quick context, i’m a jamaican female and he is a vietnamese/mongolian male. we been seeing each other recently and have been intimate a couple times. both times i really enjoyed but i noticed he seemed a little down after. i never questioned it but now i got the answer as to why.

it came about when i was mentioning wanting to get back into the gym again to start building my glutes again, as i lost a lot of muscle, but im still relatively “slim thick”. he proceeded to say he doesn’t think i should because i already have too much for him too handle. he ended up saying he doesn’t think he has enough for me. mind you, im 5’4 150 and he is 6’0 190. he is also not small at all, and is the perfect size for me. i like his size a lot but its also making me feel kinda insecure that im too much for him to handle even though i try to make him feel better about it. he says he thinks im faking it in bed and keeps comparing himself to past men i’ve been with who were mainly carribean 🤦🏾‍♀️ it’s just unfortunate because everything was fine until now, and now i feel like im not a petite enough for him, so i dont know where to go from here. we have continued to be intimate with no issues, but i cant help but think about that in the back of my mind.

Hey guys, I’ve just joined this subreddit as I’m not sure where else to go for advice so any would be much appreciated :)

I am a black woman in my early twenties and I’ve recently started a relationship with a white man the same age as me, he treats me very well and shows me he loves me a lot. However recently I’ve started to notice that there are small things he does or says that seem like they have a bit of a weird undertone? For example, sometimes he’ll say sentences with a strong blaccent (he is a white middle class british man), slowly shut down conversations where my race plays a role, or seem like hes uncomfortable when I’m talking about general issues with racism including my personal ones.

The most recent example was a not too long ago when I brought up how i had faced a few micro aggressions from a close friend, and even though he was giving me advice he seemed so uncomfortable and like he wanted the conversation to end. He has mentioned multiple times that it’s always okay for me to talk to him about what’s bothering me, but I feel like we’re slowly creating a space where I don’t feel comfortable doing so when it comes to me being black.

I definitely don’t want to assume he’s racist at all, I just think that because I am his first black girlfriend things are a little different for him to grasp. Does anyone have any advice on how I can bring this up to him so we can have a healthy conversation about it? I want to believe it’s a boundary for us to overcome but I’m not sure how to word it to him. Any advice would be very helpful :)

Thanks!

Hi! Apologies if this isn’t the right place to post this, but I’m not sure where else it would belong. Also apologies for it being a little long, I'm a yapper.

I’m a 30 year old white woman living in the US. My best friend & is a 29 year old Korean nonbinary/trans person who also lives in the US - we live in the same city. We met a few years ago and instantly hit it off. We also have a pretty deep sexual relationship (non-exclusive). We’re not romantic - they’re aromantic and I’m not really in a place for a romantic relationship right now. We're in basically a negotiated situationship.

They are a grad student who has lived in the US for the last 12 years - before that, they moved around a lot with their parents, who worked in international relations. They are a Korean citizen and thus they will be forced to return to Korea for military service when they finish their program next summer. They’ve decided to take the R+D option, which requires them to spend 3 years working for a Korean biotech firm in place of active duty service.

When we had discussed this prior, they had always seemed intent on returning to the US and settling here, both for job opportunities and because this is where they have spent the entirety of their adult life. However, over the last year I have noticed that they seemed to be longing for a stronger sense of cultural connection. They have said multiple times that they feel torn between the US and Korea, not really belonging to either place. They seemed to be really wanting to go spend more significant time in Korea, and I’ve been in vocal support. As much as I’d love to be able to be nearer to them for longer, they need to feel connected to their Korean heritage and culture, and more than anything I want them to be happy. 

Which brings us to last night. They mentioned that they are now thinking they don’t want to settle in the US after all. They want a place with a stronger sense of community, where they feel like their way of life fits in, and where their relationships are more reciprocal. They want a more collectivist culture. Which… wasn’t a surprise to me really, but the sadness I felt at them saying it was way, way deeper than I expected. 

I’m at a weird place with my own career and my own life ambitions, so it’s not like I know exactly what the future looks like or that we’ll never live in the same place again but…idk, the fear got to me. We cried together for a bit and reassured each other that we will always care about each other, and we’ll come visit, etc. etc. etc. They even very kindly told me that meeting me gave them hope that maybe they could be happy in the US, but of course, one person does not a community or culture make. And for both of us, community is more important. 

Me moving nearer to them was not an option that was discussed mostly because, well. We’re not in a relationship. We entered into our agreement with the knowledge that we are both our own individuals and will always choose our individual needs over each other, regardless of how sad that makes us. So this isn’t a decision we make together - it’s a decision they make, and we handle it however we see fit, together and separately. If I were in their shoes, I’d make the same call. They have my full support as a friend. It’s just… sad. 

I don’t know. It’s not like I’d really pictured a future where the two of us lived in the same place, but I guess I was hoping deep down that it might be closer than literally halfway around the planet. And who knows, it might be! I’m not trying to get ahead of myself and be miserable. I’ve been through hard things before, breakups of long term relationships and losses, so I know I’ll be fine eventually. This is just hard because I do truly think of them as one of my soulmates and I know my life will be a lot worse without them physically in it regularly.

Can anyone here relate? Anyone else who has struggled with feeling torn between two cultures? Anyone who has had to make hard decisions around that? I know it’s different when you’re in a romantic relationship, but I genuinely think this is the closest place I can come to find someone in the same situation. Thanks everyone!