My boyfriend and I have been together for two years. Often, but not always, when I bring up that something is bothering me or that my boyfriend or his family hurt my feelings, he won’t address the initial hurt and he will nitpick the language I used, explain away what happened, or interrupt me several times assuming he knows what I was about to say (even when he’s wrong) get mad and again my concerns are not addressed. He will very rarely apologize and take responsibility. He also uses his adhd as an excuse.
The nitpicking of language and the constant interruption often gets me confused and it escalates the argument. He will then argue that I didn’t communicate something to him clearly enough. He somehow always turns the argument on me, and makes me feel like I’m the bad person or calls me abusive etc. We have arguments that literally will last over 12 hours. Sometimes when the arguments have lasted that long and have gotten that out of control, and he’s yelling at me, and I start to think about how many shitty things he has done to me, I lose control of myself and I’ve hit myself before. He turns around and uses this as the example of why I’m the problem and not him. At this point he will be totally calm and it will be unbelievable to me because I’m so upset.
It’s so hard for me sometimes to not lose control and cry hysterically or hit myself. I go to individual therapy, and we went to couples therapy for a while, but the therapist suggested individual counseling for me and he took this as a sign that I’m the problem and he won’t go to therapy again.
I don’t want to break up with him, because often times we are happy together but our arguments get out of control, and I would like advice on how to stop arguments from spiraling.
TLDR; my boyfriend will nitpick my language, interrupt, argue, or do other things to deflect when I bring up an issue or a problem to him. He rarely lets me get my point across and this leads to arguments escalating. How do we stop this cycle?
37 comments
Your relationship sounded similar to one of my previous ones. It wasn’t as bad as yours, but he also was really good at nit-picking my language and using manipulation to get us going in circles.
> How do we stop this cycle?
Break up. I guarantee you can do better. 12 hours of arguing is ridiculous. Don’t be afraid to walk away! Also for yourself, I recommend reading “How to Be and Adult in Relationships” to see what a healthy relationship looks like.
> but the therapist suggested individual counseling for me and he took this as a sign that I’m the problem and he won’t go to therapy again.
The same thing happened to me. He was such a manipulative smooth talker and somehow convinced the therapist that I was the issue. It turned out I just needed to find another relationship, and all the issues went away. I didn’t even need to continue individual therapy anymore.
If you really want to work on it, give me word for word how your arguments start and continue, and I’ll give examples. But it won’t do much because it sounds like it’s on him.
Sometimes couples counselors will recommend individual therapy because they think the relationship is abusive. Taking an abusive partner to couples counseling often makes it worse – They learn exactly how much they’re hurting you and they find better ways to push your buttons and weaponize things that the therapist says.
You said that you’re an individual therapy – What is your therapist say about this? Because to me this sounds so incredibly unhealthy. I don’t think there’s anything you can do to change him or to make a relationship work when your partner is intentionally picking you apart. He’s a grown ass 37 year old man, he knows what he’s doing.
It’s really concerning to me that you say that this relationship makes you want to hurt yourself. I think you should continue getting counseling, but I also think you should get as far away from this guy as possible.
This is not a WE issue if only one of you is being a shitass.
No matter how good the “good” is, the relationship is not viable if you can’t resolve problems together as a team. Imagine spending the rest of your life like this. It’s called DARVO: deny, attack, reverse victim and offender.
I would not participate in these argument marathons. Once he starts his nonsense, tell him you’ll reconvene when he’s willing to listen, and end the argument. Or better yet, the relationship.
You can’t stop him from doing this, he’s doing it on purpose to manipulate you. Do you want to be with someone who never takes any accountability and has no respect for your feelings?
This is exhausting. Leave him, you’ll be at peace
I just left this exact relationship. There is nothing you can do when they’re convinced you are the problem for getting frustrated with their behavior. There’s never a right way to present anything, there is always something to nitpick
WE? Why would he? It’s his cycle and he loves it.
Thing is, it shouldn’t be like this. Me and my partner are just “I feel like x when you do y.” “Oh I’m sorry, I’ll try to avoid that in the future.” “That would be great, I know that you’re going with this direction, x, but yeah. Kinda felt a bit y.”
That’s it. You never have to be picked apart like this, you shouldn’t have to. He’s trying to dismiss your feelings, to remove validity.
He’s doing it to dismiss you. It’s not ok.
Have you heard of DARVO? Deny, attack, reverse victim and offender. He’s doing whatever he can to take your attention away from legitimate concerns
I think you need to read the description of the Water Torturer in Lundy Bancroft’s book.
OK, let’s see…
-he does not listen to you when you say your feelings are hurt or when you are expressing your wants/needs
-he rarely apologizes or takes responsibility
-he calls you abusive
-you have had fights that last for 12 hours
-you are driven to hysterical crying and self harm
-your therapist says you’re being mentally abused
My friend…the only way to fix this is to get away. I know you have some happy times, but the real test of a person’s character and the health of a relationship is how you move through the tough ones. This isn’t a guy capable of getting through the tough parts of life. Right now, having only been in a relationship for two years? You’re on easy mode. There are no kids, no dying parents, no lost jobs or financial catastrophe, no breakdown of looks and physical health. What happens when the mode gets turned up?
37 is extremely fucking grown. It will take him years to change himself so radically that he becomes a communicative, supportive, loving partner. You don’t have years. No one’s mentally resilient enough to withstand that much emotional turmoil without some serious damage, damage that the worse it is, the longer it takes to recover from, if you ever do fully. You need to be with a partner that brings out the best in you, not one that is actively harming you.
So the only thing you can do is to point out the behavior to him, tell him that if it continues it’s the end of the relationship, and mean it.
I want to be blunt, though, I think it’s too late for that.
I want to suggest that even having the kind of fight you describe once a year is unacceptable. It doesn’t matter if it’s your fault or if it’s his fault. If you’re a couple that fights like that with any regularity, you need to break up.
Like if I had a 12-hour argument where I was being called abusive, or there was yelling, it would be a come-to-jesus moment for the relationship. “That can’t happen again. You’re either a full partner in helping figure out how to stop it, or we’re done.”
And if it happened again even eight months later, I’d be gone. You can NOT have a healthy relationship where things could spiral at that level with any regularity. It’s just not possible.
The other thing is, look you can’t fix a relationship unless BOTH of you want to fix it and are willing to do the work, m and the thing that’s clear from your post is that he’s not willing to do his share. Even if his share is merely being a constructive partner so that you have a safe space to work on your individual issues (and no, I DO NOT think that’s the problem) then he still has to do that. He still has to be that partner.
And he’s not being that partner.
Which means this isn’t fixable.
Why would he stop this cycle? It sounds like this is his go to to win/diffuse arguments.
The best way to stop arguments from spiraling is to stop arguing.
My GF will nitpick my words and argue small points. But she’s an attorney so she gets a pass😆
She is respectful and not at all mean-spirited – again like a lawyer – so I just let it roll off of me or ignore her.
Sounds like that’s not the case with your relationship. and my understanding is that, unfortunately, it is not uncommon to have such an abusive relationship, and on average, the women are the ones being abused.
Seek therapy.
Switch to text communication then he’s like that. I do that with some of my friends.
Hey OP, you know how there are some houses that are like “it could use with a bit of a renovation, but the bones are really good” and there are some houses that are “the foundation is fucked, there is nothing that can be done for this house”? Your relationship is in the latter category.
>my boyfriend will nitpick my language, interrupt, argue, or do other things to deflect when I bring up an issue or a problem to him
>
>The nitpicking of language and the constant interruption often gets me confused and it escalates the argument
>
>**He somehow always turns the argument on me**, and makes me feel like I’m the bad person or **calls me abusive** etc. **We have arguments that literally will last over 12 hours.** Sometimes when the arguments have lasted that long and **have gotten that out of control, and he’s yelling at me, and I start to think about how many shitty things he has done to me, I lose control of myself and I’ve hit myself before. He turns around and uses this as the example of why I’m the problem and not him**. At this point he will be totally calm and it will be unbelievable to me because I’m so upset.
>
>It’s so hard for me sometimes to not lose control and cry hysterically or hit myself
>
>he took this as a sign that I’m the problem and he won’t go to therapy again
>
>our arguments get out of control
There is no breaking this cycle because *this is the cycle he wants*. He WANTS you to feel like you’re the problem. He WANTS you to be distressed and hysterical whilst he maintains his calm. He WANTS you to lose control. He doesn’t see a conflict as an opportunity where you both address and work through the issue as a partnership, he simply uses any complaint you might have as an opportunity to subjagate and emotionally destroy you.
This is the cycle of abuse. This relationship is going EXACTLY the way he wants it, and he’s not going to change.
This sounds like an argument with a narcissist. You sound like a martyr. 12 hour arguments? Who else but a martyr would hang on to that?
I spent 14 years in a martyr /narc relationship, and I know how addicting it is. It is addicting because the wounds are the two sides of one coin. The narc has abandoned the true self, and the martyr thinks they have to do something to be loved. Round and round. The narc will never take responsibility or feel remorse. The martyr keeps trying to find things to do to fix the situation.
What woke me up was Byron Katie’s The Work and Melanie Tonia Evans. Google, they are both online and much of what they offer is free.
Are you sure he isn’t a narcissist?
What you wrote gives off the impression that he has some communication issues. On top of that, he is not “arguing in good faith.”
What that means is that he is not making the effort to understand what you are saying. Instead he is attacking you and nitpicking the way you are saying it. By doing that he gets to ignore what you are saying. And therefore he gets to avoid having to accept responsibility for his part in it and deal with it.
Giving your age difference I would consider moving on. He is definitely old enough that it is reasonable for you to expect him to be able to communicate like a mature human being.
>I go to individual therapy, and we went to couples therapy for a while, but the therapist suggested individual counseling for me and he took this as a sign that I’m the problem and he won’t go to therapy again.
I take this as the couples’ therapist wanting you to understand your own feelings better away from your abusive boyfriend.
Don’t let him avoid the issue. If he starts deflecting, shutdown the discussion, and punish him. Show your frustration.
Are you arguments about relationship issues or politics or science? I asked this because my history might help for some of the scenarios.
He’s 10 years older and acting more childish than you
Tell him that’s not relevant and then leave the room. He may never get past this behavior, so you have to decide if you can put up with it.
Why would you stay with a gaslighting fuckmuppet???
Dump him and find someone worthy of you!!!
>The nitpicking of language and the constant interruption often gets me confused and it escalates the argument.
This is by design. He has come to be aware, consciously or not, that if he escalates the argument he can derail you, goad you into reacting, and ultimately flip it all back into your face. It also vindicates, in his eyes, him screaming at you because the fight is underway.
And note that even though you acknowledge that it is his nitpicking that leads to these escalations that you still downplay it and make it seem like it just gets ‘out of control’ when no, he is clearly in control, he is clearly pursuing a desired [or predictable] outcome. He should be well aware, via the ongoing therapy and just the fact he is older, that his approach isn’t a positive or conducive one and yet he persists.
>It’s so hard for me sometimes to not lose control and cry hysterically or hit myself. I go to individual therapy, and we went to couples therapy for a while, but the therapist suggested individual counseling for me and he took this as a sign that I’m the problem and he won’t go to therapy again.
Note also he has contrived a pretty convenient way to avoid personal growth and responsibility here as well. If anything, a good therapist would have sensed he would steamroll the discussion and the way the situation was twisted is a good example of why couples therapy isn’t always a good thing because the toxic one can often easily twist things. After all, your partner is an expect at twisting things as is, right? That’s what this is all about.
He knows how to stop the cycle. He just doesn’t want to. He wants you upset, that is the direct consequence and clear intent of his actions. He likes being able to put you down, take it out on you, after all despite being so keen to hurt you and claim it isn’t his fault he hasn’t left, right? Like if he was sensible and actually worried he’d have left ages ago but he chose to mock and goad you instead and that is much scarier than I think you appreciate.
When you are in a good relationship, fights are not about winning, they are about finding ways forward that respect the boundaries of both parties (or so involved parties).
If it is about winning, people are not going to improve in the relationship.
I used to do darvo. It was what I learned. I scared a lot of people away that tried to help me. The only reason it changed is that *I* wanted to change. Until that moment all the effort people put in me trying to build a relationship was futil.
You are being abused.
Based on your post and your responses in the comments, I’m not sure this relationship is viable either way. But being from a family who does this, learning how to stay calm during it is a good lesson to learn as you’ll meet people like this occasionally in all kinds of circumstances. My personal favourite is to go dead-faced as visible anxiety and upset feeds these people. Then, keep repeating the actual topic everytime they deflect and redirect “This isnt about you thinking im a b, its about [topic], we can discuss your thing later”/”Y situation is irrelevant, we’re talking about X”. If it absolutely doesn’t work and they start getting aggressive, point out exactly what they’re doing and end the conversation because of it. “You’re going for personal attacks and trying to hurt me as a person instead of discussing what I brought up, and I’m not gonna listen to that nonsense.”
Works 10/10 times, it may destroy your relationship because its built on a foundation of you crumbling everytime. But you’ll feel less shit anyway.
Only read the title, break up. That sounds just like my ex wife. The purpose was to deflect the argument from something she couldn’t win instead of just admitting she was wrong. Guess what, she was NEVER wrong. Just yesterday i texted her that she apparently doesn’t understand English.
A healthy relationship doesn’t have this. Heal yourself.
The nitpicking of language hits so close to home. Girl, please just leave him. People who deny, deflect, nitpick, and then call you abusive / gaslighting / manipulative because you called them out on their shitty behavior are insecure pathetic abusers who are trying to manipulate you. They are often delusional to the extent that they start believing their own lies and delusions. They, too, victimize themselves. Does it feel like even when he agrees with you it’s not genuine? That he just wants the argument to stop in order to take zero actual accountability? And if it keeps going in circles, does he want to have the last word, and admitting he is wrong is followed by “yes, I know, I’m just the worst person. I can’t do anything right”? All of this is manipulative ingenuine behavior of someone who is really ill in their head. Maybe not even a psychiatrist can help them, let alone their partner or family.
I’d highly advise you to at least take a break from him. Emotionally detach, don’t see him for a while or see him much less. And if you do see him, just try to develop being indifferent – people like this prey on you getting emotional, they feed off of it. Don’t give him that. And they promise to change but a few days / weeks / months later they will try to suck you back into this toxic cycle again. Please consider breaking up with him
《《I don’t want to break up with him, because often times we are happy together but our arguments get out of control》》
Google: Sunk cost fallacy in relationships
And just because a manipulative asshole is nice to you. He is still a manipulative asshole.
Google: TRAUMA BOND, Narcissistic abuse
WALK OUT OF THIS RELATIONSHIP. BLOCK HIM EVERYWHERE. GO NO CONTACT
And if you think guys like him are worth suffering for, get therapy. Most likely you grew up in a toxic home environment and you had to be loving and kind to your abusers, AKA MOM AND DAD, AND SIBLINGS TOO.
Google: Stockholm syndrome
There is a word for this it’s called “mindfucking” (sorry) but that is what’s going on here. It is a learned behavior, and he seems to be good at it. It is working for him in “dealing” with you and what he considers unpleasant demands/questions and such.
I would be **real careful** here…he’s almost a decade older, has gotten away with such nasty behavior, and you are no match for this maneuver of his. As you already have seen, it is totally frustrating, and unless you take an advanced course in how to counter/work around this strategy, you are looking at a man and a relationship that cannot improve bc there is no avenue for genuine communication and occasional real criticism
He’s the only one who can stop this cycle, and he doesn’t seem interested in doing so.
How to end the cycle . Break up. It’s not like your having an intellectual conversation. He just trying to be smart
I recommend that you read the book Why Does He Do That. He talks about therapy and how it can be used against the victim by the manipulative man.
He’d rather argue for 12 hours than spend one minute admitting he did something wrong. People like this don’t change