My boyfriend is known as a quiet laid back guy. He doesn’t expound much and gives a lot of one word answers. But his demeanor is so great and he’s strong and warm and sexy. He calms me down (I get bad anxiety), he’s good to me, he shows me how to live in the moment, he’s relaxed, he treats his family like gold, and I love him.

However there is one other thing. He actually does say a lot under his breath to himself. Like whenever we speak. The things he says under his breath, I think of them as him “thinking out loud.” At first even though I was deathly curious what he was saying (bc I’m very curious what he’s thinking and who he is), I ignored the mumbling. It was easier to say “he’s not trying to say it loud enough that I can hear, so it’s obviously not meant for me” and shrug it off. But recently I have discovered that if I strain to listen, I can hear more of his thoughts on the subject we are discussing—remember I said he gives a lot of one word answers? Well these mumblings are him elaborating —it’s the why behind his yes” or “no.”

So now I have this superpower to get to know him better and we end up having wonderful discussions, but only if I strain really hard to hear (completely disengage from whatever I’m doing, turn my whole head and attention toward him, watch his mouth even…).

But it’s really hard to do all the time and I would love to ask him to speak louder? Only I don’t know if that’s effective? I have watched old people ask young people to speak louder , and the young people always do it for a short while and then naturally go back to speaking in their habitual volume.

So yeah. I’m guessing growing up he needed to do this and it’s become a habit that’s always stuck. Also he’s had some difficulties career wise so if you’re wondering how someone could function in normal life like this, well it’s not like he’s running a company or something.

Anyway sorry so long but can I just ask him to speak louder? Or is it something I have to get his buy-in on by earning his trust by continuing to listen hard when he speaks? God I feel like a social worker trying to get advice on helping a child.