To feel annoyed English will never become the main language in DP's life...

[chicoingles]

Hi there,

My DP is Spanish and would say she was fluent in English (very good English accent and only noticeable she is foreign when she pronounces certain words, but you couldn't guess she was Spanish at all) but when she gets angry/is tired tends to switch to Spanish. We have been together for 7 years now and it has always been like this, although we did spend the first 4 years of our relationship mainly speaking in Spanish, whereas now we mainly speak English. I do have have a degree in Spanish but feel our relationship works better in English. AIBU thinking English will never become totally natural for her? Would be very interested in hearing the opinions of any foreign ladies who have an English DP.

when I'm tired I would divert to English as speaking Spanish does require my brain to think more than usual, whereas English, being my native language doesn't.

Dont you think its the same for her?

You are being very unreasonable.

You answered your own question when I'm tired I would divert to English as speaking Spanish does require my brain to think more than usual, whereas English, being my native language doesn't. she probably feels the same about her native language.

I am English but live in Sweden with my Swedish dp, wespeak a mix of Swedish and English, for example we always talk about medical things in Swedish, we talk about things to do with our baby in Swedish, we talk about sex in English, when we have disagreements it's in English, we talk about food in Swedish but housework in English.

You have the opportunity to embrace both languages, try to embrace Spanish.
If you want a girlfriend who speaks English all the time you need to fin a British/American/Australian partner.

is this a stealth boast about being bilingua? I dont get it

hmm, just realised that my last post may look as if I am agreeing with you over switching language when tired, whereas I mean just the opposite, you took on a partner with another language, you need to embrace that, as I do with Dutch.

Are you Nick Clegg?

Miriam LTB.

Also - think hard. If you have kids then it is likely that she will want to speak spanish to them, which means she will be speaking spanish all the time to your dcs, and your household will be very bilingual, much more than now.

if you don't like it, please think about that now before you go any further together.

reeling lol

This is such an odd post, I don't know where to start. Why would you be annoyed someone still wants to speak their native language, just as you do? Find someone English if speaking naturally in English is very important to you.

Actually I think that Miriam is the most surprising and interesting thing about Nick Clegg!

OP, how would you react if you saw a thread from someone upset that his/her dp wouldn't speak his/her mother tongue 100 percent of the time? Utterly unreasonable.

YABU, and frankly this makes you sound like a narrow-minded nobber.

reeling, I love you.

that's just weird

My friend is german but has english mum so spraks it like a first language. If she is around german speakers she does tend to lapse in to german esp if she gets annoyed - just an unconcious thing

Aw,i'm quite fond of you too Malenky.

SteppeMum: You are right.
Reeling: What does LTB mean? No, am not lol!

Can you go back to this thing about your relationship working better in English?

I don't understand you and I'm British!

You still haven't explained why her speaking Spanish at times bothers you.

LTB = Leave The Bastard - as used often on the relationship boards

ditch her.

find a lovely English bird. Bob's your very english uncle.

Well I feel things just work better in English. Again that is a very subjective opinion and surely she would say it works better in Spanish if push came to shove. Thanks steppemum for that, very new to all these abbreviations!

so you say it works better for you, but not for her, and you still want it that way? Poor lady...

Have you tried using both languages at once? So you speak English and she replies in Spanish?

I find it is much easier to understand the other language than speak it, so it takes the pressure off you both.

How bizarre. If you feel that strongly about it wtf did you get involved with a foreigner ?

OP, you are being utterly, utterly unreasonable!

If you didn't speak the language, I would have a little sympathy (though still not much) but you clearly have a good grasp of Spanish so why are you so keen to build in this linguistic inequality into your marriage? Why always your mother tongue and not hers? Why shouldn't she speak in whichever language she feels like speaking at any given time. You married a foreigner - so just accept that she speaks a foreign language sometimes. It's no big deal.

We have 3 languages in our marriage - one his, one mine and one neutral one that we both speak fluently. We interchange between them as and when we feel like it, but try to stick to the neutral one when arguing - it's fairer!

I'm bemused by this. I can't see why the OP has a problem.