Sometimes it’s impossible to argue with someone who’s suffered a brain injury.

The injured person just doesn’t have the emotional regulation to talk about contentious issues. Or there’s something else that’s changed and makes argument counter-productive.

(It’s not just brain injury. But it seems like the most common cause after a wreck.)

The injured person looks the same and sounds the same when they laugh. They go to work and play with the kids. But there are emotional deficits that prevent the kind of problem resolution that kept the relationship on the tracks before they got hurt.

Probably the most affected person is the injured person’s husband or wife.

I know what you’re thinking: Everyone wants to have fewer arguments. But too much of a good thing isn’t a good thing.

Productive argument is the basis for conflict resolution. Losing this tool erodes intimacy, encourages disassociation and turns small issues into big ones.

Productive arguments are opportunities to express and evaluate each other’s needs. They’re like negotiations. They:

• Clarify values

• Strengthen trust

• Reinforce boundaries

• Build resilience

When spouses aren’t able to argue a pressure-relief valve is removed. Pressure silently builds up and damages both the relationship and the people in it.

There are all of these invisible losses. They’re hard to detect and identify. If someone’s limping, you know their leg is hurt. But it’s very hard to quickly recognize and diagnose the inability to argue (or so many subtle things like inability to argue). And the irony is that even though they’re very hard to perceive, they have such a corrosive effect on the things that matter most.