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One thing that has become clear to me over the years is that many of the frustrations that we have with parenting are, at least in part, frustrations with our partners. This isn’t because we don’t like them or because we didn’t pick well! But parenting and running a household with another person can be a challenge. Parenting, in particular, introduces a lot of questions that you may simply never have anticipated. In The Family Firm, I talk about the idea of managing your household a bit more like a business — not to take the warmth out of it, but to try to do a better job on working through frustrations.
One key element in that advice: surfacing conflicts on purpose.
Most people do not like conflict. We especially do not like to have conflict with our spouse or partner, who we love. And as parents, conflict can feel extra destabilizing (no one wants to fight in front of their kids), not to mention a distraction from all the other stuff you need to get done.
However, rather than avoiding conflict with your partner, I strongly believe you should surface these conflicts on purpose.
The core reason: disagreements do not go away if you ignore them. Instead, they just stay and worsen and then, usually, blow up when you’re not ready for it.
When you bring up conflicts at a scheduled place and time, even though the conversation may still be hard, you are making the choice to address the problem when the anger is dialed down, which almost always has better results.
A familiar scenario
Consider this scenario. You feel strongly that your 7-year-old must be in bed, lights out, at 8 p.m. You are aware that your partner doesn’t really care as much about this strict bedtime, but you’re the person who does bedtime most of the time. You know if you bring this up and discuss it, you’ll end up arguing. So, instead, you just keep doing bedtime and never talk about it.
Then, one day, you’re out of town for work. You call at 9 p.m., and your partner says that the child is awake, just hanging out and having a snack. You freak out. You yell at them; they yell back. “This is your rule, not mine!”
The conflict hasn’t gone away; it’s just waiting. And that moment — the moment when you’re both tired and yelling — is just about the worst moment for this to surface. Now that this has led to a fight, you’re both entrenched, and it is going to be even harder for you to come together and agree.
It would have been better to discuss it before.
So, how do you do that?
Establish the “big picture”
In The Family Firm, I talk about developing a “big picture” for your family. I propose that families sit down and write out a mission statement and some key priorities for the coming year. I also suggest being explicit about the ideal — or, well, the possible ideal — daily schedule. (If you’d like worksheets to make this easier, you can access them here.)
This “big picture” step is the first part of surfacing conflict. You don’t have to do this frequently, but with some regularity (once or twice a year), it is useful to sit down and talk through your family’s big picture. What do you want your days to look like? What are the important things to get done over the next year? We might assume these answers are the same for every family, when in fact they are very specific and personal to you.
I recommend you do at least some of the thinking separately. That is: you write it down, and so does your partner (or even your kids, depending on their ages), and then you compare notes. This helps you avoid anchoring your conclusions to the first person who talks. This way, if there are differences, you are more likely to see them.
When I talk through this approach with readers, one common reaction is a version of: This might work well if you agree with your partner about things, but my partner and I would definitely not agree on our main priorities, so this wouldn’t work for us.
My point: this is precisely who this tool is meant for. If you and your partner agree on everything, then you don’t need this because there is no conflict. We need this because there are conflicts to work through. This is an opportunity to do that work in a moment when you are not actively angry, so you can reach a broader, shared understanding of how your family will work.
If you do this and you find your core values and mission are very misaligned, that will be difficult. But, again, that misalignment doesn’t disappear if you ignore it. These conversations — maybe with an outside therapist, in some cases — are a better way to navigate.
Schedule a regular check-in
It’s helpful to work through the big picture, but there are smaller conflicts that come up all the time. This is where many relationships would benefit from a more frequent (weekly or monthly) relationship check-in. Basically, a meeting. With an agenda.
If you have such a meeting on your calendar, you can add items to the agenda as they come up. The meeting is, then, an opportunity to talk things through outside of the moment they come up. In my household, we have a fixed weekly time called “Hard Conversation Time.” This is a 30-minute time period at a time when we do not expect to be bothered, which is reserved for bringing up difficult issues. Often, there is nothing on the agenda. When there is, though, we both come into the conversation ready for the idea that it may be difficult.
These hard conversations do, sometimes, involve conflict. But it is smaller conflict, rather than avoidance, and then larger blow-ups.
Start early
Surfacing conflict is, in my view, core to parenting at any stage. But there is a real opportunity to begin this early, ideally, when your child is first born. The first year of a first baby is very hard on marriage; marital happiness declines a lot before rebounding. One thing that can help is having time for consistent check-ins to see how things are going. This serves as an opportunity to discuss conflict, but also to just reconnect and see what you might need to change.
I recommend people set these meetings every other week, beginning at birth — seriously, put them on the calendar. I think you’ll be glad you did.
The bottom line
- Surfacing conflict on purpose with your partner is a strategy to lower frustration and address disagreements before they blow up.
- Start by establishing your family’s “big picture” — your mission, priorities, and ideal daily schedule — to reach a broader, shared understanding of how your family will work.
- Schedule regular check-ins and discuss your conflicts when anger is dialed down, not in the heat of the moment.
- Begin these check-ins early, ideally when your first baby is born.
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