stonewalling

I read an interesting article this morning on how not to be a jerk during your next fight. The article brought up a few points that I wanted to share on the blog.

First, that stonewalling, or avoidance:

"conveys a lack of respect. Interestingly, studies show that most men are physiologically unaffected by their wives’ stonewalling. However, stonewalling has quite the opposite affect on women. Wives’ heart rates increase dramatically when their husbands stonewall."

The article then goes on to say that 85% of men are stonewallers. I am curious to see what percent of women are stonewallers. If I would have to guess, I would say 99%. I am a huuuge stonewaller. If I am fighting with my boyfriend I don't want to deal with it and so I ignore him for a few days. Then you know what happens? Nothing. He will call me like nothing has happened and then be completely confused when I tell him I have been ignoring him. When he stonewalls me? I check my phone frantically throughout the day waiting to see if he has apologized and I stress myself out until we eventually talk again. This method sucks, and doesn't really do anything to fix the problem.

So how do you fix this then? I am still learning, but this article has a suggestion that I love. You make better choices! Fighting is all about the choices you make and how you decided to make the other person feel. Instead of ignoring my boyfriend "to get him back for hurting me" I can reach out and nicely tell him how I feel. It sounds so easy when I type it out, but it's hard and takes a lot of work to keep calm and be friendly when someone you love hasn't treated you how you would want.

Do you have any tips on how to fight fair?