DP embarrasing me over periods

[Bluebirdies]

I’m 30 I know I shouldn’t exactly be embarrassed by them (and deep down I’m not) but this is how DP is making me feel.

I was having really bad stomach cramps last night. He was asking me what was wrong and I told him and he pulled a disgusted face. Then this morning I had come on and he said “eww”

When he says these things, I do pull him up on them but he says he’s joking but they aren’t funny to me. For a while now I have been trying to make out what this means. Is it just something he’s grossed out by? Or is it an example of not really caring about me? I can’t work it out

My 18 year old has been with her boyfriend since they were 16. When they were first together he'd bring flowers and chocolates when she had her period- just drop them off at the door. These days he just brings Maltesers, does a hot water bottle (she genuinely does suffer in a way I never did), finds something funny to watch. It's lovely to see. He was brought up with the same, strict, Catholic upbringing to me- keep periods hidden and suffer in silence. He is prone to becoming pretty ill with chest infections so my daughter reciprocates the care. He's just a decent human who loves and respects his girlfriend. Who knows whether they'll stay together, but I'll always be happy that both of their first relationships set the bar for how they both should expect to be treated in future. (Very much unlike my relationships. )

My teenage boys wouldn’t behave like that!

Who the fuck are the 4% who thought you were being unreasonable? 😳

My DD's 17 year old boyfriend buys her tampax and pads when she asks him to if he's popping to the shops.
I could not be in a relationship with a man who couldn't cope with periods.
What would it be like if you had kids with this cock-shine? 🤔

You don’t know me, my relationship or our dynamic. Anyone who gets icked out super easily by bodily fluids (he really, really does, it makes him go pale and want to vomit) but STILL holds your hair when you’re vomiting, brings you glasses of water while you’re busy shitting your guts out on the toilet and goes out to buy you sanitary products and painkillers when you’re on your period, then rubs your back to help reduce the cramps? Keeper.

What’s your phobia? Would you willingly put yourself through it every month just to make your other half feel better? I know that if I had to walk across a rope bridge over a sheer drop every month to help my other half…I’m not sure I’d be as supportive a partner.

But hey, everyone has their red lines and if your baseline is that your partner has to be good with bodily fluids then that’s fine. I decided a long time ago that it wasn't as important as all my DH’s good qualities and the way he just tries to make me happy every day. So your snark is understandable but ultimately misplaced.

Yeah, my 11 year old son would NEVER. He is currently being trained about different products I or his sisters may need fetching from the shop. Always with a bat of chocolate

Love the overreactions !
But I must have missed the LTB responses. 🙄

God help you, but you must be desperate.
If you weren't, you would be so long gone.

Misogynistic prick.

He’s just emotionally immature. Please never have children with him.

and he would literally call me ‘unclean!’.

Women having periods are not unclean. That's a vile thing to think and a vile thing to say and a despicable attitude to pass on to children.

You are with a boy not a man, clearly emotionally immature.

I find anyone who abuses a woman for her femininity abhorrent.

Find yourself a real man.

TBH I think that quite a few men do have that 'yuk' response to periods but the grown up ones know that it's their problem, a bit like having a phobia, and are able to treat women respectfully in spite of it.

This isn't just immature - it's so unkind, and he's not joking. He's just saying that to carry on getting away with this shitty behaviour, and he's shown you his true colours.

Your body is an icky inconvenience. He shield be supporting you. If you stay with him, don't expect any support from him when you're older and in need of more serious care.

My DP always says 'lovely' in a sarcastic tone when I tell him im on my period. It doesnt bother me, he doesnt like blood, it makes him feel weird, he has however watched me give birth twice and been supportive the whole time with that. Even when our kids fall over and theres blood he goes weird over it. Some people (not just men) dont like blood, even the mere mention of it. Doesnt make him a Manchild.

Actually I can even tell my 11 year old son if I have a painful period..! My DH happily picks up pads and tampons.

Perhaps he was brought up to think periods are dirty or a women’s secret. He’s needs to educate himself

How immature and disrespectful of him! Women have periods for fucks sake.

He’s an immature twat.

Is he 12?

Me and DH joke when it’s “shark week”. But we’re both doing it so I have no issue. You’ve told him you don’t like it and he’s still doing it. So he’s not listening to your feelings.

Sorry, I didn’t put that well - I was hoping the exclamation mark would make it clear that he was joking in a ‘point the finger and do a hammy overacting accent while saying it’ way (especially as I made it really clear that he still does everything bar actually getting my period blood on him, in which case he’d flipping hyperventilate). He doesn’t actually mean it - it would usually have been accompanied with a ‘get thee to the pig shed outside the village, woman! Uncleeeeeeeean!’. Guaranteed to make me laugh, which is the best antidote to period cramps for me.

That’s why I said to the OP that I can't vote on hers because I know from the outside, my relationship could look like an instant LTB but I know it’s not. Only she knows if what he’s doing and saying is driven by an innate revulsion to bodily fluids (genuine issue) but he’s still lovely in many, many other ways or if he’s just a dick.

A joke needs to be funny to be a joke. You might think it's funny but there's far too many women still having to put up with such stupid, misogynistic attitudes for me to find it funny.

This man needs to grow up or go. How would he help you through child birth if he’s scared of a bit of menstrual blood? Not husband material.

I couldn't be with a man who demonstrated such a despicable and obnoxious attitude to something I experience every month, sorry.

Sadly I have dealt with men in authority at work with attitudes like this. One wonders if they have Mothers, aunties, wives or daughters, it's ridiculous.

But it's primarily up to mothers to teach their boys about periods, especially their own, which if they are embarrassed about periods themselves, they won't do, although I thought the subject was covered in school?

Surprised any man between his twenties and fifties has an attitude like this today. I could understand my father's generation, where such things were kept mysterious and deemed in poor taste to discuss, but not today!

I would consider moving on to someone more mature and responsible.

*Corrected spelling

I won’t lie I voted YABU for even listening or paying attention to him and trying to figure out what it means. I’ll help you out he’s an immature douchebag

Ok, that’s fair enough - I can understand that. It’s just different strokes for different folks and I’m sorry our strokes impacted you. Believe me, if I thought it came from a place of misogyny, I would not have brooked it. My DH is the least misogynistic guy I know, frequently gets very angry by any examples he comes across and calls it out publicly - he’s not one for letting it slide through politeness or fear of being judged! Neither of us are.

It's an example of him being incredibly immature and rude. Unbelievable behavior. I'd tell him how his comments make you feel, and if he didn't stop, dump him.