Conflict

Conflict is something that every marriage will face. Some couples are really good at figuring things out and working through things. Most marital problems are perpetual, they are things that come up multiple times. It can be hard to be patient with your spouse, especially if it is something you have had happen multiple times, but marriage is a commitment that we work on over and over.

When I first got married, my husband and I rarely had conflict. We were really poor, but we had what we needed and we were happy. It was pretty calm for three years, then my daughter was born. When she was born, we had life hit us like a brick wall. We had medical problems, job changes, moving multiple times and almost no sleep on top of everything. I quickly learned that my husband wasn't the most patient person in the world when he was tired, and I wasn't very patient when he was impatient. We got more picky at each other and brought things up that bothered us. It was easy to point something out when we were already frustrated and tired. 

Our daughter is now nine moths old. We still haven't figured everything out but we are much better at being patient in our exhaustion. It has taken a lot of time to work on it but it is so much better now that we aren't so easily annoyed with things. I think that our ability to work together has also made other things much easier, being able to work through them together rather than on our own. 

Another concept of marital arguing that I thought was interesting was flooding. This is when your heart rate gets fast and you are instantly just really angry and be hard to calm down from quickly. Men are more likely to hold onto the state of flooding than women are. 

Emotions are a rough thing to understand. It's hard to balance your own emotions and try to figure out and help another persons emotions. Doing all of this on top of everything else life throws at us seems impossible sometimes. Having this ability is something that takes practice and patience, with yourself and your spouse.