You’ve had this fight before.
You know the one. The words might change, but the script feels familiar: one of you starts the conversation (pursues), typically with some type of grievance. The other one gets loud (usually defensive) or withdraws (distances), and before long, you’re back in the same emotional standoff.
It’s not that you don’t love each other. It’s that you’ve each developed a survival (long before you even met each other) strategy that once protected you, but now keeps you stuck and disconnected.
Here’s the thing. You can’t connect when you’re protecting. When you are surviving, you are protecting. Your partner shouldn’t be someone you have to protect against, but your brain can’t tell the difference between their actions and the experiences that developed these protective adaptations in the first place.
Why We Repeat the Same Fight
Therapists like Dr. Sue Johnson, founder of Emotionally Focused Therapy, describe this as a negative cycle: a looping pattern of protest and defense that masks deeper emotional needs.
- The pursuer often says, “You never listen.”
- The withdrawer hears, “Nag Nag Nag” but feels “You’re failing again.”
- Both end up feeling unseen.
Esther Perel calls this the “dance between connection and autonomy.” The more one partner reaches, the more the other retreats, not because they don’t care, but because closeness triggers fears of loss or rejection, and it’s easier to retreat before finding out if I’m truly rejectable.
Harville Hendrix (Imago Therapy) adds that our conflicts are rarely about dishes or deadlines; they’re about unfinished childhood business. Our partners stir up the very wounds we need to heal, and that’s not a mistake. It’s an invitation.
And Terry Real, through Relational Life Therapy, teaches that when couples fight, it’s often adaptive child parts leading the conversation, the hurt child or the controlling child, rather than the functional adult self.
The Real Problem Isn’t the Argument; It’s the Pattern
The most common downfalls of conversation are when, what the Gottmans call the “Four Horsemen”: criticism, defensiveness, contempt, and stonewalling, show up. When these show up, couples start fighting to win instead of fighting to understand. And, truly, not even to win but to protect our inner child.
But beneath every fight is a simple question each partner is asking in their own way:
“Do you see me? Am I safe with you?”
Once you recognize this question underneath the argument, the fight changes shape.
How to Break the Cycle
You can’t logic your way out of an emotional pattern. But you can begin to interrupt it.
- Map Out the Cycle: Start to track what happens when someone brings up a topic, usually a grievance of sorts, and how each of you responds. Use the Four Horsemen to label the responses or add in your own label. Add on to the cycle until you get to resolve or shut down.
An Example of this might look like this:
- Slow Down the Moment
When you notice you’re in the loop, name it out loud. “We’re doing the thing again.” This small pause invites awareness instead of reaction. - Shift From Accusation to Vulnerability
Replace “You never listen” with “I feel disconnected when I can’t get through.” Vulnerability disarms defensiveness. - Identify Your Underlying Need
Ask yourself: am I seeking reassurance, respect, or space? Communicate that instead of the symptom. - Seek Process-Oriented Help
A couples therapist in Philadelphia can help you identify your pattern and practice new ways of relating — in real time, with both partners present and engaged.
The Takeaway
The next time you catch yourselves in the same fight, remember: You’re not broken, and you don’t need to break up! You’re looping. And loops can be broken and rewired.
By slowing down, naming the pattern, and leading with vulnerability, you can transform conflict from a disconnect into a connection.
If you’re ready to understand why you fight and how to reconnect, our couples therapy in Philadelphia helps you learn the emotional language of your relationship. You don’t have to repeat the same cycle forever, you can rewrite it together.