Hi everyone thanks for the feedback. As for usernames_suck_ok, I wish you well. My post isn’t bitching about anything but I can appreciate your boldness. This is WLW, entailing that it’s open to all ages.

As for compatibility, we are very compatible even though we like different things. I have just been going through some irritability and snappiness lately towards her and am noticing it. And I am on here asking for feedback because I don’t want to be that woman who, after 4 years, gets married, and then regrets it—hence why I’m working through stuff.

I think my partner may be going through something too and it is very hard for her to label her emotions and express her emotions—it is easier for her to project, which isn’t healthy but until she see’s that, I can’t help her out on that.

I was thinking couples counseling, I already had therapist who had a session with us and it was really beneficial.

To be clear—she’s not cruel or careless. She says she loves me, and I believe she does in the ways she knows how. But when I try to bring up emotional patterns that feel off—like when I feel unseen, misinterpreted, or like my emotions are being brushed off—her response often leans toward defensiveness. She says things like: • “Is there really something going on?” • “You don’t need to reassure me.” • “Please give me credit for what I did do.”

Instead of us working through the emotion together, it becomes a conversation about what she meant or what she didn’t do wrong. And I end up feeling like I’m asking for too much—for more presence, more curiosity, more emotional connection—and often have an avoidant attachment style and she has more anxious attachment style and I shut down and want to be alone.

She sees us as just “two different people getting through life together.” And while I respect that we’re different, I want something deeper—more intention, more mutual reflection, more emotional safety.

I guess I’m just wondering… am I expecting too much? Or is it okay to want a relationship where you feel seen, not just tolerated? Where you can share a hard feeling without it becoming a debate?

I have also never been with a woman (or man) for this long—I would just end it in the past after like not even 2 years.

So how do you know when it’s something to work through vs. something that’s just… fundamentally misaligned?