Conflict Resolution in Relationships: Why Unmet Needs Create Deadlock
Jan 07, 2026
Conflict Resolution in Relationships
Over the years of working with couples in couples therapy, mediation has inevitably formed part and parcel of the work. What tends to happen is that couples therapy is usually entered into as a last resort. The prognosis is generally good when you have two people who are genuinely willing to work on making the relationship function again. That part, in many ways, is a given.
But the other given—which is often overlooked—is that very rarely are both people equally “in” the work. More often than not, one person is leaning in more than the other. This creates an imbalance, and at a certain point that imbalance reaches a threshold where the ending of the relationship has to be addressed. When that happens, the process begins to look far more like mediation than true couples therapy.
What I have consistently found—perhaps in a very reductionist way, both conceptually and in practice—is that when couples reach a point of being completely at loggerheads, where there is no movement on either side, both individuals are essentially not having their basic needs met.
A simple example looks like this:
One person wants intimacy. The other person, whose emotional needs are unmet, believes they cannot provide that intimacy until they feel emotionally held. At the same time, the partner needing intimacy does not have the emotional capacity—often due to burnout—to provide the emotional holding the other requires.
Here you have a perfect storm.
At the baseline of this dynamic sits the same statement on both sides:
“I need you to give me what I need before I can give you what you need.”
This applies to both people.
What I also notice is that instead of directly attending to these basic needs, both parties skirt around providing what the other needs. This is often justified through anger, resentment, or unresolved past pain. There is an ego response here that needs to be acknowledged and carefully teased out for both individuals. What this stubbornness—perhaps a better word than resistance—does is prevent the other from receiving the very medicine they need. And the paradox, of course, is that this medicine is being held by the partner, and vice versa.
Added to this is the conflict of who moves first or who provides first. This is an enormous ask for anyone who has been hurt. At the core of this hesitation is an emotional wound that wants to be healed while simultaneously trying to avoid being reopened. This is where the internal narrative becomes fixated. It scans the relationship for evidence that confirms the story that moving first is dangerous and that avoidance is the safer option.
If this narrative can be bypassed—even momentarily—and there is an acknowledgement that the relationship was not entered into on the basis of wounding but on love (and yes, also familiarity and codependence), something begins to soften. The fear of the unknown keeps many people together, just as much as the fear of hurting the other further if a final decision is made.
What follows is a kind of messy soup of justifications: whose story is right, whose pain is more valid, who is responsible for doing the work first. Both people remain stuck, waiting for the other to create enough safety before stepping forward, while simultaneously holding the medicine the other needs to re-enter the relationship.
If we think about this from the perspective of bypassing or bridging a problem point—as though it were an electrical circuit—we find ourselves in a position to address basic needs without forcing resolution.
In practical terms, this often shows up around intimacy.
The person who cannot bring themselves to be intimate frequently imagines that intimacy means jumping straight into full penetrative sex. This is what they know, at a core level, the other person wants. That self-imposed pressure immediately creates performance anxiety. The moment intimacy begins to form, they freeze and pull back.
What is ironic is that the moment intimacy is allowed—even briefly—is often the moment where connection returns. Very quickly, there is a sense of “we should do this again.” This is also the moment where the other partner finally feels emotionally held, because the medicine they need has been received.
The difficulty arises when intimacy has become so aversive that the idea of being in that context already evokes repulsion. At that point, the nervous system will not allow a direct leap forward. The only way to short-circuit this ingrained circuitry is to return to principles drawn from sensate focus.
This begins in an almost disarmingly simple way: sitting clothed in front of one another, focusing on admiration. The attention is on bodily sensation—what is happening internally—while noticing how, over time, the nervous system naturally becomes less defensive. The longer we remain in that space, the more the body begins to surrender to new information.
This allows the unconscious to anchor itself in lived experience rather than past narratives. Slowly, previous negative experiences lose their grip. This is what I refer to as experiential deletion.
From here, the process unfolds gradually:
Face and neck.
Shoulders and above.
Waist and above.
Genital touch.
And only later, sexual connection.
At each stage, reflection is essential. What was felt? What was safe? What was enjoyable? The pressure to perform or to have sex is deliberately removed.
Before any sexualised activity takes place, there must be a very clear conversation around DBMAT (Desires, Boundaries, Meaning, Aftercare, and Trauma). I will speak to this in more depth in a later article.
The key point is this: before penetration is ever considered, there must be an understanding of how the body is entering these intimate situations under stress. When we stay with the tension—focusing on desire, breath, love, and non-pressure—the body naturally recalibrates. It is then, and only then, that sexual connection can re-emerge without force.
For many people this process can feel tedious, but it is precisely this slowness that allows the deadlock to dissolve.
When we turn to emotional holding, the dynamic is surprisingly similar.
The person who struggles to hold emotional space is often so emotionally depleted that they feel incapable of holding someone else’s emotions. This creates another form of performance anxiety. They feel they cannot resolve what is being expressed, so they disengage, dissociate, or withdraw.
When emotional conversations are happening, it becomes vital that the person expressing their emotions notices shifts in the other. The moment the partner begins to lose focus, dissociate, or shut down, the conversation needs to pivot. Rather than continuing the narrative, there needs to be a genuine enquiry into what is happening for the other person in that moment.
Dissociation is a clear indicator that the experience is becoming traumatic. Often beneath it sit shame, guilt, and a sense of impotence—the feeling of being unable to fix or resolve what is unfolding. Avoidance then becomes the only perceived exit.
When this is brought into awareness, an important reflection becomes possible: the emotional process has quietly become about the self rather than about the person needing to be held. This is not a criticism but a moment of insight. Sitting in that discomfort together allows the nervous system, once again, to surrender to what is real rather than what is feared.
Emotional holding is not about fixing. It is about empathy. When the pain is recognised as shared rather than one-sided, something begins to settle.
This approach is intentionally reductionist, but it is effective. I have seen it work. At the core of every long-term relationship is the reality that you came together because you desired one another and wanted to love one another. Along the way, you also discovered aspects of this person that are difficult, uncomfortable, even unbearable.
This is where a real choice emerges.
You can leave and likely repeat this same process elsewhere until the difficult parts surface again. Or you can stay in a relationship where you have already seen both the good and the bad and consciously choose to work with what is real—without the fantasy that your partner should be flawless.
Both paths are deeply uncomfortable.
Only one allows for conscious growth together.
Only you can decide which discomfort aligns with how you choose to live.
Vaya Con Dios
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