u/redder333

I love my boyfriend, we’ve been together 9 years, and we’ve done long distance before (undergrad, internships), so it’s really nothing new for us.

The real issue is, we’re together or apart, roughly every 6 months we have a fight because I come to him with my feelings (about him or not) and he gets mad at me. It’s not everytime, but every 6 months there is a time it will make him completely push me away. Sometimes it’s framed as me “not approaching him right” or “expecting him to be a perfect listener.”Often he eventually admits he was being mean about it, usually after I’ve already apologized.

This time feels different. I moved from Columbus to NYC 2.5 months ago for my first job out of grad school. He was excited, and has been calling it a stepping stone for both of us since it gives him a push to leave his current unfulfilling tech job. Tuesday night we were on a call and I was having a horrible day at work. This is something that, I admit for the last month I’ve probably complained and leaned into him for support about a little too much. I told him I was ready to start job hunting again. He seemed checked out the whole call and eventually asked to get off to do leetcode.

Hours later I called back to tell him I’d booked a therapy appointment and asked to talk more. At this point, what had gone from a bad day at work had turned into me being in a really bad spot. He said “give me 10-20 minutes.” 45 minutes later I called again because i thought he forgot, but he was on his computer, barely responding. I finally said if he wanted to get off the phone he should just say so instead of making me feel worse. I told him this felt like the same pattern from past long distance stretches where he makes me feel bad for coming to him when I’m really going through it.

That’s when he blew up. He said my feelings have become an inconvenience given his own stress about finding a job to move here, said I don’t appreciate him enough after he supported me through grad school, sarcastically said “it’s about time” I went back to therapy since he’s “been telling me for months.” (I can acknowledge I should have started again while job hunting earlier in the year.) When I said I’d call my mom instead about it because I’ve clearly overwhelmed him, he said “yeah, go ahead, I clearly don’t give you the 100% perfect response every time.” He also said “literally all of this is so you can have a career.”

I ended up just apologizing repeatedly. I know I’ve leaned on him a lot this past month, and that’s fair to own. But the move benefits him too (better earning potential, and he’s very career/finance-focused), and I do regularly acknowledge his financial contribution and I make it clear i’ll to make it up to him once this all works out, even when he insists he views us basically married at this point and it’s “our finances.”

Well, we haven’t talked in almost 3 days now. I called on day 2 as an olive branch and he declined it . I texted an apology about the pressure he’s under and leaning on him too much. He left me on read.

I’m not perfect in this either, but at what point is this just unacceptable? Am I being unreasonable, or has this actually crossed a line?​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ How do you navigate this when we’re both stressed from a big change?