We’re Not Fighting—We’re Practicing a Rupture-Repair Cycle

Saturday, April 19, 2025

“We’re just in the rupture phase. For the third time today.”

This meme is pure therapy-speak satire, poking lovingly at the couples who’ve gone so deep into Gottman Method language they can no longer just call it a fight.

But beneath the irony lies a truth: we now have a framework for understanding conflict not as relational failure, but as relational maintenance.

John and Julie Gottman’s research fundamentally reshaped how we understand couple conflict.

In their studies, happy couples don’t fight less than unhappy ones—they just repair better (Gottman & Gottman, 2015).

A rupture—whether it’s a snapped comment, an eye-roll, or a full-blown yelling match—is not the end of intimacy. It’s a stress test. What matters is whether the couple can exit the gridlock and return to baseline.

But here’s where the meme gets interesting: couples now know the language of rupture and repair, but that doesn’t mean they’re doing it.

Saying “we’re in rupture” isn’t the same as soothing a nervous system.

Quoting a therapy book during a fight is like shouting CPR instructions instead of breathing into someone’s mouth.

The meme highlights what therapists are increasingly seeing in the wild: conceptual fluency occasionally outpacing emotional regulation.

It’s the relational version of knowing the term “polyvagal” but still screaming at your partner in the kitchen.

This is a classic example of what Robyn Walser (2020) calls the difference between content and process.

This is the discussion that pisses off some couples in therapy. Couples love content.Therapists love process, and see content as the mere fight du jour.

Many couples can now identify patterns and name behaviors—but they haven’t built the muscle of moment-to-moment repair. The rupture-repair cycle isn’t just a concept; it’s a skill. And it often begins not with language but with tone, facial expression, posture—what Stephen Porges (2011) would call “neuroception of safety.”

The Gottmans recommend small bids for repair: humor, touch, softening language. But research also shows that couples who can interpret these bids successfully are often those with higher levels of emotional attunement and attachment security (Cordova et al., 2005).

What’s missing from most meme-based understandings of rupture and repair is timing. A repair attempt too soon can feel invalidating.

Too late and it becomes irrelevant. And for couples with trauma histories, repair attempts may be misread as manipulation.

Here, trauma literature adds a layer: what one partner intends as re-connection, the other may interpret through a lens of hypervigilance (Herman, 1992).

Even more nuanced is how different neurotypes engage the cycle.

Neurodivergent couples—particularly where one partner is autistic—may experience conflict and repair through completely different sensory and communication frameworks (Gernsbacher, 2006).

What feels like rupture to one might feel like neutral stimulus to the other. What’s meant as repair might go unnoticed, or worse, misinterpreted as sarcasm.

Final thoughts

So yes, call it a rupture-repair cycle.

But make sure you’re not just describing your own dysfunction with therapy speak.

The meme works because it gently mocks the way therapy culture can give us euphemisms for distress without always giving us tools for repair. But the science of repair will not let you down. If you’ve read this far, I can help with that.

Ultimately, the beauty of this cycle is its humility. Love isn’t about not breaking—it’s about building the reflexes to repair with warmth and return with grace. And if you can laugh while doing it, even better.

Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.

REFERENCES

Cordova, J. V., Gee, C. B., & Warren, L. Z. (2005). Emotional skillfulness in marriage: Intimacy as a mediator of the relationship between emotional skillfulness and marital satisfaction. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 24(2), 218–235. https://doi.org/10.1521/jscp.24.2.218.62272

Gernsbacher, M. A. (2006). Toward a behavior of reciprocity. The Journal of Developmental Processes, 1(1), 139–152.

Gottman, J. M., & Gottman, J. S. (2015). 10 principles for doing effective couples therapy. W. W. Norton & Company.

Herman, J. L. (1992). Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence—from domestic abuse to political terror. Basic Books.

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

Walser, R. D. (2020). The heart of ACT: Developing a flexible, process-based, and client-centered practice using acceptance and commitment therapy. New Harbinger Publications.