What we have here is a failure to communicate…

Boy, does that famous movie quote resonate with this story!

If you were with a partner from another culture, would you want them to learn your native language?

This woman wasn’t bothered by her partner refusing to learn her native language at first, but now, the situation has changed!

Check out what this woman had to say on Reddit and see if you think she’s being unreasonable.

AITA for telling my BF that I’m upset because he’s learning his coworker’s language but gave up on learning mine?

“I (28F) am originally from China and I moved to the U.S. to study and now I work here.

I’ve been in a relationship with my boyfriend for two years now, let’s call him Mike (30M).

Lately something has been bothering me and I need an outside perspective on it.

It’s Mike’s reaction to his coworker that is bothering her.

So Mike works at a marketing agency and he has a coworker, Eliza (27F).

She works at the same company but in a different team, so they don’t really work together much, except during company wide events or the rare times their teams collaborate. Mostly they just see each other during breaks or during lunch.

Eliza is deaf and has been since birth.

The company provides interpreters, so there’s always someone there to allow communication when needed. Despite this Mike recently started learning ASL (American sign language) so he can “communicate with Eliza more easily”.

She’s not totally cool with this…

At first I thought it was sweet, but the more I thought about it, the more it bothered me.

I asked Mike before if he would ever want to learn a bit of Mandarin. Not because I expect him to be fluent or anything, but because it’s my first language and it would mean a lot to me if he showed an interest in that part of my life.

My family back home doesn’t speak English and I thought it would be a nice gesture.

Mike tried Duolingo for like two lessons before giving up, saying that Mandarin was too hard because of the characters and tones. He said it wasn’t worth the effort since I speak English anyway and we don’t need Mandarin to communicate, so he deleted the app.

She doesn’t understand why he’s willing to learn ASL but not Mandarin.

I told him I could teach him some phrases, nothing really difficult, but he also declined.

And I get that. Mandarin is incredibly hard to learn when you speak a language that’s so different. But now he’s putting all this effort into learning ASL for a coworker who he doesn’t even work with too closely.

I pointed out that Eliza already has interpreters, so it’s not like learning ASL is essential for him to talk to her.

It feels like the same situation as us, he doesn’t need to learn her language either. But somehow that is worth the effort while Mandarin wasn’t.

They don’t see eye to eye about this.

When I brought this up Mike said I was being unreasonable and that learning ASL is “different” because it’s about inclusivity and making someone feel comfortable.

I asked him if he didn’t care about making me or my relatives happy by surprising them with some Mandarin phrases when I also speak his first language and that language gives you some insight into a person’s culture and background.

But he insisted that it isn’t the same thing.

Her friends have differing opinions.

I told two of my best friends about this.

One of them thinks I’m right to feel hurt. She said it’s weird for Mike to put this much effort into learning a coworker’s language but not his girlfriend’s and she even implied that maybe there’s something more going on between him and Eliza.

But my other friend said I’m overthinking everything and acting jealous for no reason. She said that ASL is a skill that benefits everyone, while Mandarin is more personal so it’s not fair to compare the two.

What to do…?

She said I need to trust Mike more and stop reading into things.

And she’s right that I struggled with trust issues in the past, but I’m really not sure if I’m being irrational here.

So now I’m really confused.

I don’t want to be the jealous girlfriend but I also can’t shake this feeling that it’s weird that he’s so willing to learn ASL but gave up on Mandarin almost instantly even though both languages aren’t “necessary” for him to learn.

AITA for feeling upset about this?”

I can definitely understand why it bothers her that he’s willing to learn another language for a coworker but not for her.

Here’s what readers had to say on Reddit.

This reader shared their thoughts.

Another person had a lot to say.

This individual spoke up.

Another Reddit user chimed in.

And this person shared their thoughts.

Talk about a communication breakdown…

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.