Do you occasionally feel like you become a different person around your partner? Does it seem like he or she has to change—or that you’ll have to change partners—for you to be your true self? Do you take turns acting like stubborn toddlers and feeling as powerless as one?

Well, you’re not alone. Just about all lovers go through a stage of high emotional reactivity that threatens to destroy their relationship. If one makes a request or an “observation” with any hint of negative emotion, it automatically triggers an unpleasant response in the partner. It doesn’t matter how the request and response are worded, the negative emotion underlying them makes both parties feel wronged and like they can’t be themselves around each other:

"You’re always complaining.”

"I’m not complaining, you’re criticizing.”

"You’re so controlling!”

"You're so uncooperative."

Emotional reactivity is an automatic response to perceived insults. For those with a low threshold of emotional reactivity, the environment seems threatening or fraught with uncertainty.........

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