing itself. It stops threatening the whole partnership and becomes what it should be: a disagreement about a matter.

When a different kind of support makes more sense

Couples therapy is not the right setting if violence occurs in your conflicts – physical violence, or threats and intimidation. What is needed first is safety and separate support for both sides. I say this openly in the initial consultation and point you to appropriate services.

An example of how it typically looks

A couple who do not exist in this exact form, but whose constellation is common. Both working, two children, well organised. On a Tuesday evening, the argument begins with the question of why the dishwasher has not been emptied.

She says: "I've done everything all day today." He hears: You are unreliable. He says: "I was at the office until eight." She hears: My work doesn't count. She gets louder. He goes quiet. She says: "There's no talking to you." He leaves the room.

Two hours later, both apologise. At the weekend everything is fine. Three weeks later, the same sequence runs its course over a different object.

In the session, something becomes visible: this is neither about the dishwasher nor about the division of labour. For her, the question in the room is whether she is alone with everything she carries. For him, it is whether he is ever enough. As long as those two questions stay unspoken, the two of them negotiate over crockery.

What you can observe for yourself

One simple observation helps, even before you have an appointment: after your next argument, note down three things. What was the outward trigger? At what point did it tip over? And what would you have wished for in that moment?

The third question is the most revealing. The answer is almost never "that he takes the rubbish out". It is usually something like "that she listens to me without immediately contradicting me".

How to tell that something is shifting

At first the arguments become shorter, not rarer. Then their tone changes. Then comes the moment when one of you says, in the middle of an argument: "This is our sequence again" – and you both laugh briefly, because it is true.

From then on the argument belongs to the two of you, and is no longer a question of who started it.