Fighting For What?

“My relationship problems consume me and I don’t have the concentration to live the life I value. ”
While conducting couples therapy I frequently hear versions of this lament. One husband said, ” Let’s stop fighting so we can work on climate change and do more charity work.”
Great idea. Why can’t they do both?
Because their fighting weakens them as individuals. He’s angry and she’s hurt and the kids need dinner.
He dreams of being a team to work together and fix the world. She dreams too. Of their being an emotional team. Where he stops judging her reactions, attitudes, choice of words, friendships. Then she’d enjoy collaborating with him
on important social issues.
He has yet to understand you must be kind on the small scale first. Your wife is asking for respect. He thinks she is avoiding committing and instead pursueing self-absorbed issues. He has to learn that his grand value system cannot substitute for his lack of tenderness toward his partner. He wants commitment from her without offering empathy or intimacy
or dropping his own ego.
Instead of fighting the good social improvement fight, he fights his wife. Wasting both of his and her lives. He wins and loses.