to be a little bit miffed or am I being a brat?

[WeedingAnniversary]

So, it was my anniv yesterday. I recieved flowers and chocs. sigh. This year i got really upset over my birthday as not ONE of my pressents had longevity, i was going through a bad stage in my life, i was very tender, I put loads of thought into everybody else's presents, and DH asked me what the matter was and i spilled that i was upset and why. Mothers Day (after birthday) i had utterly lovely presents - really well thought out and focussed. it's not the money issue {not asking for excess}, its the easy present route that has miffed me. dh is working away at the mo, but came home for anniv which coincided with other quite major things (both positive and negative) so we actually had only about an hour of alone time. i haven't mentioned it, he doesn't know how i feel. aibu to feel a bit miffed?

You sound a bit high maintenance tbh. Who can think of special, thoughtful, focussed (?) pressies for every single occasion in the year? And despite you saying that you put loads of thought into everyone's presents, you got your DH a wedding card and no gift... So my verdict: brat.

Well I don't want to say yabu because I do think it depends on individual people but in my house we don't do presents for each other on mother/father's day, we help the kids do something crafty or a card or something and we buy something for our own parents. Anniversaries are usually about making time to spend together in a more special way, ie booking babysitters and going out rather than presents. I never buy myself nice chocolates so I would have been really touched about that personally, but we don't even do cards for anniversaries or Valentine so I appreciate we may not be the standard.

I think it depends on wether chocolate and flowers is a cop out for your dh or not, if my dh did it it wouldn't be a cop out it would be genuinely very thoughtful and meant to be surprise me for him. Only you know the answer to this though.

I would be gobsmacked to get anything on our anniversary, we usually don't even remember it.

They are a cliché, but no more so than something from Halfords for a man!

So, you're complaining about his gift to you of flowers & chocolates, but you got him nothing?
Oh right.
That seems fair.

You didn't even put any effort into the card and you do sound high maintenance. YABU in my view.

Another thing that leans me towards brat (sorry OP, I mean it lightheartedly which is the sense I get of how you also mean it?) is your comment that "not ONE of you birthday presents have longevity"...

How many presents did you get?! That sounds like at least 4?

Flowers and chocolates are easy, but if he thinks you like them, it's not a thoughtless gift.

I don't think there's a single wrappable gift that's better than your husband choosing to make the time to come back from working a away to be with you on the day. You can't buy that.

We hardly ever get the chance to give presents (financially) and neither of us expect them, any time I get flowers from my husband I appreciate them, actually I love getting flowers. It shows he's thinking of me, the actual gift isn't important, I think it's very brattish, sorry... At least he's thinking of you and remembers all these occasions.

He guided the dc on Mother Day to make sure I had lovely things. we don't do Valentines Day, and we call our winter break our Christmas pressie to each other. things for the car sounds a cop out, but he has a specialised vehicle which is his pride and joy and would love anything focussed for that. i've explained bad picking of the card, just a slightly unconcentrated choice, sadly. he told me the nighht before he'd cancelled his hotel, but with all the things that left me no time to buy anything - i thought i had till sunday. all you saying I wish I had chocs/flowers, that's lovely, but if chocs and flowers were not quite up to his usual standard and you'd had a conversation previously and having a rough time, wouldn't you honestly feel "little bit miffed"?

daisyj i've got him nothing YET. which wasn't an issue, as i will have something when i next see him.

Do you equate special gifts with love, OP?

Only my ex husband would rather buy a gift any day, than actually do his share of the housework/childcare/shopping etc.

Unlike my DH now who insists on doing far more than his fair share, because he enjoys taking care of us all.

I'm not saying you do equate it with love btw, just wondering?

He came home :)
Sounds like times are tough so I'm not going into my grip box.
Treat yourself to something nice tomorrow as a well done for getting through crappy times gift

please please ignore the "that's lovey" i'm typing on two windows and it all got mussed up, it was meant to say "i can understand that and i'm sorry,"

I'd be v pleased with flowers and chocs - but it so happens that I particularly love both those things and am not going through any sort of rough time.

Unless you're a hayfever suffering diabetic I think they sound like nice gifts. Try not to lose sight of the fact that what you do have with longevity is your relationship itself. Better than or .

That's an intersresting thought gifts = love. i'm not sure. maybe appreciation of relationship? i might need to ponder on this. he's been working away since february, i've seen him for 4 weekends since then. i'm at home managing all these things and he's excellent comfort on the phone, but it's not a patch on having him around. my dreams aren't of jewellry and fripperies - he did me a teeny photo book of the dc previousy which i adore, and will keep forever - maybe another one of those would have cheered me up?

Sounds like you're lacking intimacy because of the physical distance and trying to mimic it with "meaningful" gifts.

Why is he only managing to get back once a month or less? How far away is he?

Brat.

Brat. Maybe he's thinking 'fucking hell she bought me another thing for the car?'

So he came home with flowers and chocolates, which weren't good enough, and he then had to hide them because they would have upset your friend

I think it's your partner who should be feeling miffed, not you.

But he came back.
Surely that means more than presents? He made the effort to come back and surprise you on your anniversary?
That's a lovely thing to do!!!

You really are being very unreasonable here.

It was my wedding anniversary this week too. I got a card. I didn't get him one! It was his niece's wedding the same day along with my mum's birthday, and I'd been caught up organising flowers for mum/buttonholes/presents/outfits and our anniversary got pushed to the back! Neither of us care. A smile, a kiss and a happy anniversary was enough. We know we still love each other, it's just a day.

You lost me a bit on "it's my anniv.". Our anniversary, surely?

Given you didn't successfully get him an anniversary card and you had no present for him I think YABU to feel hard done by tbh. You have your reasons, I'm sure he does too. How lovely of him to come home though, that's got to be worth more than a present.

It sounds as if he has to do all the running in the relationship.
He's working away from home, which is NOT a bed of roses, makes the effort to come home with presents, which aren't good enough, while you didn't get him anything and didn't put any thought at all into his card?
And then you insist on shoving his flowers out of the way in case you upset your friend?
If anything he is the one who has a right to be disappointed in the way his spouse is behaving. It all sounds very unequal.

Try to make it up to him. Make an effort to show him how much you cHerish him rather than just regarding him as a source of presents. He gave you the gift of his company, but what he got in return was "that's not good enough. I wanted a proper present".
Poor guy.

Magazines and tv shows have a lot to answer for.

Brat.