Stick At It

When life inside a couple has grown full of strife, when argument follows argument, when both people are hurting and being hurt, what more natural response is there than to conclude that it is time – sadly but necessarily – to get out? Love isn’t meant to be like this. This degree of conflict and misery can’t be normal or right. Friends agree. Other suitors beckon. The digital world seems rife with possibilities. There have to be alternatives. It’s a planet of eight billion; there have to be easier solutions. We ache for calm. We wake up in a frenzy. It’s time to get out.

Or is it? The feeling may be incontestable; its legitimacy may be a great deal less so. For when we properly assess the situation – when we step back and consider matters from the perspective of a lifetime, or of the human race as a whole – then it becomes far less clear that getting out summarily is the sole or best answer.

In fact, a whole raft of evidence suggests that – despite the pain – we would be advised to take it very slowly indeed, to step right back from the precipice, and to develop the courage for another go.

The reasons are multiple:

— Because it is not, whatever it may seem, likely to be simply better out there.

— Because any alternative human we might find will bring with them a raft of fresh and immense complexities. No one is ever normal – we just know them less well.

— Because we are hugely peculiar ourselves; because we need to remember – very modestly – how much trouble we are bringing into the situation; because it is not all their fault; because (whatever our therapist or best friend thinks) there are two forgivably mad people here, not just one.

— Because we have already achieved so much with this person that we are now omitting to keep in mind. We have been in love with them. We find them attractive. We have laughed deeply together. We hate the same people. We are neglecting to fathom the stunning rarity of this. They’ve seen us at our lowest ebb. They took us to hospital; we nursed them through multiple illnesses. We tolerated extraordinary shenanigans from them. We’re on their side. We danced in the kitchen. We have years behind us. We gave them nicknames and a teddy bear. We built a world together.

— Because we have already worked so hard at understanding them – and they, us. Perhaps we’ve had some therapy; we’ve read some books; we’ve got some bits of the map of our psyches under control. We know that they’re a bit this because of their mother, and we, a bit that because of our father. This sort of knowledge didn’t come easily. It took months, perhaps years, to achieve this level of psychological fluency. Maybe we’re only a third of the way through, and the missing two-thirds is weighing heavily on us right now. But let’s not overlook how much we already know. What sorrow it would be to tip the whole structure into the sea, to get rid of all the hours of conversation, the learnings from a thousand arguments, and to stand afresh with a new person back at zero across a dinner table. We must be sure –cosmically sure – that this is the only option before we destroy an entire library of love.

None of us have been here enough times before to know the wisdom, or otherwise, of burning the structure down. But let’s not minimise our good fortune to have run into this – admittedly tricky but in essence wondrous – being. They were a gift, and we knew it before the pain set in. We aren’t silly; we didn’t fall in love for no reason. Most people we meet bore us after a minute, and would revolt us naked. We’ve managed years with them. This is everything.

We’re complaining and wanting to run because we assume that fighting and misery are abnormal, but only because we’ve been insufficiently exposed to genuine normality. What’s truly abnormal is to care about someone as much as we have cared for them. Of course they are mad, but we are too. And so is every human we will ever alight upon.

Let’s acknowledge the agonies in a full-throated way. They are an unparalleled nightmare. They have horrendous childhood wounds. They’re anxious or avoidant – and any number of other pathologies. One could fairly stick more or less an entire psychological diagnostic manual to them.

But perhaps it feels so bad now because – strangely – we’re getting ever closer to something real. The increased fighting isn’t an indication of incompatibility, but of the increased risk and tension that comes as we prepare to properly allow someone into our lives. The arguments may not be dysfunction so much as defences crumbling. This may be the terror of two people who’ve been schooled all their lives to be alone, preparing – finally – to unmask themselves.

There is so much anger and suspicion on both sides. We’ll need to swallow our pride, accept things we swore we’d never countenance, admit to vulnerabilities we’ve been in flight from since the start.

But – perhaps – we should do it. In a deeply imperfect world, this is something remarkable. Let’s head back inside. Let’s stick at it.