I’m not sure really how to begin this, and I feel like this is more of a vent rather than seeking actual advice. I just feel lost and a bit desperate for external thoughts/opinions on my situation.
I have been living in Japan for about 2 year and a bit years now as a university student (and I’ve studied Japanese on and off for about 2.5 years). My language ability is not great but it’s not bad either. I understand what people are saying to me and I don’t have many issues with expressing how I feel on a somewhat basic level, but I’m no where near fluent or even comfortable in Japanese. Progress is pretty slow going. I’m studying everyday with little visible results. I don’t have many local friends, I have found that people are more closed off, especially towards foreigners. I also feel like, in order to make good friends here, you gotta be comfortable enough to converse with them in Japanese. I am feeling a little bit stuck and not even sure how to continue and what to do. I’m a bit of a fish out of water. And thanks to COVID-19, it has been even harder than it was before to really get out there and make friends during the last 1.5 years. I’ve tried sports and hobby clubs, I’ve tried apps to meet friends, classmates, tutors, you make it, but I haven’t been able to make any long-term friends/connections which further cements my feelings of sadness/slow resentment towards myself, my situation and also my partner.
Onto my partner. He and I had been together for 10 months (he is native Japanese) and he is bilingual after studying and living in the states for 4 years and studying English since junior high school. We have a great relationship and I sincerely care for him and love him. Together we converse 95% of the time in English, which didn’t ever used to bother me, up until recently. He is aware that I am seriously studying Japanese and pretty eager to use what I’ve learnt, but almost quite worried about not being able to reach a level of fluency that would allow for more career options here in Japan.
But here’s the thing. Despite him knowing how much this is placing my mind, he says he knows how I feel but he just doesn’t seem be interested in helping out in the slightest.
There are times when we switch our spoken language to Japanese, but it’s always very short lived and it honestly hurts because I feel like he doesn’t feel like I’m good enough (which I get is true) but it hurts and is honestly really unmotivating. I also feel like he would just rather converse in English since we’re both comfortable in it and since he wants to keep up his ability since he is no longer using it on a daily basis. Sometimes on the rare occasion that we are talking in Japanese, if I suddenly ask about what one word means, he will switch completely back to English and finish what he was saying/explaining all in English. Last night when he did this, I asked him if he did it because he felt I didn’t understand. He said it was because explaining something in your second language helps improve your ability a lot. I always feel like since he’s the one who is the most proficient, he’s the one who receives all of the language benefits.
I understand there shouldn’t be any kind of score or tally like this in relationships, but recently I couldn’t help but notice the glaring contrast between our use of English/Japanese. I feel like it’s all very one-sided, as I am always helping him with his English mistakes while speaking/texting, etc. I have also expressed on multiple occasions that I’m worried that I’m not improving because I’m not using Japanese enough on a daily basis. I know that it is not at all my partners responsibility to assist me and act as more of a tutor than a boyfriend (I would never want that). I just kind of want him to want to help me out a bit from time to time.
When I’ve expressed my feelings of worry and my He just points at me which has now become his way of saying, ‘say what you just said but in Japanese.’ But often times I can’t… And so I just feel trapped in this cycle of studying, attempting and not getting anywhere beyond basic conversation and it’s starting to actually also impact my mental health. I cry about this often and I am honestly contemplating if I kinda fucked up and should’ve immersed myself even more into the local culture and made more of an effort to be with only people who spoke Japanese when I first arrived here.
Long story short, I feel like a bit of a failure for not being more proficient in the language by now and also I feel like I’m coming to resent my partner (even though I really truly don’t want to).
Is there any way around how I’m feeling and could there be some way where everyone wins here and everyone can achieve what they want? I feel like this will continue to be an issue for me and I don’t want it to come to a point where is affects my relationship any further / break us up.
TLDR: I am studying Japanese and feel like my progress is really slow going and my native speaker partner doesn’t seem to understand how I’m feeling and continues to mainly use English when we communicate and it’s beginning to make me resent him.
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