My partner and I are both 33, I’m F he’s M. I’ll call him Max. We’ve been together almost 6.5 years. The last almost-year has been intermittent long-distance (1-2 months apart, 1-2 together). We did something similar for a year earlier in the relationship, both times for work. We have been trying to get work in the same place to live together permanently starting next year. We’ve talked about kids, we love each other very much, and our relationship is (was?) very serious/committed.
I’m visiting him in his country after a month apart, and we had 3 really great days, and then had a conflict. We had a day or two of tenseness, and today he asked me to leave/stay somewhere else and not contact him for a few days so he has some time and space to think. In a few days he will let me know if he feels up for trying to work things out, or if he wants to break up.
I want to make things work. I have left to give him the space he’s asked for, and I don’t plan on talking to him/hassling him or anything. But I am so incredibly sad. I feel wrecked by this, I want our relationship back so badly. I’m not even sure how I can get through the next few days.
\*\*What can I do to prepare for our meeting, both to be prepared for losing him if that’s what he decides he wants, as well as to ‘set things up for success’ if he decides he wants to try to make things work?\*\*
As practical advice as possible please, I welcome your own stories/experiences, or books that you’ve found helpful, etc., but most of all I would appreciate if you read the below and have any specific advice about things I am “doing wrong”, seem not to have considered/noticed, or could do better to reliably meet his needs and prevent conflict in future.
DETAILS:
We are both very sensitive people and both have some baggage/issues that we want/expect the other person to be considerate about. We’ve had sort of a low-key tumultuous relationship. When things are good they are so good and we are so happy together, but we have really recurrent conflicts and misunderstandings (weekly to monthly). About half of these feel absolutely horrible for one or both of us – we feel totally abandoned/callously not cared for by the other person, like they are not meeting really basic needs we can’t do without and/or the other person is making us feel like a POS.
For me this is mostly around rebuilding after my trust was violated (he deliberately deceived me about something he knew was a big deal for me from past trauma), and not feeling respected or like my boundaries are respected. Often these things make him feel unfairly blamed/maligned or like I’m putting something on him that is basically about me controlling my emotions better. Small example that we basically dealt with OK: some kinds of noise/music give me migraines sometimes. He didn’t initially believe me and was pretty dismissive. He needed to understand it better and believe it was plausible to respect it, but I wanted him to respect it basically because I said it was my experience.
For him, it’s mostly around being able to be heard and have my attention/sympathetic listening. Small example that we dealt with okay: I easily get overwhelmed and sometimes need time or space away from him to process. It makes a huge difference to him if I give a timeframe for this; he basically can’t emotionally take my withdrawing with no warning for an unspecified amount of time. I’ve been trying to respect this, I understand it and sympathize with it, but I have not been perfect at thinking of it in the moment.
We have been to couples therapy in the past, but we never really ‘connected’ or had a great experience with either of the two different therapists we saw, it’s super expensive, and the long distance makes it pretty difficult. We’re both open to it, but it’s not a “short term solution”; I think he needs to hear some things from me before he would even want to continue the relationship … but I’m not sure exactly what, or how I can translate my eagerness/compassion to meet his needs into reliable action in the moment to prevent these conflicts ever happening again.
The “straw that broke the camel’s back” conflict: I was exhausted after travel and work and we had a minor disagreement (about something that tangentially touches sensitive topics for both of us), and I had work to do. He said he wanted to say his piece and have me listen sympathetically and leave things in a better place before I went to work. I said I was sorry, but I didn’t have the mental and emotional bandwidth for that. It escalated in to a few-hours “conflict” of him bursting into my office and insisting we talk, and me trying to talk but feeling like it was just toxic and unproductive and getting overwhelmed and needing space.
I can see from his POV he was asking for something so small, just the minimum amount of interaction that would meet his needs, and to not get it was devastating and made him feel like “if I can’t get this in this situation, and we’ve had all these conflicts in the past, it seems realistic to expect I’ll just never get it, and I can’t live with that.” From my POV it did not feel small, in the moment, and I felt like I set a boundary for what I could handle and it wasn’t respected, which triggers a lot of fears for me. In retrospect, I should have given an alternative, or something/anything that would have made him feel heard.
I think there’s a big element of self-fulfilling prophecy, where both of our fears and insecurities about the conflict get magnified by trying to avoid it and instead we escalate it. How can we break out of this cycle, in the moment?
How can I my eagerness/compassion to meet his needs into reliable action in the moment to prevent these conflicts ever happening again? What should I be doing or commit to doing in order to ensure this? I feel like I’ve been trying but I’ve been working hard not smart at it, and I feel desperate to do better.
At the same time, I don’t want to be in this relationship if we’re just not well-matched emotionally and can’t solve our issues. I will be devastated if this is the outcome, but I’ll respect his decision if he does not want to try anymore.
TL;DR: partner asked me to leave due to unmet needs in relationship, will talk in a few days. How can I simultaneously set things up for success in meeting each others needs, and also prepare for breakup?
4 comments
I’m not sure why you’re interested in staying together.
I’d cut out half that equation and plan for the breakup. I might not even wait a few days…I’d do it now.
Kind of sounds like he has issues in this conflict? It’s one thing to request support and another to demand it and then stonewall you when you say you don’t have it to give.
From the sheer length of this post you seem to be very involved in this relationship, which is fine and understandable, but forget what he wants, and take some time to figure out what you want. You can’t control what he decides to do. Don’t forget to focus on your own needs.
>We are both very sensitive people and both have some baggage/issues that we want/expect the other person to be considerate about. We’ve had sort of a low-key tumultuous relationship. When things are good they are so good and we are so happy together, but we have really recurrent conflicts and misunderstandings (weekly to monthly). About half of these feel absolutely horrible for one or both of us – we feel totally abandoned/callously not cared for by the other person, like they are not meeting really basic needs we can’t do without and/or the other person is making us feel like a POS.
When things are good for anyone, then anyone will be happy. That is pretty much a given and does not make any relationship more special than anyone else’s. The main concern is the recurring conflicts. Every relationship will have bad moments and have conflicts and that is a given. However what separates something that lasts and something that is bad is how conflicts are resolved. Conflicts are supposed to be solved and moved on from. If you are fighting over the same thing over and over again, then that is toxic.
So when you described the aftermath of your conflicts, from my experience, these are the same experiences of exes and divorcees. This is not the experience of a long lasting relationship. Everyone is an individual so there is a certain amount of selfishness expected and that is normal. But if there is incompatibility then those small selfish requests become major conflicts. So I feel like the incompatibility is also a concern in the long term. Taking the emotions out of the equation, do you really think your values, behaviors, and lifestyle choices are a good fit for each other? Cause if not then call it quits. Even if you brute force an incompatible relationship, the most you do is delay the breakup and increase mental and emotional wear.
It’s been 6+ years and you guys STILL can’t be together without frequent conflict.
I know you want to make it work, but that’s a very strong indicator that this is not the right relationship for either of you.
Take the time to really think about why you’ve been trying to force this for so long. Fear of being single? Fear of finding another partner? Holding onto what you know? Those are the usual reasons, but those are not good enough to keep clinging to a relationship where you’re getting your feelings hurt nearly every week.