My (28F) boyfriend (29M) thinks I'm complaining, but I feel like I'm just sharing things from my day

My boyfriend and I have been together for about 9 months now. We had a sort of casual thing for about 2 years prior to that, as I was applying for grad school previously and we were unsure of where I would end up location wise. Besides this he has been a very supportive person in my life, very thoughtful and helpful. However, I'm not sure if what we are experiencing is just a fundamental incompatibility.

We seem to be arguing a lot more lately and I need some insight. The main issue is that he thinks that I am often negative and complaining, when I view it as just like talking about things that happen that aren't necessarily positive or negative. For example, I sent him a text today about being unable to find a store earlier in the day.

This was my text "I got lost in that suburbia hellscape today. Over by the mall where there's the home depot and the target and every other store imaginable lol. I was trying to get to xx but it doesn't exist, at least not where Google maps said it was. Even the satellite view of it shows an empty lot. I'm still very confused!"

From my viewpoint, this wasn't a complaint. I felt like I was just sharing something that happened in my day that I found amusing, not to mention the area I was talking about we had joked about previously as being super weird and confusing. He proceeded to send me a screenshot of the dictionary definition of "complaint". So I said I understood his viewpoint and that I shouldn't have mentioned it. He then basically wouldn't drop it, even when I was trying to be understanding of his viewpoint. He said he doesn't understand how I lack such self awareness around this issue, that I always seem to play the victim, amongst other sort of hurtful things.

Last week we had a similar incident when I was expressing how I felt uncomfortable because an email was missed for a position I was applying to related to grad school. The application was a formality but I still had to send the documents in by the deadline, which I did but the person in charge must have overlooked it. I was notified by someone else to resend it. I was feeling not so great about it because it still felt like I made a bad first impression and even if I corrected the situation, the person still thought I slacked off and didn't send the docs when requested. I'm probably providing too much detail on this, but my point is I was feeling kind of crappy about the whole thing.

I told my boyfriend and later he brought it up in an argument as an example of me complaining too much. Saying why would I even mention it, what is he supposed to do about it, it doesn't even matter and the person probably doesn't care about me and I'm overthinking it.

I tried to explain that it was just me sharing something that happened that made me feel a certain way and I didn't think I was complaining. Really I just wanted to be heard but it feels like he is only willing to listen if what I say is positive. Life is not always positive and there will be some negative moments and emotions. I'm not sure how else I can communicate this to him or if we will ever see eye to eye on it. To me, part of being in a relationship is having the space to vent about things sometimes. I know no one wants to hear that all the time, but I really don't think I'm doing that.

I grew up in a household with a lot of negativity, so I am not surprised that I picked up some of it. But I absolutely do not want to be a super negative person and I'm really trying to be more aware of the things I say. But something like the above, to me, is just a normal thing to share in a relationship. I've just started therapy too because I know he's not completely wrong in this. But when we discuss it, it seems like he is asking me to see his viewpoint only as the right one and what my viewpoint is doesn't matter. I guess I'm looking for alternative perspectives on how to handle this?

tldr: Boyfriend thinks I complain too much, I think I'm just sharing things that happen and they aren't necessarily positive or negative.

Submitted December 03, 2019 at 07:21PM by flotus2016 https://ift.tt/363Ibqo