You’re Not Fighting About the Missed Text
Couples and polycules: y’all know how this movie starts.
Cue: “How hard is it to just text me back and tell me you’re busy?”
And... action.
Fifteen minutes later, you’re in an all-out blow-out about respect, effort, who cares more, whether the relationship is secretly dying, not to mention “your goddamn mother / ex / friends.”
Cool. Hate that for you.
You’re convinced that if they would just listen to what you’re actually saying, this would all blow over.
But the fight was never really about the missed text. You’re fighting about what the missed text means.
And, spoiler alert: that meaning is nowhere to be found in the actual text chain.
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Do we need couples therapy?
I get where you are, because I’ve been there myself. Right now, it’s all:
“I have to pry everything out of you.”
“You’re overreacting.”
“Why am I always the one bringing things up?”
“You’re too sensitive.”
“I can’t do anything right.”
More flavors than Baskin Robins, but at the heart of it, it’s all ice cream.
Different trigger. Different jabs. Same ending.
Something small happens, things escalate, everyone gets flooded, and suddenly nobody feels heard anymore. One person feels abandoned. Another feels attacked. Somebody shuts down. Somebody pushes harder. Everybody leaves resentful as hell.
And underneath all of it is usually something much bigger.
Things like:
Feeling unheard and invisible in the relationship, like a ghost
Sensing your effort is never matched. “Why is it so goddamn hard to let me in?“
(Cue Carrie throwing le Big Mac at Big)Being criticized, trapped, controlled, or constantly made to feel you’re “not enough”
Feeling terrified that nothing is ever going to get better
Feeling powerless because you’ve tried everything and nothing is working:
not the books, the podcasts, TikToks, or even the “10 conflict resolution strategies” list ChatGPT made you at 2 a.m.The constant fear they’ll actually leave this time
So, you keep having the same basic battle, just with new landmines to take the blame.
Landmines like the dishes. Laundry. Work schedules. Sex (or lack thereof). Money. Boundaries with friends or exes. The absolutely UNHINGED thing their mom said at lunch last week that was a big deal, actually.
If you’re in a polycule, things get even more layered.
It’s all that, and now also:
Not getting along with one of your partner’s partners (and feeling super frustrated at them and guilty at yourself for it)
Trying not to disappoint everyone as an anchor partner
Power struggles around priority, overnights, and feeling special
Keeping mental scoreboards about emotional labor and fairness
One partner’s pain getting minimized to keep the system “stable”
A lot of the same core wounds monogamous couples deal with. Just inside a bigger, more complex relational system.
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But we’ve already tried everything
By the time you get to me, you’ve probably already been trying really hard for a long time. Months. Sometimes years.
You know all about why these fights keep going in circles, but feel totally out of control and just can’t get seem to out of them. You don’t need more talk, you need action.
I don’t think you’re crazy or doomed or “imagining things.” But I do think most couples need actual professional support getting out of the cycle where:
One person pushes → someone gets defensive or shuts down → the first person pushes harder → now everyone’s overwhelmed and nothing gets resolved.
I can promise that endlessly rehashing the dishes or the text isn’t going to fix things. Neither is becoming better at arguing your case until somebody finally says, “Fine. You’re right.”
Real change looks a lot less glamorous.
It looks like slowing the pattern down enough to see what’s happening underneath the fight it while it’s still happening. And then attacking the root problem instead of each other.
And it looks like sitting with the discomfort of hearing hard feedback without immediately counterattacking.
And owning up to hurting someone you love without trying to make excuses.
Noticing how old insecurities, past trauma, shame, rejection, or fear are making “hey, can you not wear shoes on the couch?” suddenly feel like DEFCON 1.
Learning how to hold space for both your pain AND your their pain at the same time without turning it into the Trauma Olympics (which has no real winners).
That’s the work.
And honestly? It’s usually not fun, especially at the start. It’s usually uncomfortable as hell.
But, once you stop fighting each other and start understanding and rewriting the pattern together, things can shift fast.
Sessions get lighter. Softer. Goofier.
You start laughing together again.
Flirting again. Sneaking in a not-so-innocent look at each other right as our session ends, leaving me blushing and oh so proud of you over here!
Feeling like real teammates again instead of adversaries.
That spark y’all wrote off as “gone forever” is often still there. It’s often just buried underneath turtle shell layers of hurt, resentment, panic, defensiveness.
And when we start clearing that old junk out?
Ohhhhhh, there you are 🔥
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You’re as ready as you’ll ever be
If you’re reading this thinking, “oh shit, this is us.” Yup.
You’re the exactly the kind of couple or polycule I work with.
Smart. Insightful. Self-aware. Deeply caring. Nerdy and weird and intense and unique in all the best ways.
And also completely exhausted from having the same fight in different outfits.
As much as you swear it’s “just a communication issue,” I can guarantee there’s an entire emotional ocean sitting underneath the tip of the communication iceberg.
That’s the part we work on together.
Not just helping y’all communicate better, but helping you actually feel heard, understood, and emotionally safe with each other again.
Including, and especially, in the moments where it’s hardest.
If you’re ready to do that work together, with someone who really gets what it’s like to be where you’re at and won’t ever judge you for it… you know where to find me ✨