How long should you give someone space after a fight?

Usually long enough for both bodies to settle, which is at least twenty minutes and is often a few hours. The space tends to go better when someone names when they'll return: 'I need the evening, and I'd like to talk tomorrow at seven.' Open-ended silence is often what hurts most.

Should you go to bed angry?

It's often fine. Trying to resolve something at 2 am, exhausted and flooded, tends to go badly. What seems to matter is not the clock but whether you've made a small move first: 'I'm still upset, I love you, and let's talk tomorrow.' Then make sure tomorrow actually happens.

Who should apologise first after a fight?

Whoever can. Going first isn't the same as admitting it was all your fault. You can apologise for your part without accepting a version of events you disagree with. If it's always the same person going first, though, that's worth raising at a calm moment.

My partner acts like nothing happened after a fight. What do I do?

Some people use normal behaviour as their repair, hoping it will mean the fight is over. Try acknowledging the attempt and still asking: 'I can tell you're trying to get us back to normal, and I'd like that too. I also need ten minutes on what happened. When would suit you?'

What to do after a big fight with your partner

First, check what kind of fight it was

This guide is for a fight that was loud, hurtful or frightening in its intensity, but where you are not afraid of your partner. Some people say things they regret. Some cry, or leave the room, or end the night sleeping on the sofa. All of that is painful, and all of it can be talked about.

A different situation needs a different response. If there were threats, if something was thrown or broken to frighten you, if you were stopped from leaving, or if anyone was hurt, a calm debrief with your partner isn't the next step, and it may not be safe. Please go to the support page rather than following the steps below.

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The first hour: do less

Straight after a big fight, your body may still be in the state Gottman calls flooding: racing heart, narrow thinking, a strong urge to win or to escape. This is a bad time to fix anything. A good first hour is mostly about not making things worse.

Don't send the long message. If you need to write it, write it in a note that goes nowhere.
Move your body or change rooms. In a small flat or a joint family home, that may mean the terrace, a walk to the shop or a shower.
Stop rehearsing. When you catch yourself drafting the next round, go back to whatever you were doing with your hands.
Wait before you call your mother, your sister or your best friend. Family members tend to remember a fight long after you two have made up, and their sides may become one more thing to manage. If you need support tonight, choose the one person who wants good things for both of you.
If children heard, tell them something simple and true: 'We had a big argument. It's not because of you, and we'll sort it out.'

The first move back

Sometime after the storm, someone has to make a small move. Gottman calls these repair attempts: anything, however clumsy, that stops the negativity from escalating. He treats whether they are made and accepted as one of the things that most distinguishes couples who do well. A repair at this stage doesn't resolve anything. All it says is 'we're still us'.

It doesn't have to be a speech, and it doesn't have to be the person who was more wrong. A cup of tea put down without comment is a repair. So is a hand on a shoulder, or a text from the next room. If you've had enough time to mean it, try one of the lines below. If your partner isn't ready, that isn't a failure. Say when you'd like to try again, and leave it there for now.

“I hate how that went. I don't want to go through it again tonight, but I didn't want to go to sleep without saying that.”

“I'm still upset, and I still love you. Both are true. Can we talk tomorrow evening?”

“I said some things I regret. I'd like to come back to them properly when we've both slept.”

The talk, usually a day later

The conversation that actually helps usually happens when neither of you is flooded, often the next day. Pick a time rather than ambushing each other. Keep it short, and aim for about half an hour. The goal isn't to re-try the case and reach a verdict on who said what. Two people in the same fight usually come away with two different memories of it, and arguing over the transcript tends to restart everything.

Take turns with these four questions. One person answers while the other listens, then swap. The listener's only job is to say back what they heard and ask, 'Did I get that right?'

What was it like for me? Feelings only, with no description of what you did: 'I felt shut out, and then I felt stupid.'
What was it touching in me? 'When voices rise, I'm eleven again at my parents' table.' Or: 'I've felt second to your work for months.'
What was my part? One or two things only, and specifically: 'I brought up your mother when I knew it would hurt.'
What's one thing I'd do differently next time? Keep it small enough to actually do: 'I'll say I need a break, not walk out.'

How to tell if the repair worked

A fight can seem over without being repaired. Both of you are being polite. Nobody mentions it. Dinner gets made. Looking back, a lot of resentment seems to start here: it wasn't the fight that did the damage, but the fact that the conversation afterwards never happened. A few signs may help you tell the two apart.

Repaired: you can mention the fight lightly without your stomach dropping. Buried: you both step around it.
Repaired: something small has actually changed. Buried: you've agreed to 'just move on'.
Repaired: each of you can say what the other was feeling. Buried: you can recite only what they did wrong.
Repaired: touch and humour come back at their own pace. Buried: you're performing normal for the children or the in-laws.

How to bring up an old hurt →

If you said something you can't take back

Big fights sometimes produce a sentence that can't be unsaid: about someone's family, their body, whether you ever loved them, or a threat to leave. It's worth treating these separately from the argument. They deserve their own apology, one that doesn't arrive packaged with a reason why you said it.

If you said you wanted to end things and you didn't mean it, say so plainly. If you did mean it, or don't yet know, it's more respectful to say that you need to think than to take it back to make the evening easier.

How to apologise properly →

Sources

Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (1999). The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work. Crown. Perpetual versus solvable problems; softened start-up; turning towards.
Gottman, J. M. (1994). What Predicts Divorce? The Relationship Between Marital Processes and Marital Outcomes. Lawrence Erlbaum. Criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling; physiological flooding during conflict.
Gottman, J. M., Coan, J., Carrère, S., & Swanson, C. (1998). Predicting marital happiness and stability from newlywed interactions. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 60(1), 5–22. How a conflict conversation starts predicted how it unfolded.
Finkel, E. J., Slotter, E. B., Luchies, L. B., Walton, G. M., & Gross, J. J. (2013). A brief intervention to promote conflict reappraisal preserves marital quality over time. Psychological Science, 24(8), 1595–1601. 120 US married couples; short writing tasks about a recent disagreement from a neutral third party's view were linked to less distress about conflict and a halt in the decline in marital quality.

ELOVIYA is evidence-informed self-help, not therapy or medical care, and doesn't diagnose anyone. If you are in danger, contact local emergency services or a support line.