I got an email the other day from Melanie, and I want to share it with you.

David,

My boyfriend and I are constantly getting into text fights. It’s ridiculous. I’ll text him something and the next thing you know we’re full-on digital thumb wrestling.

I can’t help it.  He just seems to always push my buttons and then I’m constantly pushing the buttons on my phone to get back at him.

What do I do?

Signed, Melanie from New York.

Text-Fighting-Do-and-Dont-Advice-david-wygantMelanie from New York,

Let me tell you something about text fighting.

But before that, let me just say that I am a pretty damn good text brawler.

I was in a relationship one time where I was constantly brawling via texts. She would say something, I would say something, and the next thing you know we’re having an all out thumb battle.

I couldn’t type fast enough. The texts were pounding in. You know when you’re in the middle of a really good text fight, you just hear boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, right?

And the beauty of the boop, boop, boop, boop, boop is that you can’t get out the anger fast enough because they’re getting it out just as fast as you are.

Here’s the deal with text fighting: It doesn’t work.

The angrier you got in the text, the more proof they have that you’re an asshole.

Anything you put in writing will come back to haunt you, especially in a relationship.

When you’re text fighting with a woman, for instance, she will go back to that text and say, “On January 4th you said…”

Now women have been doing that for generations, since the dawn of time—probably since the cavemen. Women have always gone into antiquity to bring up things to fight about.

The problem in the digital age is that now they have actual proof.

So don’t do it. Do not text fight.

If something comes in that you just absolutely can’t ignore—text this back to your lover:

I’m in the middle of a meeting right now. I’d love to engage you in a text brawl but I can’t. J Let’s talk about it later like adults.

Text fighting doesn’t work.

So don’t do it—the future you will thank you.