Is my relationship genuinely emotionally ab*sive

@Cinnamoroll I have more to say, but I’d love to hear more about that because I am quite baffled by that response

@Cinnamoroll He was saying that he thinks it’s influenced by that because he swears he wasn’t annoyed when I was upset by the tone of voice.

@spookycupcake @spookycupcake Because he was saying often white people perceive poc as sounding aggressive when they aren’t and while that is a totally valid in general,it does also dismiss my concerns

@spookycupcake His point of view of the situation as a whole also was very different than mine so it’s confusing

@spookycupcake I don’t know what kind of racial trauma your partner may have experienced, but what he is doing by saying that is antagonizing YOU and causing a separation between the two of you on the basis of skin color. If he’s doing this every time you confront him that is absolutely a form of control over the situation, whether it be to silence you or to dismiss your concerns, or because he genuinely believes it and is unwilling to be trust you enough to have a conversation. Either way, he holds contempt—that is not good. At all. I come from a biracial family, and although my family has its own problems (you will often see me rant about it on here lol), my mother (a POC) has never ONCE made a sour judgement about my father because of his background. What he’s doing is absolutely unfair and, if it escalates enough, can be racism! Judging someone’s character on the basis of their skin color is racism. Keep that in mind.

@spookycupcake I’m not sure if what you are experience is abuse since I am only witnessing just a fraction of your entire relationship, but I can say this is not a healthy dynamic. He’s refusing to acknowledge your concerns, refusing to own up to his own emotional outbursts, and yet victimizes himself when you do the same. If you two cannot communicate, a relationship cannot thrive. My partner and I can get fussy sometimes with one another, but we ALWAYS, ALWAYS, sit down and listen to each other’s concerns and take it damn seriously, even if pride is eating us up, because we TRUST the other enough to know they are being genuine and want to best for us and therefore any criticisms is GOOD and HEALTHY. A relationship needs a safe space where voices can be shared and heard for the sake of MAINTAINING that safety. If one party is not willing to commit to that, then the relationship is suffering.

@Cinnamoroll Thanks for response. It is absolutely frustrating how it has happened multiple times and there’s not much I can do about it. At the same time while I don’t want to excuse it I also want to make sure I’m not explaining it in a non-neutral way. When I mentioned that it’s unfair that he says that he was saying I was seeing it in black and white and that he means it could be influenced by it while not fully being the reason. But at the same time he does claim that when I was critiqueing his tone of voice he was genuinely not annoyed. In one hand I am a lot more sensitive than him (not a bad thing) and I often have to explain things about sensitivity to him that feel like no-brainers to me. I don’t think he had malice but it still hurt

@Cinnamoroll Yeah, we do almost always end up resolving it in the end and having a genuine conversation about it. This time it wasn’t a full one because we kinda went to sleep before it happened. And again I don’t want to sound like I’m making excuses but he didn’t have an outburst, i just didn’t like his tone and wanted more sweetness from him and wanted him to realize/acknowledge it. We absolutely have unhealthy times especially since breakup is brought up too often. I don’t want to be in denial but deep down I do believe that it is good and he does almost always end up taking accountability after the fact. And genuinely we are each others best friends. But i think unhealthy aspects are present too often and definitely need to be worked on

@spookycupcake Some people do naturally have a harsher tone, but that doesn’t invalidate your concerns because I’m assuming he doesn’t always talk that way? Surely something is changed in his mannerisms that convinces you he’s upset—it doesn’t come from nowehere. I also get nervous that my partner is upset with me even when he isn’t, but that’s my ROCD acting up and oftentimes, after assessing the moment in retrospect, I realize he wasn’t acting angry or upset. I was just imagining it. Not saying this is your case! But what I’m saying is you can probably look back on these moments and pinpoint WHAT it is that makes you believe he’s upset. Maybe he gets more quiet, maybe he doesn’t look at you, maybe he has a habit with tapping his fingers or fidgeting, maybe he raises his voice. If you two can have a safe conversation about this, you should be able to communicate on why this misunderstanding (if it really is one) is happening. And he shouldn’t feel the need to shut it down every single time.

@Cinnamoroll Yeah it doesn’t sound like he does when he is being really sweet and affectionate and that is what I want when I’m sharing how my feelings were hurt. Luckily I have therapy today

@spookycupcake Like it doesn’t sound genuine/emotional enough for me

@spookycupcake And I want him to go more in depth in order for it to feel genuine instead of just saying sorry

@spookycupcake Also we both have trauma from toxic environments growing up so I hope there is a chance for us to change our dynamics even though it’s hard