I (27 F) and my husband (26 M) have been married for almost 3 years, together for 4. I feel like there have been a few times where I know our communication can improve but idk why I feel like we struggle with it.
Last night we were sitting on the couch watching our show and decided it was time to get ready for bed. I work night shifts and I had just finished my stretch of 4 shifts that morning, so I slept from 8am-1-30pm (ish). I was still exhausted from my work and I was tired (possibly a little over tired). My husband kept saying “you’re always tired”, which is usually a way he likes to tease me. I understand he was trying to be teasing about it, but he just kept saying it over and over. I would say things like “I know” or “well yea I just worked” and I was kinda over hearing it. When he kept saying it, I started to say things like “babe don’t be rude”, “stop being rude”. It got to the point that I felt like he was making fun on me and me being tired is a bad thing. I start to get upset and then he gets frustrated and goes “babe I was just teasing you don’t need to cry”. I start to try and explain my self and then he’s like “I should have just stayed at the school and studied if you’re so tired”. This really hurt my feelings because I was out of town for 4 days, and then just worked 4 days in a row, so we haven’t seen each other much. I was excited to finally sleep next to him but now I’m upset and he just stopped talking. After he made the comment about studying, I said something like “babe! Really??” And then he didn’t say anything. We went to bed without another word.
Whenever I try to bring up how sometimes I feel like he teases me to much, he’ll either say something like “I know I need to work on it” or “I just won’t do it at all then”. It really frustrates me because I want to have a compromise where we can have the fun, playful teasing, but then when I say I’m done he knows to stop. But it never works out and every once in a while I “ruin the mood” by getting upset. Any advice??
TL;DR: how can I tell my husband when his teasing is too much without him getting offended or me getting upset?
Comments
Meta-communication.
Sit him down and communicate about how you communicate.
In this specific case, you would tell him that, when he continued to make that joke, it made you feel xyz, and from your perspective, you told him to stop when you gave noncommittal answers. In the future, when you react with these phrases, please see it as me telling you to stop.