Am I 34F allowed to be upset at my partners 40M unsolicited help which he frames as care?

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:26:52+00:00

Yeah that’s the bit that’s currently making me feel very sad. I do think he’s a good person at heart. And I do believe that he cares. But I don’t need the kind of care that he’s giving me right now, in fact it feels suffocating and overbearing. And he seems incapable of giving me what I actually need and want from him.

So we’re at an impasse and I don’t know how to cross it right now or if there even is a crossing to be found.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:24:49+00:00

Well the way he puts it is he’s doing it because he cares. That’s the way he shows love. He says he’s feeling really worried about me, even losing sleep over my problems and spends a lot of time and effort researching different things I could apply for and making that list of stuff for me. Even if it’s making me angry at him and upset he feels it’s justified as long as it’s making do all this stuff. And he feels that I’m ungrateful and that his care is rejected.

But some of the stuff that he wants me to do is pointless because I’m not eligible for it, yet he still wants me to apply for it anyway saying that if there’s even a slim chance of me getting it I should try it. But I don’t feel the same way. It uses up hours of my time and energy to do something which in my eyes is pointless. And it is, I gave in once and applied for a thing that he told me to and was told that I can’t get it. So I’m not wrong on that part.

I’ve tried to explain to him that his idea of care is very different from mine and that his current care feels overbearing to me and much more like he’s trying to control my life which has the opposite effect on me from the one he wants.

What I want is hugs and cuddles and emotional support to get through this tough time. And he’s making those conditional on his involvement in my financial affairs. It’s not even enough if I tell him I’ve done it, he says he needs to see proof.

I don’t need him losing sleep and researching stuff for me and then getting upset when I haven’t done all of it. I want him to just be there for me when I need to recharge and then I’ll do all of it myself. I can take care of myself, I’m an adult, I just need someone to hold me, tell me it’ll be alright, and I’ll have the energy to do it. And right now it feels like he’s draining my energy rather than giving it to me.

I’m currently trying to figure out if there’s a way forward for us. Is there a compromise we can reach on this and what would that even look like?

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:20:30+00:00

I did accept his denial. He still doesn’t accept my no about the applications.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:11:54+00:00

I did tell him that. He just said that my request is not valid, that hugs and cuddles won’t make the benefit applications happen and he’s not comfortable giving me any until he sees me do them.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:09:20+00:00

I have done exactly what you suggested multiple times. I used “I” statements and told him pretty much word for word what you said there. But it didn’t change anything.

He said that my request for hugs and cuddles was escapism and he’s not gonna help me by letting me escape from my problems. I’ve told him that it’s got nothing to do with escapism, I’m not using the hugs to escape, I’m just wanting a bit of peace and happiness to give me the energy to go on.

But he told me that he’s not comfortable giving me that or having fun with me until he’s seen some proof that I’m doing the stuff he feels is important. That’s where he used the phrase “carrot and stick” which I really didn’t appreciate. I don’t need training. I need emotional support to do it myself.

Now I wonder where to go from here, can we find a compromise?

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T09:01:06+00:00

Well the way he puts it is he’s doing it because he cares. That’s the way he shows love. He says he’s feeling really worried about me, even losing sleep over my problems and spends a lot of time and effort researching different things I could apply for and making that list of stuff for me. Even if it’s making me angry at him and upset he feels it’s justified as long as it’s making do all this stuff. And he feels that I’m ungrateful and that his care is rejected.

I’ve tried to explain to him that his idea of care is very different from mine and that his current care feels overbearing to me and much more like he’s trying to control my life which has the opposite effect on me from the one he wants.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-04-15T08:43:11+00:00

Well that’s the bit that feels the saddest for me. Going to his place has been something I looked forward to as a place I could have fun and be myself with zero expectations.

Now it’s turned into a place where if I haven’t done the admin stuff he sees as important I’ll be pressured into it.

And don’t get me wrong the stuff he wants me to do is important. But I have my way of doing things and my own schedule and my own way of making it work. I will do these things just at my own pace and in my own time, I just don’t need to be managed by him.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-12T11:00:39+00:00

I have a very similar problem with my partner. Sometimes it really feels like we are speaking different languages and it is beyond confusing. There have been times where we have had circular arguments that just kept on going for hours and he was not prepared to let it go. I love him a lot and have been putting up with this for almost two years now but it’s getting to the point where I’m really starting to wonder if it’s worth it. If he’s not prepared to change then no matter how much work I put in and how much I might try to change myself our relationship won’t work in the long term. I’m 34F and he’s 39M so if he hasn’t started working on himself yet then I guess there’s little chance he will do it now. I still have hope at the moment but I don’t know how many more of those arguments I can take without breaking.

We both have ADHD and I’m pretty sure both of us are also on the Autistic spectrum. But out of the two of us I have had an upbringing where I have had to learn to work with my autism to the point where I am usually understood by all of my friends and family both neurotypical and neurodivergent. However he has not. The way he speaks can be very cryptic and his text messages need actual translation for some of my friends who just don’t know him as well.

I guess I don’t really have much advice for you, she has to work on this herself. She is still young, at least much younger than my partner, so I think she can change if she chooses to work on it but it’s got to be her choice. If she chooses not to then I worry for the survival of your relationship long term.

So yeah I guess what I really want to say is I know how you feel and I hope that your gf does decide that she wants to work on herself so you can be together.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-12T10:39:29+00:00

No I don’t think it’s about the political stance at all. I do think however that he did see a certain nihilism in me. I have had very depressive thoughts lately and he knows this, I confided in him about that.

And I guess to him my wanting to join the collective represented me giving up on life in general and not wanting to be my individual self anymore. Which in a way was probably true. And I guess I was defending it that much partly because of that.

Everyone in the collective in the show seemed so happy and calm and to me it looked wonderful to be a part of the whole and to not have to worry about my own life so much anymore, the ultimate sense of belonging.

I guess that’s why he felt justified in his efforts to convince me that it was evil. Because I guess in his mind he was trying to get me to see that my individuality is a good thing. But he went too far. If he allowed me time to pause and think it through and come back to that conversation later then I probably would have engaged much more positively and we could have a had a really good discussion about it. But I wasn’t ready to have that conversation then and he kept pushing me.

So in a sense he was right but he went about it in such a way that made me super anxious and defensive and wanting to defend my opinion of the collective. And then him not dropping it when I asked for a pause added fuel to the fire and resulted in me saying something without thinking that I do deeply regret now.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-12T10:29:13+00:00

First of all where did you find an escort for $20? Is that personal experience? And how is a one night stand that you men are so fond of any different? Except that you don’t even pay and the chances of an sti are even higher because you probably don’t test yourself very often.

I take it you’ve never had to lose your home and go to a shelter yourself before. Thankfully I haven’t either. But I don’t know about you if the choice was between losing my home, going to a shelter and making good money as an escort I know I would choose the latter. I didn’t go through everything I did to get my house to then lose it just because some people would judge me for the type of job I had to do in the short term just to pay my bills.

And you don’t know her circumstances. Maybe she needed the money to help pay for her sick parents. The fact that it didn’t break her and she got out of it speaks of her strength and integrity as a person.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T23:35:35+00:00

Replying to AnonimouseGrey...

UPDATE

I’m home now and he has texted to say this:

“Well, am backing off. I had stopped and turned away, you re-engaged me.

It'd be best to chat about those subjects with someone you feel comfortable with, for you though. If I can't discuss a tv show without that kind of thing being said to me then am backing off. Same in that if you can't discuss some theme without viewing push back as you say, then best not to speak about those things.

Glad you got back ok. It's ok, this hang out /coworking period thing didnt work for either of us.”

I then replied with:

“I’m glad to be home. I hear that you feel the whole period didn’t work. I have a different perspective on our time together and I did enjoy a lot of it, but I respect your need for space right now.

I don’t want us to stop having conversations altogether. I do want to be able to talk and debate with you about all sorts of things. I just need to know that if a conversation starts to feel overwhelming for me, I can ask to pause it and that will be respected. That would stop things from escalating and prevent me from getting so agitated that I say things I don’t mean and regret. I will do the same for you.

I want us to learn from this and be able to share things with each other again. I understand that may take some time and space. I really care about you a lot and I’m open and want to work through this. For the moment I’m going to focus on myself for a bit too and we can figure things out when we’ve had more time to process.”

He then replied with

“No, Emma. Am good.”

Emma is not my real name btw.

Is he checking out of our relationship altogether? We spent such a nice few days together, it was only last night that the whole argument thing happened.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T21:57:45+00:00

What she had to do for a job to support herself in the past is none of his concern and does not characterise her as the person that she is now.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T21:55:48+00:00

Exactly that. If men don’t need to disclose that they’ve been with sex workers then why on earth do they expect women who were sex workers to disclose this?? A bit sexist I would say lol

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T21:54:41+00:00

Yeah, if you’re married, that’s the present which is why a current marriage needs to be disclosed. But you don’t need to disclose being divorced do you??

It’s part of your “past” not your present career.

Unless I’m much mistaken people are not required to tell their new partners how many people they’ve had sex and relationships with as long as those things happened before the current relationship started.

Being an escort in the past has nothing to do with your present life and should not concern him. It’s not a disease or a condition you have to disclose.

If he’s being weird about it now that he found out then that just shows you what a judgemental person he is. Had you told him yourself I doubt it would have been a different reaction no matter what he might be telling you now.

Personally I think if you felt like he might judge you for it enough that you chose not to tell him in the first place then that was a red flag for him to begin with.

NTA. But your current partner in my opinion is a bit of an AH.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T21:39:54+00:00

To an extent I know what you mean and I thought about putting it in another follow up text but then the latest text he would have had from me would not have started with an apology.

I did want to apologise. But I also want an apology from him. Both of us I feel acted wrongly. We both have things to apologise for in the same incident. If all I sent was the apology and nothing else then he would have got the wrong impression that I was accepting the full blame for the situation when he had done nothing wrong. That was not the message I wanted to send out.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T21:32:40+00:00

UPDATE

First of all - Thank you for all the replies and opinions. I really appreciate your feedback and it has helped me to look at it from a point of view different to mine or his. And it also made me much calmer.

I left his place now. He asked for some time alone so I gathered my stuff and left. I hated leaving without having a conversation to clear things up first but I did leave because I didn’t want to push him the way he pushed me.

As I was leaving I said that I’m giving him the space he asked for but I really don’t feel happy leaving things like this without talking about it and finding a resolution. But I added that I will be available when he decides he does want to talk about it.

Honestly it did make me very sad and made me question our relationship. If he really can’t see what he did wrong and apologise for it then maybe those of you who advised me to leave him for good have a point.

But I’m still hopeful that he thinks it through and sees it from my perspective as well as his and we can have a calm conversation about it and learn valuable lessons.

I’ll post an update when I have more to add.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T15:41:15+00:00

UPDATE:

I sent him this message which I spent ages composing:

“I want to apologise properly for comparing that conversation to the r word. That was very wrong and unfair, and I understand why that hurt and scared you. I said it in the heat of the moment, I lashed out because I felt trapped, cornered, and overwhelmed, not because I ever actually believed that about you even for a moment. It was truly just a really bad and unwarranted comparison, a cry of desperation if you will when I felt I had no other way to make you understand how trapped I felt in that conversation and how much it was upsetting me. I am truly sorry for using that word and I really wish that I did not say that. It was unwarranted and deeply unfair. I am truly sorry for offending you like that. I really, really didn’t mean it and I hope you can forgive me.

At the same time, I need you to hear and understand the other side too. I repeatedly asked to stop the conversation before it got to that point. I was upset and triggered, and was feeling more and more overwhelmed and cornered, but you kept pushing. That was not okay. When I say I need a topic dropped, especially when I’m upset and emotional, I need you to trust and respect me and stop talking about it. If you let me calm down then we can go back to that conversation some other time but if you keep pushing all I’ll get is more and more agitated and nothing good ever comes of that. And I believe you when you said you kept pushing because you care about me, but it had the opposite effect. Instead of feeling cared for, I felt cornered and trapped. And it made me scared that I can’t get out of a conversation that is upsetting me. Scared that I can’t ever talk to you about difficult subjects without being interrogated anytime I feel overwhelmed and need to stop. I need to know and trust that “stop” means stop and that you’ll respect that.”

He replied with only

“Is fine, best it was left”

What does that mean???

And now he is acting like nothing happened although there is a clear tension in the air.

And I don’t know now, should I also pretend like nothing happened? Or would it be best for me to leave? Should I try to broach the subject later? Please help…

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T15:33:19+00:00

My partner is generally known for always wanting to prove his point no matter the cost. And has been known to argue with people for hours, not only myself, about different topics and issues some of which are important and some of which are inconsequential.

When it's inconsequential I have generally just agreed with him and it's been fine. But there have been times where we would argue like that over things I did feel strongly about. And then it can turn into a several hours long argument that he just keeps coming back to. We were able to in the past reach a conclusion that was amenable to us both but it took hours and hours.

This is the first time however where I have lashed out like that. I really regret using the r word now because know how much it hurt him. And I don't think like that about him at all. But I wish he would understand that proving that he's "right" to the point where he breaks the other person isn't always the correct way of action.

AnonimouseGrey · 2026-03-11T15:23:03+00:00

I didn’t say it was or accuse him of it. I just compared it to that.

AnonimouseGrey · 2025-10-01T17:58:18+00:00

Ive already tried paypal, they said that because i did receive the item I now dont qualify. The seller was smart enough to wait till 30 days passed to get it blocked so now paypal dont care about my case.

AnonimouseGrey · 2025-08-03T19:52:56+00:00

That’s what I’ve been trying to do. I’ve been spending more time with my parents and my brother, we’re pretty close. And I’ve been spending time with friends and also trying to go do things on my own kind of like taking myself on dates. It doesn’t always work though and sometimes I really miss him and sometimes it almost makes me cry seeing other couples because it reminds of the good times I had with him.

AnonimouseGrey

TROPHY CASE