I’m really sorry for a really long post but I wanted to make sure I did not misrepresent anything that happened.
**Context:**
Me (21F) and my boyfriend (28M) have been in a serious relationship for 3 years (currently LDR). Our relationship started in very dire circumstances when he was in desperate need of therapy and medical intervention because he had been suffering from undiagnosed condition (nothing that affects his everyday behavior, had to remove the reference because of the sub’s rules). I helped educate him about the it and he sought help from professionals and is doing a lot better now. The first year of our relationship was very tumultuous with daily arguments, ugly fights, near-breakups but we managed to work through our issues and build a stable relationship. For the last year and a half we’ve barely even been arguing or bickering and were getting along really well. I noticed him changing his demeanor during fights where earlier he would walk out or just try to win the argument to him actually trying to sort out issues. However, I noticed a pattern where since the beginning of our relationship we’d get into really ugly fights right on my birthday. I have always felt a bit morose and dull on my birthday since I was a child which can be annoying for people who want to celebrate the day with me.
***Birthday 2:*** ( I can’t remember what exactly happened on birthday 1 but I’m sure a fight broke out and I had to apologise to him)
Last year, he lashed out at me for not wanting to do anything special and being sad as he was trying to cheer me up. He decided to walk out and said he has decided to not speak to me ever again aka break up. I also have a lot of anxiety issues so whenever there’s a fight of this intensity and he walks out, I go into panic mode for some reason and bombard him with texts and calls because I can’t bear not knowing what’s about to happen next (or if I manage to not do that, I still have bad anxiety attacks). We’ve spoken about how that makes me feel before but I’ll admit it we haven’t really brought it up again since we haven’t been fighting for a long time. I was deeply hurt that he had to lash out like this on my birthday (even though I don’t really celebrate it). I don’t think he ever apologized for it and even I never brought it up with him again even though I sort of resented him for doing that. I think I ended up apologizing for him for my behavior and asking him to not leave me. He never addressed the birthday issue again even though it was hard for me to get over it but we moved on eventually.
***Birthday 3:***
Last night, we got into an argument again. It wasn’t a serious issue but it snowballed into one. One thing he tends to do during conversations is if he wants to hear me say a certain thing (apology, for example) or answer a question he will not listen to anything else I say UNTIL I say the exact works. For example, his only reply to anything else I say would be “That’s not \_\_\_. I’ll speak to you when you actually say \_\_. I’ll be waiting until then.” And he really says this over and over for like 10-15m ore more until I either I cave in and do it or one of us leaves the conversation. We’ve had conversations about this too but I don’t know if they were taken seriously enough. So the same thing happened last night which was actually my birthday and he kept on replying “waiting” to every single one of my messages until I got fed up and started mirroring his own behavior to show him how annoying it is. I admit, it was not a good way to handle the situation but he was literally not ready to listen to anything else I said. And in the middle of all that I realized that we were fighting on my birthday again. Then I dropped all this and brought up how he acts like this (probably unintentionally) on my birthday every year and that deeply saddens me. He got extremely mad at me bringing this up and thought I was changing the subject and said goodbye and left. I, as usual, had anxiety attacks because he simply stopped replying to all my messages so I left him a couple of voice notes explaining the entire situation. A few hours later he replied saying he’s broken his phone and won’t be able to reply to my texts like he usually does-completely ignoring what I was telling him.
I decided to not to let this drag me down and focus on how I could enjoy my day without thinking too much about him (I did not talk to him the entire day) and I managed to do it well for the most part. But I don’t know how to speak to him again. I don’t want to be the one having to bring up what happened last night since that makes me look like I’m starting a fight again or nagging….but I also don’t want to let this go like last year because it builds up resentment. I feel disheartened that he can’t let things go for a day (especially when it isn’t a huge issue) and let me relax on my birthday instead of breaking up with me for 2 consecutive years. I suspect he’ll try to avoid talking about this due to fear of us breaking into another argument again, but in that case, it’ll always keep replaying in my mind until I get closure so I’m not sure how to address the situation moving forward.
For those of you who know, I have an anxious attachment style while he has an avoidant one. I would again like to reiterate that we haven’t had a single fight in months and had been in a stable relationship for a really long time so these things don’t happen frequently.
TLDR: we have different attachment styles – mine anxious and his avoidant. for some reason fights break out on my birthday ( we are in an otherwise healthy relationship) and I end up having to apologize while I am deeply hurt that my bf can’t let things go on this one day. this never gets addressed and builds up resentment. not sure how to handle this.
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15 comments
If things explode periodically it’s not a healthy relationship. You are both better off moving on.
You two never managed to build a healthy relationship. You got a little closer, but not really close to a real healthy relationship. Having periods of time without fights doesn’t mean anything if when you have fights you still can’t resolve them in a healthy way. And you two never managed to consistently do that. I’m sorry it hurts and this is over, but this was a really bad relationship that needed to end. I hope one thing you will learn from it is never enter a relationship by trying to act as someone’s quasi-therapist. That’s a giant sign that the relationship is going to be toxic. You two didn’t start as equal partners. You started as you trying to help fix and change him. That’s a problem right at the base of your relationship.
He sounds exhausting. Why do you even want to stay with him? You can do much better than someone who plays the incredibly fucking childish game of not speaking to you unless you speak the exact words that will satisfy him.
Too difficult to give an opinion without the context of what he’s toxically asking you to say before conversation can continue.
I get that you feel anxious, but bombarding him with messages when things get weird is also toxic. It’s pressuring him to respond in moments where he clearly needs space.
Things are likely becoming heated because his toxicity stops conversation from moving forward, you (for whatever reason, good or bad), refuse to say the line, and then after he checks out, you demand he continues to engage. And I’m guessing during this barrage of needy messages you are not saying the line.
Again, not saying his demand that you say the line is legitimate, but if it has some value, then you refusing to say the line could maybe also be toxic.
But my hunch is he’s 80% of the problem here, but maybe it’s more 60/40, kinda impossible to tell.
I think you guys should break up.
This relationship sounds exhausting. Why are you bothering with this? You can and will be able to find another partner
I’m wondering *why* you hate your birthday so much since childhood? Are there some unresolved feelings you have to work through?
Either way, this doesn’t sound like a mature guy to be dating. He’s 28 and deals with things like a teenager would. I know you say that your relationship hasn’t been all that bad lately, but why can’t he just support you if you’re feeling down? Why is he blowing up every birthday instead of just trying to chill out with you?
My last relationship was tumultuous. We fought a lot more than you and your boyfriend. But I’ll tell you now, this isn’t the healthy relationship you think it is. Think about it. Do you want to live the rest of your life like this?
My ex would kind of do the same thing about apologies. I had to apologize for the things he wanted me to be sorry for. This man is 28. He ought to know better. Do not give him leeway just because of a medical condition. I’ve made that mistake.
I honestly think you need to consider if you want to invest the time and energy to make sure this doesn’t happen. But you’re young. Just because you’ve invested three years into this relationship does not mean you need to invest the rest of your life into someone who has not shown they respect you enough to change.
My ex would do this, ruin any birthday by causing fights or breaking up. I figured out later that he didn’t like me being the center of attention
I think you know that he’s abusive. Right?
This is typical narcissist behavior- my ex husband ruined birthdays, holidays, any occasion where I’d have been happy normally and the day didn’t revolve around him. The best birthday present your bf can give you is to get out of your life and let you find partner who truly cherishes you.
This is an abusive relationship. When it starts out bad, it stays bad. And now you’ve reached a cycle of reactive abuse. Y’all need to walk away.
This makes me so sad and mad. You deserve better than this. Don’t let your anxiety tell you otherwise. How can someone claim they love you when they do this to you on your birthday?
If he’s not mature enough to talk about it… he’s still really unhealthy… if you stay it’s just a free pass to keep acting like this. And his behaviour is really unhealthy for your attachment style.
Anxious+avoidance attachment is the *worst* combination of attachment styles. And unless both of you do serious work on yourselves, that specific dynamic will not improve. This man does not sound nice to be in a relationship with. Checking out of an argument until the specific permutation of words comes out of the other person’s mouth is toxic af, and you spamming him with messages when he withdraws will never help the situation either. Unless both of you can do some major soul searching, you will make each other miserable. Heck, you’d both likely make anyone else you were in a relationship with miserable too.
I used to have an anxious attachment style, I totally get it. But I realized how it was harmful to my relationships, and started to recognize the thought processes in my mind that sparked a spiral, and I worked really hard to process those feelings in a healthy way. It’s made things so much better for me, and it’s made me a better partner. It’s not impossible at all, and I promise you will feel better about yourself when you are able to manage the anxiety in a constructive way.
I’m trying to imagine the circumstances of an extremely mentally ill 25 year old man reaching out to an 18 year old girl and that being a healthy basis for any kind of relationship. Much less a LDR.
Look, he’s got a lot to work on and the way he handles conflict is very controlling and awful.
And you are a 21 year old woman now, you’ve grown up a bit since this started, but at no point were you in charge of fixing or rehabbing this man.
It’s time for you to do your own work on codependency and fix yourself. Whatever you learned in your family of origin that gave you anxious attachment, and whoever taught you that broken disinterest combined with periodic badgering was what love looks like, you need to heal the part of you that believes that. Give all that beautiful love you have to love yourself. And you will start to be attracted to the wholeness and the healing on someone else.
The classic book is “Codependent No More” by Melody Beattie, but also check out the website love is respect. And if your family member was/is an alcoholic or an addict, look into AlAnon. And if at all possible for you, go to counseling.
You don’t have to put up with anyone treating you the way he’s treating you. Not on your birthday or any other day. But you won’t be available to find healthy attached love until you believe you deserve to be treated well, until you let go of the need to fix or change potential partners, and until you love yourself enough that being single is endurable and ok.
It’s so much better to be with someone who has the capacity to love you well and treat you well. And that person is you.
Something I learned the hard way about love and relationships is that when you say “Everything is great except for …” then it really isn’t great. He gave you a gift by breaking up with you. Accept it and move on, don’t go back, don’t take him back.