(Sorry about the anime? Let’s just be creative and say it adds a new dimension to the point.)
Anyway.
Now that we’re all caught up, and possibly hankering for some Dragonball-Z, here’s what I don’t get – why would ANYONE, much less seemingly competent people who function normally in all other aspects of their life, be content to stay in a relationship that is constantly steeped in conflict?
Disclaimer: Despite the potential entertainment value that you’d think I’d get as a single woman seeing “happy couples” around me fight, I gain no joy from seeing strangers, friends, or co-workers is situations like this for two reasons. 1) I really feel bad for couples who are genuinely unhappy but for some reason can’t get themselves out of a toxic relationship and 2) because it makes me feel like a big two-headed freak that two people who borderline HATE each other have standing Friday night dates and a steady source of jollies - but I don’t.
Moving on.
While it’s admittedly been a while since I’ve been in a relationship long enough for a deal-breaker to surface and have my first thought be, “How do I deal with this?” instead of “Hmmm…wonder how long I should wait until I unfriend this tool on Facebook,” I really don’t understand the point of staying with a person who you can’t stand more frequently than you can.
Let me draw you a little picture of how this works in my mind:
As you can see, my threshold is low. While my list of deal-breakers may seem petty to some of my friends (like the fact that I can’t stand a person who has no ability to differentiate between homonyms [“your” and “you’re” are TWO ENTIRELY DIFFERENT THINGS PEOPLE]), one of the biggest, most non-negotiable ones is a basic lack of respect and appreciation for each other in the relationship. During almost every fight that I’ve gotten into with a significant other I’ve had the distinct feeling that the person was being crazy, an idiot, or both. Now, if this holds true, then that means that there are a bunch of couples walking around at any given time that are harboring ugly thoughts for the person that their with for a significant amount of time. That’s a big sign to get out, yes? Aren’t these fights a symptom of a relationship that has run its course?
Apparently not.
I don’t know. I don’t have the answer on this kiddies. It’s totally possible that I throw relationships away before I’m ready to make the grown-up sacrifice of dealing with Nothing Fights. Is there a ratio of Good to Bad that people go by? If you only fight 30% of the time, is that cool?
The best I can come up with is that maybe for some people fighting is a way to show that they care. Or maybe the people who have the most numerous, most ridiculous Nothing Fights have makeup sex soooooo good they’d rather hate the crap out of each other than give it up?
You tell me.
UPDATE: Upon further thought - this is what the graph really should look like.
Once I've reached my threshold, a fight about where we're going for dinner could potentially make me abandon ship. Plus, always title your graphs, kids. :)
Now playing: Puddle of Mudd - She Hates Me
via FoxyTunes
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