Being so tight with money?

So you are paying half the rent, bills, food, taking him on holiday and doing all the cleaning. Wake up! He is utterly dreadful and taking advantage of absolutely everything about you that he can! No wonder he has substantial savings. Living with you is lucrative for him. When he tells you he loves you ignore him. He is lying.

OP, could you find some money for counselling to find out where your rock bottom self esteem and respect come from?
This is not normal.
4 years you have spent with this ugly horror.
How can you be intimate with such a man....who would hide the butter.....bloody hell?
Would you actually inflict him on a child?
How selfish would that be?

You sound like a lovely woman who has completely lost her way.
4 years with probably one of the meanness men on MN...and God knows that is saying something.
Don't waste your breath trying to talk to him.
Get organised and get away from him..
Surely be to God 4 years of living this way must be enough for you.

Please imagine what he would be like if you had a baby. Until you experience pregnancy/birth and the inability to work for a period of time it's hard to imagine how much you need a decent giving partner. Financial abuse often escalated in pregnancy.

There is a saying "mean with money, mean with love" it's very true.

I was with friends a while ago and one friend talked about her high earning husband who severely restricts their children. Despite being young they have to pay for 50% of non essential clothes and items. Essential is uniform & underwear. Everything else has to be split and they have to find the money from birthday gifts or selling items online to have anything extra.

We all sat open mouthed yet the friend is conditioned to this and as they got together young she doesn't know anything else. Up until then I thought what a lovely couple. She isn't allowed a pay app on her phone "as spends too much" her husband goes through all receipts so no one dares sneak in something they would like.

Miserable way to live and I am sure her H has amassed vast sums of money.

Oh just YUK. Meanness is such an unattractive quality and often seeps into other parts of the personality. I can’t bear it.

i was with a mean man once (blinded by love) and honestly, looking back I can’t believe how stingy he was. I went for dinner with him and his new partner years later and they each paid for their own meal (they were living together) and I realised some things never change.

This isn't normal. You deserve more than this.

£2.50???

If my OH asked me for £2.50 I’d take the piss relentlessly.

Also my Fanny would be dryer than the Sahara.

If he's always been like this, it's exceptionally unlikely that he will change now.

I think you are right to be reconsidering this relationship. Really think about whether you would be happy living like this.

OP honestly, as soon as he started itemising the bill that would be me off.

Don't get me wrong, I am fully behind 50/50 and in no way whatsoever expect the "man to pay".

With my DH for decades and, while we've never had a joint bank account, we have similar outlook to money and what's leftover is shared in joint savings.

But quibbling over £2.50.

I'd ram that bill up his tight arse.

And leave.

Haha it’s like the OP should set ups go fund me for doing a public service for others 😆

Jesus what a twat. I’ve also been with my dp for 4 years, he earns a lot more than I do and pays for pretty much everything - holidays, meals out etc. I contribute as much as I can but he knows I don’t have much money, and he never makes me feel bad about it or brings it up. I think even if I was earning a lot more he’d still want to pay for everything, he’s just like that. Itemising shopping receipts, fuck that.

OP it's not even about fancy weekends away, it's just the day to day of life. How on earth can he even think it's ok to as you for £2.50?! Please be proactive and leave this man. It doesn't matter how much he says he loves you- talk is free! You sound like a lovely person and do not deserve to be treated in this abusive way.

Of course he tells you 'he loves you' ... he loves being in the situation where he can comfortably increase his savings regularly, never has to risk spending money on someone apart from himself and has a girlfriend who seems willing to treat him to nice things.
Wake up OP ..

I had a friend with a bloke like this. I bought her a bottle of champagne when she eventually left him.

Cooking you dinner then charging you half!!! Honestly. Does he charge you for extra loo roll if you are in your period? I'm just wondering how far he goes. You mention you are dieting, are you bigger than him? Does he charge you more for shower gel?
I'm not trying to be mean, I just don't think you realise how ridiculous he is. I don't know how you can take him seriously.

Please don't stay either this man for the rest of your life, or if you do not get pregnant, that's when he will really start charging you and you won't be able to work to the same level (or you will but the childcare costs will be coming out of your salary only). If he doesn't charge you for his sperm

This is obviously a question you shouldn't answer on here, but do you guys actually have sex? Or fun? Anything apart from familiarity and fear of the unknown keeping you together?

Run for the hills my friend. Sounds like a control freak

Do you actually have a sex life with him? I can't imagine anything more unattractive than having to pay my share of the petrol if he drives or having sex with someone who hides the butter!
For goodness sake ... end this 'relationship' now.

Seriously OP just rip of that plaster and get rid asap...don't think of the 4 years at least you have not wasted your whole life! Please leave this man. If you want a family what happens then? This is not how couples live and you need to be free of him. Please do not have a child with this man. How awful for you. This is a form of abuse OP - so subtle and worse for it.

My Grandmother always said, “A man who is mean with his money is mean with his love.” She was absolutely right. Dump him, this won’t improve.

I think I used to live with this bloke! If we went into town shopping at the weekend, and he bought a newspaper, he’d ask me for half of it. Poor thing, he only earned three times what I did.

Your life will only get more miserable if you stay, and you will resent him more and more. Trust me, I’ve been there. Time to pack your stuff and leave.

As my late grandmother would have said, he’s so tight he wouldn’t give you the drippings off his nose!

Biggest turn off. YANBU

Stop buying him lunch. You’ve paid enough already.

You want to have a think if there’s anything worth working on. As an outsider looking in, I don’t think there is. He gaslights and shuts you down if you try to discuss that you’re paying more than your fair share.

I am presuming you’re relatively young. You’re wasting your youth and fertile years (if you want kids) on a man, who will always love his bank balance more than another human.

Ditch him there's nothing worse than someone who's mean. if they're mean with money they're mean with their affections too.

I was with a man who was mean and I got to
the point that i couldn't stand the constant adding subtracting dividing - rotting up who owed what and the time it all took.

The final nail in the coffin was when my mum came to stay and he refused to pay for any food for her and would sneak into the house his own food that he paid for and eat it in secret, but he was quite happy to eat any meals I cooked and I'd paid for - I was so embarrassed and angry that he should treat my mum like this who herself was so generous with money even though she hadn’t got much.

Get rid - it won't get better

I'm pleased to see you rent rather than own, much easier to get out of a relationship when you're not completely financially enmeshed.

He just sounds awful. What a miserable way to live; you deserve so much more. Do you want to leave him? I know it can be scary, but imagine a life with somebody who happily takes you out for dinner or allows you more than a scraping of butter!