The subject changes — money, in-laws, the dishwasher — but the shape does not. One person pushes for a resolution, the other withdraws to stop it escalating, and each move makes the other worse.

Very little of the work is about the dishwasher. It is about what each person is trying to protect: usually being taken seriously on one side, and not being a disappointment on the other.

Couples work is slower than people hope and less dramatic than they fear. What normally shifts first is not agreement, but the speed at which things escalate.