"It's always me they're like this with"

Here's a belief that feels like evidence. They're not like this with other people. With their friends they're warm. With you they're short. So it must be you.

I'd ask about the sample. You see how they are with you. You see how they are with other people at parties, at the school gate, on the phone, in short public stretches where everyone is warm. You don't see how they are in the car alone, or at eleven at night after a bad day, or at the kitchen table when nobody's watching, because the only person at that kitchen table is you. Your sample of them is the private one, and everyone else's sample is the public one, and you're comparing your private sample to their public one and concluding that the difference is you.

Story and Repetti's couples were angrier and more withdrawn at home on bad work days. Not at work. At home. The bad day was carried into the one place it could be put down, which is the place with the person who'll still be there tomorrow. That's not a sign that you're the problem. It's a sign that you're the safe one, and being the safe one means getting the weather that the public sample never sees.

If you want to test this, compare notes. Ask their sister, or an old friend, whether they go quiet when they're tired. You'll usually hear a laugh and a story about a car journey in 2009. The quiet at dinner is the quiet they've always had. It's not aimed. It's what they're like when the day has been long, and you're the person who gets to see it, which is a different thing from being the reason for it.

There's an honest exception, and it's in chapter 24. If they're warm with everyone and cold with you, consistently, over months, and the check doesn't clear it, that's information. But "always me" usually means "I'm the only one who's there for it", and those aren't the same.