Or is this not a compliment?

[SaltLampCity]

I had therapy a few years ago and she said I needed to take focus away from seeing the value in what I do to see the value in who I am instead.

I've been seeing someone for a while. He very rarely compliments me. He will comment positively on things I've done (eg food tastes nice, candles look good, I bought a nice dress) but not on who I am.

He says things like "girls look pretty/sexy/cute" when they [insert whatever I'm doing] but never tells me that i do. It just feels really cold and impersonal. He claims these are compliments. To me it feels I have just prompted him to tell me what he finds desirable in women in general. Nothing about me.

For example, we went away at the weekend. I was siting partially clothed on the window seat in the hotel room. He came over and 're-positioned' me into a pose he finds sexually alluring (not explicit, just a pose he likes) including making minor adjustments to the direction my feet were pointing and how my clothes were draped. Then he said "you look sexy like that."

He claims it was a compliment. It makes me feel cheap. I reads to me like "I want to fuck women when I see them sitting like that. And now I've made you look as though I want to fuck you too".

There's just nothing about me in that at all. He could have positioned the woman next door like that and she'd have looked equally sexy.

AIBU?

@AryaStarkWolf

Yes I see what you mean about the comments (not just that weird pose thing) it's like he's telling you what he finds attractive in women and wanting you to behave in certain ways so you fit his ideal? Instead of seeing you as an individual person with you're own unique traits and quirks that he finds attractive/likes about you specifically. Yeah odd. I would find that off putting and almost like he doesn't see women as actual people

Yes, thats exactly it.

I've started to think recently that he thinks the purpose of women is to look pretty/sexy and that any evidence we have thoughts/feelings/opinions or any form of 'inner world' is very unattractive. He isn't curious about me at all.

Trust your gut on this one. He's not making you feel good.

Also, your description of him repositioning you 🤮 I wouldn't want him after that

He's 100% an odious, repulsive creep, so dump him now and let him get back to his pay per view porn habit. This man is not nice at all.

He sounds really weird

He sounds like a disgusting creep. Does he have any redeeming qualities?

@Anonymous48

He sounds like a disgusting creep. Does he have any redeeming qualities?

He does but they're being somewhat overshadowed by this side of him that has started emerging recently.

It's the first time he's ever done the repositioning thing!

There's no intimacy. We have sex but it's not intimate. The last time we had sex was that day and I felt like I was a prop

I'm thinking about the compliments my husband gives me and they are nothing like what this man says to you, OP. They're about me as an individual rather than an object, not how he wants me to be or thinks a woman should be. What you are saying makes absolute sense. Please get rid of him and find someone who values you for who you are inside.

I've started to think recently that he thinks the purpose of women is to look pretty/sexy and that any evidence we have thoughts/feelings/opinions or any form of 'inner world' is very unattractive. He isn't curious about me at all.

That's no good, you can do better than him. Actually just being by yourself would be doing better!

most women want their partners to find them sexy and it's normal for women to want to look sexy.

If your benchmark is porn, perhaps you can kid yourself that if his is true.

It really, really isn't true, is it?

He isn't curious about me at all.

Throw this one back.

I would think he has many many issues. The not being able to compliment thing would end it for me, even without the weird posing sex doll thing. Is he quite narcissistic in terms of his own self absorption in how he looks? He sounds quite vacuous.

He sounds like a bit of an aesthete. It's rather old fashioned. It's up to you whether to put up with it or not.

There's no intimacy. We have sex but it's not intimate. The last time we had sex was that day and I felt like I was a prop yeah end it. You deserve better than to feel like this.

Wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG!

oh huge red flag massive red flag, red flag the size of mars

@SaltLampCity

There's no intimacy. We have sex but it's not intimate. The last time we had sex was that day and I felt like I was a prop

I hope you're not contemplating staying with him?

[quote Anonymous48]@SaltLampCity

There's no intimacy. We have sex but it's not intimate. The last time we had sex was that day and I felt like I was a prop

I hope you're not contemplating staying with him?[/quote]
No. Just working it through in my head.

We have a lot of mutual friends and he is very well liked. He's regarded as very kind and a gentleman. I'm steeling myself to be seen as the bad guy.

He's a creep, get rid. No it is not normal to do that!

This is just wrong. I have met men like this before, where I was an interchangeable bit player in their life.
My friend at the time gave me the advice of if he hasn't asked about you 10 minutes into the conversation he is just not interested.
It was good advice.

Nope, so controlling and really creepy - to reposition you while you sit is objectifying and disregarding of you, I assume you were sitting comfortably rather than for his entertainment. I’d find him deeply unattractive after that.

@Jellycatspyjamas

Nope, so controlling and really creepy - to reposition you while you sit is objectifying and disregarding of you, I assume you were sitting comfortably rather than for his entertainment. I’d find him deeply unattractive after that.

Probably should have been clearer. We had stopped for a break during sex. I'd put a robe on and sat on the window seat. So not like we were watching Murder, She Wrote or something!

But yes I was just sitting comfortably.

But even so, it just felt wrong.

@M0rT

This is just wrong. I have met men like this before, where I was an interchangeable bit player in their life. My friend at the time gave me the advice of if he hasn't asked about you 10 minutes into the conversation he is just not interested. It was good advice.

That is good advise

@SaltLampCity that’s because it was wrong, to reposition you for his attraction is very wrong indeed.

Oh my god he sounds like such a weirdo, avoid.

@SaltLampCity

I take it its not usual for men to do it either then? I've not experienced it before but then I've not dated a huge amount!

Even if it was ‘usual’ it doesn’t mean that you, or anyone else, should accept that.

He is creepy and doesn’t see YOU as a real person.

He needs dumping really, and also a short sharp shock lesson, on how to be a proper man,in a proper relationship with a woman. He is just living in his own dream world.