As a suspected introvert, I really love sitting down and hearing about my partner’s day, but this is really crucial:
>Its tiring to be mostly on receiving end, either there is a lot of negative stuff being unloaded unto you, or people are hopeless in some basic situations and can't speak up or generally help themselves or similar, and there is very little I can actually help with.
I’m sure OP is wonderful and I don’t want to make assumptions about them, but I’d hate to do this with someone who is really negative and finds too many things to complain about. The other thing you mentioned is that if you’re a certain type of listener, it is an exhaustible skill to engage with so many “i need comfort not solutions” type stories and conversations.
> it is an exhaustible skill to engage with so many “i need comfort not solutions” type stories and conversations.
Very much this. I'm in a similar situation myself, and I noticed at some point I started mentally begging for any of the complaint to be something solvable, because I'm running empty on comfort. It's especially hard when you heard the exact same complaint for like 5 times in the last two weeks; comforting stops feeling sincere just by sheer repetition.
>Its tiring to be mostly on receiving end, either there is a lot of negative stuff being unloaded unto you, or people are hopeless in some basic situations and can't speak up or generally help themselves or similar, and there is very little I can actually help with.
I’m sure OP is wonderful and I don’t want to make assumptions about them, but I’d hate to do this with someone who is really negative and finds too many things to complain about. The other thing you mentioned is that if you’re a certain type of listener, it is an exhaustible skill to engage with so many “i need comfort not solutions” type stories and conversations.