Boyfriend shows little to no emotion...HELP!

[KittylovingBlond]

Some Background:

I have been with my boyfriend for over 2 years, in which time I have fallen completely in love with him in many ways. He is the most positive person I know, and rarely complains about anything. He is extremely intelligent, has a fantastic career as a mechanical engineer (could be a borderline workaholic), and is affectionate when we are together. He loves me very much, and shows me on birthdays and Christmas with jewelry and other surprises. He’s great with his niece and nephew, and has a wonderful family relationship. His parents are from Germany, so they speak with an accent, and are genuinely very sweet people. He is one of the only people that I can spend a lot of time with without getting annoyed or tired of him. I have a full-time job at a bio-tech company and just recently started working towards my Master’s degree.

The problem(s):

I have begun to notice several patterns in our relationship which have caused us a great deal of stress. It seems like it’s only recently that these things come up though, so I am wondering if the added stress of starting school has affected my judgment. Anyway, the problem is that he seems to lack some very basic human emotions…or at least doesn’t know how to show them. He will tell me that he loves me before we hang up the phone, or sometimes in person when we are being affectionate. Beyond that, anyone’s guess is as good as mine. We live quite a distance away from each other which is a strain in itself, but with the distance comes a need for added reinforcement of love/caring during the times we are apart. One of the things I have noticed is that he cannot make plans ahead of time, even with me. He won’t even mention getting together with me until Thursday or Friday of every week, when it’s too late for me to make plans with others if he has something else going on. This lack of planning our next meeting makes me very upset because it seems like he doesn’t even think about me until the end of the week and then, only out of obligation. It is a long drive to my house, which he is usually the one to make because I have my own place.

The next problem is that since we aren’t together during the week, we have to depend on using the telephone to communicate. He is not good at responding to emails, text messages, or anything else, so we are left with the telephone. Our nightly chats have become routine and lack substance. It’s almost as if I am talking to a stranger every night. He doesn’t mention anything about me, or us, or when he wants to see me again. He talks about work, what’s going on with his parents, etc. Sometimes we will sit and not say anything at all. If I try to make conversation or tell him a story about what happened that day or something interesting I want to share, he either doesn’t respond at all, or he says “oh.” I try to lighten the mood and get him interested by asking him questions about himself and what he would do in certain situations, hypothetical of course. He thinks that this is annoying. If I have a bad day at work and try to tell him about it, he again, either doesn’t respond, or says “oh.”

There’s no situation which elicits sympathy from him. I could tell him anything that happened to me or almost happened to me during the day (for instance, a car accident) that upset me, and he would disregard it completely. If he says anything to these situations it’s something along the lines of “it could be worse,” or “suck it up.” I have been upset in many situations and have gone to him to unburden myself, with nothing but cold, logical responses. He says that I am over-dramatic, that I have no reason to be upset, and basically ignores it. If I am VERY upset, and he doesn’t understand the reason, then he tells me that I am “insane” or “sick.” He also thinks that I get upset and make up arguments because I like to. He thinks I enjoy arguing with him and crying. It is getting to the point where I don’t want to tell him anything at all, and the person that I turn to when I am upset is anyone but him.

Clearly, it’s not always like this and right now I am very biased because I am writing when I am upset, but this is how I feel a lot of the time and it’s causing a major rift in the relationship. My question is, is there a way to correct this? He rarely complains or is upset about anything- and tells me that when he is upset he doesn’t always have to make a big deal about it like I do. How can you teach someone to be sympathetic? I thought it was a natural response when someone is upset to say something comforting like “man I can’t believe that happened…” or “wow, I’m glad you’re okay.” It doesn’t even have to be elaborate, just SOMETHING, ANYTHING in response to my being upset. Am I wrong to expect him to empathize? Should I try and work on it with him or is it a characteristic that you either have or don’t have? I have never met anyone like this, and I don’t understand how someone who supposedly loves and cares about you can react to your pain in this way. Please, any advice would be appreciated.

PS. I should mention that I have met people who complain all the time about everything, and I am not one of those people. For me to talk about it means that I am really very upset, scared, shaken, etc. I would understand him if it was a constant whining problem.


-Kitty

[minks]

are you prepared for honest answers here??

[KittylovingBlond]

Absolutely

[minks]

Originally Posted by KittylovingBlond

Absolutely

Ok first things first, guys are not the greatest communicators of emotions period so you have to handle that.

Next has your guy always been emotionally "cool" if yes than you have nothing to worry about. That is his normal way. If it is a new thing then look further and be prepared for answers you may now like.

Ask yourself what you want hun, emotions a plenty or a good stable loving guy who is there in every way but the verbal emotions.

And another thing, some folks are crap at expressing much on the phone. I deal with the telephone daily, some calls are good others are nasty (my collection calls I become a real bag). So when I get on with someone for a personal call, I am most comfortable with the black and white stuff get to the point and emotions are best left for the up close and in person meetings. I hate to have a personal fight over the phone, I hate to talk personally over the phone, I find them cool and business like.
So perhaps he is that way too.

[KittylovingBlond]

Thank you for your response, I really appreciate the insight.

I think you may be right- he is generally "cool" emotionally, and rarely gets upset, anxious, or excited.

The problem is that the phone is really all we have in between visits, and if we talk like dry crackers it's almost worse than not talking at all. How do I keep the "love" during the week when I feel like he is a stranger on the phone? Maybe that is the solution...to not talk at all? What does that say about our relationship?

You are absolutely correct that we have some communication issues...and they have become very damaging. How do we go about fixing that? A lot of the time since he doesn't see a problem, and thus he won't be willing to work toward a solution.

If I knew how to approach it and find a way to work towards better communication, I think it would really help.

Thanks again for your thoughts!

[BabyRider]

Kitty, here's what I see:
Men are not emotional, women are. It's always been that way, and always will. Men have been "trained" that strong emotion is a weakness. It's silly, it's not fair, and it's the truth.
That said, let me start from your first paragraph and ask, Do you equate love with presents? Practically the first thing you mentioned was "He loves me and shows me by giving me "things" at Christmas and my birthdays." Material things, as I'm sure you know, have nothing to do with how much a person loves you.

You also said that he is borderline workaholic. There's part of your answer right there. Are you a young couple, planning a future? Perhaps he is thinking of that, working hard now, focusing all his energy on that, to make a better life for the TWO of you. A possibility?

You have expressed, very eloquently, a desire for more emotion from him to all of us. Can you do that with him? Not over the phone, but sitting him down, face to face, and saying, "Sweetheart, you know I love you. I know you love me. So why do I feel this distance from you so frequently?" Write down what you want, what you need, what you expect. There are things you can and should expect from him, emotional support being one of them. I use the "writing stuff down" method whenever I come across an issue I don't know how to resolve. While I'm alone, I think about what the problem is, and what I need to feel it's been fixed. I make a list. That way, you don't have to worry about forgetting things, you can get all your thoughts down without being interrupted, and you can approach him in the same business-like manner he seems to favor.

When you tell him about something that should elicit a response and he just shrugs, stop him and ask, "Doesn't that bother you?" Keep lobbing the ball into his court.
One of the most important things in a relationship is communication. But HOW you communicate your wants, needs and expectations is important as well. If emotion makes him uncomfortable, put it to him in a factual, formulated way. Find a way to discuss the issue on his terms.

I like what Minks said: "Has he always been this way?" Because if that's the case, you knew it going in. Were you hoping to change that? Because it is never a good idea to go into a relationship with the intention of "fixing" what you think is wrong with someone.

It's pretty obvious that you love him, so the last question is, how much effort are you willing to expend to resolve the issue? You can't change him, and shouldn't try, but if you can reach an understanding why he is this way, it will help you relate to him a lot better.

[KittylovingBlond]

Thank you for your response Babyrider, you also have a great deal of insight in this issue.

First, I want to address my opening paragraph- especially where I mentioned that he buys me jewelry to show that he loves me- I said that only to emphasize that I rarely see it in any other form. No, I do not equate gifts with love. In fact, I would give everything back for a resolution to this problem that is causing such heartache on my part. I didn't mean to mislead you there.

You are right on the money about his workaholic nature- he is planning to marry me and has said that he is just getting things together for us to settle down. He is working on buying a house and has always told me that everything he does for his job and training is so that we will be able to have the things that we want down the road.

You have also touched on an issue that I didn't address as plainly- my ability to communicate. I also have a problem in this regard, and have a hard time admitting fault most of the time. I also tend to bottle things up until they spill over, which causes a meltdown in the end. I think that because I have this issue of sharing personal information with anyone but people I am close to (besides you guys in the forum, ha!), is what makes it hurt even more when I don't get a response. It's almost like hey, I'm doing you a favor by showing you who I am, and you're ignoring me. So in that way perhaps I am setting myself up for disappointment...

I do understand and know for a fact that you can't change someone, and I don't intend to. I think we both have communication issues that we need to work on both with each other and seperately. Like I said, I just started getting bothered by this recently, so it must not have been an issue in the beginning. I should say that we met in college, and all but lived together for almost a year. After graduation, I bought a condo and moved near my home town, and he is still living at home an hour and a half away with his parents. He is planning to buy a townhouse in the next month or so, but it will be in the same area as he is now. It's been almost a year in this long-distance situation, and we have handled it alright so far. These recent hiccups are what I'm concerned about...and as I mentioned in the first post, it may be that I am overstressed with work and school and am more irritable now.

Thank you for the advice on keeping the ball in his court and pushing him towards the answer. I think that will probably do the trick. Thank you again for your in-depth response, I am very appreciative of the suggestions.

[weeder]

Very very frightening... especially the lack of sympathy part. Signal of narcissicim
to me.. This, unfortunately , just might not be the one your looking for. Be careful.

[KittylovingBlond]

Originally Posted by weeder

Very very frightening... especially the lack of sympathy part. Signal of narcissicim
to me.. This, unfortunately , just might not be the one your looking for. Be careful.

Thank you for your response Weeder, I hope you are not right...I'll keep everyone posted though.

[devist8me]

The link below is to a book by John Gray, "Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus". Like most books along these lines, its just this authors opinion about how things are but it really helped me. I suggest it to any friend who complains about things like this, your story rings a bell from previous friends who have had the same problems.


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...22302?v=glance