General Relationship Thread

So today I learned that I may have been emotionally abusive in my previous relationship. I was offended and appalled that my ex deem it so, so I tried to figure out what was it that he thought as abusive. It seems that after we broke up, he recounted his experience to friends/family, and people thought I was overly controlling and possibly abusive.

The reason: we had problems, so I said we break up or we try to solve those problems. He was confused and needed time, which I gave him (3 weeks to a month), I said I want to try to work through it, and he agreed. Apparently he felt that he was somehow pressured into agreeing, which is where the "abusive" thing came from. I get the impression that he was afraid that I would be upset and hurt and range of other things so that's where the pressure comes from. But I don't think that I emotionally manipulated him into anything. I'm quite puzzled.

(He had gotten to the point where he wouldn't tell me things in case they upset me, which is not what I wanted. So essentially he would be annoyed at me but not tell me, and eventually that kind of exploded.) I didn't find out what he deemed as abusive before the problems started, since he got annoyed and angry at me for bringing it up (it's a depressing topic...), but perhaps the whole "he has cater to my needs" was what made it feel like it? I had asked him how he feels about things and what he thought and he never told me these things until we broke up.

I just. I don't know. really really don't want to be an abuser? My reaction was "flip tables" and "what the flying fuck" so here I am. uh, anyone care to shine some light?

Dude. 19. That's like, barely even sapient yet. It'd be like asking to date the cat.

Based on your description alone, he sounds way too passive-aggressive for his own good. You do not sound abusive, again based on your post. I have been in an abusive relationship, and it sounds nothing like what you're describing. NOTHING like that.

19 year olds are great fun to play with. (I was shagging one before I met Quat.) Wouldn't marry one, but then 19 is too young to get married anyway.

Uhm, well, the fact that your reaction is to go and take it out on innocent tables, and swear profusely might point to being somewhat hot-headed and intemperate. Which can come across as abusive.

Is there something wrong with dating the cat?

Elyscape, you spend time in the Kawaii subforum -- how do you feel about dating catgirls? For me they're a little too weeab--

Oh, wait, that's not what she meant?

...

Ew.

What's the issue with the kid? Is it because now you know your date is older than you thought she was? 'Cause a 19-year-old in college isn't going to cramp her dating style the same way a young kid still at home would.

It's because he doesn't want anyone to notice when his dates go missing. If they have loved ones, the cops might eventually check his basement, and then he'll be in big trouble...

He's a clever one, but clearly you're already one step ahead of him.

Basements? Rookie mistake.

What are you like when you're upset? Because that seems to be the recurring theme, not wanting to upset you. Not saying "getting upset" = "zomg abuse," but it's possible he found your way of dealing with being upset SO uncomfortable for him that he felt he could never upset you (and telling someone "omg the way you get upset bothers me" is a one way trip to argument town, so I can also understand why he didn't think that was an option either).

I mean, from your post, my gut says he was sensitive to when you were unhappy (especially when you were unhappy because of something he did), and whatever way he explained that to people made it sound like something more sinister at work. My gut also says it was most likely you two were fundamentally not a good match, since he did not want to upset you ever, and you did not want him holding things back just because they might upset you. :P

Thank you for all your responses!

Mhmm, I never thought he was passive-aggressive, I've noticed I am though. Since I like getting my point across and doing it snarkily sometimes.

Rest assured, no innocent table was harmed in the process! I did swore though. I'd think that would be aggressive?

I think it depends what I'm upset about. Generally I think I just get ranty and talk a lot. If it's problems between us, let's talk about it. I also tend to cry. Our differences probably stems from he does not like talking about problems, he prefered to deal with them alone, I think. Except he'd get upset when the issue is bought up later as well, as in the heavy issue just brings him down?

Ultimately I think I just felt like I was being blamed for not being psychic enough to know that he was annoyed at me without him telling me. I tend to ask if I notice and if there's anything I can do, but it generally just leads to denial and annoyed at me for suggesting so. Eh.

I think for a long time, he felt he was giving more into the relationship than I was, so it was an imbalanced relationship?

There's only a four year age difference, so it's not that. And it's not an out-and-out disqualifier like having young children, it's just something that seems intangibly odd to me. Maybe it's another reminder that dating is a young person's game and I'm about a decade out of the prime years for it.

Maybe . . .it's a reason to show you still got it.

Well, I mean, it's a moot point in this case. I don't want to date her - that whole "no attraction" thing is a game-breaking issue there.

You chose... poorly.

Is it moot though? I mean knowing why you feel that way might help for other dating too. I understand why you wouldn't want to get involved with someone who has kids because of the complications and such, but if the kid(s) is grown up and basically out of the picture, but that still bothers you, it would be helpful to know why...maybe.

(Note: basing this only on the above, so just throwing this out as a hypothetical)

It's entirely possible that he did like talking about problems, but he felt that the 'talks' were just triggers for non-productive confrontations.

A common pattern in relationships is that a dominant partner will attempt to control the power dynamics by controlling the nature of discussion. This is usually done subsconsciously, and unfolds sort of like this:

- friend is bringing up something I'm uncomfortable with
- attempt to bring conversation back to my side by distraction/interruption/derails
- if that fails, use emotional leverage (shutting down, crying, shouting, getting angry)
- friend gives up because conversation is not productive
- friend decides not to bring up issue again (i.e. I win)

The reason this can be seen as abusive is that it's emotional blackmail, "Bring this up, and you'll suffer by being uncomfortable". The 'abuser' (and I hesitate to use that term, since there are many degrees of this) doesn't recognize this as abuse because they're not being physically confrontational and they're staying within the conversation and they're not actively preventing the other person from continuing the conversation. It's a passive aggressive way of shutting down discourse ("Fine, we can talk about this, but you're going to hate every minute of it").

I've recommended this book a million times, but I'll do it again: Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most.

I bought that book cause of you...it is good too.

In this specific case, yeah, I'd already made the decision that I wasn't interested in pursuing things before the revelation. In general, I tend to be of the opinion that a single mother with kids at home doesn't have enough free time to date at the level I'm looking for, the potential for spontaneous "Hey, what are you doing? Let's go get dinner" nights without having to worry about meddling third parties, that kind of stuff. Yeah, that might restrict a lot of my options, but I've decided that I'd rather deal with zero options than settling for less than what I want. Going down that route leads to long-term resentment and is just a recipe for failure.

I think in this case the reason it weirds me out is not so much the age thing (only a 4 year difference between she and I) but the vast gulf in life experience - she spent 18 years raising a kid, I spent most of that time gallivanting around and having adventures and stuff. There's a distinct lack of commonality there.

Well, he could always shoot for the mother-daughter combo ... =)

That one is definitely difficult to get checked off the list. Harder than twins!

Eww. To all of you.

Hey now, don't dump me in with the incest facilitators.

Whatever happened to SuperJay and that coffee shop lady?

No progress to report at this time. We've only gotten to talk once in the last couple weeks (she hasn't been there or has been busy the other couple times I've been there) and despite a promising start - she gave me a radiant smile and what I can only describe as an arch look when I teased her about remembering my name - we only talked for a few seconds before some peon interrupted us, saying she was needed on the phone.

It's cool, though. I can be patient, since we're destined to be together.

I just told some smart young thing my number, and then I told her she could cause excitement in my pants anytime she wanted with that.

She turned hilarious colors of red.

I hit "like", not because I liked it, but because it was so dumb it made me laugh.

Same here. Oh Aeon, never change.

I liked the post because I prefer to think Aeon throws off the curve in favor of the rest of us.

I need some advice from those who have been there before....

So I'm staying with my girlfriend this week. We get along well, and everything has been good overall. But I don't feel as in synch with her as I did with my ex-wife. It causes me to doubt our long term potential sometimes, even though I'm really happy with her overall. But I started wondering today if I'm being too demanding on the relationship. I mean of course we aren't as in synch...we haven't lived together for 15 years!

I can't really remember what it was like at the beginning of my previous relationship. It kind of blurs together after all this time. I can't remember if things were better, worse, the same, or whatever.

But I guess my real question is whether this is normal after coming out of a long relationship. I don't want to undermine something that could be really good by comparing it to something that lasted a really long time. But I also don't want to make a mistake and ignore legit warning signs. On the third hand, I don't want to blow little things into more than they are, even though little things can actually be pretty important. I'm not sure I'm being very clear here, either, so I'll just read what those of you who have gone before me have to say.

I've told you a bit about my own experience with my first serious girlfriend after my divorce, but I'm hesitant to apply my experiences to anyone else's because everyone's relationships and situations are different. But I do think it's completely normal to experience some exaggerated emotional responses after coming out of a long-term relationship, even a while after the fact. That you don't feel for your g/f the way you did for your ex-wife is probably normal as well, and I don't know what your priorities are as far as relationships, but I don't know that I'd worry too much about your long-term viability just yet. Frankly, I wouldn't expect to go right from your divorce into a relationship with the woman you'll then spend the rest of your life with.

Can you elaborate on what you mean by not feeling "in synch" with your current girlfriend?

Dang, it was supposed to cause uncontrollable swooning. Perhaps I should flash my bottom at you guys, that'll do it!

No, if you're going to post pictures, go all out and do frontal nudity.*

*please don't

(satisfaction guaranteed!)

In my experience, yes. In a long-term relationship, you get used to a lot of things over time that become familiar and comfortable. When you start noticing those things in a new relationship, it often makes you think of the previous one and there's often a bit of an emotional disconnect there. "Whoa, having someone else's toothbrush by my sink reminds me of when my ex started keeping a toothbrush here, I hope things don't fall apart the same way" - or something like that.

Yeah, I'm in an entirely different situation (married almost 30 years), but I know how much more of a well-oiled machine we are now than we started out. Also, my daughter's fiance has been lurking about the place and not everything he does is the way we do it and it's often noticeable and off-putting to us, even though he's not doing anything wrong. I'd say you're probably fine, Robert, as long as you can find the line between things you just have to get used to and things that need to be talked about.