Love in translation: when language gets in the middle
When I met my girlfriend, one year ago, she had already been living here, in Spain, for over 2 years. She can speak Spanish, and she did it through our first date, but she did warned me that, if we were to start speaking English, there would be no way back, and it actually started from the second date.
English is not her first language and neither is mine but still it has been the one we've used to communicate between us, the scaffolding to share ideas in our little world. She is an English teacher and, as I would find out, she was used to speak English with "everyone" here, so she had no issues with it. I, on the other hand, I had only gone through a period of time when I spoke it, at work, and it was a while ago, so it took some time to get used to it. Fortunately my level was already good enough for her.
I found myself in a completely different space not only speaking a second language, but also in a whole different context, talking about completely new topics. This was going to be my first long term relationship, and I would live it in English. In it, we shared, discussed, and fought for the relationship facing and talking issues. I would learn love and I would learn it in a second language.
Eventually, I made a move to expand our world sharing my social space, introducing her to one of my groups of friends, one that I thought would be easier to start with since they are generally more educated and I knew they could speak English. But not really, I found out just half of them can. They are very nice people and they did spoke some English with her, but it is naive to think people would talk in a different language just to accommodate my girlfriend. I didn't really think it would happen, it is unrealistic. Isn't it?
For this now 3 years, my girlfriend has managed to get around speaking English in this non-cosmopolitan city. As I understand now, she has forced people as much as she could to speak with her in English, only speaking Spanish when there was no other way. While I try to understand her situation, the way She came here and it's implications, as She has explained to me, this is something I see as a clear problem but when we talked about it she didn't agree (I wasn't the best way to tackle it and She got defensive). I told her see lives in a little bubble and it is limiting and even hurting her. She won't speak the local language, her job prospects are very narrow because of it and, as I have already observed, it makes it hard to bring her into my social circle. I have my ties to this place and I don't want to leave, we've talked about it and she knows. She is ok with living here, or so she says, but it is not convincing since these words don't match her actions. I know I'm asking a lot but it is not a selfish demand even if it feels like it, we both know it is the best for her.
At this point, I decided I would put some effort and faith on the line. I downloaded Duolingo and I started learning Ukrainian and I let her know eventually. It was some days after, that suddenly she started to text in Spanish.
A few days passed until we met in person. I picked her up to go to the mall but something was off. She didn't say hi getting on the car. In fact, she didn't say a word until one hour being together, when she told me she felt ashamed speaking Spanish with me. This was a tough situation. I was quite anxious all that time and after that I felt worried wondering how she sees me to feel ashamed like that (now I believe I'm not the main issue with this).
We have continued on this line. We speak Spanish between us, but we still resort to English when we struggle to get to an understanding or the conversation is not so chill and demands a "safe" language common ground.
My idea wasn't we speak Spanish in our little world, but I understand her social situation here is not so good, so I will be taking this responsibility. But the thing is, it felt so weird in the beginning, and it still does. As I said at the start of this post, I learned to love in English and now speaking Spanish for the intimacy of our relationship feels off, like using the wrong tool. The words that I learned to express my care, my concerns, my vulnerability... they have been substituted for others that feel empty because they don't carry the feelings and the story we have been through, they lack that context that allow them to be intimate themselves. My own language feels unauthentic and I carry this as a secret (our secret, reader) for I'm taking responsibility of this need of mine that she learns Spanish. I'm also worried she feels the same, or even worse since she is now speaking yet another language with even less meaning to her, but I can't gather the courage to ask her for fear I would flinch. I know I must not ask, nor flinch.
I'm sure it will get better. We will deal better with our struggles and it will feel natural eventually and we can regain the intimacy and connection we may sometimes miss. In the meantime we pay the toll, and hope that love doesn't get lost in translation.
If you have or know about other experiences related to this, or you want to discuss this topic, please don't hesitate to write.
I could use some perspective.