Lessons from Years of Walking With Couples Through Conflict

After years of sitting with couples in crisis, I've learned that the fights about money, chores, or parenting aren't really about money, chores, or parenting. They're about something much deeper—and understanding this truth has transformed how I help couples heal.

Lesson 1: Your Body Keeps Score in Your Marriage

The first thing I notice when a couple enters my office isn't what they're saying—it's how their bodies respond to each other. One partner's shoulders tense when the other speaks. Someone's breathing becomes shallow. Eyes dart away. These physical responses tell me more than hours of conversation could.

Your nervous system remembers every time you've felt abandoned, criticized, or unseen—often from long before you met your spouse. When your partner triggers these old wounds, your body responds as if you're in danger. This is why a simple disagreement can escalate into World War III in seconds, leaving both partners wondering, "How did we get here?"

This is also why communication techniques often fail. You can't "I-statement" your way out of a triggered nervous system.

Lesson 2: Every Couple Has an Attachment Dance

In my Birmingham practice, I see the same pattern repeatedly: one partner pursues (needing connection, reassurance, talking things out) while the other withdraws (needing space, time to process, emotional distance). The more one pursues, the more the other pulls away. Both feel abandoned. Both feel suffocated. Both are trying to create safety in the only way they know how.

This pursue-withdraw dynamic isn't a communication problem—it's an attachment injury playing out in real-time. Understanding this changed everything about how I approach couples therapy. We don't start with communication skills; we start with creating safety in the nervous system.

Lesson 3: Conflict Is Information, Not Catastrophe

Here's what I tell couples who arrive believing their marriage is falling apart: your conflicts are trying to tell you something important. They're highlighting where you need healing, individually and together.

That explosive fight about your partner being on their phone? It might really be about feeling invisible, just like you did as a child. The cold silence after disagreements? Perhaps it's the only way you learned to stay safe in chaos. These patterns developed for good reasons—they protected you once. They're just not serving your marriage now.

Lesson 4: Traditional Couples Therapy Has It Backwards

Most couples therapy starts with communication and problem-solving. But if both partners are operating from triggered nervous systems, the rational brain—where those skills live—is offline. It's like trying to teach someone to swim while they're drowning.

This is why I use EMDR and somatic approaches. We must address both partners' individual nervous systems first. When couples feel safe in their bodies, they naturally communicate better. When old traumas are processed, triggers lose their power. When attachment wounds heal, intimacy becomes possible.

Lesson 5: The Couples Who Succeed Aren't Who You Think

The couples who transform their marriages aren't the ones with smaller problems or better communication skills. They're the ones willing to be curious about their patterns. They recognize the signs they need help and take action despite their fear.

They learn that their partner's withdrawal isn't rejection—it's overwhelm. That their own pursuit isn't love—it's anxiety. That beneath the anger is hurt, beneath the criticism is fear, and beneath the shutdown is often profound sadness.

Lesson 6: Safety Changes Everything

Real transformation happens when both partners' nervous systems feel safe enough to exit survival mode. In my office, we create this safety through:

• Predictable rituals that anxious partners can count on

• Breathing space that avoidant partners need

• Co-regulation practices that calm both nervous systems

• Repair processes that rebuild trust after ruptures

When couples learn to recognize and respond to each other's attachment needs, something beautiful happens. The pursuer learns to self-soothe. The withdrawer learns to stay present. Both discover they can be separate and connected, independent and intimate.

The Most Important Lesson

After all these years, the most profound lesson I've learned is this: love isn't enough to save a marriage, but understanding is. When couples understand that their conflicts arise from hurt, not hatred—from fear, not malice—everything shifts.

The partners who seemed incompatible discover they're perfectly designed to heal each other's deepest wounds. The marriage that felt doomed becomes a sanctuary for growth. The patterns that once destroyed connection become doorways to deeper intimacy.

Your conflicts aren't signs of failure. They're invitations to heal—individually and together. And with the right support, you can transform your marriage from a battlefield into a sanctuary where both partners can finally feel safe, seen, and deeply loved.

Tate Chang is a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor specializing in trauma-informed couples therapy in Birmingham, Alabama, and throughout California. With specialized training in EMDR and attachment-based therapy, he helps couples transform conflict into connection. Schedule a free consultation to explore how this approach could change your marriage.