Ask him if he thinks [it] is a big deal.
Assuming he says no, ask if he respects you.
Assuming...
Thanks for this. I know he thinks it isn't a big deal because he has already told me so, but I didn't ask him if he respects me though, that's a good point.
I think the reason why I "erupt" at him every few months like this, is because a whole bunch of little things eventually add up into something big, and I explode at him. So when I say to him that I feel insecure because some woman who lives in America that he has a business relationship with, calls him sweetie (and he calls her sweetie in return), he says I'm overreacting. But the problem is that he doesn't call ME by any terms of endearment most of the time AND he rarely gives me affection unless I ask him for it (and even then makes sure I know that he's not really into it) AND he almost never says "I love you" without me saying it first (and sometimes not even then) AND barely talks to me half the time AND didn't do want to do anything special for our anniversary AND nitpicks every little thing I do that irritates him without ever acknowledging anything nice I do for him AND AND AND. AND THEN, on top of all that, he carries on all affectionate-like with some girl overseas who exports guns for him. So the thing with the American girl is not in itself a big deal. I understand that he's been dealing with her for many years and they are friendly - and she does him lots of favours by making his urgent orders a priority, so he wants to maintain a good relationship with her. BUT, taken with all the other things that he's NOT doing to show his love for ME, some days it becomes the straw that breaks the camel's back.
I feel like I have explained this to him. Probably not quite as clearly as I did in the above paragraph, but when I'm in the middle of an argument with him, I tend to get flustered and forget to make salient points, so that he will understand.
And so the issue never gets resolved to my satisfaction, as each time we discuss it, the end result is that he thinks that the problem is me needing to "get over" my trust issues (which is much more easily said than done), and that he doesn't need to change anything about his behaviour (and I'm just being "hysterical", as
@Sighs pointed out).
I'm racking my brain trying to work out how I can bring this issue up again in a way that a) doesn't stress him out too much and b) gets my point across, but it's hard, because when he's stressed out (which is most of the time) I don't want to bring this stuff up, and when things are going well, I don't want to "ruin" his good mood! *sigh*
I feel like I do need to bring this up again, because the problem will not go away until I can get him to understand, and undertake to be more considerate of my needs.
The next time he nitpicks something that I've done "wrong", I think I will challenge him and say - "The next time you get annoyed about something I've done, I want you to ALSO think of something
nice I've done for you recently. Because it really upsets me that you only seem to focus on the negatives in our relationship."
