Hi Everyone,
Hope all is okay and safe. I am back here again after couple of years. I am so confused at the moment and I hope that you can all give me a little light and help with my relationship problems as it's really giving me so much stress and anxiety. I am very sorry it is quite long as I would like everyone to have understanding of my problems
My boyfriend and I have been together for a little under 2 years and since we have been together, honestly I can only remember few moments of laughter and harmonious life with him, lucky if we can survive full month without arguing over silly things.
We do love each other though but we are very different. I am strong willed, outspoken, versatile and physically stronger than him, I am active, independent and Optimistic. Emotionally though I won't say I am what I said above I must admit. I am also quite inquisitive and won't settle with "I don't know" response especially when bf is in charge of a task.
My boyfriend on the other hand is very opposite. He's quite a feminine man. He's passive aggressive, very sensitive, lazy, prefers to sit on couch all day and watch Netflix than go for a walk let alone exercise. Struggles to deal with basic stuff and quite inept. I am not being mean and exaggerated when I say he's inept but he really is. Just to give you an example. He struggled to identify which is sugar and which is coffee? and does not know how to beat an egg, fry egg, or even how to mix food in the pan when I am cooking. When things in the house needs screwing or assembling or when TV needs fixing, it would be me that would be doing it. As well as lifting with heavy things etc. and I'm no weight lifter, I'm just an ordinary 10st 5'5 girl . He is smart though and geeky and I love him for what he is. As much as I respect him and his capabilities it just exhausting sometimes that I cannot rely on him with anything and my is patience not always there.
Friends and family especially his side are quite aware of this, in fact they knew him longer than me and they would sometimes make funny comments or tease him whenever we get together. Not insulting comments but just comments like they would directly tell me to let them know if I need tools to use. My boyfriend would laugh along or he would also tell his friends and fam that I am the handyman in the house. However, when it's just him and I at home, he's different, he's domineering and overbearing, he's very stubborn, he cannot take constructive criticism and would always think he's being attacked or even when no criticism involve, he would get very defensive and plays victim. I feel like my boyfriend is insecure of me as there was one time when he struggled to assembled our old dismantled bed frame, he cried and was feeling down and told me that he feels as if he couldn't do anything as he had to ask for my help and that I am better than him as I can do a lot of things. His best friend told him once long time ago that he does not know anything in life that caused their friendship to break. I have of course gave him positive advises and reminded him of things I couldn't do without him. This is just one of the many things he's done and said that I felt he was being insecure.
I also notice that he would try to control me by making me listen to whatever he'll say which I have regardless of what it is, but in a while I noticed that its only one sided, it seems he's not letting me have an opinion with anything and being me, I usually push to get my opinion, suggestion and comments across that would often lead to arguments. His reasoning is always "he can't have his way" which is same to my reasoning too and I feel like there's more of his than mine but he's not seeing that, whenever I get my way, that's because there was an argument first and he would be miserable and when there are any hurdles of my way he would blame me.
We fight over silly little things because he cannot take criticism, and I am not even being disrespectful of him, he would take it personally that it is an attack, he would get very defensive. I of course would react to his behaviour and when I get upset and angry because of how he reacted and made me feel like I'm the bad guy, my voice is raised, I am not calm. He however is a passive one, he would used my anger against me and plays victim. Then the silence treatment follows, followed by awkward small talk until it fizzled out and next thing you know we're okay again (for one or few days until there is another issue again) Whenever he's done something annoying again that I would call him out or he gets upset for whatever reasons just because he's very sensitive, he would act very cold, very rude, disrespectful, stonewalling and vindictive and he would bring up the issues that never got solve weeks/days previously so the current ones will never get discussed and my feelings of why I got upset of the current ones has been set aside. I then find myself justifying for the previous issues and we're back arguing again about the previous issues and the pattern is the same. However, whenever I would done something that I knew it upset him, i would recognised and apologised but this is not always the case as majority of times, he would not tell me I have upset him until days later. It's as if he is saving it as if it's his shield to use against me than discussing his wrongdoings.
Until recently I had enough of this behaviour and to my anger, I called him out and told him how I truly felt. Told him hat I felt he was insecure of me that's why he would jump on every chance to control me but because he's got low self steam and that is weak and he acts like a woman (not being sexist, just referring to him struggles to cut vegetables as scared to cut his fingers, cries when cat attracts etc.) I know I shouldn't have said that and it was not nice but I did not recognize that mistake straight away. I was very angry as we had one of our arguments at that time and his usual behaviour whenever we argue is he would walk away and gone to room and shut the door.
Next day, he was okay again like nothing happened, we went to central London and watched a play in the theatre, was all good. Until end of the day when we were on the way back home.
Our train was at 10:50 and we arrived at the station at 10:44. The platform is right opposite of the gate, takes 2min normal walking. He however was panicking that we were going to missed our train, he was telling me to hurry up, told him he doesn't need to (and he's well aware it does not take time to get to the platform) but he was running and left me whilst keep checking on me indicating to hurry up. (at that time I felt he was again trying to call me) Train arrives, I saw him jumped on the train and I also jumped on the train but to a different carriage 2 doors away from his, he looked at me and I made a gesture sign that I will go to his carriage. Turned out he didn't see me and I saw him jumped back out just before door closes and he was left behind. I was annoyed but found it funny. Problem was my phone was dead and I didn't have my house keys. I knew I would wait for him for 2 hrs to get home. As I couldn't wait for him for 2 hrs in the cold, I went home, wrote a note that I will be waiting for him at a shop we both know as it was very cold to wait outside and told him to come see me there. Almost 3 hrs later he didn't turned up at the shop, I was worried his train might got delayed or something might have happened to him, didn't want to leave shop in case, we missed each other. I begged again the shop keeper for charger (as initially I was told they didn't have any) when I have spoken to him, he said he's at home, read my note and asked If I wanted picking up and said he didn't want to leave house in case I will be home. I got annoyed and he also got angry than apologizing and again brought up previous issue. He sarcastically apologised, so insincere, didn't even try to hide how fake apology it was but I accepted it to cut it off.
Next day back to stonewalling, aggressive manner, over acting and just constant disrespectful and again I reacted to his behaviour and there he was again bring up previous issues. This time he's very angry for I call him weak and like a woman which is understandable but instead of really telling me how he feels, it was constant "I am like this and that and I am an abuser" and was being rude and ill-mannered. I have apologised and he said that I wasn't sincere, I had enough and had to go away for few days, told him and I have to see family as step uncle passed away, he's maintain communication whilst I was away for few days (probably being sympathetic) When I came back, immediately he was being the same, vindictive, disrespectful. I had to leave again and back at my family home, he never message me whilst I was away for 5 days and when I came back, it's like nothing happened. We are at the moment awkwardly talking casually and sleeping in different rooms. I don't know if its worth staying. Financially, I am struggling and we've just moved to a new house so the whole moving stress is not gone yet. Please advice, I am very sorry again it is long but really appreciate your help
Just to add up and worth knowing my bf not showy of his emotions and lack of knowledge of showing affections, although he would try. My boyfriend was 33 when we got together and I am his first ever gf and first to be in bed, so our bedroom too is not quite great as he is very shy to initiate to get intimate.
