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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP

This is very familiar and was how our relationship was in the first few years after having a kid. It is pointless to figure out who is right/wrong because that is the problem. You are both incredibly defensive and neither of you feel heard. When she screams you are not listening to me, what she is really saying is "I do not feel heard or understood." And neither of you feel that way because you start right off the bat defensively. I am not going to go into all the details but here is what worked for us--truly worked.

We had some counseling that broke down barriers of defensiveness and resentment. We talked through a couple things and got to a starting point which is that 1) we loved each other; 2) we didn't want to continue this way 3) we acknowledged our communication was the issue more than any single disagreement and 4) what we were doing was damaging our marriage and bad for our kid.

We had to retrain ourselves to talk and listen. step one was using "I" language. you may think you are using I language when you say "I really wish you would..." but in fact, you are not, its just a passive way of blaming. "I language " is "I would like to better understand X." I feel we are not making progress toward Y. I am feeling stressed out by X demands and want to find a solution. Can we talk about ways of doing this?

Once you truly remove blame language--whether direct or passive--the respondent should not respond with immediate defensiveness. This took training for both of us, as it was so ingrained, and had a lot to do with how we were each raised (DH was raised with defensive critical parents, I was raised where people didn't work out conflicts for ages and then it exploded).

Then, we had to learn that our first reaction was NOT to be defensive but rather to validate the other person's experience. We had to do exercises that felt silly and forced at first--we had to mirror what the other person was (we thought) saying BEFORE we reacted with our own feelings or responses. SO it was "so, I think you're saying that you feel upset because of X, is that right?"

this seems simple, it was hard at first. but it lead to real discussions about conflict. We also learned to table conflict, and find specific times to talk. And once we built the confidence that we would actually address things, we were able t p ut aside the urgent need to get into conflict, knowing that we would have an opportunity to work things out.

I am not going to comment on all the ins and outs and she did/I said of your post because, as I learned, these things are incredibly subjective AND the more you try t prove the other person is in the wrong, the more you will both fail to solve the issues. So the first order of business is to stop trying to prove to yourself, and DCUM how wrong your wife is (she may be, but you're also a participant)--and step back and get some help and some outside perspective on the dynamics. For us, once each us agreed to give the other person the benefit of the doubt, once we were able to actually HEAR each other because we were not immediately REACTING to tone, perceived criticism, etc, we made progress.

Our marriage is not perfect but I can't remember the last time we had one of those fights. And several years ago I was sure we were going to split up because our fights were so horrible--not that we were violent, but that each of us was totally convinced that the other person was the problem. I had to throw out that idea completely--it wasn't even that I had to accept my culpability, it was that I had to decide that proving the other person's wrongness was never, ever going to solve things and would make it worse.

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This is great advice.[/quote]

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