What To Do If My “Stay Calm” Advice to Stop Fighting Doesn’t Work

What do you do if the tools don’t work?

What if all of those amazing strategies you’ve been given –

The “I” statements, the empathy, the validation, the communication techniques –

What if, in the moment that you deploy them, your partner stays triggered, or even escalates?

You were hoping they would suddenly “snap out of it” –

You want to hear them gush with relief:

Thank you – as they throw their arms around you – I get it! Thank you for hearing me and not fighting me! You’re the best partner ever!

But instead, they say things like:

“You’ve promised this before – I don’t believe a word you’re saying”

“If that were true, then why did you (*insert complaint here*)”

“Oh (mocking you) you are just so calm and mature, and I’m just crazy, everything’s my fault, right?”

So Now What?

This initial “fail”  is universal for all of us!

And it can be so damaging, if it makes you so hopeless that you abandon the whole process –

Afraid that your partner is beyond the reach of even your most sincere efforts –

But the fact is that the change, the healing, the shift between you, is actually right on schedule –

Taking place, in a sense, behind the scenes –

If you can lose your attachment to getting immediate results –

And, in those moments, continue to hold the space with love…

In other words, persevere –

And look, I get it – it is so very painful-

When you are truly trying to change and grow…

And care and connect and be vulnerable…

To have your partner lash out at you, or turn cold and hard…

But if you understand the factors at play, you can actually use these moments to create the breakthrough you both are longing for –

If you remember that this is simply more of a long-term effort than you wish it was…

Keep holding the space of love, and keep these things in mind:

They Are Trapped, and You Can Free Them

When your partner – or anyone, including yourself – is emotionally escalated, they are in a sympathetic nervous system state of fear – what most of us know as fight/flight/freeze.

This is true even if they are being aggressive, in which case, on a nervous system level, they are afraid of a threat.

This is almost always related to unresolved lifelong wounds around emotional vulnerability, and affects everything about how they perceive you – including the very clarity of their thoughts.

Therefore:

When you realize your partner is escalated, shift your thinking from being frustrated that you can’t communicate “rationally” –

And replace it with this awareness:

In that moment, you are no longer having a dialogue, an exchange of ideas and perceptions –

And instead, you are simply helping someone you care about make it through a painful emotional episode – 

Accept it without ego:

Someone you love is in distress – they feel unsafe.

You cannot expect anyone in the throes of an emotional episode to do anything but protect themselves, automatically using the fight/flight/freeze programming – their “armor” – to “protect” themselves –

Even though it has actually kept them trapped all their lives, preventing them from owning their power to communicate effectively, problem-solve, and create positive outcomes.

Another Consideration

Through the years, confronting but not resolving relationship triggers, winding around each other’s unmet needs, and blind spots regarding emotional wholeness…

The two of you have, over time, created a script that you both know by heart –

Where you both know your roles…

And when you take that away from them – by trying to communicate in a different way, using your new therapeutic tools –

The primal reaction of the protective identity created by their fight/flight/freeze response is to feel afraid, and confused, and uncomfortable…

And so they may continue to be mad, because it is always easier to feel the rage than the pain behind the rage, with all its vulnerability…

But beneath the surface, they are absorbing your finer vibration…

A transitional period which you both must go through until the “rewiring” really establishes itself –

It may take a little longer than you wish it did, but with consistency –

And the support of a solid therapeutic, coaching, or otherwise comprehensive approach –

The sense of safety and a “new normal” becomes strong…

They will eventually feel more grateful and loving towards you than ever before, that you put in the effort to heal both of you…

And as this more refined vibration becomes the energy, the light in which you both make your home with each other.

The change will come – sooner than you think – if you are True to Love.