Home→Forums→Relationships→So Confused…
- This topic has 2 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 7 years ago by Inky.
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November 2, 2017 at 11:23 am #176279AnonymousInactive
For the last 2 years I have been dating this guy, and it began as a free, fun light relationship, full of adventure and happiness. We both brought in some baggage from our past relationships, but we talked thru most things, and attended counseling. I moved in with him full time in June. Sounds like things should be great, but they aren’t. We are arguing all the time, and not over just anything..2 days ago he began making what I felt were very racist comments and I called him out on hit, because he knows that I despise racism in all forms. It all began because he felt it was weird that my company celebrated Martin Luther King Day, and that morphed into him calling Abraham Lincoln a scum bag. I told him that I thought it was wonderful that we celebrated Martin Luther King Day, and that Abraham Lincoln was a wonderful president. Like every other time I disagree with him, he goes off his rocker and begins getting nasty and saying inflammatory things that he is completely aware will cause an argument. It’s always over the most random of things..unsolicited advice, humanitarian issues, environmental issues. I am not a political person, but if I express my concern for the environment, I have to listen to him talk for hours about how the environment cannot be spared at the expense of the economy, or that the US government should be responsible for helping flood or hurricane victims. It is so disturbing to me that in one breath he is telling me how kind, caring, and understanding he is, but in the next losing his cool because we got stopped in traffic because a church was letting out. He is a non-committal paradox, and he will argue any point from any side to always be right, no matter how ugly it is. This confusing, and I have no idea how to feel, or what to trust about him. Values are a very important part of a relationship, and when we met our values aligned. Now I am starting to see we are not. To make matters worse he has decided that he wants to pursue a job in the UK for 3 years, and wants me to come over after a couple years and live with him, once I have wrapped up taking the CPA exam. Our relationship is rocky, and I support him in decision to go, and am even excited for him, but it seems that with thing so strained how in the world are we going to maintain a long distance relationship. He is not an evil guy, and is a boat load of fun, but we have no plans of getting married, and I don’t know where our future is headed. If I can’t trust things now, how can I give up everything and move half way around the world? Is there any way I can make him understand that his nastiness towards other races and despairing comments about women are hurtful, and that words have power? When I confront him on the things I am told I am delusional and projecting things onto him, and that he didn’t say that, and I should listen better, and I am a terrible communicator. Any advice?
November 2, 2017 at 12:11 pm #176287AnonymousGuestDear Natalie:
Yes, I do have advice: don’t confront him with his/ your stands on racism, the environment, and so forth, not if you want a better relationship with him. It is not his fault that he feels the way he does. His emotions on these issues are a result of existing neuropathways in his brain that when get activated, they get activated. Better not activate them.
Of course it is your right to choose a different man… with different neuropathways, but if you choose to continue this relationship, better accept his pathway for what they are. These pathways, the ways they were created, are usually not a matter of character or thoughtful choices, but are a result of what he had heard at an early age, heard and recorded. What is a matter of character is acting-or-not on these pathways. Behavior is subject to choice, not feelings.
anita
November 3, 2017 at 4:50 am #176363InkyParticipantHi Natalie,
My advice is to cheer him on, let him move with great fanfare… and then casually don’t move in with him halfway across the world later. Usually I would tell people to be direct, but in your case it will be tons easier to break up with him long distance as he always makes you “wrong”. This way you can literally unplug.
If he asks (after you dump him through video chat and before you unplug) tell him that his political views, **AND RANTING** is way over the top. It is not what you say, it’s how you say it. I mean, your aunt can love your uncle even though he’s a Republican, but when she leaves him because he keeps ruining the holidays with his drunken racist rants everyone totally understands the real reason why. And it’s not because of his conservative views.
Good Luck!
Inky
- This reply was modified 7 years ago by Inky.
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