Stay Silent, Stay Together

Every kid hates to see their parents fight.
Doors slamming. Siblings crying.
We make promises to ourselves that we won’t argue with our future partners.
That no fighting equates to a healthy relationship.

I never fought with my first boyfriend. In fact, I prided myself on how well we kept the peace.
We watched as other couples faced conflict after conflict and laughed knowing that it could never be us.
I saw worth in a relationship where we never raised our voices, where we rarely disagreed, and where we sat out our issues until they disappeared.

Though, those issues never really disappear, do they?
We ignore and ignore, sweeping every conversation under the carpet.
Staying together. But staying silent.
Until that carpet is forcefully pulled from underneath us and there’s too much to navigate. Too much to try.

The Boy

In all honesty, I can’t think of much my first boyfriend and I would have argued about.
We were similar in so many ways, and any differences we did have never seemed big enough to cause conflict.

I loved him because he was kind above all else.
Because he was soft.
Because he was smart and driven.
Because he was friendly to all, but a best friend to me.

The dynamic we had was exactly what I imagined love would be when I was little.
Gentle. Safe. Fun.

Losing it was something I never prepared for.

The shift didn’t happen all at once.
It was quiet, but fast.
Like I blinked and something had changed.
And the worst part? I was the only one who seemed to notice.

It started with small things.
The way he stopped holding eye contact.
The way his tone flattened.
Excitement turned to idleness. Presence turned to passivity.

I felt it all but said nothing.
I told myself I was overthinking. Being too emotional. Reading into things.

Then he showed me a podcast clip.
A man saying abrasive, arrogant things.
I waited for him to call it what it was—bullshit.
I waited for us to laugh at how ridiculous it was.

But he didn’t.
He just nodded.
Nodded in agreement.

That was the moment I understood.
He was different.
And I wasn’t imagining it.

The Redpill Shift

I can’t fully explain what I felt at that moment.
Was it dramatic to feel like I was losing him?
Was it crazy to believe he was slipping away?

But the more I thought back on our conversations, the clearer everything became.
I wasn’t crazy.
I wasn’t sensitive.
I was right.

Still, I wasn’t ready to confront him.
Wasn’t ready to warn him about the danger of redpill content.
About how quickly men feeding other men false power can rewire everything they believe about women, about love, about themselves.

I didn’t want to sound patronising.
I didn’t want to play the role of the “nagging girlfriend” or the “woke girl.”
I wanted him to see it for himself.
To wake up and realise that this content wasn’t just going to break us—it was going to break him.
And I had faith that he was smart enough to do that.

But time passed. And we carried on as if nothing had changed.

Still, the things he started saying echoed in my mind.
Calling my girlfriends “sluts.”
Saying women wear makeup only to attract sexual attention.
Making sweeping statements that he insisted were “just facts.”

A few months earlier, he would’ve laughed at ideas like that.
Back when he was proud of how much respect he had for his mother and sisters.
Back when he still saw women as equals.

I started to bring it up. Carefully.
I tried to reinforce the importance of equality between genders.
That being a feminist doesn’t mean being anti-men.
That it’s about respect, not rivalry.

But he shut it down.
“Men and women are biologically different. We’ll never be equal.”

It missed the point entirely.
And he knew that.
He was smart enough to understand what I was actually saying.
He just chose not to.

It was like he was unraveling.
And the more it happened, the less space there was for me.

He didn’t have to say he stopped valuing my opinion. He showed it.
He didn’t need to admit he trusted men more than women. His silence made it clear.
I was no longer someone he listened to.
Just another female who didn’t get it.

Silence in Return for Peace

I started shrinking without even realising, just to keep the peace we always shared.
Instead of crying to him, I cried alone.
Racking my brain for ways to bring him back.

Back to a place where he believed women could think with logic.
Where he knew we weren’t performing for male attention.
Where men crying wasn’t weak. It was human.

But I felt hopeless.
I felt alone.
The one person who might’ve helped me was too lost in his “alpha” mindset to notice he was losing me.

And still, I stayed.
Even as he turned his back on women.
Even when he said he hadn’t.
Even when he couldn’t hold eye contact with me.
Even when I felt, deep down, that he saw me as inferior.

I stayed.
Because I knew him before.
Because I’d seen his softness.
Because not for one second did I question his intelligence.

So I made excuses.
“He’s still young.”
“He’ll mature.”
“He’s just easily influenced.”

And those excuses held me together.
Until they didn’t.

Eventually, I told him directly: you need to stop.

But of course, he didn’t.
Because I was just a sensitive girl, acting on emotion.
And he was a logical man whose opinions were bible. Unchallenged, untouchable.

Even when I showed him videos of his favourite creators making blatantly sexist claims, he shrugged.
“Well, that one’s just a joke,” he said.

It wasn’t until one of his male friends called it out—told him that watching Andrew Tate was “gay” and pathetic—that he finally stopped.

And that told me everything.
He didn’t stop because I cried.
He stopped because another man told him to.

It was proof. It was sickening.
These men, these creators, hit their target.
They got through.
And they won.

The Lesson

It was hope that kept me silent.
Hope that he’d wake up and understand why it mattered so much to me.

It was the promise I made to my younger self.
That I’d avoid conflict at all costs.
That arguing meant dysfunction.
That silence was safer.

It was memory that kept me silent.
The memory of the boy I fell in love with.
The softness I once saw.

It was fear that kept me silent.
Fear of being seen as dramatic. As nagging.
Fear that speaking up would push him away.

And it was empathy that kept me silent.
Because I never wanted to sound like I was talking down to him.
I wanted him to feel like my equal.

But now I wonder…
Could he have said the same?

If you’ve ever felt silenced—
If you’ve ever swallowed your truth to keep your relationship intact—
Please hear this:

You don’t have to do that anymore.
You don’t have to be the glue that holds it all together.
You’re allowed to speak.
You’re allowed to take up space.

And to the men consuming redpill content or standing by while their mates do:
Be careful.
Step back.
Ask yourself what it’s teaching you.
Ask how it’s shaping the way you treat women.
How it’s shaping the way you see us.

And ask yourself this:
What will you lose,
when you stop listening to the people who love you,
and start listening to strangers who don’t.