Aggression in Relationships:

One thing I’ve noticed in the practice of psychotherapy over the years, is that for some people, aggression allows connection. There is something paradoxical about this, and it took me some time to realize that what might seem “mean”, “tough”, or “confrontational” on the surface, is actually the key to helping some people feel safe in a relationship. I’ve often wondered about this and what it is about a more detached or “rough” stance by the other person actually allows a person to connect. Another way of looking at this, might be to wonder what it is about being “nice”, “helpful”, or “kind” that some people experience as dangerous and threatening?

Here are some thoughts I’ve come up with:

For some, the idea that they might be angry or aggressive is such a dangerous idea, that finding it in the other person is a relief; it allows the person to be distracted from their own buried anger, or to feel like the “good one” by contrast to the other person’s “badness”. This might be because the person was victimized in the past by someone else’s aggression (for example, if a parent’s anger led to physical abuse or rage attacks) and they don’t ever want to be identified with the aggressive person who hurt them so much; they might subconsciously prefer to be with a partner who is aggressive, than to consider that there might be some buried aggression inside of them. Another possibility, is that such a person uses this in a self-righteous way; if they are the “martyr” in the face of others’ aggression, they can feel virtuous and good about themselves. In a sense, this is a situation where a person gets to feel “good” by seeing others as “bad”.

It can be quite difficult and irritating to be in a relationship with such a person, because they may be quite provocative but deny any responsibility when it comes to the other person’s aggression. For example, someone might not do anything around the house or to contribute to the family responsibilities for years due to constant complaints of being “ill”; they may then talk about how bad they feel not to be helping and how guilty they feel about watching everyone work so hard and not being able to help due to being sick. In such a case, the partner who is picking up all the flack may feel extremely resentful, but if their anger comes out, they feel guilty because the other person can’t help being sick and already feels so bad…this is an extremely imprisoned situation because this partner is doing all the work without help, feels naturally some resentment, but is not free to express that resentment without feeling like an “aggressor”, or a perpretator of hurt on someone who is already quite victimized. This is an extremely difficult and suffocating kind of partnership to be in.

I think that there are others who feel indebted to a person who is “nice”. This might be someone who grew up with a “nice mother” but an unspoken expectation that the child would meet some need in the mother (or other) in return; for example, the child would never separate and leave home to leave mother alone. Or, the child was never to take the father’s side but to view the mother the “good one” and the father as the “bad one” in all situations. Or, the child was to never hurt his mother’s feelings by becoming angry towards her, in exchange for her doting, care, and “niceness”. The child might alternatively have had to listen to the mother’s problems in a way that was uncomfortable for a child to hear, but felt guilty to say no because of how “loving” and “good” the mother was towards the child. This is a situation in which “love” comes with expectation and indebtedness, and perhaps more troubling than this, the expectations are not stated explicitly but are implied or meant to be guessed.

There are yet other situations in which a person has a “dismissive” or “avoidant” attachment style, and the idea of someone else being “helpful” or “nice” is associated with feelings of weakness or vulnerability. It is almost a humiliation to imply that such a person might need to be treated “nicely” or cared about by someone else in some way. These are people who value independence and being able to “tough it out”, constantly trying to prove their invulnerability.

I think there are situations in which a person feels conflicted inside of himself; part of him wants to change, and part of him doesn’t. There might be a “tough” or “critical” part of the personality in conflict with a part of the personality that wants to be “nurtured” or “take the easy way out”…and having someone else be that “tough” or “critical” voice feels like a relief, because now they are not in conflict with themselves, but with the other. An example of this might be someone who wants to stop using alcohol, but also doesn’t. He fights about it within himself, but when someone else pushes him to stop, he then can view them as the problem for being too “controlling” or “tough”, and lose himself to the part of him that wants to succumb to his desire to drink.

I can also think of people who have been hurt by caretakers, and connect love with being hurt. For such people, being treated with kindness does not resonate with their experiences of past relationships with important others, and may feel empty or like the other person doesn’t “care”.

Have others experienced such dynamics, and what ideas do you have about this?