The same old arguments … the same old cycle. In the marriage counseling world, we call these negative interaction cycles. The topic or concern or issue may change but it’s usually the same pattern: one spouse is more demanding or trying to get a response and the other avoids or dismisses or withdraws. And then it escalates from there. Today, we’re going to help you get started on breaking out of this pattern!

The Three Cycles

There’s really just three kinds of cycles. The most common is where one spouse is pursuing or demanding or attacking; the other spouse is avoiding, dismissive or withdrawing. Sometimes called the attack-withdraw or demand-withdraw cycle. The second is where both spouses typically go on the attack. The third is where both spouses avoid. Let’s break these down a little bit.

The Demand-Withdraw Cycle

In this form, one spouse (classically the wife, although occasionally I see this in reverse) tries to engage in a discussion about an issue that is important to him or her. They will typically make demands or apply pressure. The automatic response of the other spouse is to avoid, dismiss or withdraw from the discussion[i].

This often leads to escalation, as the demanding spouse feels ignored or unheard and so has to resort to increasingly strong forms of attack in order to try to break through the defenses. Unfortunately, the withdrawing spouse, in the face of an intensified attack, will often double down on the defense and withdraw even more, often stonewalling the attacker.

This will continue until either the attacker gives up which is a profoundly lonely moment for him or her, or until the withdrawer explodes.

This style of conflict is not good for marital satisfaction (no surprise there).

The Mutually-Hostile Approach

In this approach, typically both spouses are pursuers or attackers. You respond to criticism with further criticism and with a conscious or subconscious agenda to provoke an angry response. As you might expect, this often escalates and usually just becomes an anger-venting, cathartic experience rather than one that actually solves problems and resolves conflict[ii].

While this may be a more frightening approach to conflict, and certainly doesn’t do much good for either of you, it is at least easier to break out of than the common demand-withdraw pattern. Simply because both spouses want to express themselves (which is helpful) and work on the issue at hand. It simply becomes a matter of figuring out a more productive way to do so[iii].

Avoid-Avoid

The third pattern is where both spouses are avoiding or are naturally withdrawers. In this situation, there’s no major overt conflict and no screaming matches but typically nothing ever gets resolved. Unfortunately, this leads to a buildup of resentment as all these unresolved issues grow and grow[iv].

Now it is important to note that your style may change. For example, if you started out your marriage avoid-avoid you may eventually find one person transitions to pursuing. Or both of you get so frustrated that you become mutually hostile.

One shift I see more commonly is in the demand-withdraw cycle (the common one we began with), the pursuer gets burnt out. Then they often come in as an avoid-avoid situation in therapy and when we do our history and assessment work at the start I soon begin to see that it used to be demand-withdraw but then eventually the pursuing spouse got burnt out.

All of these cycles are more common in couples whose marriage is distressed: if things are going badly and there’s a lot of tension and unresolved anger then falling into a negative cycle is much easier. As you’d probably expect, each of these cycles creates further distress in the marriage[v].

How To Break Out of Conflict Patterns

Ok, now let’s talk about how to break out of these cycles. First by looking at the wider context of marriage then with some specific skills.

Equalize Power Imbalances