Never Enough

My Ex likes to cook and bake. I’m not a fan of cooking. For me, cooking is a chore like cleaning the bathroom: I enjoy the outcome, but not the process. One day, my Ex chose a dish for us and watched a recipe video with me. The plan was that she cooks it later with me assisting her. However, when she was busy studying, she suggested that we switch roles: I do the cooking while she oversees me and continues studying. I hesitated, because I hadn’t paid attention to the recipe and this scenario triggered my fear of negative evaluation. Yet, I decided to ignore my fear and agreed, because the suggestion made sense: she was busy and I was available.

It stressed me that she was watching and I made mistakes. She responded by smiling and making jokes. She later told me that she tried to lighten up the mood, as she sensed how I became stressed. To me, it felt like she was making fun of me, intensifying my fear of negative evaluation. I reacted short-tempered when she hinted at my mistakes.

When we talked about the situation later, she told me that it triggered her fear of abuse. She suffered from childhood abuse and reacts sensitive to any form of intimidation. I explained how I felt in that situation and that in no way I was intending to threaten her. We discussed how to deal with this issue in the future. She gave me a few tips from her experience, but also told me that I have a temper. I asked her for understanding that cooking is not as much fun for me as for her and to be patient without judging me.

Though it seemed that we resolved the issue amicably, it didn’t last. She kept expecting that I assist her with cooking meals that she had chosen and blamed me for not having fun. The blaming turned into shaming: me getting stressed over something that is fun for her, is a sign that there is a problem with me that I should work on in therapy. I countered with another occasion that was supposed to be fun. We went to an Eastern European restaurant, where some guests happened to have an exuberant celebration. It was a bit intimidating, but I just rolled with it, while she got scared. She argued that this is different, because you cook at home and home is the place where you feel safe. It was a silly argument. Her underlying motivation was that she likes cooking and she expects me to like it, too. If it stresses me, then something is wrong with me, because she gets intimidated, so I have to work on myself. This mentality is typical for narcissistic entitlement combined with a lack of responsibility: her needs come first and her partner has to adapt to her. The cooking incident would later become her reason number two for the failure of our relationship.