Feel like I'm annoying and need to watch my words

How long have you been with him?

This man has two women doing unpaid emotional labour for him and has the audacity to bitch about it. When someone complains about the quality of your emotional support it’s time to withdraw it.

Its time for him to employ a counsellor.

You dont have to be a narcissist bully to triangulate people LOL

Telling her his female friends at work are great listeners in comparison to her is a shitty thing to do and yes, its toxic behaviour in my opinion.

What on earth do you hope to achieve from doing that apart from making OP feel rubbish?

Good grief, the lengths people on MN will go to, to defend shitty men is unbelievable 🙄

I do think your husband sounds rude however, I have noticed that even a slight interjection ‘great’ etc can completely derail some people’s thought process whereas others (like me) appreciate a bit of light engagement.

There is an extreme (my mother) who will interject too much before the tale has even got going that does de- rail it e.g lots of cool and great and so happy she did that before you can explain the dog died which would have been about four sentences.

comparisons with woman at work is not on though!

You’re absolutely right, I’m NOT declaring that the OP’s partner is definitely a shitty, overbearing bully and that she is in a toxic relationship with someone who clearly doesn’t like her, just to make her feel rubbish…

And in trying to suggest take a more nuanced and balanced approach and considering more than one possible scenario I am of course going to incredible lengths to defend shitty men. As this is my life’s work….

He's picking holes in everything you say so that when he leaves you for the wonderful woman at work he'll be able to blame it on you and your behaviour.

Get out now before it gets worse. Im sure there are plenty of people who would appreciate a partner who listens but also voices opinions. Pack your stuff and get your escape planned and one day when he's at work leave a note saying "have fun with Jenny from accounts, I deserve better than you", and get tf out.

My husband is like this. He hates if I say, “That’s too bad.” “Did you ask her why?” “Oh. I thought it was on Wednesday.” Anything like that. Like you, OP, to me it indicates interest and paying attention. My friends and I all converse this way. I finally realized that DH doesn’t want to have a conversation, hardly even knows how. What he wants is to give a (long) MONOLOGUE. I have to wait several beats of silence before I can speak without him accusing me of interrupting. All this to say, I don’t think it’s you, OP, I think it’s him.

I think you sound really lovely, compassionate & empathetic -
It's awful to feel like you need to walk on eggshells & second guess how your partner wishes you to respond -
Yes oftentimes caring folks I know, use active listening like you describe, just to acknowledge the person opening up, is being understood -
Honestly I don't know how your partner is trying to make your active listening seem wrong - Most folks I know of prefer to open up to someone with a compassionate heart who understands just like you seem to be doing -
I really hope your partner sees the light & comes to realise how blessed & lucky he is to have someone so kind & caring as you are...

I work with someone who does the mini-acknowledging thing while I’m talking. Far from making it sound like she’s listening, it comes across as if she’s trying to hurry me up so I finish (and then probably so she can speak). I find it intensely irritating. Could it be this?

He's not respecting the social norms of conversation, which include allowing the other person to speak instead of monologuing. Your "right" and "I see" type of thing is part of these social norms. I forget the name for it, but it's how we show that we're engaged and listening. A long pause is normally an invitation for the other person to speak. He's really rude with the "I'm not finished".

Perfect Work Woman will be on MN any time now:

"I have an older, married work colleague who keeps cornering me for a "chat", but it's just boring monologues. He gets tetchy if anyone else tries to speak, so I've given up trying to make it a conversation, and just sit there silently, hoping he'll get fed up with my lack of interest and go away. Unfortunately this has encouraged him, and he singles me out, saying I'm a perfect listener and his wife isn't interested in what he has to say 🤦‍♀️

I'll go mad if I have to keep listening to him droning like broken bagpipes. But I can't be too rude because I have to work with him! How can I get the boring self-centred twit to leave me alone?"

Tender shoots of abuse popping up there. Just the beginning. Showing you that u r inferior to him and not up to scratch.. chip chip chip away at self confidence etc.
I have never experienced someone talk to me like that. What a prat and nasty little man he is.
Get rid pronto and find someone normal.

Sounds like your listening skills are quite advanced to me - occasionally nodding or saying 'yes' or something simple like that to show youre paying attention. But perhaps try to hold off on the advice at least for a while. [I have a tendency to try and suggest solutions too and have found it sometimes isn't what people want.] Perhaps instead after commiserating that the situation sounds difficult or hurtful or disappointing etc, you could gently ask what they think they might do about rhe situation. And if it sounds like a good idea say that you think it sounds like a good idea?.

He sounds like a twat. LTB

Best response on the thread.

And the devaluation phase begins...the woman at work is not a friend

OMG please get rid of this annoying controlling fuckwit.

I think not wanting those encouraging single word or phrase responses in conversation is weird and controlling. And comparing you to the woman at work is shitty.

But having someone jump in and try to fix problems and give unsolicited advice constantly is super annoying.

I had exactly the same issue with my ex and concluded it was a ‘him’ problem. I’d never encountered this with anyone else before, normally conversing normally and interjecting with my thoughts (which were more often than not supportive), but he didn’t want to hear it, making me feel like I might as well be a brick wall if he wasn’t interested in my opinions, thoughts or solutions. And saying ‘I haven’t finished yet’ during lengthy pauses - I’m sorry ? Do I need permission to speak ?! It made me resent him, but I know a lot of it was him feeling unheard or not important, stemming back to childhood issues. Which systematically made me feel shit when I was being shut down for trying to help.
Sometimes as a result of subsequent fall outs over this, he would actually start with ‘now I don’t want your feedback, I just want you to listen’, which would instantly make me say to myself ‘well, I’ll listen but he can fuck off and deal with it himself then !’ thus causing further resentment. Especially if said issue he wanted to talk at me about also affected me, yet I wasn’t allowed to offer resolution or ideas.
Did I mention he was my ex ?
Although this was just one of many things that caused me to find him very difficult to tolerate - couples counselling didn’t even help, although it did help ME feel heard !

I already mentioned my ex who did this, but strangely enough (or maybe not so strange) his adult son always did the same. It was great fun (not) when they were together with their unfinished sentences, lengthy pauses and then finishing the sentence just as you were losing the will to live.

What amused me was they used to get furious with each other for interrupting the drone-pause-continue monologue, yet neither could see that they were doing the same thing to each other! They also both used to do the storming out in a huff number. So I had to sit there while being bored by 2 droning selfish fuckers, who then got annoyed with each other over the pause/'interruption' , and then it was a competition to see who managed to make it to the door first in order to storm off in a huff. God it was dreadful.

I've said it before, one of the nicest results of splitting up with an ex is that you can also jettison all their lousy friends and family, too. Bliss!