Many couples have experienced this situation: a conflict issue arises at home and the discussion becomes more bitter. Although both of them know that guests are coming to dinner, they cannot stop verbally attacking each other. But, at one point, there is a knock on the door: the first guests begin to come. Forced by the situation, they stop arguing, let themselves be absorbed by the party atmosphere and, hours later, when everyone leaves, they find that they are no longer angry. The reason for disagreement is still there, but it no longer has the importance it used to.
Everyone who has been in a relationship knows of the healing effect a temporary break has on escalating interpersonal tension. In the example it is a few hours, but in many cases the required separation may be weeks or even months. It is not about the typical "let's give ourselves some time", but about using that dead time as a conflict resolution technique.
Family therapist Sharon Gilchrest O'Neill works using that strategy. She mediates these periods of separation by helping to reach agreements : who will leave the home, how the children will be cared for, if there are any, what the relationship will be like during the provisional separation, etc.
According to this therapist, the ideal time for separation is around six months : it serves to stop the escalation of tension and is not long enough for the couple to feel that there has been a permanent separation.
