Me (30 M) and my girlfriend (26 F) have been long distance for 8 months. I live in NY, and she's in Toronto. It's not that too long of a distance, but she just recently immigrated there, so she's probably not going to be able to visit me until she gets a tourist visa, which would take over a year, or Canadian citizenship, which won't happen until at least 2028. And so, I've been visiting every 3 months or so since August 2024. We met through Reddit that summer. It just happened naturally. We weren't initially attracted to each other via looks, but we just got along so well. It was very easy for me to be vulnerable for her, and she really appreciated it. We would talk and text so much and I think I gave her so much attention that my work performance suffered.

I should probably add this information: I'm a nurse and work 12 hour night shifts (It sucks and it's hard, but I enjoy it). So we agreed to talk less, and to call whenever we coincidentally had free time. It worked for a while, but she couldn't do it anymore, so we had to start planning calls (which is very difficult with our schedules, but we did what we could).

There would be times that she would text me while I was at work that she'd get a headache or a cold, so I texted her to take a Tylenol. The next morning, I'd text her good morning, and then she would get really upset that I didn't ask her how she was feeling (after I worked a 12 hour night shift treating sicker people). This happened more than once, to the point that I told her that I didn't think I could meet her emotional needs anymore. She cried and said that she's read on Reddit that most relationships with nurses don't work because the other party doesn't understand, "But I want to understand". This made me head over heels for her. However, at this point, I think I was starting to get emotionally tired.

Previously when we fought or argued, I would be very patient and calm and have no problem listening to her perspective. There was one instance where I posted an inappropriate Instagram story about a model, (I said I wanted to make soup out of her bath water) and I knew I was in the wrong. But other disagreements and fights, where I was once patient and understanding, I'd get very irritated when she expresses what and why she feels about what I did and I can't help but feel like I'm being scolded and so I yell, and this makes her very upset.

The last fight started when we planned an all day video call/movie date for yesterday. I promised her we could talk all day because I assumed we wouldn't be able to call at all the week before. We ended up being able to call on Saturday. On Sunday night, I asked her what time we were going to watch the movie because I wanted to work out at some point in the day, and she got upset because I promised her all day, but that was when I thought we wouldn't be able to talk until that day. I think she's overreacting, but I could be in the wrong.

I can't help but feel like I'm being scolded when I was patient before. It could be an ego issue, and I have been through trauma in the past from not standing up for myself, but I also think that I may just be emotionally exhausted. AITA? How can I make myself vulnerable again? Can we bring this relationship back to how we used to be?