how not to communicate

I am beginning to really realize that any changes that I need to make, I need to make. Maybe it's a man thing but I am finding my man to be extremely resistant to any notion of working things out that goes beyond him saying we have some things to work out. I think it's the old thing about conflict and confrontation that makes him so very uncomfortable, unlike women who really like to get into the juice of things, the depth of things. Of course I have never been one to just let things lie, I have to force the issue every goddamn time. Yet, I am at a loss as to how to communicate with someone who just becomes stone-faced at any attempts I make to talk to him. Then we go around in the same circles -I get upset that he is so uncommunicative, he gets irritated that I am complaining, I get hurt that he's being cold, he feels attacked then overwhelmed. And then there is silence, back to where we started. It's fucking crazy.
It's so boring-even to me at this point but I just can't stop the desire, the need to feel some sort of response from him that is not angry or cold. I know that it may never come, he's got his own stuff to figure out and I suspect that he is just not ready to deal with it, may never be. I suspect that he is afraid of the depth of his frustration, just as I am afraid of the repercussions.
Which goes back to the beginning of taking care of my own life, my own happiness, my own shit. It is such a no-brainer I know but somehow I lost that. I am not moving out, not ending my relationship (which complicates things a hell of a lot I know) but I do need to figure out a way to be amazing within this context...feels like I've got my work cut out for me.