Bottled Up Anger

Me and my boyfriend met in London when both of us were working there. He is Italian and I am Portuguese. I was fairly happy with my life, I had a nice job that paid me well, I was saving a lot of money and was overall happy about my situation. My boyfriend and I lived together in a room in London, he was working in the same company as I but as a sales representative, his job was really tough and he was not happy about it all, he tried to get some desk jobs but because his English was not perfect he never handed up landing it. He was unhappy and I saw him losing motivation day by day, so I started searching and found out that there were plenty of desk jobs in Portugal for Italian speakers.

I am Portuguese and I have practically ranned away from Portugal, I hated my life there, the bad memories, the people, etc but I thought that together there we could have a better life and he could have a more fulfilling job.

We moved to Portugal and our life definitely got better in the sense we bought a house, we both had comfortable jobs etc. I reconnected to some old friends but unfortunately he didn't make any friends, I feel that he did not find anyone that he had things in common and I feel that he became really unhappy because of that. We go to Italy frequently and is always a bittersweet journey, I get the feeling that he misses home a lot but that when he is there he realizes there is nothing left for him. I think this makes him extremely unhappy and he often gets angry about simple things, he has a lot of emotions bottled up and we have extreme fights over a lot of stuff, even little things. Most of the times we have this fights he almost collapses, there is no physical violence but it is obvious the fights have a tool on him, and on myself.

The last fight we had was about a parcel of food that he wanted to send over for Christmas to Italy, before we get there. I was not particularly excited over sending anything to Italy because it was expensive and because food in Italy is a thousand times better, so why spend money and time if the things we are sending are worse than the things that are already there? We have already bought stuff from Portugal to his family and the reactions were always “meh” so I was not very on board with the whole parcel idea. I told him this and then I asked him what he wanted to send over in the parcel, and he said 3 or 4 quilos of codfish. For the ones who are not aware, codfish is this very salty dried fish that you need to water for days, and then cook it. I told him that the codfish that is sold in Portugal is not even local (its from Norway) and probably is the same one they sell in Italy (so again a waste of time and money). He started becoming really upset, like I do not want to give his family a nice treat for Christmas and that from now on I will not bring anything to my friends and family from Italy.

He shuted himself in the room and by Facebook I told him that I am not forbidding him to do anything, that I am just giving my opinion and that if he wants to send the goddamn codfish he can, but that I am not going to cook it.

I (mistakenly) assumed he wanted me to cook codfish in a Portuguese manner, something that I do not want to do because I am a terrible chef and I do not want to disappoint and embarrass him in front of his family (they already gave me the looks when I said I didn't like to cook)

He then became extremely angry, that he never asked me to do nothing, that fried codfish was a traditional dish in Italy and that I was a total for assuming he wanted me to cook it.

((I assumed this because obviously if you send something from a country to another people will want it to be cooked in the original way, otherwise what its the point?)) and that he does everything for me, cooks for my family when they come to our house and that he didn't ask me nothing and he is fed up of me assuming things etc.

While shouting this to me, he treats me that if I assume something like this one more time he will break up with me. At this point he is shouting and then he falls on his knees almost having an heart attack.

He said he was fed up of me, that I was a "ing ", that he was fed up of my family, that he had a life before me and I treat him like he was nothing before we met, that just because I have “some advantage” from him I cannot treat him “like this”. At this point I do not know what he is talking about.

My family loves him and asked him nothing, the only thing they did was love and support us as a couple and invest in our relationship (they helped with the down payments for our house).

He said that he doesn't want to have nothing to do with the house anymore, that the next time I assume things he will leave and he doesn't want anything to do with us.

I don't think this is normal at all. I understand couples fight, but I think there is something very wrong with a person if a fight over one person assuming something wrong, can lead to the other one threatening to break up the relationship and almost having an heart attack in the process.

I understand that me assuming things can be frustrating, but at this point? I think that he has a lot of pain inside of him, I can see that he is suffering but if it's me causing all this pain why dont he just leave? Or if he is unhappy with the life he has, why can't he talk about it?

Sometimes I just wish he would just sit down with me and just say: I am not happy, you don't make me happy, I will leave you.

I would be very sad but at least I would free him from whatever I am doing to him. I love him so much, I do not want to see him in pain but sometimes I feel this is all my fault, that I am slowly killing him, that the life we have is just dragging him miserable.

Please help me, I don't know what to do.

His a miserable jerk. He takes out his hard feelings on you. What you are describing is a complete lack of ability to handle relationship... and probably life in general. He's having a toddler melt down talking about something that should be fairly easy to talk through.

Why don't you just leave him? You are unhappy. He is unhappy. He is treating you poorly. Stop waiting for him to grow up and make the right choice. Break up with him. Relationships don't have to be miserable.

He says that he is fedup of me assuming things and he needs me to change. I would like to change but it is hard, I do assume things too much and I need to work on my communication skills but its hard to communicate if someone starts screaming at you almost immediately.

He says that he is fedup of me assuming things and he needs me to change. I would like to change but it is hard, I do assume things too much and I need to work on my communication skills but its hard to communicate if someone starts screaming at you almost immediately.

You can't get so good at communicating that you communicate for both of you. "making assumptions" is way down on the list of things to fix after "acting like a child" "being abusive" "threatening to break up". You very well might have things to work on in your communication style but it doesn't matter because you could be perfect and he still would still be throwing fits.

He's SCREAMING at you. Over mailing fish. And he is putting the blame on you. Don't stay with this guy. He isn't mature enough to be in a healthy relationship. You can have a partner that works through frustrations and disagreements like an adult.

He says that he is fedup of me assuming things and he needs me to change. I would like to change but it is hard, I do assume things too much and I need to work on my communication skills but its hard to communicate if someone starts screaming at you almost immediately.

If you make the effort to change, then he has some changes to make on his end too. Rose is right about him being abusive. I would say mention counseling to him so he can fight his demons with a therapist, but if he responds to that with another temper tantrum, nothing good will come out of it.

Thanks for your words. Yes I agree that he definitely needs to work on this anger, he really gets mad!

I read a lot of articles about how assumptions can damage a relationship and I was shocked of how common this is. I will try to avoid making assumptions but it is hard because it is so deep in my personality, I studied art and creative writing so I am always profiling people and making them into little characters so yeah I guess I assume A LOTTT. But I honestly didn't realise how damaging this could be. I will try and hope things get better between us, again thank you all you guys are great

Leave him. Don’t keep up with this codependent garbage. Your assumptions are not the issue. His temper and abusive behavior are the issue.

Rosephase are you really trying to help people here or are you just throwing the message "Dump him" around? I have been checking your replies on other threads and you always say the same! People are not here to sick validation to leave their partners, people are here looking for help and for answers and you messages come across as immature and poisonous. Relationships are hard work and leave is not the answer to every problem! True love and a true connection is earned with time and patience and understanding, I am here trying to look for positive advise, not negative toxic words.

You look like you have some issues of your own so please restrain yourself from making this sort of comments on my thread, please and thank you!

Ahhhhh, the mediterranean communication....

I don't judge him negatively about the codfish incident(since it seems to have communication issues yourself) but generally I think that he is not ready to be in a relationship. He has some growing up to do on his own.

How long were you together before moving to Portugal and bought a house? It seems you moved in together very quickly and impulsive...

We are together for 3 years now, it was quick yes, we had to make some hard choices and to buy a house together was a risk we took but I am not regretting it at all. I am not concerned about financial and social aspects of it all. What I am concerned is how am I going to stop this snowball of assumptions and resentment

We are together for 3 years now, it was quick yes, we had to make some hard choices and to buy a house together was a risk we took but I am not regretting it at all. I am not concerned about financial and social aspects of it all. What I am concerned is how am I going to stop this snowball of assumptions and resentment

 

From your part, you have to improve your communication skills somehow.

 

From his part, he should learn to control himself better somehow.

 

The "somehow" is different for everyone, you have to find out on your own.

 

Good luck!

You argued in length how you felt about the fish, but that is only your opinion. His is different. No wrong, just different. Apparently it meant something more to him then he saying or you're willing to see.

Does this dynamic happen often?

You seemed to dismiss his wishes.

You didn't need to agree with them but if it was important to him would it have cost you anything to have been a little more supportive?

Rosephase are you really trying to help people here or are you just throwing the message "Dump him" around? I have been checking your replies on other threads and you always say the same! People are not here to sick validation to leave their partners, people are here looking for help and for answers and you messages come across as immature and poisonous. Relationships are hard work and leave is not the answer to every problem! True love and a true connection is earned with time and patience and understanding, I am here trying to look for positive advise, not negative toxic words.

You look like you have some issues of your own so please restrain yourself from making this sort of comments on my thread, please and thank you!

I do always advise people leave abusive unhealthy relationships. I can understand that can feel bad to hear before someone is ready to hear it. But I try anyway. Because it took me hearing that my relationship was unhealthy and abusive from a bunch of different people and a bunch of different times before I could hear it. So I keep trying.

Your partner treats you very poorly. You are unhappy. He isn't interested in changing and insists that it's you who have to change. He uses ending the relationship as a weapon out of anger. That isn't anyway to treat someone you love. Patience and understand are for people who don't actively try and hurt you. Patience and understand towards someone who lashes out in anger is codependency and a super unhealthy for both of you.