Two Nervous Systems Walk Into A Marriage

We don't just bring ourselves into relationships. We bring our nervous systems, too. All those complicated wires that control so much of what we think, feel, and do can run hot. And not in a good way. 

Two nervous systems walk into a marriage.

One says, “I want to talk about something.”

The other hears, “EVERYTHING IS F*CKED.”

And thus begins an argument about the dishes.

Or money. Or sex. Or parenting. Or whose turn it was to pay the electric bill or call the sitter or drive to practice. Or, somehow, something that happened in 2017.

Marriage is funny like that. We like to think we're bringing our hearts, personalities, values, hopes, and best selves into a relationship. We are. But we're also bringing our nervous systems. And those nervous systems have histories.

Quick EILI5: Your nervous system is like a smoke alarm, but for your body. Its job is to keep you safe. It includes your brain, your spinal cord, and lots of nerves that travel throughout your body. It's constantly sending messages back and forth between your brain and all your other parts. Sometimes there's a real fire: you're in actual danger. Sometimes there's just burnt toast. And sometimes your nervous system goes, “OH MY GOD, FIRE!” when what you're actually experiencing is…burnt toast. That's because its job isn't to carefully investigate everything before reacting. Its job is to protect you quickly.

And sometimes two people bring two very sensitive smoke alarms into the same house. One person's alarm goes off when someone gets quiet. The other person's alarm goes off when someone gets loud. Neither person is necessarily trying to hurt the other, but suddenly both alarms are screaming, and everyone’s running around in circles yelling about fuck knows what instead of doing the stop-drop-and-roll we learned in kindergarten. Nobody is checking for smoke. Nobody is looking for the extinguisher. Someone is giving an itemized list of every fire they've ever put out, and someone else has decided the best way to establish who's right is to set the kitchen on fire too.

The problem isn't just the fire anymore. Neither person is regulated enough to figure out what kind of fire they're dealing with. That's what happens when two nervous systems get activated at the same time. The goal isn't to figure out who gets to be right while the house is on fire. The first job is to get everyone safe enough to think. Then you can figure out what started the fire in the first place. (Because 9 times out of 10, it wasn’t what either of you thought it was.)

The thing nobody told you: Your nervous system has been taking notes your entire life.

Some of us learned early on in childhood that raised voices meant danger. Some of us learned that silence implied danger. There are others among us who’ve learned that the safest thing to do was to become very small, very agreeable, and very good at reading the room.

Then there are some of us who learned to fight. Some who learned to flee, or shut down. Some of us may have learned to keep talking until the other person finally understood. Some of us learned that vulnerability was rewarded, and others that vulnerability was ammunition.

Some of us grew up in families where nobody talked about feelings at all, so now we're forty-something-or-other-years old, standing in the kitchen saying, “Oh, I'm fine,” with the emotional subtlety of a lit match in a dynamite factory.

None of this means our childhood has to determine our marriage, or any committed relationship that we’re in.

What it does mean is that we don’t enter our adult relationships as blank slates. We enter them with nervous systems that have been collecting data for a very long time.

The thing nobody told you: Your nervous system does not care that your partner is not your parent.

This is one of the cruel little jokes of intimate relationships. Your adult brain may know: My partner loves me. My partner isn't trying to hurt me. We are having a disagreement, not an existential crisis. Meanwhile, your nervous system is over there like, "Interesting theory. I have some other ideas for you to consider.”

Because our reactions aren't always determined by what's happening in the moment. Sometimes they respond to how something feels. A particular tone of voice. A slammed cabinet. Someone walking away. A partner getting quiet. A change in facial expression. Feeling criticized. Feeling ignored. Feeling controlled. Feeling rejected. Feeling like you have to defend yourself. …I could go on, but you get the idea, and there’s a good chance you’re probably already thinking about that one thing your partner does that triggers you most, triggers your system to sound off for a five-alarm fire like  Lewis Black in  Inside Out. 

And suddenly you're not just arguing about what happened five minutes ago. You're carrying five minutes ago, five years ago, and maybe twenty-five years ago into the same conversation.

Odds are, if you’ve been together for a minute, you repeat this pattern over and over. And your partner, bless their big, equally-dysregulated heart, may be doing the exact same thing. Which means, sometimes two people can be standing in the same kitchen, having the same conversation, and experiencing two completely different realities.

One person says: “I'm trying to explain why I'm hurt.” The other hears: “You're a terrible person and I'm two seconds away from leaving you.”

One person says: “I need ten minutes to calm down so I don't say something I'll regret.” The other hears: “I’m stepping away to plan my next verbal attack.”

One person says: “Can we please stop talking about this for a minute?” The other hears: “Your feelings are dead to me.”

And now we're off to the races.

This is where emotional regulation matters.

Regulation doesn't mean never getting angry. It doesn't mean becoming so calm that your marriage feels like a meditation app. (But LMK if you need one.) It doesn't mean swallowing your feelings, speaking softly, or being endlessly accommodating.

The thing nobody told you:  Dysregulation is not an excuse for acting like an asshole.

And it definitely doesn't mean one person gets to behave badly and then announce, “My nervous system was activated.”

Hardly. Your nervous system may explain your reaction. It does not excuse your behavior. That's an important distinction.

We can have trauma. We can have attachment wounds. We can have ADHD, anxiety, grief, chronic stress, complicated family histories, cultural experiences, discrimination, loss, or a thousand other things determining how we respond to conflict. We are still responsible for what we do with those experiences.

The goal isn't: “I never get activated.” The goal is: “I notice when I'm activated, I know  what helps me come back into the present moment, and I learn how to stay connected to you and to myself while we figure out what the hell just happened.”

That's regulation.

The thing nobody told you:  Your partner's nervous system is not your enemy. But it isn't your responsibility, either. 

We can support one another. We can learn each other's signals. We can say, “You look overwhelmed. Do you need a minute?” We can learn that sometimes “I'm fine” actually means “I am absolutely not fine, but I don't yet have the words.”

We can create agreements for conflict by discussing what a timeout actually means in practice (before the need arises), how long we can step away before the other person needs us to check back in, and how we make sure “I need a minute” doesn't quietly turn into three days of the silent treatment. (Again, guilty.)

We can agree to take breaks without using them as punishment. We can give each other enough space for our nervous systems to come back down without leaving the other person wondering whether the relationship is still standing.

We can come back after we cool down. And not necessarily with a perfectly organized TED Talk about our feelings, but with enough regulation to listen to our partner, think about what’s actually being said and how we feel about it, and remember that the person standing across from us is someone we love.

We can apologize without adding a twelve-point defense about why we did what we did.

We can repair…not just by saying “sorry,” but by asking what would help make things feel safer or different next time things get heated.

And we can become curious instead of immediately becoming defensive. What happened for you? What did you hear me say? What did you need at that moment? 

Because sometimes the most important thing we can do in a marital conflict isn't to explain ourselves better. It’s to be genuinely curious about what our partner is experiencing.

Not every couple walks into marriage carrying the same histories.

Conflict in a relationship gets even more complicated because relationships don't happen in a vacuum. They happen in a world that is complicated, unjust, and often painful.

Race matters. Culture matters. Gender matters. Sexuality matters. Family expectations matter. Religion matters. Money matters. Disability matters. Parenthood matters. The experience of being visibly different from your partner can matter. So can the experience of being misunderstood, stereotyped, excluded, misgendered, discriminated against, or expected to explain yourself over and over again.

That is to say, for some couples, the stress isn't coming only from inside the relationship. Unfortunately, oftentimes the outside world gets a vote too, as if it wasn’t hard enough to handle the fire in your home with just the two of you. That doesn't mean every conflict between partners is caused by oppression or culture. It means that context matters.

So what do we actually do with all of this?

We start noticing our patterns.

When I feel criticized, I get defensive. When you get quiet, I panic. When we argue, I chase, and you withdraw. When you raise your voice, I shut down. When I feel ignored, I get louder. When things feel overwhelming, you disappear into your phone.

And there it is. Not a villain. Not a hero. Not a firestarter or someone fanning the flames. Just the pattern. Once we can see the pattern, we have something to work with.

Because the goal isn't to become two perfectly regulated people who never hurt each other. That sounds exhausting, a little boring, and, quite frankly, impossible. The goal is to become two people who can gradually recognize what is happening while it is happening, and respond appropriately to the situation that is  actually  at hand. 

Two people who can say: “I'm getting really activated. I don't want to make this worse. Can we pause and come back to it?” “I know you're trying to explain yourself, but I'm feeling defensive. Give me a minute.” “When you walked away, I felt abandoned. I know that may not have been what you meant.” “I hear what you're saying. I'm not ready to agree, but I want to understand.” “That wasn't okay. I was triggered, but I still hurt you. I'm sorry.”

Those aren't signs that a relationship is failing. They're signs that two human beings are learning how to stay in relationship with each other when things get hard.

And that's the real work, fam. 

The thing nobody told you:  Marriage isn't two people promising that they'll never hurt each other. It's two people agreeing to keep learning how to find each other again.

Sometimes that means therapy. Sometimes it means a walk around the block. Sometimes it means eating something because apparently being hungry has turned you both into complete assholes. Sometimes it means sleeping on it. Sometimes it means saying, “I was wrong.” Sometimes it means saying, “I don't know how to do this yet.” 

And sometimes it’s a call to accept that love alone isn't enough to make a relationship safe, healthy, or sustainable, and to get the support you need to figure out what comes next. (Because if there is a five-alarm fire, you should be running.)

Two nervous systems walk into a marriage. Neither one arrives undamaged. Neither one gets it right all the time. Both will get overwhelmed. Both will misread things. Both will occasionally bring yesterday's ashes into today's argument.

But with enough repeated safety, authentic curiosity, personal accountability, and mutual repair, those nervous systems can learn something new: we can have conflict and still be connected. We can be different and still belong to each other. We can come back.

The thing nobody told you:  We can be hurt without becoming enemies. 

I often think that's where the real marriage begins. When you can recognize that, even with your increased heart rate, clenched jaw, rising rage, and the lump in your throat, no one actually wants to burn the house down.  Your nervous systems are trying to protect you. They just don't always get the size of the fire right. You can learn to put it out together. You can stop, drop, and maybe even roll a bit, together.

…

Research & Further Reading

This piece draws on some really interesting research about attachment, emotion regulation, conflict, and what happens between two people when things get hard. If you’re the kind of person who likes to know where the ideas come from, here are a few places to start.

Emotion regulation & couples
Emotion Regulation in Couples Across Adulthood — Claudia M. Haase (2023)
A broad review of how couples regulate emotion together, including the reciprocal and coregulatory processes that happen between partners. 

Attachment & emotion regulation
Attachment Orientations and Emotion Regulation — Mikulincer & Shaver (2018)
A review of research connecting attachment patterns with how people regulate distress and respond to threatening experiences. 

Attachment & relationship functioning
Romantic Attachment and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation on Dyadic Adjustment — Fávero et al. (2021)
A review exploring the relationship among attachment, emotion regulation, and relationship adjustment. 

Conflict & the demand/withdraw pattern
Gender and Social Structure in the Demand/Withdraw Pattern of Marital Conflict — Christensen & Heavey (1990)
One of the foundational studies of the pursue/withdraw pattern that shows up in so many couple conflicts.

Taking a break during conflict
The Effects of Briefly Interrupting Marital Conflict — Gottman & Tabares (2018)
Research examining what happens when couples briefly interrupt an escalating conflict. 

Repair
Repair During Marital Conflict in Newlyweds — Gottman, Driver, & Tabares (2015)
Research examining how newlywed couples move from attack/defend patterns toward collaboration during conflict.

Partner responsiveness & intimacy
Toward an Optimized Measure of Perceived Partner Responsiveness — Crasta et al. (2021)
Research on the experience of feeling that your partner understands and responds to your core concerns. 

Relationships & the outside world
Racial Discrimination and Romantic Relationship Dynamics Among Black Americans: A Systematic Review — Rice et al. (2023)
A systematic review examining how racial discrimination can affect romantic relationship dynamics among Black Americans.