AIBU to ask you if staying with this man is a mistake?

[MsConsuela]

Please be patient and read to the end if you can!

Pros-

1. One of the two people in the world I can really be myself with
2. My best friend since years- I tell

him everything, he's my confidante apart from my mum.

1. I trust that he won't cheat- this is big for me, because my ex cheated and all the men in my family cheated, so that insecurity never left me. I value the open line of communication we have and how honest and patient he is with me.
2. I don't want children and it's impossible to find men my age who don't want them either. He's ok with not having them and he never pressures me on this
3. I have anxiety and temper issues- he's very patent and understanding with it.

CONS

1. He is an absolute miser. Doesn't spend on anything other than bare essentials.
2. He has taken me out one exactly ONE date since we have been together.
3. Because he is such a miser we barely go anywhere- he never eats out or goes to the cinema and this makes for a rather boring life.
4. I am not one of those entitled people who expects her bf to spend thousands on her- AT ALL. But he is the sort who will ask me to pay him back even £5 and he has never bought me anything (except chocolates on my birthday and an occasional pack of crisps)
5. He isn't very encouraging of my work. Now to be clear, he isn't a chauvinist who expects me to stay home and cook (in fact he does all the cooking), but at the same time due to his general negative attitude he's always telling me I won't get the promotion or the project.

Basically, I don't think I've ever gotten a well done on anything from him.

1. This is a big one- he's into some risky investments (that aren't even allowed in his profession) and it really really bothers me.

Since we are a couple and if we look at a future together how can I be with someone who is usually a miser and then gambles his life savings and reputation and job away? It doesn't make sense and when I told I could t live with it, he said he couldn't stop for at least a year.

1. We don't agree on how much to spend on rent and it's going to be impossible to find a place together.
2. He lives at mine but never cleans anything other than kitchen(because he's the one who mainly uses) and doesn't help pay the bills.
3. While he always looks after me when I'm sick, he doesn't offer to come for doctor's appointments etc unless I insist. Recently I had some traumatic medical procedures for which I went alone, and I felt very unsupported then.

I have seen some positive changes in him in terms of going out and doing things that make me happy- but very little.

His risky investments can potentially damage my reputation at work too if they come out and that causes me a lot of anxiety ( I won't give details here)

I do love him, but my friends are sick of me because I'm always unhappy and moaning about something or another.

This results in me nagging him constantly and us fighting.

I don't know what to do.

My background is very complicated. I have nobody except my Mum and she lives in another continent.

I've been alone here for six years and the idea of being alone again isn't appealing

As pathetic as it sounds, I liked the idea of someone other than my mum being there for me.

I'm damned if I leave and damned if I don't/

What should I do?

"I'm always unhappy and moaning about something or another. "

There's your answer. Leave him.

Re-read your post as if you were reading a random MN post and say "Why do some women settle for absolute crappy losers?"

'I don't know if that makes a difference'

You are minimising and making excuses for him.

I think if you're making pro/con lists about someone then your heart isn't in it and it's time to leave. Nobody will be perfect but if you want to be with them you won't make a list trying to convince yourself that there's enough on the pro side to make it worth staying.

Your subsequent posts making his behaviour not his fault are worrying though. I assume that's from him excusing his behaviour with his upbringing/need to support others etc. If he's aware of it he can address it. He can have therapy, or he can choose to make changes in his life. It sounds like he doesn't want to, so this is how he will stay.

Leave, he doesn't make you happy now, and nothing will change to make you happier in the future. You don't owe him anything for him leaving someone else "for you" - he wouldn't have left if it were a great relationship.

Firstly, he is NOT insider trading. Categorically no.

I have spoken to multiple professionals and a lawyer and I am not at risk(YET). But of course if we moved together "officially" and this became serious and more public, then I might be.

Which is why I agree with people who say now is the time to end it before he does something serious.

What he does once we are No longer together is his problem.

As a friend it was my duty to warn him which I did.

And it was my goodness that I haven't told on him (yet)

But I mostly did that for his mum and sister, not for him.

What I got from your post is that you are with him because:

• you are insecure
• you are scared of being alone
• you don't have any other people that are close to you (in this country) so you have made yourself dependent on him
• you don't think you will meet anyone else who also doesn't want children

There are lots of things you don't like about him but you are brushing over these because of the above. How about making yourself free so you can meet someone you actually enjoy being with and can have fun with.

Trial separation may be a good idea to give you time to think how things would be without him.

The same mum and sister that don't love him?

Is this about whether you want to leave him, or whether you're scared to feel like 'a bad person' for leaving someone you perceive as being worse off than you, emotionally or financially?

I totally understand it, and sympathise - but the four friends I can think of, just off the top of my head, who've devoted years to similar situations have all watched in open-mouthed amazement as the 'near suicidal' bloke in question shacked up with someone else in a matter of weeks. So don't start weighing your own happiness against his in some sort of imaginary scale and making yours worth less than his - it's not.

I have already told him that trial separation has to happen. He will move out this weekend.

And I've told him not to even consider us getting back until he has sorted his finances.

That's a good first step.
He will always be a tight arsed misery guts though.
Once he out, you can keep him out.
One step at a time!

And he always talks about his pregnant friend who has an abusive alcoholic husband and says it's her fault for continuing to stay with such a man (classic victim blaming)

And he mentions these other boyfriends very pointedly and then hints at how lucky I am that he doesn't drink or return home at random hours or cheat

Let's just unravel this.

His mum and sister don't work. So presumably they get housing benefit and unemployment benefit of some kind. And he - this man who doesn't pay rent and is too tight to buy you more than a bag of crisps in recompense - is spending his money on them? When he believes they have never ever loved him? When he is a miser?

Sorry, I don't believe that. He might say he's giving them money, but I would bet anything he's not.

I mean, yes it's great that he isn't a cheating alcoholic, but I hardly think I should feel grateful for something so basic

His mum and sister aren't in this country either.

So they don't get housing benefit etc.

Therefore he does send them some money

But of course if we moved together "officially" and this became serious and more public

But what do you call the relationship that you have right now? Are you saying you're unofficially or secretly living together, or somehow not an acknowledged couple? Or that it's somehow less problematic that he doesn't contribute to the rent and bills, despite living in your house/flat, because it's 'unofficial'?

Why doesn't he pay towards your bills?

Good plan to ask him to move back to his own flat! Great step.

Meanness is the character fault I could least tolerate. I'd have left him long ago.

NikiSaint-

Well, since we each technically have our own flats and lease and address, we are not legally living together. As in, we have not declared a joint address to work etc.

While it indicates his crap character on these things, it's a blessing in disguise that he hasn't paid rent or transferred anything to my account. That's my evidence that our financial affairs are separate and I have no part in his flakiness

Imperial- likely because bills included in my rent and he is still paying rent for his flat where he doesn't live...

No idea.

Is it flakiness, though? It sounds as though he's involved in something that borders on illegality.

Why does he live in your place if he has his own? Is he paying rent on somewhere he doesn't live? Really?

Another small example.

I use more of the kitchen roll than he does.

Because I use it to squeeze out my makeup sponge in the morning.

So he tells me I have to but the kitchen roll because I use more of it

I understand saving money, but really?! This is incomprehensible

Get him out, then change the locks and block him, you don't need this crap in your life

Imperial- it's not illegal.

And if by some chance it is, then it's his funeral and he can deal with it now that he'll live on his own.

Yes, he has his own place but he pushed to live witn me initially because due to our work hours, we would barely see each other if we lived separately.

But in retrospect- there are many couples who don't live together and still make time so we jumped the gun on that one

Jeez. Does he work for the Inland Revenue, by any chance?!