Need advice about my relationship

[Anonybrit]

I have been in a relationship with a girl for about 2 years. She lives about 3 hours away and we see each other every month or so.

 

We have had serious serious problems, mostly confined to when we are apart. Very quickly when long distance we would start to have arguments a lot. I am older than her with a very different family and she is quite a hostile and reactionary person a lot of the time if things aren't going her way, and I found it very very hard to deal with this as I had never experienced it in anyone before.

 

Gradually arguments got less and less common as we saw each other more and more, however when they did happen, again when we were apart, they became worse and worse.

 

I have to say 99% of the time she is the one that fires the first shot. She will react badly to something understandable, she will react angrily to something she should be sympathetic about or she will act insensitively about something touchy like money etc.

 

However once she has started it, she quickly adopts the perfect attitude to an argument - walking away. She finds it very easy to just stop talking to me and blank me, however I just cannot handle this, I am a talker, I talk for hours about my feelings and other peoples feelings and in arguments I really cannot handle it when she takes a time out to chill, even though that is for the best often.

 

Partly because I get so frustrated when this happens, and partly because we have an extremely bad track record of resolving issues EVER no matter how obvious it seems to everyone else who is in the right, I quickly lose the plot, lose sight of the calm, rational approach (letting us take a break then discussing it calmly) and just get angrier and angrier.

 

I say something nasty and she starts ignoring me, so I say something nastier to try and get a reaction, which doesn't work, so I say something even *more* nasty and the whole thing spirals up and up until it no longer becomes her ignoring me because we need to take a time out, but her ignoring me because I've really hurt her feelings.

 

I have just done this again, worse than ever. Once again I was in the right initially and she reacted angrily to something she should have been perfectly sympathetic about, and instantly I assumed that as usual she would never come around and continue being unreasonable and unfair and the whole cycle started and before long I had upset her more than ever before in our relationship, we are currently not together and may not get back together and will meet up on tuesday to decide.

 

 

I really really wish that I could control myself when these things happen. When we are together in person, 99.999999% of the time one of us (always me) gives in and we make up and it's fine and normal and how it works in every good relationship. But when we are apart it gets so bad I assure you, everyone reading this would have left the relationship by now.

 

I also really wish that she wasn't basically always the one in the wrong, and so blatantly in the wrong, because it is never so easy for me to just appologise or let it go once it has started, because I know that almost immediately once again the issue that was important to me and my feelings is gone and it's now (understandably) all about how I react.

 

 

 

When things are good in our relationship they are absolutely sublime. It is true that I tend to put more in than she does, for example I give her breakfast in bed everyday, something she has never done, in fact she has never gotten me a birthday present and it always seems I go out of my way more for her than vice versa. But even so, when e are in person life is great and I love her so much and I don't want to lose that.

 

But in order to not lose that I have to try and make her stop causing arguments over sensitive issues without me doing something that anyone else would have left me for instantly every single time.

[savignon]

Sometimes people just bring out the worst in each other during fights. If you want her to take responsibility for her behavior and change her M.O, then you'll have to do the same.

Fair is fair.

[Anonybrit]

I know I cannot hope that she will never be unreasonable again, everybody is at times, but it is only once every few months these things happen and usually as a result of lots of built up problems.

 

Twice in our relationship we have taken a step back and said look, this is SO seriously wrong, we need to change to go on. She has changed in some ways but it's still the case that week to week she will frequently react angrily to something any normal person would just be pleasant about and it just stores up inside me.

 

Maybe I will have to just learn to accept that she will always react obnoxiously to certain things, and maybe if I leave it and keep my cool and give her time to think about it for a few hours or something, then go back to it, she will be more reasonable?

 

I have never tried that really, I think if we do get back together after this, that is what I will try and do. I am so impatient when it comes to arguments I just want them to be sorted immediately. I'll try giving her some time to reflect on it, and try presenting my side of the situation in the softest most sugar coated way so she doesn't bite my fingers off!

 

If this doesn't work though and all that happens is she forgets about it and I have to repress each and every little thing again, I don't think I will be a happy person so long as I am with her. The more effort I put into appeasing her and making her happy, the more angry I get when it all that pent up misery comes flooding out..........

[anya1607307555]

I really think the less you react to her outbursts (effectively giving her something to react more against) the quicker she will pull herself up on her behaviour.

 

To be honest, your anger is almost tangible and you do come accross slightly parental, having to be the one to correct her mistakes. Keep a check on your tone when responding to her. You can equally achieve what you want by keeping quiet. Give her the space she needs to think about the implications of her actions and allow her to correct them herself. Some people just take longer to arrive at the same answer. Then suggest you talk things over.

[Anonybrit]

I don't think I come accross as parental at the time, I don't look down on her at all I regard her as an exact equal which is why I find it so hard to deal with her treating me like an enemy all the time. But you're right the more that happens the more parental a role I am pushed into and that's exactly how I feel when I have to discuss it with friends or somewhere like this.

 

I really just want us to be on equal grounds, I want her to question everything I say and vice versa and if she doesn't agree with me I want her to say so. But it gets to the point where the most reasonable request is met with anger and stubbornness purely because it involves her sacrificing something, anything, no matter how trivial.

 

For example there is a website on which she posted about our relationship - I do the same here, so that was fine - but the reactions were really extreme and people said really insulting things directed at me. So I asked her not to use that website when she comes to stay with me next week, but she exploded saying I was being controling and refused to come down.

 

I just don't know how to deal with reactions like that, I am left feeling like she has put the a forum before me, and we were on good terms too. I just don't understand how she could treat me like that, and so I start to lose it

 

Please please please I need advice on how to avoid this happening, I don't want to EVER upset her but I don't want to have to bottle things up or accept things that make me unhappy!!! ;(

[anya1607307555]

Perhaps because she feels you are telling her what she should or should not be doing. In that instance perhaps asking her if she feels the site is helping her resolve your relationship problems would have opened up a dialogue between you. After all she is an adult and is capable of making her own judgements on things, right? Give her credit for making her own decisions. Yes, you may feel it's the wrong one but at least she will feel like she can express herself openly to you. There is no need for you to bottle things up, you just need to learn how to communicate with her in a way she will listen, as opposed to shutting off.

[Anonybrit]

I am not asking her not to use the website ever again, I just don't want her typing away on a forum on which I have been repeatedly insulted while lying in bed next to me. Sometimes when something someone does would obviously upset you, asking them not to do it isn't being controlling it's making a request of your partner because you feel they care enough about you to do that, it takes a particularly self-absorbed mind to see that as "you're controlling me I don't want to see you again!" Don't you agree? You misunderstand, this is not me asking her to stop using the equivalent of enotalone while around me, it is the equivalent of her not talking to a friend on the phone who constantly insults me while sitting next to me.

 

Some people just take longer to arrive at the same answer. Then suggest you talk things over.

 

Anyway this is my conclusion, thanks for the advice.