What “negative” emotions do you think are normal to feel in a healthy relationship?
July 3, 2025
Do you ever feel annoyed, distant, or even angry at your partner and still think it's normal? Just curious what others experience.
7 comments
Context matters a lot. Negative emotions are a part of life. There is no way to avoid having them.
The most important thing is how the person handles their emotions if it’s something that’s spilling out from other categories and how the couple navigates it if it’s something that directly involves both of them.
For example, being mildly annoyed can be relatively normal if it’s some small things like them not taking out the trash when it’s full or loading the dishwasher wrongly. But what’s important is what you do about that. Holding it in because “it’s a small thing and pointless to bring it up” isn’t good because it’s gonna build up and, one day, it’ll just be a needle in a haystack.
All depends on situation and intensity of feelings. But yes even negative emotions are normal in relationship as long as it’s short term and not permanently negative.
A full range of negative emotions is entirely normal in a healthy relationship. Totally normal. Even nearly universal.
A healthy relationship doesn’t mean you don’t feel annoyed, distant, angry, bored, disappointed, or very frustrated with your partner sometimes. That’s bound to happen when you’re spending your life with someone, and what they do (or don’t do) impacts your life in some way.
What defines a good, healthy relationship is how you deal with and respond to those feelings, and to the conflicts or circumstances (if any) that sparked them. Can you process those feelings in a healthy way, both alone and together? Can you navigate conflicts in a healthy and cooperative way, and solve them together? That’s what matters, and that’s what makes a relationship good.
Of course there have been times I have been angry, frustrated, or just super annoyed by my partner. Of course!
What I do is give myself a little time for the emotion to calm down. Then I can evaluate better if it’s something I need to bring up with him, or if it was just a passing, reactive emotion to something that isn’t all that important, and doesn’t represent anything that needs to be discussed or changed.
If you only have persistent, long-term negative emotions about a partner, that’s a different story.
All of them really. What matters is at what level you let them out. It’s normal to feel negative feelings but it’s not normal to go into violent rage fits.
Oh yes, if you never felt that way then something would be wrong. Humans are just wired to irritate each other, even accidentally, which is why we need alone time. It’s how you handle those feelings that matters.
All of these. Any relationship that doesn’t allow you to feel the full spectrum of human emotions probably isn’t a safe relationship.
ALL OF THEM.
You can be angry at your partner. But you can express it in a healthy mature way.
7 comments
Context matters a lot. Negative emotions are a part of life. There is no way to avoid having them.
The most important thing is how the person handles their emotions if it’s something that’s spilling out from other categories and how the couple navigates it if it’s something that directly involves both of them.
For example, being mildly annoyed can be relatively normal if it’s some small things like them not taking out the trash when it’s full or loading the dishwasher wrongly. But what’s important is what you do about that. Holding it in because “it’s a small thing and pointless to bring it up” isn’t good because it’s gonna build up and, one day, it’ll just be a needle in a haystack.
All depends on situation and intensity of feelings. But yes even negative emotions are normal in relationship as long as it’s short term and not permanently negative.
A full range of negative emotions is entirely normal in a healthy relationship. Totally normal. Even nearly universal.
A healthy relationship doesn’t mean you don’t feel annoyed, distant, angry, bored, disappointed, or very frustrated with your partner sometimes. That’s bound to happen when you’re spending your life with someone, and what they do (or don’t do) impacts your life in some way.
What defines a good, healthy relationship is how you deal with and respond to those feelings, and to the conflicts or circumstances (if any) that sparked them. Can you process those feelings in a healthy way, both alone and together? Can you navigate conflicts in a healthy and cooperative way, and solve them together? That’s what matters, and that’s what makes a relationship good.
Of course there have been times I have been angry, frustrated, or just super annoyed by my partner. Of course!
What I do is give myself a little time for the emotion to calm down. Then I can evaluate better if it’s something I need to bring up with him, or if it was just a passing, reactive emotion to something that isn’t all that important, and doesn’t represent anything that needs to be discussed or changed.
If you only have persistent, long-term negative emotions about a partner, that’s a different story.
All of them really. What matters is at what level you let them out. It’s normal to feel negative feelings but it’s not normal to go into violent rage fits.
Oh yes, if you never felt that way then something would be wrong. Humans are just wired to irritate each other, even accidentally, which is why we need alone time. It’s how you handle those feelings that matters.
All of these. Any relationship that doesn’t allow you to feel the full spectrum of human emotions probably isn’t a safe relationship.
ALL OF THEM.
You can be angry at your partner. But you can express it in a healthy mature way.