Reply to How to de-escalate an argument with someone who refuses to and doesn't care about the consequences

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[quote=Anonymous]As he's screaming at you, apologize for being thoughtless and agree with everything he says.  Praise him for bringing all of these issues to your attention.  Praise him for anything you can think of.  Tell him you'll do better in the future, and you're so lucky to have him for guiding you to see the light.  With any luck, after a while, he'll have no more ammunition and not be getting any new fuel from you, so this will diffuse the situation and bring his anger level a notch or two down.

Don't even remotely suggest that anything he says is wrong, including that he's angry and needs to calm down (by taking a walk, for example).  He'll take that as a full blown threat.  You stating that you're walking away is implicitly implying he's done something wrong, which he'll also take as a threat.  And in the rage state, any threat is a 10 alarm fire.  You cannot have a back and forth conversation, he can't process it in his state.  Anything you say he'll interpret it as a threat, then attack you with it.  If you can and feel like it would help, bring the issues up at some point when he's not angry and can talk about the calmly.  However, it sounds like he's not someone who can ever really be reasonable, so this might not even really be possible.

Try to stay away from him as much as possible and live your life.  Your choice whether to stay or divorce, not judging either decision.  If you stay, try to learn the triggers (however illogical they may be) and either avoid them or just stay away entirely when you can tell he's agitated/tired/hungry whatever it is.  [/quote]

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