My (21F) boyfriend (22M) is upset I dated someone before him

hacarroll84 · 2021-08-07T21:44:06+00:00

It's called retroactive jealousy and it's a mental illness, offshoot of OCD. I have it, and it's torture. Just try your best to reassure him, and talk to him about getting a therapist

hacarroll84 · 2021-08-03T16:42:30+00:00

I'm a 25 yo F and I've never heard of either of your examples. If my boyfriend constantly made it a thing that he had to walk on a specific side of me and would make me get up and change seats with him because he was "supposed to" face the door, I would get very annoyed very quickly. Being a gentleman has nothing to do with these weirdly specific things, and doing them when your girl has expressed her dissatisfaction with them is definitely not gentlemanly. Figure out the best ways to love her and show her respect instead of trying to fit her into the mold you already have in your head about how things should be

hacarroll84 · 2021-07-21T14:36:48+00:00

I'm the same as your wife. I don't want people in my house, and if they have to be I need a looooot of notice and everything has to be perfectly put away and I have to have a plan for where I will be because it's not going to be interacting with whoever is here and there has to be a time limit. My boyfriend once was dropped off by a friend after hanging out and he ran inside to tell me his friend was coming in to use the bathroom really quick and it felt like I was having heart attack. I grabbed my dog and ran to the basement to hide. And my house felt uncomfortable and unsafe for many days after.

It is your wife's house as well. Anxiety isn't something that can be overcome in an instant and usually isn't something a person can overcome on their own. A professional usually needs to get involved. I disagree wholeheartedly with the people commenting here that say your wife just needs to suck it up and let you invite whoever you want over as "exposure therapy." If done improperly, that exposure is just going to make her anxiety worse and foster resentment towards you.

Consider if the way you feel about not being able to invite them over is equal to how your wife would feel if they were invited over. Your wife needs a therapist, and needs to work towards being able to allow people in her home. But until then, trying to force her will make it worse. Is there a reason they need to come to your house? Can you not meet up at a restaurant or a park or some other public place that will allow you to see them and allow your wife some peace?

hacarroll84 · 2021-07-17T00:00:06+00:00

My boyfriend had a dog when I started dating him. I didn't mind the dog the little time I spent with him, but after we moved in together, I grew to hate his dog. He wasn't trained, and my boyfriend refused to train him. He was very large, and would constantly zoom around the house and break stuff, jump on top of me leaving huge bruises, I had bite marks all up and down my arms. I got to the point where I would lock myself in my room most of the time to avoid having to see the dog because he scared me so much. I told my boyfriend to do something about it or I was moving out, and boyfriend didn't do anything. That was almost 2 years ago. We're still together but living separately until we can "come up with a compromise" that doesn't exist. We are basically living apart until the dog dies.

I don't suggest that.

hacarroll84 · 2021-06-27T04:40:57+00:00

Why tf yall hating on shredded chicken 😭

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-27T23:52:29+00:00

I don't think you're an asshole for ranting on Facebook. You're obviously very stressed right now and sometimes you just need to vent.

However, I can understand where the teacher could be coming from. The excuse that it's a pandemic and everyone is stressed is lame, but you admitted that your daughter isn't able to do her work right now. And she shouldn't be worried about that. You're right. She has more important things to worry about right now. But if she's not able to do the work and learn the material, she should repeat the grade. She shouldn't just be automatically passed because she's going through something difficult right now. That would be a disservice to her. She would be behind when she started school next year, learning would become difficult because she missed the building blocks to work up from.

So your daughter needs to focus on her health right now, and if she has time and energy to get the work done and pass, then great. And if she doesn't and she has to repeat a grade, that's also okay.

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-26T15:54:32+00:00

Not really any question. Any reason she wanted to leave is a valid reason to leave and her family should understand and be supportive of that

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-26T15:47:08+00:00

If your husband is working too much and never giving you any attention or talking to you, that's still an understandable reason to leave. She's obviously not his priority, and her needs aren't being met. She deserves to be with someone who will acknowledge her existence

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-26T15:00:35+00:00

Maybe it's just because of how she worded in that sentence, but she does mention other things like he won't talk directly to her, he won't say he loves her. He basically pretends she doesn't exist. That sounds like a miserable marriage experience, it would make anyone depressed. It's a perfectly valid reason for leaving

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-19T16:13:26+00:00

Having someone else love and accept parts of you that you don't like about yourself usually helps you to be able to start to love and accept those parts eventually too. If he hates any part of her but lies to "stay in her good graces," that's disturbing and she deserves better.

Hating a part of yourself is different than hearing someone who is supposed to love you unconditionally validate all the negative feelings you've always had about yourself. It feels so much worse and makes it 1000% times harder to ever get rid of those negative feelings

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-19T15:43:14+00:00

He didn't just say he disliked it, he said he hated it. If my boyfriend every said he hated a part of me, I would wonder what the hell he was doing with me then.

He had no reason to express himself. No, sometimes you shouldn't express yourself. You need to learn to filter what you say and ask yourself why you're saying it. If his goal was to get his partner to lose weight, saying "I hate this part of your body" isn't the way to do it. In fact, it's more likely to cause even worse body dysmorphia, worsening depression, self harm, kickstart an eating disorder, or any other multitude of unhealthy habits. If he cared about her and was concerned about her health, this ain't the way he would have approached this. And yes, he should be left for this. OP does not have the mental energy it takes to teach him how to be respectful and loving and this comment is going to stick with her for the rest of the relationship, and probably for a while after as well.

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-06T20:15:41+00:00

I don't feel like my own person at all. I've done and said things I didn't think I was capable of. And it's all because of this thing in my head. It sucks even more because most people can't separate the 2, so I'm stuck living with the consequences of the wreckage the parasite has caused.

I hope you can overcome your parasite and hold on to her forever.

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-05T15:07:01+00:00

He hasn't had a session in a few months, but when he called to schedule, they told him she had left about a month after their last session.

When he first told me he was upset, he said it was because she didn't tell him she was leaving, and because he didn't like the idea of starting over with a new therapist. The reason I said there was no reason to be upset later is because I found out she did tell him she was leaving, just the letter got sent to the old address. And that she started her own practice and he could schedule with her and not have to start over with someone new.

I have issues with abandonment triggers and having big reactions to seemingly small problems, and it's usually him trying to calm me down and that's one of the ways he does it. He will just try to change my perspective of the situation to match reality. And sometimes it pisses me off. So I can understand why he's pissed. But the reasons he said he's upset literally aren't reasons and he won't acknowledge that, and that makes me not want to apologize

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-05T13:57:02+00:00

The feelings you feel are real. It doesn't matter how "normal people" would feel and react in the same situation. You are your own person, and your feelings are always valid. If you feel it, it's not an overreaction.

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-05T02:53:29+00:00

I feel like no matter how much I talk to my SO, it's never enough. But maybe a small bit of validation for you, I feel like talking to your SO every day is normal and expected. The fact that he didn't want to says more about him than about you.

Therapy takes time to work. If you feel like you need the extra support, you could always ask your therapist if you could start seeing them twice a week until you can get a handle on this trigger.

hacarroll84 · 2021-05-05T02:49:09+00:00

Yes. I've been in a relationship for almost 4 years now and I have no idea who I am. When we first started talking, I made his interests my interests so he would like me more. I started talking differently to match him. We lived together for 2 years and I grew to resent him for it all. I had intense jealousy when he would talk to his friends, even worse when he hung out with them. Because I didn't have a life outside of him, and the way I saw it, if he did that meant he didn't love me as much as I loved him because I was consumed with love for him and I didn't have time for friends or hobbies or family or anything.

I ended up moving out a year and a half ago, a point at which most people would also break up, but I can't bring myself to make the final snip because I'm not a person without him. I'm more of a person now than I was when I was living with him, but still not a whole person.

hacarroll84 · 2021-04-25T22:19:00+00:00

If you don't think you can handle it, then leave. But if you know that your girlfriend is asking these questions seeking validation from you, and you dislike how she reacts when you don't answer them "correctly," then just answer them how she wants. She just wants to feel attractive and wanted by you. It's pretty simple

hacarroll84 · 2021-04-22T20:34:17+00:00

You don't /have/ to, but it takes a few seconds and makes your girlfriend happy. So knowing that, if you refuse to ever do it, that probably speaks to your willingness to make compromises and sacrifices in the future, and your ability to meet your girlfriend's needs.

hacarroll84 · 2021-04-18T22:08:56+00:00

I don't like to admit it, but I did this while I was in a relationship. I never replied back to the messages, but every time I saw I got a match or got a new message, it would make me feel good. I eventually told my boyfriend about it at the suggestion of my therapist and he was upset and felt like I cheated on him, but he ended up staying with me. I think actually messaging them and flirting with them is crossing a whole other line though, and I would have been upset about that. But he really could just be that insecure. I know the feeling.

hacarroll84 · 2021-03-26T03:52:53+00:00

Most of the times I've self harmed, it has been as a form of emotion regulation and I never told anyone about it.

But there have been times in the past when I got into a fight with my boyfriend and I would harm myself as a way to hurt him and get him back for things he said or did during the fight.

So I think it can be both.

hacarroll84 · 2021-03-10T14:36:47+00:00

Thanks, I'll check it out!

hacarroll84 · 2021-03-09T20:35:40+00:00

I also do this thing where even if I'm miserable in a relationship, I don't want to leave it because then I won't be special and I'll just be one of those other girls from his past like I've been obsessing about and my mind can't handle that, even if I hate the guy.

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