Anonymous wrote:What? So he opened up to you as he could about his feelings and you pretty much called him immature and shut it down? No wonder he’s not talking to you.
I would have said “why do you feel like that?” Is is the same as when you were in hs?” What would you rather feel like? Anything we can do to make this better?”
Your partner wants to talk to you about his vision of himself and you’re not even listening.
+1
It’s like tell my kids, you deal with the reason you are upset in the moment, not days/weeks later as a justification to be mean. Conversations like “why did you call your teenage sister “baby” when you know she doesn’t make like it, “well last week she said my outfit was ugly”... If the 401K is an the issue, then during a conversation about finances, work this out. If it’s that serious that you feel you need counseling or divorce, then bring this up as a separate conversation that finances are giving you anxiety and how can you work together to improve the situation. While I get human nature makes it easier to be passive aggressive rather than face a situation head on when it occurs, it’s not productive or useful to actually changing the underlying situation to behave this way.
For the specific conversation, I saw an opening about why he feels disconnected and not anchored. Usually people keep up a facade of everything being perfect until it’s not so I would have taken that opening to find out what is going on. Maybe it’s related to behavior you are finding puzzling and doesn’t make sense to you, maybe it’s not. But to move forward in your relationship and tackle the hard stuff, each of you have to feel like you are being heard by the other person and that you are a team.