Help me through this argument

[missjaysays]

Hi, I think I need abit of mothering and some advice, my mum isn't here and I just feel so sad.

Me and my boyfriend of 6 years bought a house together, we moved in about 5 months ago. At first we were on a real high, that's worn off now but we are both still very happy together. It's so nice to have our own space.

Over the last 2/3 months we have been having frequent arguments/disagreements and fallings out. Its mostly over very silly things, I can't even remember the last one to give you an example it's that daft.

Last night I had 3 friends around for dinner, he was at work but came home about half an hour before they left. He came and sat down with us while we were chatting away, he works with one of them and they had a brief gossip about work, he finished his drink then went up to sort himself out after work. I thought all was fine.

My friends left and I went up to see him, I was looking forward to seeing him after us both being in work all day. I said hiii and he immediately said in a very nasty tone 'your joke and your shitty friends laughing was not funny' I said 'what?' He said 'doesn't matter'. He didn't speak to me for the rest of the night, even in bed, all of today has been radio silence when we'd usually text a few times during they day. He's in from work and still not a word even now.

I literally have no idea what he meant, nothing nasty or inappropriate was said. I obviously said at the time 'what do you mean!? I don't know what I said!' And he ignored me. I've asked the girls today and they are just as puzzled as me.

I honestly didn't say anything untoward. It's been eating away at me all day, I feel anxious and off kilter not knowing what the problem is. Should I just go and ask him again? I feel like he will just reject me and then I will feel silly. I don't think he is right to not communicate with me, even if he feels I have hurt his feelings. I wonder if he misheard something I said or misunderstood something? He has all day to think about this, why is he not coming to speak to me?

Any advice? If we fall out he always seems unbothered where as I always want to fix the problem and make friends asap. He won't care if we sleep on an argument where as I really hate that. I just don't understand!

Let's sum up:

-He is upset and won't talk
-Then blames you for not talking
-He flips the whole thing around and he is the victim, despite freezing you out and hurting you
-And however much he has hurt you for two straight days, now he is fine and ends it with a "joke"? Your pain is a joke to him?

OMG, WTAF! Ditch this piece of shit. What he did to you is a classic narcissist freeze-flip. You are his supply. He gets off on your pain, proven by the fact that he is able to joke about it. Don't continue down this path, because he will break you in pieces and then be done with you.

What a piss taker! So now he has upset you, knocked you off balance, he has decided you're forgiven (for some unnamed offence) and wants you to slip back into normal life, until the next time he can upend you. Classic coercive control.

Fuck that!

Text him back.
I have gone over the incident in my head, asked my friends and also asked you, what it is that has upset you.
If you won't tell me what was upsetting you then how are we as a couple to find out where our boundarys are.
I do not wish to have this happen again so please tell me, so we can finally put this arguement to bed.
Love X

Sorry OP
I can relate to how you’re feeling and I can’t say strongly enough how I wish that I had taken heed of the warning sign of this sort of thing earlier on in my relationship.
15 years married now and the sulks have got more frequent.
Yes we seemed ok in other aspects it was just very rarely (in the beginning) we had these issues and were he was unable to communicate or resolve them in a normal way. I hate conflict so earlier on in our relationship would just hate the atmosphere between us so would do everything I could to smooth things over, and be so relieved when it passed that I didn’t want to bring up the topic and discuss it more.
Over the years in some moments he has been so cruel, cold and unempathetic in a similar way to how you’re describing your husband. And then it’s ok again and on we go. But I don’t want to carry on living like this as with each ‘sulk’/episode (not sure what to call it!) it erodes the love a bit more.
Now I’m thinking of leaving but it’s so hard because we have children together.
In hindsight I can see the red flags so I would urge you to take heed of them to avoid years of potential misery.

If he can't articulate in a mature manner what exactly upset him so much if anything then how are you supposed to 'mind what you say' in future?

You'll end up walking on eggshells around him in case you inadvertently upset him. I wouldn't let this go if I were you, or it'll keep happening.

It takes a special kind of person to refuse to speak for two days over a perceived remark which they won’t discuss with you.
Your dp sounds like a horrid person and I wouldn’t put up with that behaviour.
I would tell him straight that normal adults don’t behave this way and he needs to grow up or leave.

You have bought a house together and he feels he now has you. He has punished you for having friends round. He is training you to be very careful you don't annoy him in future. He decides to end the punishment and thankfully you are not letting this go. You are in the early stages of being abused by a controlling, gaslighting narcissist. Do not get pregnant with this man, the abuse will escalate dramatically. Best wishes OP.

How dare he?!!!! "I'm done"????

What those two words are saying is - insert patronising tone... "well my little woman, I forgive you for not knowing what you did wrong and I ak done punishing you, we may return to normal now, cos I'm in charge of this relationship"

If you can't think of what you might have said that caused a small amount of offence, there's simply no way you can have said anything that warrants days of silent treatment. Not that I think anything warrants days of silent treatment. Kids act better than that. Issues should be discussed. An hour's quiet time to gather your thoughts into order so you can better communicate your feelings is one thing, days of sulking is controlling behaviour. I get what you're saying that you will fight back and not be controlled, but you shouldn't HAVE to. Don't let this become your norm. I would bet my next mortgage payment he cannot offer an explanation for his behaviour, because actually he's got a strop on about something unreasonable and knows it would sound ludicrous coming out of his mouth.

Stand firm. I'm not saying leave him, but nip this now so it doesn't happen again and ge knows it is unacceptable. Good luck. You're handling it very well IMO.

Sorry for typos... you get the gist I hope!

He might resent the warmth and rapport you share with your friends...so to throw cold water over the proceedings by making you doubt your conduct and throwing your loyalty to him into question, would serve his agenda well.
Just saying.

Possibly that is. This is pure conjecture on my part but that’s what’s occurring to me going by your articulate description of the event.

I get coercive control, I just can't see that with myself. I think I'd leave before I let that happen

You might get it but your quite unaware that it’s already happening.

He controlled your behaviour this morning by you being upset and repeatedly asking him what you had done wrong. And look - he’s over it now and you STILL don’t know what you did and he STILL isn’t telling you what you did.

Just basically told you to watch your mouth. With out actually fucking saying what..

That ain’t cute love.

But hey ho - you’ve been warned apparently ..

He's warned you without telling you what THE FUCK ABOUT. This is seriously not good on any level. It's no coincidence that he's showing this side now you can't easily walk out the door. From now on you'll be waiting for the 'old him' to reappear so that things will get to be 'what they were'. Trouble is, the 'him now' is who he really is, the other guy was an illusion.

Not all coercive control/abuse has all of the elements. You don't need to be stopped seeing friends and family to be in a controlling relationship. What you're experiencing is more than enough, surely?

As PP mentioned, please, for the love of God, NEVER breed with this man. No one would want their kids learning this behaviour and seeing it as normal

You are in the best place right now and he doesn't realise this. You have a better understanding of his behaviour. You know 100% that you did nothing wrong. You are still you, at this moment. But...

He is trying to break you. He invented a reason for his anger (an anger that has no justification). He has spent 2 days punishing you for his anger, all the while blaming you for it. You gave him what he wanted this morning by getting upset. He has waited 2 days to see you upset. That is his punishment done now. He is happy with the result. You weakened, in his eyes. Job done number 1.

I really hope I am wrong, but that is what it is looking like to me.

The test is this: Imagine inviting the same friends over this coming week? Now listen to your thought process: is he now central to your decision making? If so, job done number 2. Please get out now.

He wouldn't tell me, he said he shouldn't have to

This alone is a major issue. How can you live a life together unless you are a mind reader?

He said he doesn't have a problem, he's getting on with his day

He is lying and you both know he has a problem. This is deceitful and gaslighting.

He said it wouldn't have taken much for me to go down last night to talk

You are responsible for fixing all issues in the relationship. Such is his sense of importance.

He didn't like it when I said I had asked the girls, and they had said no I hadn't said anything bad. He said 'what's weird, that's not normal' to have asked them

Knew he would hate this! You have risked his mask slipping infront of others. Abuse thrives away from outsiders. Will you now be be cautious talking to others or getting a sense check? Abusers are very protective of their external image.

He has now decided to stop punishing you (however despite not knowing what you have done) you are supposed to accept responsibility and watch your speech in future.He is not accepting any blame. Are you ok with this?

All of us who have ended up in a seriously abusive relationship see the red flags and the way it starts. He is textbook. It always starts suddenly, usually after commitment, such as house buying (this was my exact situation). It seems irrational and your brain is shocked by the change. I even put it down to medication he was on..that was my mistake as I knew nothing of how abuse creeps up.

If you want to learn more then read books "emotionally abusive relationship" Patricia Evans is good.

Btw, strong, independent, feisty women are often targets so this does not make you immune.

Thing is OP it's not over yet, is it? You still don't know what caused him to react that way because he has been stonewalling you about it. Now he is continuing to keep you off-balance by declaring the incident 'over' - but still not letting you know why he was upset in the first place - which will keep you guessing.

It's not weird to ask friends what they think as they were there - yet he is also trying to make you feel like you did something wrong by asking them about it.

You might work with abused women and believe you could never allow that sort of situation - but think of it this way - how many people out there know the 'signs' of alcoholism, for example, so are convinced they would never let that happen to them? Probably a good deal of alcoholics!

I don't know if you have ever been in an abusive relationship before but learning about them and supporting people from the outside is a lot different from the actual experience of it.

Gaslighting. What a nasty piece of work.

I wouldn't let this go (his behaviour towards you).

Btw, strong, independent, feisty women are often targets so this does not make you immune.

Strong, independent women are very often targets of misogynists. It's like a badge of honour to bring them down. They hate women so are overjoyed having one to bring down 'a peg or two'.

Op I second what many others have said. Unless he is prepared to sit down and tell you what his supposed issue was and also allow you to talk from your side about your dissatisfaction with his actions (and take it onboard) .. then he doesn't deserve to have things back to normal. Why should he ? I know it's hard to hold your nerve as you do love him, want things to be ok and calm.. but do hold your nerve. If he won't tell you and won't allow a conversation that enables this to be resolved (and a commitment TTS the will not act in this way again) then that is of his doing.

I'm not sure if it's the correct advice but in that event (which is essentially stonewalling) I would absolutely be giving him a taste of his own medicine and get on with your life even though all you want is for things to be back to normal.

This will show him that he doesn't get to control the barometer of your relationship and your home. He will want you back when he wants you (ie now) .. he doesn't get to control that (and you) .. and needs to see that you are your own person and will not dance to his tune. You don't need to be arsey. Just breezy and unfazed by his ridiculousness.. good luck

@Sparklfairy you’ve absolutely hit the nail on the head. OP this is abusive. It’s a worrying response from him and should be a massive red flag.

People do not end up in abusive relationships because they are weak, or because they are the kind of people who put up with things. They do it because it starts well, they love them, then its little things that they can't quite put their finger on, then its just one odd instance thats out of character and they love them, then its a rare event and not who they really are. Its a slow drip against your boundaries so rhink very carefully about your response to this

I think my response would be along the lines of your behaviour over the last two days has been unacceptable. I am not prepared to be in a relationship where two days of silent treatment is ok. You need to explain why you felt it was acceptable to behave this way, or we are, indeed, done.

Please also read about narcissistic behaviour. The operate as follows:

Love bomb
Devalue
Discard

I wonder if he was incredibly loving at first to hook you in. Sounds like you’re in the devalue stage.