Communication breakdown

[Wormworld7]

Whenever I try to talk to my partner about any issues in our relationship he shuts down, gets defensive, storms off, sleeps downstairs and blocks me on all messaging platforms.

I must admit, I'm human, I'm learning to navigate the ups and downs of a relationship, but I feel I'm working on myself and getting better at expressing myself fairly, giving myself time to think about how I feel or how i want to respond when things get heated. And I don't think he is doing the same work.

For example, ironically, a recurring problem.between us is that he doesn't listen fully when I'm talking about general day to day stuff. He gets easily distracted and zones out, doesn't ask questions or show much enthusiasm for my stories, but when we're talking about his stuff, we can talk at length and both parties are invested and enthusiastic, I know a lot more about him, his life, his social circles than he does mine, because of this, and its obviously upsetting to me. It knocks my confidence because I get anxious to talk or open up, as he either swiftly moves on, changes topic quick, doesn't really engage or many of times I've spoken and he says absolutely nothing. Silence.

I've tried to speak about this issue and how I feel but he just ends up reacting badly to the perceived criticism, telling me its me who doesn't know how "conversations flow" and I never end up feeling heard.

Another example, on the weekend he was moody all.day over house work. I tried talking to him about how his mood and constant moaning as he did stuff was making me feel and bringing down the mood of the house and again, he shuts down, switches it around and blames me.

It's like no matter what the issue, him or me, his only response it to run away and shut down. He can't talk things through and seems so emotionally immature, imo. I end up feeling so hurt by all this and crying, then he doesn't console my upset and ends up berating me for being upset, telling me "just because you're crying doesn't make you right" his lack of interest in resolving things upsets me more and the cycle goes on.

Is this normal behaviour?

He won't change if he doesn't recognize he has a problem or want to change. The status quo suits him - he doesn't have to face things and you're running around frantically trying to connect with his wounded child. How do you think you can unilaterally change the situation. Flogging a dead horse comes to mind.

Thank you! I think there are some elements of that dynamic within us, for sure. I articulate myself and I don't want to come across as though I'm not an incredibly flawed human myself. I find myself in these push pull arguments with him, and I definitely act out and in ways I'm not proud of. So I'm by no means perfect, but I recognise that at the very least I have insight into my behaviour and a will and want to change and grow and be better. I understand the foundations of a solid relationship are built upon effective communication and I domt think I struggle with that. At least not the starting point of simply knowing how important it is.

I definitely don't put myself last by any means, and I definitely always make myself heard in many group dynamics. I just ensure I hear other people too. I belive myself to be a good listener and have been told I am too. But I can also talk and open up, with the right people, when I want to. I value listening and communication so highly, what else are we without it!?.

You've made some.really valid points and I.will certainly try to apply them as best I can! Thank you @lovenotwar149

@FloweryWowery I agree, I know. I did come here to seek advice, because I genuinely don't know what is normal. I've read about certain attachment styles, anxious and avoidant, which seem to fit well. But I seem to be the one feeling hurt all the time over it.

He says I push too hard and I go on and make things last 17 hour talks, but he won't give me the bare minimum to begin with so has no idea how I behave or handle things, if he just didn't do all the deflection and running. It drives me insane

Stop trying to work out what's right or wrong, what's normal, what you 'should' accept.

There are no 'shoulds'.

Do you want this relationship, as it stands? It's a yes or no question. This is the relationship he offers you. If you want it, take it. If you don't, walk away.

My ex was like this and it was exhausting. The reason I 'went on' about things was because he blocked any attempt to communicate about issues and that made me frustrated. If he had been able to just talk openly about things without jumping on the defensive we would have been able to sort things out there and then rather than have a row then 3 days of him sulking and ignoring me. I also have a child with my ex and decided that actually it wasn't healthy for them to witness a toxic relationship between their parents where open communication was not allowed. I spent 8 years trying to figure out how we could get around our communication issues before accepting that it's just not possible to make someone change when they don't think their behaviour is even contributing to the problem.

@Watchkeys i do believe there should be some room for allowing things to change, although I'm aware that when somebody lacks insight to see their emotional immaturity there isn't much hope!

@roseopose yes spot on, exactly that. The thing that keeps me holding onto hope is that occasionally at the end of a 5 day conflict, we get a glimmer of light and it's almost lile he gets it a bit. But it doesn't then change his behaviour going forward, the next time it happens it jist repeats the same crap again. It's sending me nuts going in circles

ditto the exhaustion pp mentioned

you know once you redirect all the energy currently being wasted spent on him/his bullshit onto yourself you will be much happier, even parenting on your own

all the other stuff that’s good doesn’t make up for daily battles - just like occasional access to the softest seat in the house doesn’t make up for being forced to use sandpaper as toilet roll on the daily

and if you’ve both had childhood struggles, both ‘love’ each other, both making excuses for him then why are you the only one knocking yourself out to improve things?

he would feel more in control of his life if he took responsibility for his actions/life - but only he can choose to do that

you get to choose whether to keep being the cat getting kicked by him because he’s frustrated at his own inadequacies

or to leave & continue your own (successful sounding) self-development without his bullshit sucking the energy out of you

Yes my ex was like this. It would get to the point where I would be fed up and say I wanted to split then we'd 'talk' mainly with me doing all the talking and expressing and him nodding along, I would massively concede and focus on what I could do better, he would make an effort for a short while, then once he was feeling comfortable again he'd stop bothering. Basically the him that could be good at communicating didn't really exist and it was a massive effort for him to maintain a persona that wasn't really him.
I spent a lot of time looking inwards at myself and my faults, encouraged by him, rather than thinking about whether I was happy and felt like my needs were met.
He would always say if I wanted him to communicate with me and sort things out then I had to go about it in a different way. I tried many many different ways and after doing an immense amount of work on myself, he was still treating me the same, only now there were new things I was apparently doing that elicited his unpleasant behaviour. The point being that you can twist yourself in knots trying to fix this but it is very unlikely he will change who he is, and the upshot of it all is you will end up a shell of your former self, taking on all the blame and responsibility for the relationship failing. Another thing is that a relationship like this can really distract you from focussing on your life and child. I spent way too much time thinking about the relationship and trying to fix it when I could have been focussing on my daughter and enjoying being with her, rather than being constantly anxious about whatever strop he was currently throwing.

But I've never been modelled a healthy relationship, never witnessed one, I don't know what they look like hence I'm genuinely asking here for help

They don't 'look like' anything. You're not trying to replicate a good example of what 'should' be. Healthy relationships feel good. They feel constructive. They feel like, when misunderstandings come along, things get resolved in a way that's satisfactory for all parties. They feel like there is a full understanding of how the relationship works.

You don't have to be modelled a healthy relationship. You have to realise that looking at other relationships makes no difference to your own, because the other relationships are about other people, and your relationship is about you, with all your experiences and quirks, likes and dislikes. You have to realise that if you have questions about gaslighting in your relationship, who is doing it isn't the issue: the fact that you have the question in the first place tells you all you need to know.

100% it does take my time away from my baby, I've said this to him. He's wasting so much valuable time stuck in these weird limbo arguments yet he paints the picture of it being me "carrying it on" because he just won't sit and have the conversation that needs to be had to end it. And he will keep repeatedly saying things like "all this over a ___", or "all thos because I said xyz", but I feel he's minimising it and not understanding its never about the thing, but about how I feel, me wanting to share how I feel but not feeling safe to, and if I do, doing all this big thing instead of just having a matter of fact chat. It's nice to hear from others who have experienced it. Doesn't give me much hope, but i do believe people can change, as I myself have.

@Watchkeys I get that, but I do feel there are healthy and unhealthy relationships. Not to say we can pick these apart by looking at them, but I think observing healthy patterns definitely helps. I do think there are patterns that people follow that repeat behaviours from generation to generation, and I feel I'm a cycle breaker. I've raised a 17 year old daughter with the emotional intelligence that I was never offered at such an age and in doing so it had changed me for the better - though I have never had to put myself to the test in my own romantic relationship until now.

I get that, but I do feel there are healthy and unhealthy relationships

This isn't a 'but'. Everything you said is true; this stuff does pass from generation to generation. Patterns do get replicated. This stuff is important in the formation of core beliefs.

But then, once you have your core beliefs, you can choose to apply them, or you can choose to judge things based on how you feel.

Do you want your relationship, as it is? It's a yes or no question. It doesn't involve breaking down the make-up of the relationship, or your own psychological processes. It doesn't involve 'well, there are good parts and bad parts'. If you had a meal put in front of you, and had to eat it all, you could say yes or no to whether you would eat it. That would be based on the proportion of things you liked and things you liked less, on the plate. Your yes/no answer would be dependent on how unpalatable the unpalatable bits were. For example, if the plate was a lovely roast dinner, but had some dishwater poured on it, that would be a hard no, right? But if there was just one piece of food you weren't that keen on, you'd likely say yes. But a yes/no answer would be possible.

Do you want your relationship, as it is?

@Watchkeys whilst I understand the analogy, and clearly, I dont want the relationship as it is, I think it is unfair to ignore the nuance here. Relationships in my core belief system, are there to grow with us as people, and romantic relationships especially, show us who we really are so we can get right down to work on those things.

I do believe people can change obviously they have to be willing. And they have to be self aware enough or at the very least be capable of taking on board feedback. Obviously I'm getting none of this from him.

I'm aware that it sounds incredibly naive to make statements like this, but I truly do believe he is a great person and this communication issue is no fault of his own. If we could just start to budge on it, then no issue would be too great because we would always have communication to see it through, I just don't get how perfectly logical people can't see this themselves hence I've turned to the Internet to ask, is this normal!?

I'm aware that it sounds incredibly naive to make statements like this, but I truly do believe he is a great person and this communication issue is no fault of his own

Yes, this is your core belief. That if someone isn't 'at fault', your feelings about their actions need to be questioned. They don't. Your feelings are your feelings, and you are invalidating them. If you weren't, you wouldn't want to ask the internet: you'd know for yourself that, 'normal' or not, his behaviour doesn't suit you, and he knows it, and he has no interest in changing, or even helping you to feel better about it. He is blatantly disrespecting you.

What was your parents' relationship like? What was your relationship like with them? What did you play second fiddle to? Fighting parents? Ill or addicted parents? Demanding sibling? Parents working all the hours of the clock? Somewhere along the line, you've learned that, even if you don't like something in your primary relationship, you should put up with it, for some 'greater good'. You say you're a 'cycle-breaker'. What cycle do you feel you've broken? It seems you're still playing out the unhealthy patterns. People in healthy relationships aren't asking internet forums for advice on how to deal with stuff like this, because they don't put up with it. They have healthy boundaries, and say 'no more'.

@Watchkeys I hear you and I don't disagree. My parents relationship was much like all of the examples that you describe, abusive, alcoholics, neglectful. I don't disagree at all with me having learned to put up with behaviours I dont agree with.

I haven't been in a long successful romantic relationship myself. Where i have successfully broken a cycle, has been with raising my daughter, exposing her to an environment very different to the one i was brought up in. In.terms of romantic relationships, I am a novice and this is bringing up a lot within me, like everything you've observed about me already, these aren't things within that I'm fully aware of, because I've been very self sufficient until now and never had to negotiate feelings with somebody else or answer to anybody else's needs, or report back when mine aren't bejng met, because when I was parenting alone, I was responsible for meeting my needs and I damn sure made sure I met them!

So all of this is new to me, I dont know my own boundaries, I don't know what my relationship needs truly are, I'm finding that out here in real time. Yes, with strangers on the internet lol

I've been where you are. Ish, obviously. This stood out to me:

I dont know my own boundaries

You absolutely do.

A question for you: How will you learn your boundaries? How will they be signalled to you? What will alert you to them? (I realise that's 3 questions but it's really the same one in 3 different ways)

@Watchkeys thing is, and what I probably meant by this, us I can be unreasonable sometimes. My expectations can be unreasonable. I can be demanding of very unrealistic standards being met. I do know I value communication. I do have a level of perfectionism. But I have trouble sometimes stepping back and seeing what is reasonable from me and what is me being totally out of line, expecting perfection and too much.

I do know it's not unreasonable of me to expect the bare minimum in communication. I'm not sure if somewhere my expectations want it to be so perfect and my standard so high that to him it feels pointless to try. I think he's said that and I'm now just internalising that belief as my own.

I don't kniw anymore!

The thing is @Wormworld7 if you're with someone who tells you your expectations are too high because they simply don't want to have to make the effort to meet them, you will always feel like you are the unreasonable one. It distracts from the real issue. I think I am very similar to you from what you say and find that if someone shuts me down and treats me badly when I'm trying to express myself, it causes me huge anxiety and I will then start behaving unreasonably myself. You might find in a different relationship where your partner has similar levels of emotional intelligence, that your expectations are just fine and you don't spend time analysing your own behaviour because there isn't an issue. You want to justify his behaviour and to do that you need to find fault in yourself, otherwise you're faced with the truth which is likely that he isn't a very mature or caring partner, and has poor communication skills.

I'm not sure if you saw the questions, @Wormworld7 ?

'How will you learn your boundaries? How will they be signalled to you? What will alert you to them?'

You've answered by making criticisms of your expectations. Which is invalidation, and also irrelevant. Can you answer the questions, without talking about what you think is wrong with you? This is where the crux of the problem lies: the self criticism. The willingness to believe that you're 'faulty'.

Someone said to me 'The only thing wrong with you is that you think there's something wrong with you.' That was useful.

@roseopose thank you. Everything you jist said is very true. He is caring and sweet and kind. He isn't just a man child in every respect. I think that's what makes it so hard to accept. And I think uts true I'm here picking myself apart, and part of me wonders if I'm not good enough for somebody more emotionally mature, because maybe I am a problem?!

@Watchkeys yes. Yes I hear you and that statement is helpful. I think I have some strong beliefs that come with some boundaries, but I also think some will reveal themselves as problems arise. And I'm sure some of my core belief boundaries will change or evolve over time.

I think my need to empathise gets in the way a lot. I do very much justify his actions and behaviours or make excuses when I'm here for a reason. I'm not okay with the way things are and how he reacts and that's on him.

So, once again, how do you think your boundaries will reveal themselves to you?

Sorry to keep labouring this question, but it's a really important one. What will happen that will demonstrate to you that one of your boundaries has been crossed?

@Watchkeys well I'd probably be upset? I don't really know

I think a man with poor communication skills is a disaster for a long term relationship.