Disagreeing Well
Conflict is not abuse, and the difference is not about volume
A loud marriage can be safe and a quiet one can be dangerous. What separates a disagreement from a pattern of control, and why the…
Disagreeing Well
Recurring arguments, repair, and the difference between a row and a problem.
13 articles · updated August 11, 2026 · page 1 of 2
Disagreeing Well
Repair matters more than avoiding the rupture
Every couple ruptures. The reliable difference is what happens in the hour afterwards, and repair turns out to be a learnable sequence rather than a personality trait.
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Disagreeing Well
The same argument keeps coming back because it is not the argument
Third time this year, same subject, same ending. Recurring fights usually have a stable question underneath them, and the surface…
Disagreeing Well
We never fight is not the achievement it sounds like
An absence of conflict can mean two people who agree, or two people who have stopped raising things. The second is far more common…
Disagreeing Well
The pursue-and-withdraw cycle explains more arguments than either person does
One of you moves towards the conflict and one moves away, and each movement makes the other worse. The loop is common…
Disagreeing Well
Scorekeeping turns a marriage into an audit
Once you start counting, you cannot stop, and the numbers are always wrong. Why mental ledgers form, why they favour their keeper…
Disagreeing Well
Bringing up the past: when it is fair and when it is a weapon
Everyone is told never to raise old grievances, and everyone does it. The rule is too simple, and the useful distinction is what…
Disagreeing Well
Arguing by text goes wrong for structural reasons
The medium removes tone, delays replies and keeps a permanent record. Those three features are enough to explain most of what goes…
Disagreeing Well
Taking a fight to a friend or a parent has a cost you pay later
You feel better and your marriage is worse. What happens to the listener's picture of your spouse, and how couples decide what…
Disagreeing Well
Some problems are perpetual, and managing beats solving
A share of what couples argue about will never be resolved, and treating it as solvable is what exhausts people. How to tell the…
Disagreeing Well
The eleven o'clock argument: timing decides the outcome
The same disagreement at ten in the morning and at eleven at night produces two different marriages. Why late-night conflict goes…
Disagreeing Well
Threatening to leave changes the marriage even when you do not mean it
Said once in temper, remembered for years. What the threat does to the foundation both people are standing on, and what to say…