argue with your girlfriend!

Sample FAQ #1: My girlfriend, wife, lover, whatever, of 3 months, 1 year, more than a year, 7 years, whatever, and I seem to be arguing all the time. She keeps claiming that I 'don't care enough.' When I try to tell her that I do, or point out the things that I do for her that she doesn't do for me, she gets even angrier. We patch things up for awhile but then we have another fight. I'm pretty much in love with her but all this arguing leads nowhere and is really dragging me down. Should I just bail or what? It seems like a lot of pain to go through and things aren't getting better. Is there something I should be doing that will fix this problem? What is her problem anyway? Do you have any insight on this?

Sample FAQ #2: My girlfriend, wife, lover, whatever, of 3 months, 1 year, more than a year, 7 years, whatever, and I seem to be arguing all the time. I really love her, but she pulls so much shit on me. Like she'll lie about something or try to hide stuff from me, she acts inconsistent, she doesn't call, goes places without telling me, she never wants to initiate sex, and [insert long list of minor but troubling complaints here] and basically it just gets really complicated. Every time I confront her or point out what she's done wrong, she just goes ballistic basically and it seems like everything ends up being my fault. I don't know what to do. I don't want to end things exactly because we have really great times but it seems like....I don't know. I'm totally lost. I'm really tired of it and I give up - so I turn to you. Any clues on what I should do?

And so on.

Okey doke. So here is where we dive into Arguing With Your Girlfriend 101. Arguing in general is a highly advanced form of civilized discourse that occasionally involves throwing things, and the proper study of it takes decades. And if things go well in your life, you will have that long to master its subtle yet rewarding intricacies. However, at the moment, you are floundering around, having involved yourself in a relationship, and therefore forgotten the simplest basics of arguing as it applies to girlfriends or what have you. Or perhaps you never really understood them in the first place. That happens. Don't worry, though, we are going to give you an itsy-bitsy refresher course in the fundamentals of arguing your way through a relationship for fun, profit, and an enhanced sex life. We'll start with some general principles in random order.

Note that 'starting an argument' is an incredibly advanced technical term involving so many equations that we simply don't have space to define it here. So we will use the layman's definition of an argument that she has started - which is when you say to yourself 'she started it!' as though that somehow makes you the injured party and entitled to compensatory damages. So if you are having a lot of arguments where she gets mad first, I want you to imagine to yourself that there is a large banner hanging over your arguing space that says: Proposed: My boyfriend (husband, whatever) does not care about me enough!

I want you to imagine this so you will more readily understand how it is that you always seem to get backed into some sort of corner wherein you are defending how much you care about her with a sort of desperate, crazed futility. Think of your argument as a vigorous, spirited debate on this important hypothesis and you will understand your own and her behavior more easily. You will not have the slightest fucking clue what to do about it, but we'll get to that later. First, you need to absorb this vital argument information slowly, mull it around in your head like fine wine, get a ferocious headache from the mulling, and then turn to me for the pain-killing advice you will now be in a position to gratefully accept. That's our basic game plan, just so you know.

At any rate, we have now answered the question as to why it always comes down to this - the you don't love me, you don't care issue, and why your FAQs are so often poignantly filled with confusion on this topic. It always comes down to that issue because that's what the fucking argument is about, you dolt! We'll go into the nuts and bolts of this, how a simple discussion of laundry can degenerate into a howling vicious morass of deadly personal insults and accusations punctuated by horribly wounded refusals to talk and an icy chill over your entire relationship, but for the moment I just want you to consider this: is there anything else in world really worth arguing about? The answer is not really. The answers to otherwise intriguing questions about the optimal number of miles over the speed limit to drive pale before the mighty majesty of the you don't really love me enough, now do you? question. As far as she is concerned, almost nothing beats it for sheer personal interest. But while you ponder that, let's move on to Principle #2.

Your whiny and heartfelt complaints about various forms of deception, about how often and under what circumstances sexual relations are conducted, her numerous complications, irritating personal habits, manipulation of any number of kinds, how she always gets mad and so on and so on...are all just clever disguises for your deep-rooted, sincere, and recurring belief that she just doesn't really care enough about you, now does she? It is amazing to me how deeply and frequently you are convinced of this in your relationships and to what extraordinary lengths you will go to just to arrange arguments in which you can hang this Debating Banner over your relationship and get your heart stomped on. But it's human nature and you're going to do it, so there's no use me babbling on about amazement. The principal difference between you and her is that you will almost never admit this, you would rather have your fingernails pulled out by wild rabid ferrets than admit what you are arguing about. So in most cases she actually has a slight edge on you in the honesty department. But who cares? Honestly, no one. It's completely irrelevant. You're going to argue about it. You're supposed to argue about it. The only important question is how you are going to turn the basics of human nature into everlasting love and happiness or at least a less than tortured life. Which brings us to Principle #3.

Let's go back to our initial principles - that arguments, even if they are seemingly about how much time you spend playing computer games, are really about whether or not someone really just doesn't love the other person enough, now do they? The definitive answer to that question, and the only truly satisfactory one, is to be found in Make-up Sex. It's really pretty fucking clear and pretty fucking simple. Even if your head is deeply enmeshed in the troubled fog of your current relationship, you can dimly sense this. You can see how if love, caring, and passion are the questions, then Make-up Sex would actually be the answer. It is misunderstanding the fundamental nature of the question that leads you astray and into thickets of verbal abuse and intermittent anguished and confused alienation.

Indeed, the classic way for human beings to truly reassure themselves that love exists in their relationship is through the magical sensual bonding act of sexual contact, ecstatic release of chemicals, warm glowy feelings of contentment and so on. You are slightly more vulnerable than she is to needing this particular form of reassurance due to differences in Social Brains, and Information Processing, and other boring (or fascinating, depending on your mood) topics we won't go into now, but suffice it to say that Make-up Sex is a pretty good deal for everyone. The question, of course, is how to get there. A question we won't address until we get to the Basic Arguing Techniques section of the FAQ. For now, we'll just go into Principle #4, pausing only briefly to point out that you can't have Make-Up Sex after an argument, unless you have an argument.

Human beings didn't invent arguments. Lots of mammals use them, and use them to establish close, loyal, intrinsically useful relationships. Rival monkeys who engage in some sort of vicious conflict (and monkeys can be really vicious in case you weren't aware) and then make up are more likely to back each other up in times of threat from another party, to share food, and to assist each other in times of distress. Dogs use initial territorial fighting to establish long-lasting dog friendships rife with loyalty and heroism. Even cats, and for all I know, ferrets, attack each other in play as a way of establishing ongoing friendly relations. Human beings are mammals and they do the same thing. Arguments, and conflicts, are key ways that mammals, including people, sniff each other out, test each other, get to know each other, learn to trust each other, negotiate ongoing living relationships, understand each other, and establish the kinds of bonds that are both mysteriously chemical in nature and surprisingly durable. No one ever truly trusts someone they haven't fought with. Remember this.

A good old-fashioned highly upset argument disarranges you physiologically, lowers your social defense mechanisms and opens all your pores so that your true underlying upset and highly caring chemicals can come gushing out in a hugely revealing and upsetting way. And all this gushing out of repressed chemistry is exactly what leaves a sort of chemical emptiness and desperate craving for replacement chemicals that allows you to accept what the other person is offering in chemical return and then wrestle each other to the kitchen floor in a desperate frenzy of extremely rewarding Make-Up Sex. The whole system is intricately designed by evolution to make sure that animals who need each other will form tight long-lasting bonds even when they later wish they hadn't. It is much, much more difficult to break up a mutually argumentative relationship than a non-arguing one. This is a relevant point in your life. It may be relevant at the moment because you are finding it harder than hell to get out of an arguing relationship even though you are in distress and want to. Or it may become a relevant point after you have been married for 17 years and your wife leaves you to marry some jerk who argues with her all the time in preference to what you thought was the ideal non-arguing harmony of her marriage to you - but was in actuality an arid, dry, chemical-free, barren wasteland of complete marital indifference. However it affects you, for better or for worse, you really need to be aware of this underlying point. Knowing this will guide your future decisions with a sure-footed brilliance and mastery of relationships that will awe your dolty and unaccomplished friends.

Let's pick this up on a more conceptual level since you aren't really accustomed to thinking of things in the brute animal terms that in reality rule your life. If your girlfriend is taking the trouble to start a 'you don't really care enough about me, now do you?' argument - it must mean that she is actually interested in the answer! She wouldn't do this unless she cared whether or not you loved her. Understand this! If your girlfriend is never starting confusing, illogical, and distressing arguments with you, it's a bad sign. Take it from someone who has very deliberately not started arguments with otherwise wonderful men because she no longer gave a fuck whether they cared enough or not. If you are having ongoing, chronic arguments that she always starts - it means that she is making an heroic attempt to get you to give the right answer. (The right answer, by the way, is that you do care enough about her. This may or may not be the truthful answer, but your most common problem is an inability to figure out how to convey this answer, whether sincere or not.) Ongoing argument starting means she is giving you many many chances.

If you are the one starting the arguments and doing the confronting, it means you are making a heroic and courageous attempt to get her to give the right answer. This is highly admirable on your part and sometimes also kind of pathetic. Particularly when you don't know how to convince her to give the right answer. But at least you're fucking trying.

If you are both starting arguments all the time, it means that you have reached a point in your relationship where both of you are unsure as to whether there is enough caring dispersed helpfully throughout the relationship and are trying to figure it out. Or - it means you both like to argue! Some couples like to argue more or less as a lifestyle because it constantly reminds them of how much they love each other. It's as though their brains were to saying to themselves 'God, I must really love this man/woman or why else would I be putting up with all this shit! I wouldn't, so therefore this must be a love for the ages!' And frequently it is. Often, to the dismay of less feisty friends and relatives, you can't pry an arguing couple apart with a crowbar. Their chemicals are constantly energized, their love constantly renewed, and furthermore, all problems can be resolved by the simple expedient of arguing about them. In short, you can get away with arguing with your girlfriend all the time if you have the stamina for it (and many of you don't), but you cannot get away with never arguing.

Many of your FAQs vaguely reference certain key time markers, such as around 3 or 4 months, round about a year or a little more, and deep into a relationship such as 4 years or 5 years. These time periods are negotiation time periods.

At around the 3 or 4 month mark, something happens inside both your heads. It may be a little earlier or later, depending on how old you are, but here's what happens: A little buzzer goes off inside your Relationship Assessment Center that says 'We May Have A Deal Here!' You have cautiously or wildly sniffed out the possiblity of good times, good sex, love, activation of feelings, attraction, the meeting of hidden needs or god knows what hideously complex set of factors it is that draw people to one another. And you have decided, sometimes against your will, that enough of these things exist to make striking a deal worthwhile.

As soon as you decide that, even if you didn't want to, your entire outlook on life changes. Because once your body decides this is something that could last more than a week or two, it immediately starts making plans for the future, and deciding how it wants things arranged, and so on. Things that were perfectly acceptable if you were only going to be dealing with them for a week or two now appear to your body to be completely unbearable if they are going to last the rest of your life. And you (or she) will be seized with an sudden overwhelming desire to start an argument over where to sit in a movie theatre. It's fine to sit in the front near the speakers so he can take in the full ear-crushing effect of the various loud explosions the movie has to offer for a month or two, but if it's going to be the rest of your goddamn life, it is imperative that you start an argument, and get very irritated about it right now at the 3 or 4 month mark.

In other words, if you're going to have a deal - it is important to negotiate the terms of it. If you skip this step, you don't really have a relationship yet. On the other hand, if the two of you are arguing like motherfuckers at this crucial point, it means you have a deal. You like each other, maybe even love each other and therefore it is worth working out the terms of the relationship. People don't really get confident enough to argue with true vicious abandon until they feel like there's something there worth arguing about. Take heart from this. Some of you bail every time this happens. Don't! You cannot get to the good stuff until you negotiate your way through the basic terms. Often these terms will have to do with how much time you spend together, how often and when you call, who calls first, sex, personal space and you guessed it - you don't really care enough about me, now do you? All you are doing is establishing that there is enough caring, as proven by the make-up sex, to make the darn thing worth continuing.

Similarly, you should expect to renegotiate the terms at around the 1 year mark. Birthdays, anniversaries and holidays are good times to get into vicious arguments and renegotiate for more favorable terms or address whatever problems have arisen in the working relationship. Again, an important anniversary like a year indicates to your body that maybe this darn thing is going to last and therefore minor problems must be addresed soon or they will last for the rest of your life! Similarly, if you plan to get married, you should set aside the entire first year for emotional and seemingly pointless arguing on a tremendous number of trivial points. There is nothing like getting married to scare the wits out of your body and make it believe that every minor irritation will only grow into a gigantic cancerous bleeding sore if not argued about right now! This is because you have basically informed it that you are indeed going to be stuck with this situation for the rest of your life.

There will also be points down the road, several years into things, when you will want to renegotiate terms. It is like a renewable contract and adjustments have to be made to update the terms, just as in a business relationship.

This goes back to our Make-Up Sex point. The point of an intimate argument is never really to win, it is to release 'I love you and want to have sex with you' chemicals. Winning doesn't lead to sex. Ponder this.

And consider this subtle yet logical train of thought (because women understand it even if you don't). If you win an argument you started, you have basically proven that she doesn't really care about you, now does she? Because that's the territory you staked out. If you are proven right, you are in actuality the loser. If, on the other hand, she wins, she has basically proven that she doesn't really love you, now does she? Let's say you are arguing because you always have to initiate sex and she doesn't and you want her to sometimes. If you prove that you are correct, you have essentially proven that she doesn't care enough to initiate sex. She will be mad that you proved this, when she was planning to keep it to herself, and you will unfailingly find that hammering home your point about how right you are, will never lead to more and better sex. If she wins, by proving that she shouldn't have to, well then we are back at square one, aren't we?

If she starts an argument about how you never call and you win, you have proven that you don't need to call and she was excessively needy to ask for all this damn calling, which means you have proven that you don't really care enough about her, now do you? And if she wins, she has proven that you weren't calling enough, now were you? You are always screwed either way.

Again, this is something you understand intuitively, and why you sometimes avoid arguments, or get desperate during them, but during full-on argument mode all subtle logic escapes you and you end up foot deep in it, twisting your ankle and falling on your face. So let's remember our points about animals, chemicals, and sex. The reason you are arguing is to release those chemicals and drop those defenses that will allow the two of you to trust each other more firmly than rationality could ever account for. Arguments are an information exchange. We'll say it again - arguments are for information exchange. Information. Chemicals. Emotions. Exchange thereof. Revelation of internal states of being. Establishment of trust. Arguments are not for winning. Never ever prove yourself right during an argument with a girlfriend. No proving!!!

Take down that debate banner, even if she doesn't. An argument is really a question, not a debate. You don't believe this and neither does she, but it is. Answer the question, or get the question answered. No one is right. No one is wrong. There is only the question of sufficient caring and the practical matter of how that caring is to be conveyed behaviorally. She has her preferences, you have yours. The two of you have a deal, and you are merely working out the terms. Embed this understanding into your soul and save yourself some amazingly agonizing heartache down the road.

Okay now that we have gotten philosophical on you (in a way that can only improve your life immeasurably), we must acknowledge the practical reality. If you are going to be arguing over where to sit in a movie theater (and you will), somehow or another you've got to fucking figure out where you're going to sit or whether you'll be able to sit together at all (sometimes you won't). The gritty practicalities are going to drive you nuts. So you will need Arguing Techniques. At long fucking last, we are leaving behind principles and moving on to actual goddamn techniques. How to resolve your horrible not caring enough problems and the even worse practical problems of What To Watch Together on Television.

Basic Arguing Techniques...

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You don't really care enough about me, now do you?