DP won't lend me his carrier bags

[Feelquiteisolated]

I know this sounds totally ridiculous but DP and I had a fall out today over carrier bags.

DP is organised, he carries 3 carrier bags in his coat and more in his car and house. I spend most weekends at his house and I have bags in my car but none in my coat. Today we went shopping and I had no bags. Had I been alone I would have bought some, but he had some. He wouldn't loan me one of his 3 in his pockets, and said I needed to buy my own.

I was not happy. I bought his lunch and dinner yesterday and during the shopping trip he added an item that cost £1.30 so I was like "well I'm worth a 20p bag!"

He ended up loaning me the bag but tonight he expressed his unhappiness on WhatsApp. He said I have no right to spoil his systems, I don't respect him, he doesn't want my mess adding to his mess. He said it's a tragedy because he can see himself ending up with no bags.

He said I need to know my behaviour was not acceptable. But I really just think if he has something I need why would he make me buy it, it feels humiliating to me. But perhaps I'm missing the point and I need to pay for not being organised.

I feel like I generally pay for more than him, well no, I know this is true. I pay for 80% of our meals out, I drive over 50% of the time, I buy him treats etc.

So he said all that and then said for me to stop being dramatic because he was going to bed. This was before 9.30pm. I'm left feeling a bit abandoned, isolated and lonely. I don't really think I'm a needy person but I feel this way quite often.

This is totally outing if he reads it, but oh well.

AIBU? should I buy and carry my own bags and buy them while out even if I would only need to borrow for a short time?

Definitely neuro-diverse.

He's still a grown man who is choosing to constantly put you down, though. And the water in face??

Please value yourself more than he does & leave him.

X

🤣⬆️ This!! 100% this!!

Op, this is for you -

I’m sure your son won’t be controlling and abusive of his partner, so there will be no need for anyone to talk about him like this.

I’m afraid I completely agree with @BunchHarman’s stance - the combination of behaviours, complete with water flicking, is untenable for someone in a relationship.

Wow Tamarindtree that's amazing! Love it

OP, have you packed his bags yet?

He’s nuts. Run far, run fast

@Ihatethemessimin my DP has a collection of tubs. Mainly tubs from takeaways but also quite a lot of margarine tubs and tupperware. They're all very, very carefully organised in a cupboard. Honestly, the microsecond you open that cupboard he hears and comes running, in a massive panic that you'll touch the tubs. Personally, I think it's very endearing and funny. I know not to touch the tubs, as it upsets him.

But the reason I think it's sweet, rather than fucking annoying, or something to be mocked, is because he never mocks me. He will give me many, many tubs, free of charge, so long as I ask him to get them rather than interfering with his system and helping myself. He wouldn't dream of flicking water in my face or telling me that I put my moisturiser on wrong. He might think it, I have no idea, he would never say it.

One day your son will, hopefully, find a woman who thinks his foibles are endearing. It's the abusive behaviour the OP's DP exhibits that's intolerable and a turn off.

Run a mile from him. He appears to be a tad nuts.

I've been having a difficult day and this made me laugh helplessly for a LONG time. Thank you, TinySaltLick...

OP, I realise he has other attributes that you appreciate and care for but someone who can be so mean-spirited and ungenerous (and someone who so stubbornly and hypocritically doesn't recognise your generosity) is really not worthy of being a partner for life (let alone worthy of keeping your bags for life).

The control and the criticism will also get worse, not better, over time. The WhatsApp exchange was jaw-droppingly outrageous -- you were the one who had every right to be affronted, he is the one who should have been apologising. He is not your king and controller. You are not his subdued subject.

You are obviously a generous, thoughtful and tolerant partner who enjoys giving treats and being kind and open. Why do you think you don't deserve the same treatment in return?

Because you really, really do.

Can you imagine growing old with this man, op?

As we get older our foibles become worse.

You only have one life, spend it with someone who is compatible with you and makes you feel loved and wanted.

I think you said you were in your forties? If so, be prepared for time to feel like it’s speeding up and before you know you will still be with this miserable man when your fifty, then sixty and you’ve wasted your whole life on someone who doesn’t appreciate you or deeply care about you.

He said I have no right to spoil his systems, I don't respect him, he doesn't want my mess adding to his mess. He said it's a tragedy because he can see himself ending up with no bags

Oh come ON 🙄

If he’s autistic or has OCD then that would help to explain his behaviours. If he’s not, then he’s just a petty little prick and I don’t know how you can have sex with him, he sounds repulsive.

Even if he is ND, he's prioritising his systems over your well-being.

And it's no way to live!

I would probably dump him for this. Or, I would give him nothing but carrier bags for all birthdays and holidays going forward. They're clearly very precious to him.

God you two sound fun. Is it not exhausting?

Neurodiversity doesn't give someone a free pass to grind their partner down. He sounds unbearable to be honest.

I know it's been two years together OP so it's not easy to just walk away but this man values you so little that he has a hissy fit about lending you a carrier bag. He behaves like an authority figure rather than a partner, he actively wanted to punish you for not doing things in what he considers to be the right way.

I know my husband disapproves if I forget a bag, but he does so silently, he would never consider chiding me. I know it must annoy him because the silly sod will try and carry everything out by hand if he forgets one, so I know he annoys himself when he does it too, it's just a little foible of his which I find secretly hilarious and lovable. That's because I also know if I really needed anything, my DH would be there for me. He'd probably let me have bone marrow or a kidney if I needed it. Imagine if you ever need real support in the future not just the lend of a plastic bag, this man does not sound capable of being there for you.

I'd honestly reassess whether you should be staying with him, he sounds fundamentally selfish and more suited to a single life.

I'd also cut the corners off his precious bags, but I'm vengeful and vindicate, so don't do that.

Time to bag yourself a new partner/friend/man

A partner/friend is supposed to enhance your life, not make it worse

He values his 3 bags for life, more than you !

Get yourself a new life !

Aww I love this, thank you very much!

Brilliant!

You are welcome, op.

Sometimes in life you have to put yourself first, and this is one of those times where you have to say that his problems are dragging you down and you know deep down he’s never going to change.

You’ll be upset and miss him for a while but he really is an albatross around your neck and you will realise that it’s much better not to be around someone who makes you feel like crap.

OP He may well be autistic. He probably is. I am autistic and I have autistic children and I recognise the over-the-top rigidity and routines.

However, he is also cruel and unkind to you.
Being autistic does not magically permit you to behave like a git.
You clearly have a choice to make here. A friend of mine left her autistic husband (after ten years) when she failed to persuade him to stop writing "have sex" on his weekly rota of chores and activities, which was displayed on the front of their fridge.
No spontaneity, you see. He couldn't cope with spontaneity at all.

He said it's a tragedy because he can see himself ending up with no bags.

Its a tragedy because he has bullied his kind generous girlfriend over ridiculous trifles and thinks this whole situation is her fault. He has zero self-awareness.

He's got the bag system sorted. Now he's sorting a system for you - moisturising your face the wrong way, showering the wrong way, washing up a cup the wrong way seem like He's trying to mould you into one of his systems, to make you do every tiny thing "the Right Way" - his way.

Also there is NOTHING in the highway code that says a driver has to obey a passenger's instructions to match the top speed in any given zone. It's dangerous and he is nuts to be imposing that on you, in a car he doesn't drive (thank God) or contribute to.

You will be walking on eggshells trying to remember to obey his restrictive rules, or even worse contravening one of his unwritten ones he's decided on but hasn't yet communicated. After two years of this treatment, you are unsure if you are being unreasonable just because he is so committed and so fully confident that he is right and the world should be organised his way.

He needs to see a therapist as his condition is becoming unsustainable.

Please don't let him make you live like this. You shouldn't have to continually face the choice of complying with all these unjust restrictions imposed on you, or suffer recrimination if you slip up.
You say that he can be sweet and good company but that doesn't outweigh these ludicrous rules, imposed at whim, and his leaving you feeling lonely and isolated every time things don't go his way.

honestly op how is he thoughtful-he lets you pay for the majority of things-he tells you how to wash how to drive etc

maybe it is a mental health thing but lots of people suffer and dont act this way

inferior food but all he cooks is a jacket potato every day