IMHO, ESH.

First off, your family shouldn’t have come at you in the manner they did regarding your boyfriend—instead they could have tried to approach him, as he suggests. I’m sure that the few instances outlined where this did happen were not simply ignored. But truthfully how much can you tell someone about a mobile game or thank them for “a small gift” before your actions are viewed as being ingenuous?

Next, and I know this will difficult to relay to someone who feels like their cause is noble or that they are justified in their actions; but try to review the topic as it was breached in your hotel after the fact. Did you sound defensive? Was there anything you did or said that could have been construed as you being defensive? Perhaps bringing it up so soon after your initial X-number of inquiries at dinner made it seem like you were nagging? Could you have phrased or acted or approached the situation differently? Typically these types of situations mean two things are happening simultaneously: 1. Your SO views the night as having ended very well/poorly, 2. The would be “instigator” has a need to and overwhelming desire to conclude the evening with a level of understanding that the SO is doesn’t understand. Perhaps the best route would have been to take a walk in silence, show him your favorite park or other interesting sight, and allowed him to mull things over in his head a bit. As an introvert I can tell that nothing helps us clarify what needs clarifying like time in our own heads. We have an innate ability to playback an event and pick out all of the flaws in ourselves better than anyone essentially pointing fingers ever will. And that time with ourselves is important. Because without it we tend to feel we acted accordingly even if that may or may not have been the case, and attempting to point out otherwise before we’ve had our moment of reconciliation will likely elicit poor results. I don’t know how long you waited to bring the topic up at your hotel, but from the sound of it it wasn’t too long after you arrived.

And finally, although your SO has a right to be upset in this situation I am finding it a bit difficult to believe that his more mature nature hasn’t kicked in yet. He’s ten years your senior yet acts as if he’s your age. The argument itself, although important to both of you for your own reasons, truly is juvenile in content. After being approached “gently” by you during the event, he could have made a mature resolution to be there for you—obviously this meeting is/was very important to you. Instead he chooses to remain the victim in the scenario, defending his aloofness and overall unwillingness to at least make an attempt at being polite in someone else’s home. Furthermore the fact that he brings up someone else’s actions and the cost he incurred to engage in the activity tells me that this guy is very very far from being mature enough to even consider marriage. The problem lie with the pair of you, not your sister’s husband or the money it cost him to get there. He is attempting to deflect the conversation away from his lack of common sense in the matter, and to me, honey, that would raise some flags that need to be addressed during your “I need some space” time that is sure to follow.

While I don’t agree with the way either of you handled it, I have to commend you for attempting to be the bigger person and extend the olive branch. But in the grand scheme of things it seems like this scenario needed to play out the way it did because now you two have some serious issues that need to be addressed, and it didn’t seem like there was ever an opportunity for them to present themselves over the course of the last year of your relationship. However you two men’s and move on from here will be critical in sculpting any future in which you two are still together. So proceed with caution and trepidation, but no so much as to walk on eggshells.