Understanding and Addressing the Reactive Cycle in Marriage
Dec 08, 2023Episode 50
Doug & Leslie Davis
Ever found yourself stuck in a never-ending cycle of reactive arguments with your partner? We're Doug and Leslie Davis, and we'll guide you through understanding how unintentional words or actions trigger this cycle and we'll offer solutions to break free from it. Our personal anecdotes and open conversations will provide insight into how you can foster a stronger marital bond.
A significant part of breaking this cycle involves understanding your partner's emotional needs. We'll unpack common misunderstandings and the reactive cycles that can stem from misaligned perceptions. We stress the importance of self-reflection and awareness in relationships, setting the stage for a healthier alternative to the reactive cycle coming up in our next discussion.
But don't fret, there's a way out. We'll introduce you to the concept of the 'care cycle', a promising alternative to the reactive cycle. While this cycle may seem daunting, it's not beneficial for a healthy relationship. So, join us for this enlightening conversation and strengthen your relationship. Next stop, a healthier and happier marriage.
Ever found yourself stuck in a never-ending cycle of reactive arguments with your partner? We're Doug and Leslie Davis, and we'll guide you through understanding how unintentional words or actions trigger this cycle and we'll offer solutions to break free from it. Our personal anecdotes and open conversations will provide insight into how you can foster a stronger marital bond.
A significant part of breaking this cycle involves understanding your partner's emotional needs. We'll unpack common misunderstandings and the reactive cycles that can stem from misaligned perceptions. We stress the importance of self-reflection and awareness in relationships, setting the stage for a healthier alternative to the reactive cycle coming up in our next discussion.
But don't fret, there's a way out. We'll introduce you to the concept of the 'care cycle', a promising alternative to the reactive cycle. While this cycle may seem daunting, it's not beneficial for a healthy relationship. So, join us for this enlightening conversation and strengthen your relationship. Next stop, a healthier and happier marriage.
Welcome to the Vision Driven Marriage Podcast. If you're struggling in your marriage, or maybe you're wondering if it's even salvageable, before you give up or before you let things get too hard, let us come alongside you and help you solidify your marriage. We offer biblical encouragement and insight to help you strengthen your marriage.
Speaker 2:
Today's episode is brought to you by our new podcast series, a Week of Stories to fortify your faith. This series brings you intimate and inspiring stories from people who've witnessed God's power and grace in their lives here, from Anna McLaughlin, angie and Matt Bauman and others who have been guests on the Vision Driven Marriage Podcast and get introduced to David and Tracy Rowland. Each episode is a testament to the transformative power of faith, offering a glimpse into the lives of our guests and how God used their relationship with their child to shape and inspire them. Join us for a week of stories that will strengthen your belief and inspire your faith journey. Click on the link in the show notes and get this exclusive podcast series only in your inbox.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Vision Driven Marriage Podcast. We're Doug and Leslie Davis, and today we're going to take a deeper dive into something known as the reactive cycle.
Speaker 2:
Have I ever told you that? I love the way you say today, don't Today. I like that.
Speaker 1:
Tomorrow.
Speaker 2:
Okay, we're looking at the reactive cycle today. Everybody has a name for it. Every counselor has their own name for it Emerson Egrich. I knew I was going to flub his name. Emerson Egrich calls it the crazy cycle, and the reason why is because once it starts, it's really really crazy and it's really really hard to get out of it. But if you're aware of it, then you can stop it.
Speaker 1:
Right, and the reason it's so difficult to get out of it is that it's a bunch of trigger and triggering and button pushing. You know we've talked about triggers before. This is more button pushing and if you've been married for any time at all, you realize that whether you want to or not, you're capable of pushing your spouse's buttons, and the way that we react when our buttons get pushed can sometimes push the other spouse's buttons and it can become a real problem.
Speaker 2:
But the way you describe that it makes it sound like it's intentional, Like I am intentionally pushing your button. I am intentionally pushing your button.
Speaker 1:
And it's really not like that. Sometimes it's not at all.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, no, it's really not intentionally pushing your spouse's button, but what happens is there's a need that's not getting met and then that puts you on the defensive when there's that need not getting met and being able to express what need is not being met and not getting a reaction, a negative emotional reaction, from your spouse when you're expressing that need. That's what a non-reactive cycle looks like.
Speaker 1:
That's what we all want to have. The problem is that sometimes we react because it goes back to some of our fight-and-flight mechanisms. It's just looks a little different because it's not necessarily just when it's an argument. It's not necessarily just when you know we're at each other and intentionally trying to figure out how to come to grips with a disagreement. Sometimes it's more subtle than that and often it's completely unintentional, where you feel like something that's really important didn't happen and your feelings got hurt very sincerely. Maybe it was legitimate, maybe it wasn't, doesn't matter. But because your feelings got hurt, it triggers something inside of you that'll either cause you to hurt them back or to run away.
Speaker 2:
Or if you do have at least a proper communication in the in the beginning and you say how you felt with good communication and your spouse felt attacked, that will also start the reactive cycle, sure.
Speaker 1:
You know, because communication is the key to everything we do in a marriage. We've said that so many times and you know we don't want to ever, ever let you think that these other things we do can exist without communication. Communication is going to be the key, but being able to become aware of the things that push your buttons is the first step toward being able to fix the reactive cycle. Because when you're stuck in the reactive cycle, when your spouse does something that pushes your button and your responses to push theirs back now, you're in this loop where, because you hurt me, I'm going to say something hurtful to you or I'm gonna do something that I know will cause you to feel unworthy. You know the attacks most of the time are not on purpose. Most of the time they are not at a conscious level, but subconsciously. We know how to hurt the people we're closest to and when we feel hurt, it's easy for us to reach out.
Speaker 2:
For instance, we had something happen just the other day that that could have went south really fast, like we could have entered into a reactive cycle fairly easy with it. But I had done the dishes in the kitchen, cleaned the kitchen, the counters were clean, you know I was, I was feeling pretty good about the work that I had gotten done in the kitchen. Well, our, our meal times didn't coincide that day, so Doug fixed his supper later of an evening, much later than what I'm usually even up, and I came down the next morning and all of the hard work that I had done in the kitchen was gone and so and, and you know, there was utensils and dirty dishes, prep stuff left on the counter, dishes on the cabinet. You know the stove still had the skillet on it and I'm just like all of that hard work that I did was not honored or even maybe even acknowledged, like I didn't feel seen.
Speaker 2:
But what happened was is I asked him, you know, not necessarily to do the dishes, because I don't mind doing the dishes, because I'm thankful that he cooks his own supper most nights, but what I asked was because I didn't feel seen and I don't like to get up to get to dirty dishes and utensils on the cabinet is to at least clean up and maybe put the stuff in the sink and I can do the dishes later, but that way the cabinet is at least cleared, and so that could have been construed in your mind as well.
Speaker 2:
I didn't do a good enough job, or you know whatever. I mean, I don't know how the male brain works, but that could have been construed as a lot more than hey, just kind of, can you clean up the counter a little bit when you're done cooking, you know. But it didn't enter into a reactive cycle. We actually worked it out fairly, fairly well, and so, and I felt seen, and I got up the next morning and the dishes were done, Well, and you know, being able to express how something makes you feel gives your spouse an opportunity to then take care of.
Speaker 1:
Well, here's the way it's described by focus on the family. When you get started in what could be a reactive cycle, it puts up a fence between you and your spouse and you have to be able to start by taking care of the things that are on your side of that fence, and the way you react to the things your spouse does is taking care of the stuff on your side of the fence. If you get defensive and that's when you get stuck in that reactive cycle, get stuck in that loop. So it would have been very possible and don't worry, I didn't feel this way it would have been very possible for me to say, well, if you would have just made my supper, I wouldn't have had to worry about it. Not how I felt, but do you see how that would have gone right into a reactive cycle, right?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, because then I would have said well, if you want to eat at five o'clock like normal people then you're right, and so it could have very easily gone sideways.
Speaker 1:
Just to make sure you all understand, it was one of those things where I had a youth group Bible study that caused me not to get home until 8.30, 9 o'clock at night. She'd already gone to sleep and so we took care of it. But the thing is, we know how things had been in our past and how things can be in your life. It would be so easy to say, well, if you would have done this, you know, then you wouldn't have had the math, because blame is something that can happen quickly when you feel attacked anytime you feel attacked. But you have the opportunity then to listen and to decide how you're going to react, rather than getting in the reactive cycle, how you're going to react to the information that you were given she was able to share. Here's a need that wasn't met. She needed to believe that she was valued and that she was seen, and here's what that meant.
Speaker 1:
And I made sure that I understood what that meant. Once I heard that, yes, that's really what she meant, then I wanted to make sure that I honored that. What she meant was did you even notice that I cleaned the whole kitchen? That's what she meant, and of course I did. It was wonderful she was asleep. I couldn't tell her, hey, it looks awesome, but of course I recognized it. It was great, and so there was a need she had that was legitimate. There was something that happened that caused her to wonder if I noticed something that she really needed me to notice, and so it could have easily gone into that cycle. So what we need to do is we need to start out by talking about what are some of the most common needs that don't get met. That can throw you into the reactive cycle.
Speaker 2:
Well, I want to jump back for a second to something that you just said, because it wasn't so much that I needed you to See what I had done, I needed you to honor it.
Speaker 2:
Right and to value it and to value it, which meant clean up your stuff and you know, and keep that that clean. Now you know we're we're still like we've only been married for 34 years, so we're still figuring this stuff out. Right, we haven't been married very long. So one of the ways that you know we work to figure these things out is how can we bring honor to our Relationship, like how can we outdo each other and being honored?
Speaker 2:
But one of the things that we haven't really delved into a Lot was how to express it when we don't feel honored, you know and so, and one of those time you know, one of the things, it's okay I don't feel honored when needs aren't getting met, which I mean it really doesn't happen very much with us at all, but some of the needs that we have, that wives have are is the need to feel valued, the need to feel loved.
Speaker 2:
We need to know that there's commitment in the relationship and we need to know that there is, that our husbands are going to be trustworthy, like that's. That's a huge one. I, you know. Out of all these things, I need to know you're trustworthy, you know, and you've proven that you are. You are trustworthy, you know. And a partnership I mean being in a relationship isn't about a husband and a wife, but it's about a husband and a life.
Speaker 2:
You know, it's about the partnership of them. So those are some of the needs that wives had. There's there's time, there's tons of things you know, this is just a.
Speaker 1:
Some of the most common one right right and and with husbands. Again, there's a huge number of things that that husbands can need, but some of the more common ones. Husbands need to feel like they're wanted. Husbands need to feel like they're understood and accurately portrayed. I think that's a big one especially, you know, because if you're not understood it's really easy to go into either the fight or the flight mentality and think I'm gonna fight back to defend myself, improve, you know, or to just say, well, it doesn't matter. So why should I try?
Speaker 2:
right and that being accurately portrayed. I think a lot of times when you're in that reactive cycle, women have the time, have the well. Anybody can blame. But you know, we tend to play the blame game and when we're blaming we're usually describing behavior and it may not be accurately portrayed at all well, one of the other things that that can cause men to Hurt in a way that they may not be able to express.
Speaker 1:
We don't always express how we feel, and so because of that, it actually can cause us to hurt, which is really weird for us because, again, we can't describe how we feel, and so, when we're talking about being understood, one of the biggest places where either spouse can be misunderstood is when the spouse who's having an issue tries to attribute their own motivations to their spouse's behavior. And Again, this doesn't happen all the time, but stereotypically, women are wonderfully motivated by how they feel about something. Men are often just motivated by the task, and so if a wife would think, well, I would have been motivated by this feeling. And so when she Criticizes her husband says, well, I don't know why you felt, and then describes that feeling and he didn't feel that at all. It feels really misunderstood, and at that point it can go into a very quickly escalating reactive cycle.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it can.
Speaker 1:
It was not not an accurate portrayal and that's hard because it wasn't on purpose.
Speaker 2:
Projection is a real thing and I think that In our human nature we project so often that we don't realize that we're projecting.
Speaker 1:
I mean, we just see it all the time, right, and so because of that, I mean, it's so easy for us to think, well, you are motivated by what would have motivated me, and sometimes that's just not true, and so we do have to be careful. But one of the other things that you know a husband typically needs a husband needs to feel successful, Like what I'm doing is working and it's good. You know that it's success, Because if you feel like I failed, I failed, I failed, I failed.
Speaker 2:
It's easy to lose hope.
Speaker 1:
It's very easy for a husband to lose hope. Husbands were wired often to at least have a small victory. Even if it's just a little victory, we need to win some stuff Now. Do you see how that can be a problem? Because then if you feel like you're in the reactive cycle and you feel like you need to, win.
Speaker 1:
You might have to win the argument which just leads into a reactive cycle. That's just a mess. One of the other needs that husbands often have, this one's shared with wives. We need to feel like we're in a partnership, you know, like we're not alone. We're in this together. But then also, husbands often need passion. They need passion Now.
Speaker 2:
And I think that's shared too with wives needs.
Speaker 1:
Absolutely.
Speaker 2:
With wives needs too. I mean, I, you know, I, yeah, I think that's a shared one too.
Speaker 1:
Well, I think so, and you know, the interesting thing about the need for passion is that it looks differently depending on who you are. But one of the things that we noticed and this is something that we just learned in our interview with Cas Morrow don't mistake, wrongly placed passion for well, that'll do, that'll show me that I'm loved, because if somebody's you know really angry and they're fighting with you, that's passion, but that's not necessarily a proper demonstration of love, and some people want passion so badly that they're willing to have negative passion, and so we do want to warn you against that. One of the things that I thought was really remarkable that Cas shared had to do with being able to look inside yourself, because what he said was if you're defending yourself, you're not protecting her about your wife. So you know getting stuck in that reactive cycle if you think like, well, I have to defend my honor, I have to defend my intentions, I have to defend my motivations, you're not protecting your wife the way you should be.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I don't have anything to follow that up, because that was good, that was. Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1:
So as we look at the whole reactive cycle, we want to not only spend a little more time this week, but next week we want to look at an alternative to it, a really healthy, helpful alternative. But as you look at the reactive cycle and you realize that you know when I have something happened to me that's negative, how do I react? And does my reaction cause my spouse to react in such a way that we feel like things are out of control?
Speaker 2:
And I think one of the things that you can do right there I mean just realizing when that cycle starts is to ask yourself if the issue isn't the issue, then what is the issue? You know, because so many times the reactive cycle starts about a circumstance that is a general circumstance, but what's happened is that there's a feeling I felt unseen, I felt unloved, I felt disrespected, I felt dishonored.
Speaker 1:
I felt like a failure. I felt like you didn't want me. I felt like you didn't understand me.
Speaker 2:
Right. And so there's these feelings that pop up, and then you're on the defensive, and then your partner reacts as if you're on the defensive, and then they're on the defensive, and then you're in this reactive cycle. So if you ask yourself what's the issue when the issue isn't the issue, you know, you can kind of maybe get to the point of I felt unvalued.
Speaker 1:
I felt unvalued by this behavior and I need XYZ or whatever, and I know you're saying okay, leslie, doug, we hear you, but that's not very easy to do. We're going to go and tell you it's not easy to do. It's not easy to do. You have to react in the heat of the moment. That's not even the first thing that you do. That's what you do after you have chosen not to react. Because, in the midst of it all, trying to process what's going on is not going to be step one. Step one is going to be when I feel myself in that cycle that I've been in before, where I know I'm going to do something that's going to make this argument go on. I know I'm going to do something that's going to push my spouse's buttons, recognizing that you have the choice not to react. Now, that again, that's easy to say, but that's the one thing you can do, even in the moment.
Speaker 1:
Because you have control over your own behavior and not your spouse's behavior, and so taking responsibility for you, instead of trying to force responsibility on your spouse, is going to be huge. Now responsibility for how you feel, responsibility for how you react, responsibility for the things that you do need, but, in the immediate moment, responsibility for what you're going to do to react to what has pushed your button.
Speaker 2:
Or not react.
Speaker 1:
Or not react, because well, and not reacting is a reaction. One of the things that I was amazed it's self control, as I was reading. The way you choose not to react makes a difference, because if you choose not to react by simply saying I need a minute, we will come back to this, but I need a minute, I'm not okay. That's a healthy way to not react. If you instead just ignore everything and try to go away and pretend it'll work itself out because things always just work themselves out that's not productive or healthy at all. So even the way you don't react makes a difference.
Speaker 2:
And next week, on the Vision Driven Marriage Podcast, we're going to look at the care cycle, which is a productive way to not react.
Speaker 1:
Right and it's an amazing thing that I think will help a lot of you. And so today, as we've looked at the reactive cycle, our purpose was pretty simple we wanted you to see that you're not alone. If you've been going through this, you're dealing with something that's common to couples. We also wanted you to see that, even though it's normal to exist, it's not what is best for you. It's better for you and you can do something about it. And we wanted you to also see that those needs that you have, especially those things that cause you to feel like you have to defend yourself, those are normal. They're not bad. The reactive cycle's bad, the things that motivate it not so much. So we're going to look at things where you can take where you are and move to a place that'll take you into a healthier relationship.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely.
Speaker 1:
And so, again, as we look at the reactive cycle, next week we're going to look at the care cycle. This is the vision-driven marriage. We're Doug and Leslie Davis and we continue to pray that God will solidify your marriage.