I was feeling tired after work and wanted some alone time to eat dinner and watch a video on YT.
I came to my boyfriend and nicely asked to not distrub me while I eat. We do this sometimes when we want alone time, we just tell each other "Do not distrub mode please š ".
I noticed he kind of got annoyed at me asking for this and I asked if something is wrong. He said no.
I then went to eat, and literally 15-20 min in, he comes into the room to play with our cat. I pause a video and quietly wait for him to leave, which he does in a minute. Then he comes to the room again, chasing the cat, playing. I didn’t say anything. Then he comes again and tries to talk to me (I think he satrted with "what are you doing/watching" but I don’t remember exactly). And I said "didn’t I ask to not disturb me?". I said it normally, no yelling, nothing. Yes, I was a bit irritated, but I wasn’t mean to him.
He sighes and leaves. We don’t speak for an hour and when he goes to the kitchen, I come to him and nicely ask "is everything ok baby?" he says yes, and I see he is being cold, but I leave it. Then 20-40 min more pass and I come to the room where he is and say "hey, is something wrong? I can see you are upset? Did I do something wrong?"
He says "Do you think you did something wrong?", I say I don’t and he says nothing is wrong. The vibe is really off and I leave.
I go to another room and watch a history video on YT. He comes to me and says "I really didn’t like how you acted earlier today".
Me: "Why?"
Him: "You disrespected me several times. You raised your voice at me when I came to check on you"
Me: "I didn’t raise my voice tho".
We keep arguing back and forth, he says I disrespect him and I keep saying that I was trying to be nice to him but he didn’t want to talk to me earlier and it is weird how he chose to present that he is upset.
While we were arguing (I stayed respectful to him but it really irritated the way he spoke to me like I was a kid who misbehaved) he started raising his voice, leaving the room and then coming back. He even said "you think I will back down? I won’t back down".
It is so weird that he chose to speak to me this way, and when I brought it up, he said I am trying to ignore his feelings and his experience and instead focus on words.
He then left the apartment and came back in 15 min. Asked me if I changed my mind and I said "not really" and he just left to another room :/
AITA in this situation??
Ultimately, NTA. An important part of a relationship is time apart, just as much as time together. You stated that’s something you both do often, specifically asking for alone time. I wonder though, does he frequently respect your request, and this is just a one off? Do you respect his asking for it?
I always respect his time alone. I might sometimes forget, get into the room where he is and see he is irritated, and I usually apologize and leave.
I’d say he usually respects it, but I often find it hard to ask for my “do not distrub time” to not upset him. idk why, I feel like it irritates him or makes him sad
This seems like a double standard. Are there other one-sided rules in your relationship, that you respect but he does not?
You should communicate your feelings to him and reevaluate your relationship if he doesn’t respect you.
Stop asking if heās ok or if anything is wrong when heās pouting like that. You are accidentally rewarding his bad behavior. Ignore him being huffy and let him use his adult words if there is something he needs to talk about
NTA. He acted cold instead of communicating, which is a major red flag. If “do not disturb mode” is a part of your relationship, then he should respect that.Ā
NTA. he disrespect the set boundaries you both agreed on that are so clear, youāve even come up with words to say to each other for them!
When is he going to apologise for crashing your alone time THREE TIMES!?!?
NTA. You were clear about what you needed, he was passive aggressive and disrespectful.
NTA. Ever heard of DARVO, because thatās what heās doing. Making himself the victim when he, in fact, disrespected you by denying your request. He wasnāt having an āexperienceā or āfeelingsā other than loss of control over you.
The use of the word ādisrespectā gets my antennae up. āDisrespectā is so often a word used by men toward women to mean āyou wonāt let me control youā.
If heād said āI felt hurt that you didnāt want my companyā then they maybe could have had a conversation about expectations for the ādo not disturbā practice. āYou disrespected meā is just a fight.
This is honestly why we argued. I don’t mind apologizing if my tone was rude. But saying I acted disrespectfully, and unless I accept it he won’t back down….I am a bit speechless and sad :/
He deliberately ruined your quiet time, and he knew exactly what he was doing. He was extremely disrespectful and you need to call him out on this, and tell him it’s not acceptable.
NTA. To me it sounds like he takes it personally that you need alone time. Maybe he gets insecure that you donāt want to spend time with him, and crosses your boundary to get your attention. When that didnāt work he got pissed because āshe doesnāt like meā. He sounds childish, maybe you guys are both young? You sound more mature tho. He has a lot to learn about boundaries and talking about his feelings and how stuff like this makes him feel instead of taking it out on you.
Massive NTA. You both have a preexisting precedent for a small amount of alone time. He didnāt respect that. He clearly wanted some attention which, yāknow fair enough you didnāt pick up on and it prolly annoyed him, but for him to then act passive aggressive and non-communicative and then throw out the ādisrespectāā¦Iām a guy and to me guys who throw that word around at small things like this is a huge red flag. Yāknow, that and the lack of communication and petty bullshit.
yes, it doesn’t even happen that often, the last time I asked for alone time was maybe 2-4 weeks ago. And it makes me sad that sometimes he has bad days and is visibly annoyed and is obviously not the nicest person to be around, but I let him be and support him, try to calm him down.
And then I make one small mistake, like being irritated, and an argument happens.
It makes me very very sad š