When your relationship is in trouble: how communication goes wrong between partners, and what can help

You know the feeling. The same argument, again, as if you had both been handed the script. Or the opposite: nothing much is said at all, and the quiet in the house has a weight to it. You lie awake going over what happened, or what did not happen. You may still care a great deal, and be frightened by how far apart you feel. Or you may be asking yourself, quietly, whether this is still the relationship you want.

This page is for anyone whose relationship has become hard, whatever its shape, however long it has lasted, and whoever you are. It will not tell you whether to stay or leave; no page can. It will try to explain what the trouble usually is made of, how people begin to repair it, how to tell ordinary trouble from something that is not safe, and when talking to a professional, together or alone, makes a difference.

First, a word about safety

Most relationship trouble is painful and nobody’s fault alone. Some of it is something else, and it matters to know the difference early. If you are frightened of your partner; if they control where you go, who you see or what you spend; if they check your phone, belittle you, threaten you or hurt you; if you find yourself changing what you say and do to avoid their reaction: that is abuse, not a communication problem, and the advice below about talking things through does not apply. Coercive control of this kind is a crime in Ireland and the UK. NHS; Women’s Aid. Joint conversations and couples counselling are not safe in this situation. Talk to a specialist service first, on your own.

• Ireland: Women’s Aid 1800 341 900 (free, 24 hours); Men’s Aid 01 554 3811 (Monday to Friday, 9 to 5).
• UK: National Domestic Abuse Helpline 0808 2000 247 (free, 24 hours); Men’s Advice Line 0808 8010 327.
• US: National Domestic Violence Hotline 1-800-799-7233, or text START to 88788.
• Australia: 1800RESPECT, 1800 737 732. New Zealand: Are You OK, 0800 456 450.
• Elsewhere, your local domestic abuse service; a doctor or a helpline can help you find it.

The abuse support guide on this site has more on safer devices, planning and support. If you are unsure whether what you are living with is abuse, toxic and unhealthy relationships describes the patterns that are worth taking seriously. In immediate danger, contact emergency services: Ireland 112 or 999; UK 999 or 112; rest of the EU 112; US and Canada 911; Australia 000; New Zealand 111; elsewhere, your local emergency number.

What usually goes wrong

Relationships rarely break over one thing. They wear down through patterns, and the patterns are surprisingly similar from one couple to the next. Seeing them is the first step towards changing them, because a pattern is something two people do together, and either of them can start to do it differently.

The argument that repeats. Money, housework, the in-laws, the phone, how much time you spend together. The subject is real, but the heat usually comes from what sits underneath it: one of you feels unimportant, unheard, criticised, taken for granted, alone. Until that is said and heard, the argument comes back wearing different clothes.

How you talk to each other. Researchers who followed couples over years found that it was not whether they argued that predicted whether they would stay together, but how. Couples who were heading for separation showed more criticism and contempt, more defensiveness, more stubbornness and withdrawal, and less warmth, even in ordinary conversations. Gottman and Levenson, 1992. Because this is where most relationship trouble is carried, and where most of the repair happens, the next section looks at it closely.

Drifting. No fights, just distance. Work, children, illness, money worries and screens fill the hours, and the small daily attention that kept you close goes missing. People in this place often say they feel like flatmates, or that they are lonely in company.

Trust that has been broken. An affair, a lie, money hidden, a promise broken again. The hurt partner cannot stop checking and asking; the other feels they can never do enough. Both are exhausted.

One of you is struggling. Anxiety, depression, trauma, grief, drinking, a difficult job, a new baby. These change how a person acts in a relationship, and the relationship starts to carry the strain. If anxiety makes you read silences as rejection and ask for reassurance, how anxiety affects relationships is about that. If you are tormented by doubt about whether you love your partner or they love you, with no real evidence of a problem, read about relationship OCD before deciding anything.

How communication goes wrong, even between people who care

Two people can love each other and still, night after night, leave a conversation feeling unheard. It is rarely because either of them is unkind. It is because communication between partners runs on habits that neither of them chose, and under stress the habits take over. Here are the ones that cause most of the damage. You will probably recognise yourself in some of them and your partner in others; most of us do both.

• Every message has two levels. One is the matter in hand: the dishwasher, the money, the lateness. The other is what the message seems to say about the relationship: “you don’t respect me”, “I am alone in this”, “you are never satisfied”. Arguments that feel absurdly out of proportion to their subject are almost always being fought on the second level while both people talk about the first.
• One presses, the other withdraws. One partner raises the problem, pushes for an answer, follows the other from room to room; the other goes quiet, changes the subject, picks up the phone or leaves. Each makes the other worse: the pressing feels like attack, so the withdrawal deepens; the withdrawal feels like abandonment, so the pressing grows. Couples caught in this pattern during disagreements were measurably less satisfied two and a half years later. Heavey, Christensen and Malamuth, 1995. Neither partner is the villain. The one who presses is usually frightened of distance; the one who withdraws is usually frightened of the conflict itself, or simply overwhelmed.
• Mind-reading. “I know what you really think.” We fill in our partner’s silences and tone with our own fears, then react to the story we have told ourselves. Anxiety does this at speed; so does a long history of hurt.
• Criticising the person instead of the behaviour. “You forgot to ring the school” is a complaint and can be answered. “You never think about anyone but yourself” is a verdict, and the only replies to a verdict are defence or counter-attack. Contempt, the eye-roll, the sarcasm, the mimicry, is the most corrosive habit of all, because it says the other person is beneath you.
• Defending and counter-attacking. “Well, you did the same last week.” “That’s not what happened.” The complaint never lands, so it is made again, louder, and the loop runs.
• Listening in order to reply. While your partner speaks you are assembling your rebuttal, so you hear the first sentence and miss the rest. Interrupting, finishing their sentences and “yes, but” all tell the other person that they have not been heard, whatever you say next.
• Flooding. When a conversation tips into real anger or fear, the body takes over: racing heart, tight chest, a mind that can only attack or escape. Nobody listens or thinks well in that state, and the things said then are the things remembered for years.
• “Always”, “never” and the kitchen sink. Once the first grievance is out, every other one comes with it, back to the wedding or the first flat. The original point drowns, and both people leave with a list.
• The wrong channel. Text messages carry no tone of voice and no face, so they are read in the mood of the reader. Serious conversations started by message, or carried on while one of you is looking at a screen, go wrong far more often than they go right.
• Small reaches that go unanswered. “Look at this.” A hand on the back. A joke at the sink. These tiny bids for attention are how closeness is kept topped up, and when they are met with a grunt, or not at all, the account slowly empties. Researchers found that it was these fleeting everyday moments, not the big talks, that predicted whether couples could stay warm and even funny with each other in the middle of a disagreement. Driver and Gottman, 2004.
• Silence that means different things. For one partner silence is peace; for the other it is punishment, or proof of being unwanted. Unless the meaning is said out loud, each lives in a different relationship. There is more on this in silence in relationships.
• Repairs that are refused. Most couples make attempts to pull a conversation back: a joke, a touch, “I didn’t mean that”. The difference between couples who recover and couples who do not is often less in the attempts than in whether they are accepted.

None of this is a character flaw. These are habits, learnt early and strengthened under stress, and habits can be changed by either partner. Communication is the thread that runs through my own clinical work and writing; the page on communication in psychotherapy and counselling explains how therapy itself works on these patterns.

Why it is worth the effort

Partly because of how it feels: a strained relationship is one of the most painful things a person can live with, and a warm one is one of the best. Partly because of what the research shows. Across 126 studies and more than 72,000 people, better relationship quality went with better physical health and a lower risk of dying early, by about as much as a healthy diet. Robles and colleagues, 2014. And partly because change is more possible than it feels from inside the pattern. None of this means staying in a relationship that is harming you. It means that if the care is still there, the trouble is worth working on.

What helps: changing the way you talk

You do not need your partner to agree to a programme. Most of what follows is something one person can start, and the other usually notices. Each step answers one of the habits above.

1. Choose the moment. Not in the middle of the argument, not at midnight, not by text. “Could we talk about something later, when the children are in bed?” gives you both a chance to arrive calm.
2. Start softly, with yourself. “I’ve been feeling far away from you and I miss you” opens a door. “You never make any effort” closes it. Say what you feel and what you need; leave the charge sheet in the drawer.
3. Say the need under the complaint. Behind “you’re always on your phone” is usually “I miss you” or “I feel invisible”. The complaint invites an argument about phones. The need invites an answer.
4. One thing at a time. The whole relationship is too big for one conversation. Pick the thing that matters most this week, and agree to leave the rest for another day.
5. Ask instead of assuming. “When you went quiet earlier, I took it to mean you were annoyed with me. Was that it?” Nine times out of ten the story you told yourself is not the one they were living. Asking is also how you find out when it is.
6. Listen to understand, not to answer. When your partner speaks, try to say back what you heard before you reply: “So when I’m on my phone in the evening, it feels to you like I’d rather be anywhere else.” You do not have to agree. You have to show you heard.
7. Pause before it tips over, and say what the pause means. When your heart is racing and you are rehearsing your next line instead of listening, nothing good is being said by either of you. Agree a pause: “I want to get this right and I can’t right now. Can we come back to it in half an hour?” If you are the one who tends to go quiet, say so: “I’m not walking away from you, I need twenty minutes.” Then come back; a pause that never ends is a withdrawal.
8. Agree how you will talk, not only what about. Phones face down and out of reach. One person speaks at a time. A word either of you can use to call a pause without it being a slammed door. Serious things said in person, not by message. Rules like these feel artificial for a week and then become the way you do things.
9. Repair quickly, and accept repairs. “That came out harsher than I meant.” “I’m sorry, let me try that again.” “Can we start over?” Couples who stay together do not argue less; they repair more, and they let the repair land instead of refusing it.
10. Answer the small reaches. When your partner says “look at this” or tells you something about their day, turn towards it for a moment, even if it is dull. These moments are the deposits that make the hard conversations survivable.
11. Put something small back in. A cup of tea made without being asked, a question about their day that waits for the answer, a hand on a shoulder, a walk. Closeness is rebuilt in minutes, not grand gestures.

Some words to borrow or change:

There are more in the free communication and appointment prompts. The attachment styles page explains why some of us reach out under stress and others pull away, which can make the pushing-and-leaving pattern easier to forgive in yourself and your partner.

When trust has been broken

Rebuilding trust is slow, and it asks different things of each of you. The person who was hurt needs honesty, patience and room to be angry and sad without being rushed. The person who did the hurting needs to stay in the conversation without defending, minimising or turning it round, and to be reliable in small things for a long time, because trust is rebuilt by evidence, not promises. Constant checking and interrogation, on the other hand, keep both of you locked in the injury; it is worth agreeing together what the hurt partner needs to know and what can be left. This is some of the hardest work two people can do, and it is one of the places where a counsellor in the room helps most.

Deciding whether to stay

This page cannot make that decision, and neither can your friends, however sure they sound. A few questions people find useful to sit with, over weeks rather than in one night: Is the care still there, under the hurt? When things are good between you, are they really good, or just quiet? Have you both tried to change the pattern, or has one of you been trying alone for a long time? Do you feel like yourself in this relationship, or smaller? Is anyone unsafe? If anxiety or doubt makes every small thing feel like a verdict, relationship anxiety or a real relationship problem? helps separate the two. If you are moving towards an ending, when relationships end is about getting through it, and where children are involved, family counselling can help everyone say what they need.

When one of you is anxious, depressed or not well

A relationship can carry a lot, but it should not have to be the whole treatment. If one of you has been low, anxious, drinking more or not sleeping for weeks, that person deserves help in their own right, from a doctor or a therapist, and the relationship usually eases when they get it. The two are closely tied: relationship distress feeds depression and anxiety, and they feed it back. Lebow and colleagues, 2012. Current guidance for depression says that where relationship problems may be contributing, or involving the partner may help, couples therapy is one of the treatments to consider. NICE; Barbato and colleagues, 2018. The depression page explains the other options. Any question about medication needs to be discussed with a qualified prescriber.

Couples counselling, and what the research says

People often leave it very late, as if asking for help were an admission that the relationship has failed. It is closer to the opposite. In couples counselling the two of you sit with someone whose job is not to take sides but to see the pattern you are caught in and help you change it: how you raise things, how you hear each other, what each of you is really asking for, and how to repair. It is practical work, and it is often a relief simply to have the conversation in a room where it cannot spiral.

The evidence is encouraging and honest about its limits. Reviews find that about seven in ten couples who have couples therapy improve, a rate comparable to individual therapy and far better than waiting. Lebow and colleagues, 2012. A recent analysis of 58 studies found a large improvement in relationship satisfaction, while couples left on waiting lists did not improve on their own. Roddy and colleagues, 2020. Gains can fade over a year or two if the old habits creep back, so the aim is to leave with ways of repairing that you keep using. Rathgeber and colleagues, 2019. The two approaches with the most research behind them are emotionally focused therapy and behavioural (including integrative behavioural) couple therapy; a good therapist draws on both.

Two honest limits. Couples counselling is not suitable where there is fear, control or violence; there, individual support and specialist services come first. And it needs both of you willing to look at your own part. If your partner will not come, individual therapy is still worthwhile: changing your half of a pattern changes the pattern, and it helps you think clearly about what you want.

If you would like to do this work with me, I offer couples counselling and individual therapy in Dublin 2 and by video call across Ireland, where that is suitable. The relationship problems page sets out the other routes and resources, including family counselling and support for sexual difficulties such as low desire under stress.

Talking to someone

It can be very helpful to talk to someone. Relationship trouble is isolating; people hide it from friends out of loyalty, and from family out of fear of the verdict. You can talk about your own feelings without putting your partner on trial, and a friend who can simply listen is worth a great deal. A few ways to begin:

If the person you would normally turn to is the one who frightens you, or if anyone is treating you badly, they are not the person to tell. Choose someone else, or one of the services above.

If you need help now

If you are in immediate danger, or cannot keep yourself safe, contact your local emergency services straight away. Ireland 112 or 999; UK 999 or 112; rest of the EU 112; US and Canada 911; Australia 000; New Zealand 111; elsewhere, your local emergency number.

Someone to listen, day or night: Samaritans 116 123 (Ireland, UK); text HELLO to 50808 (Ireland); call or text 988 (US, Canada); Lifeline 13 11 14 (Australia); call or text 1737 (New Zealand); elsewhere, findahelpline.com lists free helplines.

Sources

• Gottman and Levenson (1992): marital processes predictive of later dissolution
• Heavey, Christensen and Malamuth (1995): the longitudinal impact of demand and withdrawal during marital conflict
• Driver and Gottman (2004): daily marital interactions and positive affect during conflict
• Robles and colleagues (2014): marital quality and health, a meta-analytic review
• Lebow and colleagues (2012): research on the treatment of couple distress
• Roddy and colleagues (2020): meta-analysis of couple therapy
• Rathgeber and colleagues (2019): efficacy of emotionally focused and behavioural couple therapy, a meta-analysis
• Barbato and colleagues (2018), Cochrane review: couple therapy for depression
• NICE NG222: depression in adults, recommendation 1.7 on behavioural couples therapy
• NHS: getting help for domestic violence and abuse
• Women’s Aid Ireland: what is abuse, and the 24-hour helpline
• Men’s Aid Ireland
• National Domestic Abuse Helpline (UK)
• Men’s Advice Line (UK)
• National Domestic Violence Hotline (US)
• 1800RESPECT (Australia)
• Are You OK (New Zealand)