1) Be in a relationship where you NEVER fought, barely even argued, and things were happy but pretty much the same from day to day? Basically zero drama. Good sex.
Maybe.
2) Have a classic romance novel/soap opera type relationship where you were both extremely wild about each other, but sometimes have loud, angry fights, drama and an element of instability? Something exactly like from The Notebook.. Say, it's 90% ecstacy but 10% drama. GREAT sex.
Yes. I don't even understand why the fights and drama would even be a problem (in theory), especially if the overall relationship is 90% ecstatic. (Hell, if all my students got 90% on their exams, I'd feel like a god.) "90%" is an absurdly high ecstasy rate.
How on earth do you have a longtime relationship and not have things you disagree about so strongly that you don't argue? You know, I say this, but I know a sp/so couple and they are like how you say and they both seem to be happy about it. My husband and I are kind of amazed by them. We both agree that it's cool for them, but it's definitely not what we want. It seems reeeallllyyyy boring.
Like [MENTION=10082]Starry[/MENTION] says, I'm glad my kids see their parents fight. I'm glad that they see us openly express our disagreements, because then they also see us dealing with it/ resolving our issues and making things better because of it. It's an incredibly important life skill to learn, that people can still love each other but get angry and strongly disagree about things at the same time. My parents were like this too and I am super grateful. As my mom said to me, "You may hate that person for a few hours and want to change the locks on the house so they can't ever come back in, but you don't run away. You deal with it and make it better."
I think this is great. I was raised by 9s, and no one ever argued. EVER. Sometimes my 4-fixed mom would throw a passive-aggressive snit-fit that was too subtle for me to detect, but outright argument, disagreement, or conflict was NEVER expressed.
If
I tried to stir something up, I was generally punished, derided, and accused of starting "drama" rather than acknowledged as bringing legitimate grievances to the table. As a consequence, I've sort of got this absurd feeling that if I so much as snap at someone, I'm going to instantly face ramifications, be rejected, put down, made fun of, etc. I'm not great at resolving my problems either--I tend to throw a ridiculous tantrum, or 99% of the time, storm away and solve absolutely nothing and expect the other person to get "the message" somehow. I certainly don't expect anyone to work with me or forgive me. It's pathetic. I can't even imagine having lived in a household where normal feelings were allowed--You mean other families...
fight??? Just one more thing I was deprived of, I guess.
Thanks for shedding light on an area I had no idea existed. It helps me understand more about why I mistyped for so long.
^^I'm so glad you said this...
My parents have been married for decades in a "cockburn 2" relationship. And I can remember so vividly as a child having one of those *omfg my parents are so embarrassing and weird and abnormal compared to every other couple I encounter in my neighborhood, the community, my friends parents, couples on primetime television...* and gathering the confidence to directly question my mother about it.
And she said to me... "Watch, young Starry, as the years go by... These couples that seem so loving and agreeable... I promise you that long after most of those relationships and marriages have fallen-apart and ended... your father and I will still be going strong." And I'll be damned... she was right.
My parents are both becoming old and ill. They're miserable without realizing it (my mom thinks she's happy, stepdad keeps playing martyr about "getting through life so that he can be reunited with Jesus", which he won't be, because of the psychological atrocities he wrought upon me), and their lives are loveless, empty, and pointless. Losers, just drifting pointlessly through life, unattached to themselves or anything else. They're the ones your mom warned you about. The marriage hasn't fallen apart, but their bonds more or less have. As my sister observes, "We were like 4 unrelated people with nothing in common living together in the same house."
It won't happen to me.
Not sx-dom, but like several have already noted, I see a lot of relevance in the cultural upbringing which then impacts peoples' relationship styles, what they view as 'norm', tons of conditioning that occurs that' can be challenging to reverse / overcome in light of being in a totally different context.
