Hi, @lissy123. The lack of explanation is a common reality in this kind of situation. I’m very cause-and-effect oriented and therefore need the relational checking account balanced to understand where I sit and whether or not the relationship is progressing. I’d been dating a girl for a couple months a little earlier this year and she was entirely incapable of explaining her motives on actions, which inevitably caused in me reactions, which consequently caused her to counter-react and induce argumentation. The fights might have eventuated very differently but at their core was the same spark – a lack of explanation. I brought up a similar contention to yours on another topic (http://tinybuddha.com/topic/help-im-living-in-limbo-during-separation/) and one poster enlightened me with this quite basic revelation:

‘The most valuable thing I learned from a counselor was that if you are in a relationship with someone, and you tell them what you need and what you want (reasonable requests, of course) and they do not give it to you, it is because they do not want to. If that person is of normal intelligence, functions in the day to day world, their reluctance or inability to do something is not because they do not understand or you didn’t explain it right. They just don’t want to do it. It’s the simplest thing in the world, and the hardest to accept.’

Like you, I always dwell on a relationship’s past as if it is going to give me valuable clues about its future. I don’t hold grudges but I do ‘remember’ things that people have done and find it hard to not go into unrelated arguments completely and utterly bias-free and independent of those memories. I know I brought up closure that pertains to breakups but the same line of thought lies also with during-relationship closure, which is obviously a little harder to regulate. The freedom of breakup closure is that it’s over and it’s out of your control, meaning you can move on without getting tied up on something that’s no longer present. Whereas during-relationship closure like yours is immeasurably more complex because the relationship is still alive and growing. When people can’t be held accountable for reasoning away their role in the conflict, especially when it hurts their partner, I’ve found they are either (a) behaviourally impaired from doing so (extrovert vs introvert mentality etc.) or, most likely, (b) they have no desire to do so. If he wants to be in a relationship with you then he needs to understand that one of his compromises for you is trying to communicate more. In the same way, one of yours for him might be to try be a little less over-analytical or sensitive of his actions when you know, and have accepted, that that’s ‘just him being him’. Apology does not negate an explanation, an apology (at least in your case) is him just addressing the point you have taken issue with and attempting to make it cease to exist in the fastest, easiest way possible. With an explanation, you get both it and the apology as one. In any case, my father was exactly like this. He would explode over trivialities and then return later with saccharine apologies that never contained explanations – just blanket statements of remorse. I hope you can work through this. But the simple fact that you’re citing issues as far back as 3 years makes communication now an imperative if you’re both to make the relationship work. I’d appreciate if you keep us updated on your progress!