Why do couples argue most in the evening? The answer lies in stress, fatigue, and communication. Photo / 123RF
Why do couples argue most in the evening? The answer lies in stress, fatigue, and communication. Photo / 123RF
That early evening hour when everyone arrives home is the danger zone for relationship conflict. Here’s how to get through it
“Darling, I’m home,” says no one ever. There is a sweet spot, or sour spot, in which couples bring all their anxieties, stresses and paranoia into thesame room at the same time on the same days. Whether they’ve walked through the front door after the commute from hell or spent the past eight hours isolated at home, people in a relationship are habitually reunited at some point between six and seven o’clock in the evening. In other words, the moment couples spend most time together is the worst moment for couples to spend time together. But do not despair: there is a solution, and it’s not just about putting the top back on the toothpaste or picking those socks off the floor.
In the first flush of romance a person could say “I’m a homicidal maniac” and the reply would be: “Don’t worry, I’m sure we can get through it”. But a year later if the same person puts the toilet roll on the wrong way round their partner will go berserk. This period can be accurately measured by how long it takes for a couple to start breaking wind in front of each other.
There is no worse time to dwell on these annoying “little things” than the end-of-the-day slump. When you get up in the morning you are at your peak in terms of resources and energy. Through the day those resources are eaten away: it could be a colleague or friend that drains your patience or that your journey back is particularly horrible. Maybe those little angels you brought into the world a few years back are turning into adolescent monsters. But you cope with challenges and hold those stresses at bay during the day because you have no choice. In the evening, we are depleted emotionally and mentally and more easily triggered. These triggers seem insignificant: Why hasn’t the rubbish been put out? Why is the house a mess? Why did you forget to buy milk? We’ve all been there.
“What we are hearing at that point are threats and challenges,” says Paul Glynn of the KlearMinds therapy service. “In the evening our coping threshold is lower. So instead of stepping back from something we hurl another threat back. It’s not what we are arguing about, it’s what we are arguing for. People fight because they don’t feel listened to or valued. But they disguise this behind trivialities. We are feeling flat at that time of day so we are vulnerable to having a grenade thrown at us.”
So what can we do to counteract all that tiredness, stress and overfamiliarity when we find ourselves disconnected at the end of the day?
Fatigue lowers our patience and makes minor annoyances feel much bigger. Photo / 123RF
Be aware of the moment
The first few minutes are crucial. Reflecting on the other person and their feelings might be a good entry point but you want to avoid mind reading — the habit of assuming what the other person is thinking or feeling — and then giving yourself a pat on the back and making decisions based on what you think you’ve figured out.
“Spouses and partners may have significantly different interpretations and expectations about what it means to ‘come home’ and how people are expected to interact on such an occasion,” writes the Harvard Business Review. Consciously dial the conflict down and then start talking and asking what the other person is thinking and feeling.
“When someone comes home and says “I want to tell you about my day” it sounds so straightforward you think surely the other person is going to be understanding and sympathetic,” says Glynn. “But the other person is often thinking ‘You want more from me? You are demanding something from me as soon as you walk in the door and I can’t do it’.” Your partner is not your own personal therapist.
Don’t get triggered
It is startling how easily a person can be driven mad by the noise their partner makes when they’re eating, but these frustrations really say “I’m tired and stressed out and I would really appreciate some quiet.” But we rarely express that and instead go on the attack over the volume of their mastication.
Anything can be a trigger. “The things that cause conflict lie in front of questions of justice,” says Glynn. “‘Are you doing your fair share?’ It’s easier to attack someone over putting the rubbish out or cleaning the children’s shoes than to ask such a brutal question as ‘Are you doing as much as me?’ If couples are in conflict their thinking capacity diminishes and they will often say brutal things and a couple of hours later say ‘I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean that’. In the moment they felt threatened and wanted to stop it and escape.”
Open up and communicate
Conversations between two people in long-term relationships increasingly come to resemble a kind of extended The Two Ronnies “Mastermind” sketch in which questions are greeted with the answer to the question before last, or a question asked yesterday, or to a completely different question entirely and even one that has never been asked at all.
Asking your partner how they are feeling is a good step but asking them what they want or need is even better — as long as it’s non-confrontational. To hear someone saying they care and they are interested is extraordinarily powerful if it provides an opportunity for a couple to work together.
Asking for help can backfire if it looks transactional or just another means of attack. Saying things like “Why don’t you understand?” or “Why can’t you see what’s going on?” will get nowhere. How things are said is crucial. “This is what I need you to give me,” is loaded with negativity, whereas “What I would like or appreciate is if you do this or help me with this” is inclusive and sincere. Communication must not be a challenge or an edict. The key is curiosity from both sides.
Asking your partner how they are feeling is a good step but asking them what they want or need is even better – as long as it’s non-confrontational. Photo / 123rf
Accept your differences
Once the communication has improved then there are other tactics to employ. Glynn recommends the idea of “benign denial” as the best way to cope with those everyday irritations. Couples can become obsessed with the trivial and use it against each other all the time. We need to develop dispassionate acceptance that the other person comes from a different emotional “culture”.
You might find it irritating or confusing but if you get over-focused on those dreaded discarded socks you are just going to go round in circles. What it says is “I can’t tolerate that you do things differently to me” so staying in this rigid mindset will get you nowhere. If you have a target and you don’t get what you think you’ve been promised (have they done the dishes as often as you agreed?) then you are creating a problem for yourself.
A common complaint is that one person wants to vent about their day and the other wants a few moments to decompress. Identifying those differences can be illuminating. “Some people needed to be loud and aggressive to get their voice heard in childhood and that carries into relationships,” says Glynn. “The same is true of restrained, quiet households, who might see vocalising as threats, criticism and judgment because that’s all they know.”
Different upbringings shape how we communicate—what’s normal for one person can feel like criticism to another. Photo / 123RF
Find what works
Whatever you discuss, don’t set it in stone. It’s also important to make sure one person doesn’t end up thinking they are acting alone or taking things more seriously than their partner. There’s no need to handle this process in a fixed way or to make it feel like an imposition. “Let’s sit down and talk for 20 minutes” isn’t going to work for everyone.
As Winston Churchill said, “My wife and I tried to breakfast together, but we had to stop or our marriage would have been wrecked”.
Some people want to talk, some want peace and quiet and others might want to be distracted or entertained. It might be taking a bath or grabbing something straight from the fridge. It might be what Mrs C calls “crap TV”, a broad category covering such gems as Below Deck or Married At First Sight. It can even be as simple as making a beeline for trousers with an elasticated waist or a dressing gown. But a word of warning before you get too comfy: “We need security, but we also need some mystery,” says Glynn. “You still need to be able to surprise someone. If we focus too much on security we lose the mystery. We need that frisson to keep the energy going.”
“The key is developing a ‘we’ sense as opposed to an ‘I’ sense,” concludes Glynn. “If we always think from an ‘I’ perspective instead of a ‘we’ perspective a person will keep fighting for what ‘I’ need and what ‘I’ feel is right and the other person does the same. But if you start to think about what ‘we’ can do then the defences start to lower.”
