Fighting with my Husband

I've explained this to people before, but I thought it would be important to share more widely. I don't expect everyone to understand, and I am not making a judgement about the confrontation styles of other couples. This is just the way we do it, and it works for us.

Saturday night I was frustrated. Alex was having a hard time figuring out if he should take the financial plunge of replacing his computer, which is very much long in the tooth. While I love my husband wanting things (sometimes he has a hard time identifying his needs), I was concerned financially. The thing is, he takes care of the lion's share of our finances because it gives me serious anxiety. All I do is pay the bills he tells me to every two weeks when we get paid. I asked him to consider out current financial plan, which if we pursue aggressively has us paying off our credit card debt (which was monstrous, by the way) April of 2018. The reason we have this plan is because that is the goal that marks the beginning of us trying to have kids (well, after/during a trip to Disney World in the fall). He was having a really hard time making a decision, and, like I said, I was frustrated.

There were other factors at play here, of course, not the least of which was an ongoing pattern over 7 years together where Alex would financially commit to something in some way or another and then abandon it. In the meantime, excited he had made a decision, I would enthusiastically encourage this new thing in his life, only to be left feeling like the fool once it had been abandoned. I felt at a loss for how to help him or support him when he was so unsure about everything. He has his reasons, of course - childhood and all that. That's his story to tell, not mine.

Anyway, we had communicated mainly through online chat at the beginning of this fight because I had gone up to bed to lie down, but he came up and then we had the rest of the discussion face-to-face. I knew we were fighting, but to the outsider looking in, it might not look that way. We never raise our voices. We never demean each other in any way. We have a civil discussion and communicate our feelings and the reasons behind it. That's the way we've always done it. That's not to say we always communicate everything we should, or that we don't sometimes go to less-than-productive places with our discussion ("then why should we even stay together/maybe we need a break/why do you even love me?"). Alex is really good at soothing those fears. Apparently, the only thing he's really sure about is that he wants to stay with me.

I have commitment issues. I have my reasons, of course - childhood and all that. When there is conflict in relationships my brain automatically goes into panic mode. "RED ALERT! RED ALERT! ABORT! ABORT! ABANDON SHIP BEFORE THEY GET A CHANCE TO LEAVE YOU! THEY ALWAYS LEAVE BECAUSE YOU'RE AWFUL AND UGLY AND EVIL AND NO ONE LOVES YOU!" Yeah, it's bullshit, but it's a learned response. Maybe I can unlearn it some day.

So we talked it out, and came to a conclusion, and stayed together. In two and a half months we'll have officially been together for 7 years, married for two. This works for us. Maybe it doesn't work for everyone, but for two traumatized kids who grew into caring adults, it works.

This is what I mean if I ever say, "We had a fight." It's all really less dramatic than you might think. Anyway, just thought that was worth sharing.