What do you consider to be a fight with your partner?

I (26f) live with my boyfriend (25m) for 2 years. We were a LDR at the beginning so during that phase we talked a lot. And we kept doing that even after we moved together. We express ourselves if not immediately almost soon as possible. I don’t like something I tell him. He doesn’t like something he tells me. Butl
sometimes indeed we fail to communicate, but it’s OK because we do it at the end of the day.

I don’t think we are fighting but his mother thinks we are always fighting and she thinks I’m mean with him. As an example: she is very annoying and push him with some stuff, he gets heated and I tell him to drop it or if he is being mean with her I try to side with her to make her feel better because he was rude. So I say stuff like “things are different in life, not everyone has the same opinions as you” and I change the topic. Because she is something and she pushes him so bad.

Or

He is driving. For some reason I get scared and I tell him to slow down even though the speed it’s legal. He says it’s OK and drives a bit faster. I tell him he shouldn’t try to laugh at me with this because it’s dangerous, people are stupid and you better be careful than sorry. So he is doing it one last time just to have the last word, I tell him “ok tsk tsk” and after I laugh and change the topic. Now that he had the last word and I don’t react he stops. Everything is said with a normal voice tone. No fights after. No nasty words nothing.. We never said anything nasty or any cuss words to each other.

Now my question is do you see that (or similar situations when we just disagree on a topic) as a fight? Because we don’t. If we disagree with something or if he is not listening to me with something or if I tell him I don’t like something I don’t consider that a fight. Especially since we are not upset or have any hard feelings. His mother sees any difference in opinion, any contradiction as a fight.

We had fights which ended with me crying or us being upset at each other but everything was OK after both of us calmed down and we talked about it. That’s what I see as a fight. No relationship is perfect and I don’t want mine to be. But she was never around and he never said anything to her. I’m sure about it.

Anyway… He tried to explain her that we don’t fight if we disagree with something. He gave her examples from her relationship. But she is… I don’t know how to describe her… She doesn’t listen and believes only what she wants… She loves to control everything, to know everything, to even take decisions for us. I hate her lol.

For more context why I dislike her. We went to the doctor to do some normal blood tests. She went there next day after we got the results. She is sharing everything from the family with other people “so what if they are discussing between them”. If we go to the restaurant why we go. If we don’t go she is saying we should go out. And other things like these.

My mom was visiting me for a week because she lives pretty far from us and she started to ask her if we still argue? So… Am I a mean person and we do fight but for some reason we are broken and we don’t see it like that? What do you consider a fight? (we live alone in an apartment and we both have jobs)