I'm scared that my relationship is failing and I don't know what to do

My boyfriend and I have been friends for a year and a half, talking romantically for 6 months and dating officially for 4. At the beginning, we had an insane amount of fun together and were constantly feeding off each other's energy. He is very caring, he's done more for me than any previous boyfriend has and I feel very understood and at peace with him. However, about 2 months into our official relationship, we began to fight. A lot.

The fights are often over relatively trivial things, which is what gets to me the most - a joke in poor taste, a comment that came off the wrong way, an insecurity. In my opinion, we don't have any fundamental incompatibilities or differences that are causing this. We don't fight about politics, money, morals, or any of the big stuff.

My boyfriend comes from a very messed up family whom he barely has any relationship with. His father was abusive. As a result, I'm the first person he's ever said "I love you" to, and getting into a relationship with me was kind of a big deal for him. On the other hand, I come from a very stable family and am very relationship-centered.

We recently transitioned to a long distance relationship and have also been through a considerable amount of life changes (graduating college, military-related stuff, moving cities, graduate school).

We seem to not be able to go a week or two without a fight. Our most recent two have been the ugliest. They're never emotionally abusive or anything, there really isn't screaming, just plain old arguing. This pattern has persisted since mid-May, so it's been about two months now. At first we were very hopeful for change, but something always seemed to come up again. We've talked for *hours* about what we can fix and change, but we seem to find ourselves back in the same spot. We've both put in a ton of effort and haven't given up on each other yet.

I'm very scared though. I'm scared that I'm in denial, I'm scared I'm lying to myself about being able to make it work. I'm scared of how much I love him and how much losing him would hurt me. I'm scared of the fact that I feel drained and somewhat hopeless when I've never felt like that before. We had a very frank conversation about where we're at tonight, and my bf explained that he's felt numb recently and is scared that this cycle is just going to continue, but that he loves me and doesn't want to give up regardless.

I'm hoping somebody has some good advice in this situation. I don't want to let go just yet.

Thanks in advance :(

(We're both 22 for context)