4 Powerful Tips To End A Fight With Your Partner

There’s nothing worse than a fight in a relationship. Not only does it make the relationship suffer, but the stress response following a fight can keep you anxious and on edge for hours afterwards, especially if the fight was particularly bad.

Believe it or not, all couples have fights, even the healthiest ones. In fact, fights themselves can be healthy, if they lead to resolution. But, when you have unhealthy fights that drag on for hours (and even days), the more likely the relationship will deteriorate and lead to a breakup.

This article will provide four powerful tips to end a fight with your partner. Whether you’re fighting with a boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, or wife, these will help you end it and get back on the path towards love and affection.

De-escalate

When you encounter conflict, your body starts to respond hormonally. This is traditionally called the fight or flight response. As you get increasingly triggered, various stress hormones increase until you are either running away or escalating the conflict (or in some cases you might “freeze”).

This response comes from the limbic system, meaning that it’s outside of your logical brain. It’s why you and your partner might not want to fight logically, but once the the trigger occurs (e.g. over money or time spent together) and fighting starts, it can seem impossible to stop.

The key is to de-escalate yourselves so that you calm down your body’s limbic response. You can do this by taking deep breaths, using EFT (emotional freedom technique), or simply excusing yourself from the situation (like by going for a walk). Anything that puts you in a calm, relaxing state will work.

If you don’t practice de-escalation, very little else will work. When someone is agitated and in an emotional state, words and discussion won’t do much good. It’s why couples who try to yell their way out of a fight only end up yelling more.

Start with Empathy

Most couples fight over stress related triggers. For example, you might come home to a messy kitchen and get mad. Or, your partner might be annoyed that you didn’t let him know you were running late after work.

Many times these stress responses will cause you or your partner to react without thinking and assume the worst about each other. Next thing you know, you’re calling each other names and the fight has gotten worse.

Empathy can go a long way in these situations. Empathy is trying to see things from your partner’s perspective. So, your partner might have had a bad day and was in no state to do dishes. Or, you might not have called about work because you were on the phone dealing with a work crisis while driving home.

Empathy is a great starting point when you’re dealing with a conflict. Rather than assuming the worst and going into fight mode, you try to see it from your partner’s perspective.

Solve Problems

Many couples tell me that they fight about the same things over and over again. In fact, studies show that most couples fight about money. So, why do they constantly fight about money, for example?

Usually, it’s because they have issues in their relationship that remain lingering problems, like one person overspends or another believes the kids are spoiled. But, rather than getting to the root of the problem and making changes, those issues aren’t resolved and fester.

You can end fights with your partner by actually solving some of the problems that cause the fights to start. This isn’t always easy and might require therapy or relationship coaching. But, it’s the only way to really end a fight.

Compromise

Love is easy, but making a relationship work can be hard, even when you’re madly in love. Sometimes love requires compromise and effort. Sometimes that’s what it takes to end a fight and settle the issues that are causing the fight itself.

Compromising is both sides giving up something for the good of the relationship. Too often one partner will end a fight by “giving in,” making them feel like the loser in a contest. This is never good for the health of any relationship since it leads to resentment and more fights.

The best compromises are “win win” where both sides feel like they are being heard and their needs are being met. For example, if you’re mad about the dishes not being done and your partner is exhausted after work, a “win win” could be where you do the dishes and your partner does more cleaning on their day off.

So, if you’re trying to end fights with your partner, these tips are a great start. Remember that if you love someone, fighting might be inevitable. But, you can still minimize the difficulties associated with them.