Read the Passage! Do you agree or disagree, or can you relate to his or her opinion in the post? ADD any thoughts or additional information that you may have found concerning their topic?

According to John Gottman, there are two relationship dynamics to consider when thinking about how a couple may communicate and process conflict.  A regulating couple will share more fulfilling interactions, their communication style will often be conducive to a healthy intimate relationship.   A nonregulated couple is one in which there will be frequent breakdowns in communication where one or both parties leave feeling dissatisfied or even upset.  These couples may use one or more of the following techniques; contempt, defensiveness, criticism, stonewalling, and belligerence. (Seccombe, 2018).  I know that my conflict style sometimes leads me to become defensive, most often this happens between my boyfriend and me because he doesn’t support some of the ways that my family communicates with me and when he brings these issues to light I feel the need to defend my family even though I know he’s right.  I have learned that just because I feel defensive does not mean that I have to behave defensively, I will usually tell him I’m feeling defensive and he will allow me the space to revisit the topic at a later time.

The negative ways in which we might behave in a conflict interferes with the ability to nurture a close and intimate relationship because every time we use one of these undesirable approaches we are essentially communicating to our partner that discussing uncomfortable things ends without resolution.  If we constantly feel like we’re fighting a losing battle, eventually we stop fighting.  Four of the previously mentioned techniques are what Gottman describes in his book as the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse.  He uses this term to describe four potential indicators that a relationship is reaching its expiration, the four horsemen are criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling.  “These are couples who have failed to find an equilibrium in one of the three stable types of marriage.  Their emotional ecology is in trouble and their marriage is beginning to spit out of control…these unions, I found, are almost certain to end in divorce” (Gottman, 1995, p. 68).  Another indicator that Gottman noted in his book is that marriage will likely end in divorce if a wife brings up an issue and is met by a response of dismissiveness which leads to heightened negative responses and subsequent dismissal of the negative feelings.