Dating Disasters·
LOWER YOUR VOLUME
An enthusiastic speaker faces constant interruptions from a partner who says 'lower your volume,' prompting a heated question about boundaries, respect, and who deserves to own the moment.
Stop the interruptions, or keep correcting?
Be one of the first to vote.
The conversation ends the same way every time: mid-thought, mid-excitement, with a flat interruption, "lower your volume."
That's the part that stings.
The poster says they've always been the kind of person who gets louder when they're excited about something. Not screaming, just rising as the topic gets interesting. They don't notice it happening in the moment. "I don't realize I'm doing it in the moment," they said, which means the shift in volume is never deliberate, never meant as a push past anyone else's comfort.
But their partner keeps cutting in anyway.
According to the poster, it happens in the middle of sentences. They'll be talking about something they care about, building toward a point, and then their partner will interrupt to say, "lower your volume." The poster doesn't think it's said rudely. They understand the basic request: keep the conversation at a comfortable level. That part isn't the problem.
The problem is what happens after.
Each interruption leaves them feeling "demoralised, and a little self conscious." The excitement drains out of the moment. The topic they were just eager to talk about suddenly feels exposed, awkward, too much. Instead of continuing, they lose their enthusiasm and no longer want to keep talking about it.
They say they've tried to explain this to their partner. They've told them that being interrupted like that makes them shut down, that the correction lands hard even if the tone is calm. But nothing has changed. "They still keep interrupting me," the poster said.
So the question at the center of it is simple, but loaded: are they wrong for wanting the interruptions to stop?
The poster says they can see both sides. They don't think their partner is trying to be mean. They know they should probably watch their own volume. But they also don't want every excited conversation to be broken in half by a reminder that makes them feel smaller in the middle of speaking.
"Am I the asshole for wanting them to stop interrupting me like that?" they asked.
It's a question about tone, timing, and whether a repeated correction can become its own kind of shutdown, even when the request itself is ordinary.