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writes: Ive been in love with a guy for 4 years. We are constantly fighting about little things. We feel so distant. I dont want to loose him. I want to improve things for us. he gets angry with me when i tell him my feelings... help Reply to this Question
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reader, anonymous, writes (26 February 2006): When you've been in a relationship for a long time, it's easy for lots of little frustrations to build up, and your attitudes start to feed off one another.
Do you really want to save your relationship? I mean - do you really love this guy? Do you really feel like you'd do anything, go anywhere for him? It's important, because saving things might not be easy, so you need to decide that it's really what you want and then commit to the work it will take.
Step 1: Stop fighting. Seriously - just stop fighting with him. It takes two people to have an argument. Think about that. You can't necessarily stop him from getting annoyed with you or picking at you. But you control 100% how you respond. Make the decision to stop fighting, and then stick to it. You say you're constantly fighting about little things, which suggests they're not important. That's good- it shouldn't be easy to let it go if that's true. This won't work immediately, and there will be times when you feel like he's being completely unreasonably and you want to react in kind. Don't do it. Whatever he does, whatever he says, act kindly. Be quick to apologize. Don't pick at him. Don't get snippy. Don't nag him about the many things he's forgotten to do that he said he would. First of all, none of that's been helping, anyway, so there's no point. Secondly, pestering him is just going to perpetuate the tension between you two.
Give things some time. Go out of your way for the next several weeks to just really be giving - try really hard not to think about yourself. A lot of people have a hard time with this - they feel like relationships are supposed to be 50-50. They're not. Relationships require compromise, which sometimes means 50-50 and sometimes means 100-0. You're the one who wrote to this board saying you don't want to lose him, so right now, you're the one in the position to give this relationship 100%. After some amount of time - four weeks? six weeks? - you'll have a sense for whether things are getting any better. At that point, try talking to him calmly about what's been going on and how things can get better. But remember - don't do that (asking him to change) until you've put in several weeks of hard work showing your willingness and ability to change yourself.
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