“Fruit can look sweet, but be utterly bitter on the inside.”

– Rick Elgersma, LMFT

Every couple has an inner arsenal, even the couples who love each other deeply, even the couples who would never describe themselves as cruel, vindictive, or out to destroy the person they promised to love. Most people never call their arsenal by name because the weapons usually arrive dressed as honesty, self-protection, accountability, or finally saying the thing they have been swallowing for too long.

No one wants to be walked on, blamed, dismissed, minimized, or left alone with all the effort. This is the point where couples decide that their arsenal is justifiable. Some of the arsenal even sounds noble at first because hurt has a way of making a person feel morally clear, especially once fear, anxiety, embarrassment, accusation, rejection, or loneliness begins moving through the body. However, the result is more often a crushing blow.

The weapons come as words and actions, or old failures get pulled into the present and used to justify withdrawal before the conversation has a chance to breathe. Sometimes your tone speaks volumes. You harden your face to intimidate, persuade, punish, or pull a reaction out of them. A memory is used for the exact moment of maximum damage. Silence becomes punishment. A refusal to answer becomes power. A threat slips out with terrifying ease: “Maybe we should just divorce.”

Most spouses, once the storm settles, would say they do not want to destroy each other. Most couples, if pushed say their person is the one whom they love the most. They just want to be understood and feel safe. They want the ache inside them to mean something to the person sitting across from them. Yet fear can turn the beloved into the opponent, and the person they long to trust begins to feel like the person they must defeat.

In these cases love does not organize the conversation. Fear does. A person chooses force because vulnerability feels too exposed, and the body begins protecting old wounds before the mind has enough time to ask whether the present moment deserves the intensity being brought into it. Your backgrounds turn into emotional arsenal.

An arsenal grows anywhere pain has gone unprotected, unprocessed, or unanswered for too long. Childhood homes can teach vulnerability as danger. Past relationships can teach honesty as punishment. Betrayal, neglect, criticism, abandonment, shame, and years of feeling small can train a person to believe no one is coming to protect them, so they better learn how to protect themselves.

Couples may even know they are hurting the relationship. Other weapons sound less explosive but cut deeply. A cold insult with little merit can still leave a deep mark. A sarcastic jab can turn a spouse into a fool. A spiritualized accusation can make pain sound holy. A moral verdict can reduce a whole person to one ugly sentence: “You’re a horrible person.”

Words may come quickly, yet the injury can last far longer than the fight.

They say, “I’m just defending myself.” Justification may be the most dangerous weapon in your arsenal because justification gives pain permission. Permission to act with the full force of your pride. “They hurt me first.” “They never listen unless I get loud.” “I’m just telling the truth.” “They need to know how badly they hurt me.” “I have a right to feel this way.” “I’m tired of being the bigger person.” “Someone has to hold them accountable.” Your arsenal feels like wisdom. Ok … to some degree, fair point. But is that who you want to be?” Their arsenal may feel like wisdom.

But does that account for how hurtful you can be? Your “sword” corners, shames, shrinks, or punishes the person you love. A spouse demands accountability while refusing any humility of their own. A spouse can quote values, faith, psychology, or boundaries while building a case against the person they vowed to cherish.

When “strength” feels like danger, contempt, resentment, disgust, panic, suspicion, or righteous fury, you’ve moved beyond constructive conversation, and moved toward selfishness. In fact, the moment often awakens an entire history, and the body does not always separate history from the present, and so couples lose the care a relationship needs.

Marriage often exposes the distance between the person we intend to be and the person we become. Quite suddenly a person hears themselves using the very sentences they swore they would never use. Many people come into love (marriage or partnership) wanting to be generous, patient, curious, kind, playful, loyal, forgiving, and open. They want to believe love will bring forward the best parts of them. But love isn’t enough. The conditions you place on love make love enough, and create its strength.

I read a quote once from the Book Atomic Habits that said something like, “Make every action you take be a vote for the person you want to become.” Hurting people you love, and giving yourself permission to do so…is that the vote you want? If you are a person of integrity, value, and faith what should you reasonably expect of yourself? Should “wield my arsenal” be a part of your answer?

Why do we believe we need an arsenal for the person we love? Maybe we built one because we never trusted love to be strong enough without force. Maybe kindness felt too vulnerable. Maybe gentleness looked too much like surrender. Maybe striking first seemed safer than waiting. Maybe vulnerability felt like handing a spouse too much power.

Over time, couples begin preparing for each other instead of reaching for each other. They listen for threat instead of meaning. They track tone instead of longing. They protect their position instead of protecting the bond. Eventually, the relationship becomes armed, exhausted, and lonely, even while both people may still want love more than war.

Maybe pain felt like it would disappear unless we made it loud enough to become undeniable. Maybe the old wound inside us believes tenderness will fail, so force has to speak on its behalf. The deeper battle often sounds more like this: “Will you still care about me when I am hard to love?” “Will my pain matter to you?” “Will you use my weakness against me?” “Will I disappear inside this relationship?” “Can I trust you with the parts of me I usually defend?”

Awareness creates a small but sacred gap between fear and action. Consider the fruit you bear.

My family has a faith life, and even though you may not, let us give you something we think we can all live around. Faith language says this with striking clarity: “take every thought captive.” That phrase from 2 Corinthians 10:5 …taking a thought captive means a thought does not get to become a sentence simply because the thought feels good or true in the moment. 

The book of Proverbs says to guard your heart because life flows from it, and that wisdom brings enormous relational force. The heart is guarded through tenderness, honesty, discernment, and careful attention. A guarded heart is a tended heart, a heart honest enough to say, “I am hurt, and I am reaching for something designed to hurt back.”

Guarding the heart means protecting the relationship from the version of ourselves that comes alive when fear grabs the steering wheel.

Your thoughts feel powerful because they have been practiced. But renewal and nobility means practicing something truer until the mind has another path available in ordinary moments of heat, disappointment, fatigue, defensiveness, and fear. 

We want to point you toward thoughts rooted in truth, honor, justice, purity, beauty, and self-control, which means healthy focus requires honesty rather than denial. A spouse can confront harm, speak about pain, ask for change, and still remember the humanity of the person across from them. You shouldn’t have to ask “can I?” You should be able to say, “Will I practice?”

Don’t you think it’s time to reduce your stockpile of arsenal?

Find out how in our next article in the “Love & Your Arsenal” Series! Watch for our next article in this series that will answer the question of what you should do with the arsenal, and give you ideas of what to do instead. May God grant you humility, and peace.