How to repair after a fight with your partner

Summary

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Life Kit (NPR)

Episode: How to repair after a fight with your partner
Host: Marielle Segarra
Guest Expert: Bea Voce, couples counselor
Reporter: Andy Tagle
Air Date: November 6, 2025

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Overview

This episode centers on the essential skill of repairing relationships after conflict, especially with a romantic partner. Host Marielle Segarra and reporter Andy Tagle speak with couples counselor Bea Voce, who outlines a five-step process for relational repair. The focus is on practical tools and mindsets that help partners reconnect and move forward after arguments, featuring examples, key concepts, and memorable metaphors—like treating the repair conversation as “customer service” for your relationship. The advice is warm, realistic, and filled with empathy, recognizing that rupture is inevitable, but repair is a learnable, repeatable skill.

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Main Discussion Points and Insights

The Importance of Repair after Conflict

• Conflict is inevitable in relationships. It’s not about avoiding fights, but about how you recover (“repair”) afterwards.

  “Rupture, conflict: it’s going to happen in relationships no matter what. We cannot avoid it.” — Bea Voce [00:33]

• Repair is described as the single most important ingredient in developing healthy, long-term, and resilient relationships.

  “Repair to me is the single most important ingredient in what actually develops into healthy, long term, secure, functioning relationships.” — Bea Voce [00:49]

The Five-Step Process of Repair

1. Do Nothing — Regulate Yourself First

[03:49–06:08]

• After a conflict, take space before trying to resolve it. This is about self-regulation, not avoidance.
• Recognize when you’re “out of your window of tolerance” (too upset to engage constructively).
• Use your own best methods—take a walk, call a friend, blast music—to calm down at least to a “5 out of 10” emotional level.

  “You don't come back into connection with your partner until you're ready to see someone else's perspective.” — Bea Voce [05:09]

• Notable quote:

  “Doing nothing is actually quite an active process.” — Bea Voce [03:49]

2. One Person Goes at a Time — Take Turns

[06:08–07:46]

• Only one partner shares their experience at a time.
• The hurt partner (or whoever initiated the repair) goes first; if both are hurt, take turns.
• Reference to “customer service”: Just like at the returns counter, focus on one problem before moving to another.

  “If both of you are doing it at the same time, it’s a total mess. It doesn’t work.” — Bea Voce [07:34]

3. Share Your Experience Responsibly

[07:47–09:52]

• When expressing hurt, use “I” statements and describe feelings, not blame/judgment.

• Soft start-ups make it easier for your partner to respond with empathy.

• Notable Terry Real quote:

  “There’s no space in relationship for objective reality. There are just two subjective experiences.” — Bea Voce [09:02]

• Example contrast:

  • Blame: “You can never be trusted with the schedule.”
  • Responsible: “I feel let down because you wanted to leave late and now we’ve lost a day of vacation.”

    “It's enlightened self-interest.” — Bea Voce [09:52]

4. Listen—Truly Step Outside Yourself

[10:33–11:19]

• When it’s your turn to listen, “zip down your perspective,” temporarily set aside your own feelings, and listen as if you’re hearing a foreign language.
• This step is crucial especially for people prone to people-pleasing or feeling unheard.

  “You take your perspective and you zip it down almost like you're wearing it as skin...[and] it’s taking a little nap.” — Bea Voce [10:40]

5. Be an Anthropologist—Practice Deep Curiosity

[11:20–13:02]

• Try to deeply understand your partner’s experience, even if it doesn’t make logical sense to you.
• Use questions like, “Can you tell me more about why it hurt you?” to invite deeper sharing.
• Key distinction: Empathy/attunement is not the same as agreeing or appeasing—don’t just “collapse” and appease, or get defensive and push back.

  “Pretend you just landed on a new planet.” — Andy Tagle [13:02]

When Repair Gets Stuck

[14:42–17:24]

• Warning signs: If the listening partner collapses into self-blame or gets stuck in defensiveness (“grandiosity”), true repair is not happening.

• Sometimes, the five steps aren’t enough; it may signal deeper individual or relational wounds needing therapy or outside help.

  “There are going to be some wounds and some triggers that are just gonna be too hard for a simple five step process.” — Bea Voce [16:45]

• If your partner is genuinely attuning, but you still cannot move on, that may be your own work to do.

  “The only person that's going to be able to meet that in the way that you really need to be met is you.” — Bea Voce [17:24]

How Do You Know When You’re Done?

[18:14–20:26]

• Repair is complete when you feel a “softening”—your nervous system settles and you can reach out to your partner again, even if gradually.
• Signs: calmness, willingness to reconnect, an inside joke, or accepting a gesture of affection.
• Relationship repair is a muscle; it takes ongoing practice, not a one-and-done skill.

  “You would never go to the gym once and be like, wow, I nailed it. I don't need to go back again.” — Bea Voce [19:42]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote | |-----------|---------------|-------| | 00:49 | Bea Voce | “Repair to me is the single most important ingredient in what actually develops into healthy, long term, secure, functioning relationships.” | | 03:49 | Bea Voce | “Doing nothing is actually quite an active process.” | | 07:34 | Bea Voce | “If both of you are doing it at the same time, it’s a total mess. It doesn’t work.” | | 09:02 | Bea Voce | “There’s no space in relationship for objective reality. There are just two subjective experiences.” | | 13:02 | Andy Tagle | “Pretend you just landed on a new planet.” | | 19:42 | Bea Voce | “You would never go to the gym once and be like, wow, I nailed it. I don't need to go back again.” |

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• [00:33] — The inevitability of conflict; introduction to Bea Voce
• [03:49] — Step 1: Do Nothing (regulation before repair)
• [06:08] — Step 2: One Person at a Time (“customer service” approach)
• [07:47] — Step 3: Speak using “I” statements and personal experience
• [10:33] — Step 4: Deep listening, “zip down your perspective”
• [11:20] — Step 5: Be an Anthropologist—curiosity and deep empathy
• [14:42] — What to do when the process isn’t working/when to seek help
• [17:24] — Recognizing your own work and individual healing
• [18:14] — What completion of the repair process feels like
• [19:42] — Ongoing practice—relationship fitness analogy

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Recap: Five Steps to Repair (as summarized at [20:38])

1. Do Nothing: Pause and regulate yourself before re-engaging.
2. One at a Time: Take turns sharing perspectives.
3. Speak Subjectively: Use “I” statements, share your feelings and avoid blame.
4. Listen Deeply: Set your perspective aside, focus fully on your partner.
5. Be Curious: Use empathy to truly understand before moving back toward connection.

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Tone & Takeaway

The episode is practical and compassionate, framed with humor and realism. It reassures listeners that conflict is normal and repair is a learnable, daily practice—a vital “muscle” for lasting intimacy.

Ideal For:
Anyone in a relationship (romantic or otherwise) who seeks concrete, empathetic advice for getting through fights and fostering true reconnection, not just peace-keeping.

Transcript

[A]

You're listening to Life Kit from npr. Hey, it's Marielle. When it comes to romantic relationships, we tend to place a lot of emphasis on falling in love, but we overlook what it takes to stay there. Sure, it's lovely to watch Cinderella and Prince Charming ride off into the sunset. But then after the honeymoon, Cinderella keeps leaving those glass slippers hanging around where anybody can trip over them. And the prince doesn't seem so charming when he can't seem to show up on time.

[B]

Rupture Conflict it's going to happen in relationships no matter what. We cannot avoid it.

[A]

Bea Voce is a couples counselor based in Austin, Texas. She finds that a lot of couples need help with what comes after the fight, the repair.

[B]

And I think we're really missing it. I think this is actually the thing that helps us grow up together. Repair to me is the single most important ingredient in what actually develops into healthy, long term, secure, functioning relationships.

[A]

Repair in relationships is the process of mending a tear after a conflict in a way that supports whoever was hurt and ultimately brings y' all back together.

[B]

Repair might look like physical touch and that's all you need for me. Repair I might actually need redemption. I might need you to own own a piece of what happened and that I might really need to see behavior change. Some people seeing behavior change isn't actually as important as the apology up front. So repair can look really different for many people.

[A]

But there are some basic steps we can share. On this episode of Life Kit reporter Andy Tagle talks to Bea about her five step process of repair for couples, including what to do right after the conflict when you're feeling steep Themed how to wait your turn when you're talking to your partner and how these conversations should feel a bit like providing or receiving excellent customer service.

[C]

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[E]

Want to talk about the everyday type of relationship pain. So bam. My husband and I went out to dinner with friends and he said something that really embarrassed me. Something he knows that I wouldn't want him to share. Where would the repair process start?

[B]

The first step that I think about is what I call do nothing. Now doing nothing is actually quite an active process, but what I mean by this is do nothing with your partner. So maybe you just blew up at them. Maybe you just walled off, you stonewalled you distance, you closed your heart. Maybe you did something in between. At this point you're starting to notice like, ah, I'm in it again. I'm in the pattern. Which is gonna take practice anyway to start to be like, oh, I'm out of what I call my window of tolerance. It could be many cues. It could be my heart starts to race, I start to sweat. It could be that I start to in my head make you my enemy. It could start to be that I literally cannot hear what's coming out of your mouth, like everything has gone blank. So it could be a number of things. It's gonna be different for all of us, but it's pretty predictable what ends up coming up here when you start to notice, oh, I'm in that predictable pattern where I'm outside of my window of tolerance. I start to understand, okay, this is my cue to do nothing. What do I mean by this? I mean you phone a friend, you talk to your therapist, you go on a walk, you take a bath. You're regulating yourself, you're getting yourself back into your window of tolerance as much as possible. Basically, the idea at do nothing is you don't come back into connection with your partner until you're ready to see someone else's perspective.

[E]

Takeaway 1 Do nothing about a rupture with your partner until you're level headed enough to actually have a conversation with them about it. Not just restart your fight or bring up the leftover arguments still bouncing around your head. Beya says you don't have to be totally calm, but you want to be at least a 5 out of 10, with 1 being your most Zen and 10 being Steam coming out of your ears and doing nothing is actually a really active process. You want to seek out the most effective ways to regulate your system. So blast that favorite playlist and go on a run or reorganize your closet. Then, once you've cooled down, ask if your partner is also ready to come and meet you on the couch.

[B]

The second step, this is the most important one that most people miss, is one person goes at a time. In this example, it's super obvious who's going first. You're the hurt partner. It's your turn to be repaired with. This is why we get into so much trouble when we're trying to repair is because oftentimes both or all people are trying to get their perspective heard in that moment. And so nobody's actually listening. People are just saying, my perspective, no, my perspective, no. This is what I. And nobody's actually listening. We're just trying to be heard. And by the way, if both of us have been hurt, you'll take turns. That's it. Your partner might say something like, we'll just keep going with this example. Hey, it really hurt my feelings when I saw you talking to our friends and I made up the story that you were being sarcastic because you wanted to put me down in my head as the listening partner, I could be like, what are you talking about? Like that I literally might be thinking about. I don't even think I said that. All of those things can still be going on in your head. But the the truth is, when you're the listening partner, the idea is that you are at the customer service window of your partner. This is from renowned couples therapist Terry Real. You don't go to the customer service window and say, hey, I have a broken microwave. Can you fix it? And then the person says, hmm, well, I have a broken toaster. Can you fix this? That's not how it works. You go to the customer service window and say, hey, I have a broken microwave. And the customer service person says, okay, great, let me help you fix that. If both of you are doing it at the same time, it's a total mess. It doesn't work. So this is where one person at a time comes in.

[E]

Takeaway 2 Simple in theory, harder in practice. Share your individual version of events one at a time. That's the way you'll actually be able to hear each other. Then takeaway three, when it's Your turn. Share responsibly by letting your partner know how their behavior made you feel, not just bombarding them with judgment or criticism.

[B]

So as the hurt partner, your only job right now is to not be a jerk. You're using eye language, you're using soft startup statements. So there's a huge difference between you saying, hey, you said something tonight that really embarrassed me. That was super messed up. I can't believe you said that.

[E]

Sure.

[B]

Could you say that? And could your partner respond kindly? Absolutely. It's just gonna take way more work for them to do that. If you say, hey, when we were sitting down earlier and you made this joke, like, here's what happened to me all of a sudden, like, I literally felt my body heat up. And immediately I went into the story, oh, my God, I can't believe you're saying this to them. How could you say this? Like, I'm literally hearing that story in my head. There's a great line by Terry Real, who I just love the way he puts this, where he says, there's no space in relationship for objective reality. There are just two subjective experiences.

[A]

That's it.

[B]

So I have my experience over here, you have your experience over here is probably somewhere in the middle is the truth, but that truth doesn't actually exist. There are two subjective experiences. So the minute that we start fighting the truth or fighting for the truth, we're in a losing. We're in a losing battle.

[E]

So just to be clear, language matters, especially when the objective is to reconnect with your partner. So, like, from your perspective, sure, it can be as clear as day that your spouse is to blame for that misflight. But there is a big difference between you can never be trusted with the schedule, and I feel let down because you wanted to leave late and now we've lost a day of vacation.

[B]

This is another Terry ism, which I love. He calls this enlightened self interest. You're doing this because, you know, a lot of people don't want to own their language when they're hurt, because they're hurt. They want to be able to word vomit and say everything that's on their mind and be able to speak their pain however they feel is appropriate to speak their pain. But then when their partner can't hold them, now what? Now we're in the same cycle of pain that we've been in over and over and over again. So once you start to own your language, this is going to make it much easier for your partner, for the listening partner to do steps 4 and 5.

[E]

Takeaway. 4. When it's your turn to listen, do just that. Try to step out of your own experience entirely.

[B]

How I like to think about this is you take your perspective and you zip it down almost like you're wearing it as skin. You're like you're wearing it as clothes, right? So you take your perspective, and then you just put it to the. And it's taking a little nap. Now, this is really important for people, for. Especially for my people who feel like they might please or override or fawn. Oftentimes they feel like their perspective never gets heard. So it's really important for these people to understand that you get your turn. It's just not right now. So your perspective is taking a nap, which allows you to move to step five, which I call be an anthropologist.

[E]

Okay. And.

[B]

And how do you do that in these kinds of conversations? Because your partner's perspective might be completely different than yours. I literally look at this like your partner is an alien, and you're an anthropologist being like, huh? What's it like to be that alien? Like, you're like, oh, like, I would never think that thought. Or I. That would. That thing that I just. That would. That would never hurt me, or I would never react that way. But because this isn't about your perspective, this is literally like studying an alien species where you're like, huh, you got hurt because I said that thing at dinner. Wait, can you tell me more about that? Like, it is your job to understand this person's hurt. And the way that you do this is by not taking on. Not taking full responsibility over here for my partner's experience. It's gonna be really hard for me to actually come over to your side and understand and be impacted and moved by what you're. If I feel like I have to.

[E]

Agree with you, hmm, what should the person who's listening first? Is there anything a person. That person should say or do during that time? Any questions that can help open up that deep listening?

[B]

So if you just start with, hey, I want to understand more. I don't know if I'm fully getting it, and it's important that I do. Can you tell me more about why it hurt you? Can you tell me more about what I said that really hurt? Can you tell me more about what's making you sad? Can you tell me more about. Is a great sentence stem to open up your partner into their own deeper reflection.

[E]

Takeaway 5. Attunement is not the same as agreement. Practicing genuine curiosity, Finding real empathy for your partner. Will give you that space. You need to reconnect. Of course, that can be hard to do when you're still angry or if you've known your partner for a million years. So be an anthropologist. Pretend you just landed on a new planet. You'll also want to be careful in this final step of the difference between attunement and appeasement. Coming up, what to do when repair isn't working? That's after the break.

[D]

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[E]

Podcast Bea what are some signs that this process isn't working?

[B]

Oftentimes what happens is two things. The listening partner at this point, because they're hearing all the things that they did wrong, hopefully the hurt partner is able to speak it in a way that has eye language. But even if they're able to do that because of our conditioning or our wounds or our patterning, well, oftentimes what this will look like is collapse. So I then collapse into your story. Oh yeah, you're completely right. I completely agree with everything you're saying. That makes total sense, right? And your experience just kind of washes away and you don't actually mean what you're saying. You're just trying to keep the peace. So it's not actual repair, it's not actual attunement, it's not actual presence. You're literally just trying to keep the peace right now. So for the people who tend to collapse, they tend to blame inwards. It's my fault. I did something wrong. I'm a bad Person versus the other side, which is. You're crazy. How could you think that? That's insane. I would never do that. Whoa, you're way too sensitive. Right. So these are my people who tend to go into grandiosity and blame outward. It's your fault. And if I feel defensive on my end, I'm not gonna collapse, I'm gonna fight back.

[D]

Right.

[E]

And so can't say anything around you like it.

[B]

That's right. So listen, you could, as the hurt partner, do everything in your power. You could own your language, you could come in a pretty regulated state and your partner could still respond in a collapsing way or in a grandiose way at that point, like, it's time to get support. This is gonna be really hard to do on your own because this is work on our self esteem. This is much deeper work than that. We really do need a support system outside of us to help both of us when we are trying to hold each other. And it's just too much, it can just cause more pain. Like, I really do think that people often enter into therapy too late because they think they can do it on their own. And not to say that some of us can't, but there are going to be some wounds and some triggers that are just gonna be too hard for a simple five step process. And the five step process is going to be way too reductionistic to actually work for what's happening on the deeper levels. And in that case, really seeking support is the best, most nourishing thing you could possibly do for relationships.

[E]

Okay, and how can you tell if this is less of an us problem and more of a me problem? You know, you've got to the end of the repair process and you still feel unsettled. When is it time to maybe seek out help just for yourself?

[B]

I like to say that if your partner is doing 70% of the heavy lifting and they're getting it like 70% right, they're doing the hard work of attuning and staying present and regulating themselves to be able to stay curious and open with your experience and not need to go into their perspective or their experience in that moment. And still you cannot come back. That is your work. To do the part of us that is unrepairable with. We need to understand the difference of how much our partner can do, which is some for sure, but not all. And if our partner can't get to all of it, there's a piece in us that really needs to be met by ourselves. And the only person that's going to be able to meet that in the way that you really need to be met is you.

[E]

When do we know repair is complete?

[B]

Bea you know repair is complete when you feel a softening. It's not so cut and dry as your partner says the right things, and so now things are repaired. It's feeling met and understood and validated in the way that has your nervous system calm and say, ha, I remember you're my partner. I want to come close to you again. Even if slowly. It could look much more like a slow thawing out of a nervous system that's coming back from holding and keeping itself safe into a nervous system that is open for connection again.

[E]

This isn't an exact science, of course, but you know when the repair process is complete, right? Maybe it's that warm, fuzzy feeling when you finish talking and your partner makes you feel really seen and heard and understood. Or just the willingness to accept her outstretched hand on the couch. Or cracking that inside joke after a day of a dead, silent apartment. Once you've righted that wrong, learn from it and use it for the inevitable next time you'll need it. Because remember, occasional conflict and tension are healthy. And good relationship repair is a muscle.

[B]

You would never go to the gym once and be like, wow, I nailed it. I don't need to go back again. That would literally never happen. We know that. I don't need to teach anybody that. But when we're talking about relational fitness, the skills need to become part of our everyday existence in order for us to get emotionally or relationally fit. It's not just a one and done. You do these steps well, you nail it, you'll never have to do them again. No, these are practices that you do over and over and over again. It takes practice, and it takes the ability to stay with the tension long enough for your partner to soften.

[E]

Bevoche, thank you so much for your time. It's been a pleasure.

[B]

Thanks so much for having me.

[E]

All right, let's recap those five steps to repair after a rupture takeaway.

[B]

1.

[E]

Do nothing. That is, don't try to fix it until you're regulated enough to hear out the other side. Until that point, do the things that help bring you down. Share one person's perspective at a time so you can, you know, actually listen to each other. If one person's upset, that's who goes first. If you're both mad, take turns. When it's your turn to tell your side of the story, remember, it's just that your side, not objective truth, so use I statements and be thoughtful about what you say. Takeaway 4 When it's your turn to listen, put your own thoughts and feelings away as best you can and then takeaway 5 practice deep curiosity to try and truly understand and empathize with your partner's perspective. That doesn't mean you have to agree, but hopefully it will help you get to a point where you can reconnect and remember the repair process is complete when you, your partner are ready to let go of the conflict and turn back towards each other.

[A]

That was reporter Andy Tagle with therapist Bea Voce. Before we go, I have a favor to ask. If you have a second, could you please leave Life Kit A five Star Review if Life Kit has ever helped you save a little money, make a healthier choice, or just made you feel a little more seen, a five star review is a great way to show your support. This episode of Life Kit was produced by Claire Marie Schneider. Our Visuals editor is Beck Harlan and our digital editor is Malika Garib. Megan Kane is our Senior Supervising Editor and Beth Donovan is our Executive Producer. Our production team also includes Margaret Serino and Sylvie Douglas. Engineering support comes from Robert Rodriguez. I'm Mariel Segarra. Thanks for listening.

[D]

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