I’ve been with my partner for just over a year. He can be very lovely, and I do think he has good values, but there’s a very performative side to him that I’m struggling with. He’s 40 yet still very attached to a sort of DJ-scene identity, always telling stories and dropping names, and it feels like he hasn’t really outgrown that phase. For me, it doesn’t feel about the music so much as about the image. He's constantly 'on' trying to make jokes and people please. On a recent holiday, he spent four hours thinking of puns to whatsapp people. I feel like if I don't respond completely enthralled, I'm then having to manage his sulks and stony silences, but it's exhausting.
I’m a single parent and I work a lot — both PAYE and freelance — so my capacity is already finely balanced. I also need occasional downtime just to reset. He sees that as me not prioritising him, whereas I see it as basic survival. The more needy and sexually pushy he becomes, the more I withdraw.
He sometimes makes comments that are supposed to be “jokes” but feel like pressure. Last week, he suggested he should come over “just for a blow job” and then saying “can delete if inappropriate.” It's like he's testing the water but and wanting to hedge his bets based on my response.
He’s questioned me about going to bed early, once calling me a liar, and if I say I need space he often sulks or gives me the silent treatment. After a meal recently when I said I was heading home as I was tired, he got stroppy and went cold with me.
There was also a big argument when I mentioned (in context of talking about shit bands) that I’d slept with someone over 20 years ago who said he was from XXXX shit band. He had a huge strop and made us leave the taxi. Yet he constantly talks about his own past and his stories are fair game. It feels like a double standard.
He'll pay for things then remind me later "I'm really kind, I've paid for XYZ" like he's holding it against me. It feels like pressure all the time.
I’ve suggested therapy, because I think he’s actually quite insecure and it could help him, but he won’t consider it. I feel like he doesn’t really value the reality of my life — that I parent alone, work hard, and need downtime sometimes.
I keep asking myself if I’m being unkind and breadcrumbing him, or whether this is the start of controlling behaviour. Has anyone been in a similar situation, and is this just a non-starter?