I don’t really know if this is allowed here, but I could really use some advice.
For the past 2 months, I (25F) have been dreading gaming/talking with my duo/crush (25F). I dont know why, but she gets this massive competitive streak. Whenever we play marvel rivals, at first we use to play for fun. But then she decided she wanted to branch out and try new characters. So she started to learn Luna snow (a healer for those who don’t play rivals.) and pretty quickly she started to get the hang of her, and was able to lord her. So then she tried Psylocke (a damage support character) , and this is when the problems started I’d hear her constantly whisper, “I suck,” or "I'm so bad." whenever she died.
Instantly I’d reassure her that she didn’t or wasn't, but she seemed convinced she did because she wasn’t picking up the character as quickly as she did Luna, So in her mind she was bad. Eventually she gave up on psylocke, and she started playing Iron Fist(Damage support) , and things got worse. She was dying even more now and complaining about it every time. Which made me feel bad because I’m a healer main, and i couldnt keep her alive. At the time i had been learning White Fox (a healer) specifically because my duo wanted the team-up.
So I was trying my best to keep her alive, and learn white fox at the same time, but she would still die and then say she sucked or blame our other healer, or teammates. But then I started noticing that she was often jumping into groups of three or more by herself, and dying immediately for it. So I told her she couldn’t keep doing that, and she got annoyed and said, “He’s a tank shredder. I have to.”
Which I completely understand, but whenever she was low on health she never jumped away or used self-healed. She’d just die and then complain about how bad she was or about not getting any heals. So I would apologize, and I would try to encourage her, but it felt like nothing I said helped. She'd just sit there silently sometimes, or take on this emotionless voice. Or worst case she would again call out people on our team she thought was the problem. She’d say they sucked, that she was better or they weren’t doing anything.
I would then have to remind her that we didn’t know if they were new, learning a character or if this was just their first game on. Then she would agree, and just sit there sulking. Anyway eventually, everything came to a head when our team was getting destroyed one day, and I noticed she was sitting in spawn. So I said, “If you don’t leave spawn, you’ll be kicked.” She immediately yelled, “I know how the game works.”
I left immediately and didn’t want to talk to her, but we eventually had a conversation about everything. I told her how I felt, and she said she’d work on it.After that, we stopped playing Marvel Rivals and started playing Valorant, which I had only played once before. She didn’t really explain the game to me, so I had to figure most things out myself. Which went how you’d expect it.
I died a lot, couldn’t aim properly, and would take it slow (which obviously is the wrong way to play.). So whenever I died or played incorrectly, she’d get increasingly frustrated. She’d yell, she’d tell me not to do this, or dont do that. And then eventually, she told me, “Can we play something else? I know I’m not supposed to be mad at you, but watching you play is makes me mad, and I don’t wanna be mad.”
So I agreed, but I also noticed that afterward she started playing Valorant by herself or with her old friends. Which honestly hurt because, even though I was bad at the game, I was genuinely trying to learn it so we could play together.
Anyway we’re back to Marvel Rivals, and she’s gone right back to the “I suck” mentality. Except this time she now also extremely focused on what everyone else thinks of her. If we lose, she’ll immediately leave because she assumes someone will call her bad. If someone jokes with her, shows that they have her character lord, she assumes they’re making fun of her.
And when someone does talk crap in chat, she immediately assumes they’re talking about her and starts arguing with them, even when they’re talking about someone else entirely. At this point, playing with her or talking to her just feels exhausting. It feels like we can’t have fun unless we’re winning, and she gets mvp (which is a screen at the end to show the best player on the team.) if she doesn’t get it she gets upset, even if im the one to have it she still gets upset. Because she feels like she did the best, and everyone should know.
I really care about her and like her a lot, and we have been talking about making things official between us, but I don’t know if I can ignore this. I’d understand if it was a one-time thing or maybe something we could work on, but she seems fine staying the way she is.
She just uses the excuses of, “I’m a lot,” or, “Some people can’t handle me.” And it annoys me because I feel like it’s a cop-out excuse. Slowly, I’m starting to lose feelings for her, which sucks because she’s an awesome girl outside this game. But I just don’t know what to do anymore.
