Personally I find one of the biggest things that keeps my relationship going is that we have ways to express discontent with each other that unambiguously frame

Personally I find one of the biggest things that keeps my relationship going is that we have ways to express discontent with each other that unambiguously frames it as not necessarily a big thing. Mostly this way is pretending to be a goofy cartoon version of George and Martha from “Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Wolfe”. Or, rather, of what we imagine would be their online role-play avatars - how a rotting lich and a hyena lady ended up together in a stable orbit of mutual loathing is an open question, but it gives us a great way to express exaggerated versions of the things causing friction between us, and amuse each other with trying to turn them into comedy. It makes checking in on the actual issue afterwards a lot easier, as we’ve already burnt off a lot of whatever anger may have wanted to make us snap at each other in these exaggerated personas in the first place.