Am I being an arse or is this controlling!?

[Dancehalldarling]

I’m in a lesbian relationship just so we’re clear on genders.

My girlfriend is so overly attentive that it’s really really starting to grate on me but I don’t know if I’m just being a bit of a cow.

examples:

• driving in my car I turn my air con up 2 degrees from the coldest. She leans forward and says are you cold with a concerned look and goes to adjust the air con again. There’s always just that little extra of whatever so she’s done something to help. I said no leave it. She then said do you want to turn the aircon off? I said no I’m fine. She said do you want my jacket? GAH!!!!
• out shopping (regularly) she will INSIST on carrying my bags. When I say no she relentlessly asks me to give them to her and it gets so annoying. Sometimes I want to carry my own bags! If I put them down for example to Pay she will pick them up and not give me them back.
• at the cinema she asks if I’m cold, I say no, I’m quite fine, she’ll take her coat off and put it over me.
• constantly paws at me and I mean CONSTANTLY has to be holding hands whether it’s driving, walking, sitting on the sofa, at dinner. It’s not just holding hands she holds my hand with one hand and caresses my arms and hands with her other hand. If she’s not doing this she’s stroking my hair or rubbing my head/neck/shoulders/tickling my arm or face.
• If I’ve asked her to do a task for example could you please grab my keys while I look for my phone, she’ll grab the keys (along with everything else I’m carrying) and then as soon as I mention I’m going to grab my phone she’ll put down what she has and start frantically joining me in looking for my phone. This is a small example but what I’m trying to say is if she’s doing something and notices I’m on a different task she will drop what she’s doing and join me 100%. Cleaning, getting dressed, whatever.
• always asks if I’ve ate, what I’ve ate, when I’ve ate. Sometimes I lie and say yes when I actually haven’t because I can’t be arsed with “why?” “I’ll Uber you food now what do you want?” “You need to eat” “make sure you eat please”
• we don’t live together but if she hears I’m doing something like painting a room she insists on coming round and doing it for me, tells me to just sit down and rest. Sometimes I just want to get things done?
• has to see me every day and kind of sulks if she doesn’t. Which is a real PITA sometimes as I have DC and don’t live overly close to her (D.C. not officially met her yet) So often I’m going out my way to call in before or after work, after school run, when DC are with their dad. Every day! This week she has sulked because she’s “hardly seen me” when I’ve seen her every day just not for as long.
• she doesn’t like any of my friends and thinks I’m too good for them. She’s not a fan of me going out with them which is very rare. My best friend doesn’t like her for a separate reason but this also plays on my mind.

I’ve gotten irritated a few times and told her I’m not made of bloody glass and can she please stop treating me like an infant. She gets the hump and says she’s just trying to care for me. But I find it really suffocating and a bit controlling! AIBU?

I felt claustrophobic about a quarter of the way through your post. I genuinely could not cope with that amount of being fussed over.

The comment you made about her being on the spectrum cause she watches your reaction when watching a film and she isn't aware of how loud she is - I do these things and I was diagnosed with moderate ADHD. Lots of autistic and adhd traits cross over as very similar things so it most likely is her adhd that is causing some of these "issues". But I don't know her fully so maybe she is autistic. That comment just reached out to me personally haha.

It sounds like she's developed a lot of insecurities from her past relationships and maybe just generally in herself. You said she's had some abuse and people probably not understanding her or maybe even cheating on her? She is trying to please you in every way so you stay, so she had stability in her life and so she knows you will be there for her.

Why does your friend not like her? This might be useful for us to see the overall situation. As you say, you're starting to go off her a bit so you're pointing out the negatives now whereas when you were feeling okay about the relationship you let these little annoyances slide. Clearly something has shifted within yourself.

She sounds caring and lovely but absolutely overbearing. Tbh I'd personally love it if my partner fussed me like that haha, some people do love to be cared for in such a way. But I do agree that it sounds like she is mothering you. Maybe there is a strong reason for that.

It sounds like you have enjoyed the honeymoon phase but now reality is setting in you're having second thoughts and are pinpointing every quirk she has, when people do that (as many of us could find something in our relationships that could validate leaving) it means times up, you want out.

Sulky, controlling behaviour that is starting to make you feel panicky about her reaction. You’ve lost your sense of self. Re-read that til it sinks in. You need to get out.

Think about a clean way to break it off. She will want explanation, closure and any belongings you have of hers as an excuse to see you. If you can’t just call/message her and break it off then do something that will upset her (like say you’ve booked the holiday with your friends) and use her reaction as a way to tell her you’re not happy with this level of intensity and you want to break up.

I hope someone comes along with good advice on how to extricate yourself asap. This is incredibly messed-up for a relationship that is only 1-year long. Thank goodness you didn’t introduce her to your kids!

She needs a shit-ton more therapy and you will need to go NC pretty fast and completely block her to avoid seeing the probable threats of self-harm/suicide. I imagine you might need to warn her family if you know them as it will need to be their responsibility to watch out for her and get her the help she needs.

I hope you don’t mind me saying I think you might possibly need therapy yourself so you can work out how to avoid ending up in a similar situation ever again. You must be so shocked at where you’ve “suddenly” found yourself. Wishing you all the best x

This was all following her going missing for 2 weeks and essentially cheated on me with her physically abusive ex. As far as I was concerned, she was at breaking point through trauma and needed an outlet, pushed me away because I cared for her and she wasn’t used to it.

I can't say that would have been my reaction to someone going AWOL and then cheating on me with someone she'd told me she hated (presumably). My reaction would have been to have not had anything further to do with her.

Just wondering, do you think your reaction would have been different if you were in a heterosexual relationship? It sounds as though you've been swamped in #bekind and you're now choking on it.

So your gf's method of getting a reaction is by trying to evoke pity in you for her? The photos of her crying are really out of order.

And you shouldn't feel guilty about not seeing her every day.

This is really unhealthy.

It seems to be like this 'love language' stuff is just another way of manipulating people. If you don't like something, it's "Oh but that's my love language!!!" and you're expected to just put up with it?

It all sounds very unhealthy OP, sorry, in just the ways PPs have described. Don't feel silly, intelligent people get drawn into this sort of thing just like anyone. It's not easy to spot this sort of manipulation if you yourself are a kind and loving person.

This might be off the wall, but another thing to consider is how useful she actually is in your life. What does she bring to the table financially, emotionally, etc? How much support do you really have from her - I mean the kind of support that actually makes you feel supported, not the fake kind that drains you (e.g. "here, let me wipe your arse")?

Real support is knowing when to be absent, as well as present.

I'm only mentioning this because in my experience, sometimes utterly useless people who are totally selfish manage to make a smokescreen for themselves by presenting themselves as indispensable. The sooner you start believing you're a fragile little princess who needs her around to look after you, the better as far as she's concerned.

That would absolutely have me run away very fast. I can’t bear overbearing people.

Exactly, this is a truth that is very poorly understood. I read in a study recently that when asked anonymously more men reported violence against them by female partners than the other way round. The difference is it's just not talked about. Growing up, one of my best friend's mum used to beat up her husband frequently. He was living in fear.
I also know a couple of lesbian couples where one partner has physically abused the other (quite severely).
Children are more likely to be abused by their mothers than fathers.
Women are capable of violence and controlling behaviour.

OP, you have to end this is. I’m certain, with a bit of distance and reflection, you’ll realise you’re not in love with her.

Sounds like a way to slowly manipulate a less strong person into being very dependent on her, as well as isolated from their friends in the long term. Classic manoeuvres and would be a huge red flag.

Someone quoted this on another thread so I am paraphrasing it here:

“When I see one sick person in a couple I know there are really two sick people in the relationship.”

This is what codependency is: an unhealthy bond between a person who seems to need extra care and another person who needs to be the caregiver. She has her reasons for trying to love bomb you/touch you/carry your things. All these things may seem necessary to her emotionally or psychologically (to feel safe) but she is also trying to put you under obligation to her, to make herself necessary to you, to make you dependent on her so that you can’t get away.

The flip side of her situation is yours. Your impulse to take her back, to rescue her, to help her stabilize is a good one. But you are too involved in it—unlike a professional—and you ate stuck in a very early stage of the rescue. She can’t progress and you need to accept that you won’t magically grow her into a real adult. You are like a person who jumps in to save a person from drowning and thinks you can also teach them to swim. She doesn’t want to swim to shore. She loves your attention! She doesn’t want to manage for herself and she is going to drown you both.

You thought you could rescue and stabilize her—and no doubt she was grateful! But she is not capable of drawing the right lesson from it (be ethical, take care of yourself, manage your trauma, don’t repeat addictive/dangerous behaviors. To the extent that she is still in trauma and acting that out she is like a dry drunk who has substituted one addiction (being the perfect all embracing gf) for another (being in an abusive toxic relationship).

deffo trauma/fawning going on here. She needs a psychotherapist. But as PP said not your issue to solve.

I don't think that she does have a heart of gold tbh.

She's abusive with her "niceness" if that makes sense.

Her love language is touching you whether you want it or not?

Isn't that abuse?

I thought this was more an issue of incompatible love languages until I got to the last two points.

Anyone who thinks that their own needs should come ahead of their partners children's needs is bad news as far as I'm concerned. Competing with a child is pretty pathetic anyway but if you imagine what their ideal situation is (having their partner all to themselves at the expense of children's relationships with their parents) you can see that it's more malignant than being insecure and needy.

I'm a lesbian who also has tendencies to nurture and loves touch and cuddles etc etc, love my DP giving me her coat and calling me Princess- and this would drive me utterly NUTS!!! Definitenly not being unreasonable by any stretch!

As an aside, I almost lost my life at the hands of an ex. Yes more likely with men, but far from impossible for women to turn violent. She sounds as if she needs extensive therapy.

The bottom line is you're not happy, and you're having to second guess yourself already. All the noise in your head created by her. This needs to stop.

It seems to be like this 'love language' stuff is just another way of manipulating people. If you don't like something, it's "Oh but that's my love language!!!" and you're expected to just put up with it?

I've often wondered about that!

Shes annoyed the tits off me just from this thread op

Oh wow. This is a new kind of extreme. I would feel like a toddler having someone do this for me. As a grown adult no one should do this for you!

As for being tactile. I would feel suffocated at this level. Just let me breathe

Some people are like this. Somewhere in the world is a person who wants to be treated this way. It isn’t you. You are not into her and she senses it, which is why she keeps making these overtures and is becoming increasingly desperate. Do her a favour and be honest about the fact that you don’t see a future with her so that she can move on and meet someone who will llove her as she is.

Another one is when we go out to eat and I’m finished she’ll take my plate away from In front of me and start cleaning my area of the table “so I don’t put my arms in any mess” which really annoys me.

MIL used to do that - worse still after kids she'd do on it at my own table. It's a control thing it often looks nice to others and can be hard to complain about but is actually very undermining and puts you on edge.

I couldn't walk away from relationship but did find completely ignore and sometime disappearing worked. There were many other problems - along same line putting me on back foot weirdly competing on odd things that you don't always realised - and when kids were young competing for our attention with them while very much being "on show" to others about being great GM.

It stopped or we managed it better or recognise it and countered - but in a romantic partner I'd leave because it's a lot of work to cope with - and to make sure you don't look like batshit one to others.

So many red flags, she's not respecting your autonomy at all. If this was a heterosexual relationship you'd probably be trusting your gut and seeing it for what it is....End it asap it will only get worse.

If she is like this now I wonder how she would be having to share you with your kids if and when they are introduced. Would she be jealous or would she be too in their faces and try and parent them too? Of she is like this with you now before meeting them and when she has you to herself then I suspect she will not cope once your kids are on the scene too.

Sorry but this last bit strays into stigmatising people on the receiving end of abusers – I’m sure this wasn’t your intention.

You don’t need to be ‘damaged’ in some way or a particular ‘type’ of person to find yourself in close quarters with someone like this. This kind of myth is precisely why people don’t recognise situations like this sooner – they see themselves as strong, confident, capable people who have no trouble asserting themselves and would not put up with being bossed around. (Hence the common refrain recognised by the OP of ‘I never thought I of all people could end up in a situation like this’.)

And OP is taking action now precisely because she does not find any of this healthy. It’s called manipulation for a reason – non-manipulative people may not immediately recognise the true dynamics at play.